Hosted By: Jamie Bartlett
Produced By: BBC
Believe in Magic is a BBC podcast that tells the extraordinary story of Megan Stammers, a teenage girl with a brain tumour who started a charity for sick children. The podcast follows Megan’s journey as she raises money for treatment abroad, while also investigating the growing suspicions about her true illness.
Believe in Magic Podcast Host:
Jamie Bartlett is a British journalist and author. He is the author of the books The People Vs Tech and The Dark Net. Bartlett is also a former presenter of the BBC’s The Media Show.
Praise from Listeners*:
- Strong Storytelling: Accounting to listeners, Jamie Bartlett is able to keep the listener engaged from beginning to end. He also does a great job of balancing the more salacious details of the story with the more serious implications.
- Thought Provoking: Believe in Magic raises a number of important questions about the power of celebrity, the dark side of the internet, and the nature of deception, having listeners think about the podcast long after they finished it.
Criticisms from Listeners*:
- Limited Perspective: Some listeners have said that the podcast is too sympathetic to Megan Stammers and her mother, Jean. These critics argue that the podcast does not adequately explore the possibility that Megan and Jean were aware of the deception and that they may have even been complicit in it.
- Sensationalism: Some people have argued that the podcast could have done more to explore the issue of Munchausen by proxy, which is a mental disorder in which a parent or caregiver makes up or exaggerates their child’s illness for attention or sympathy instead of just the sensational aspects of Megan’s story.
* The True Crime Connection teams aims to keep this as an unbiased search database. In order to do this, we curate what people love the most and the least about a podcast by analysing ApplePodcast reviews.
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