The Secret Histories of Nerd Mysteries Co-Hosts Have Revitalized the Show with MaxFun
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The first time Austin Taylor and Brenda Snell met, the latter was working at a comic book shop and Taylor, who uses he/they/she pronouns, was a regular customer “but not a weird, honorary employee yet.” Their friendship didn’t officially begin until Taylor won Snell’s handpicked box of comics for the store’s Christmas giveaway/raffle, which included every then-released issue in writer Tom King’s run on Marvel’s Vision, Jenn Woodall’s Magical Beatdown Vol. 1, and Jane Mai’s Sunday in the Park with Boys. Impressed with the picks, Taylor returned to the store, told Snell she’d gotten her box, and asked for more recommendations. He even opened a monthly pull list to keep up with Vision.
Now, Snell admits to befriending very few of the customers she interacted with at the comic book store, and Taylor still seems shocked that they’re friends.
“I cannot state enough that Brenda is a local celebrity here,” Taylor insists. “To this day, Brenda is famous around here, so [at the time] that was why I was like, I can’t befriend this person. I’m just a customer. I don’t want to make them feel weird.”
But after Taylor volunteered for Free Comic Book Day and the pair collectively went through the trauma of the beloved but stressful annual event, Snell invited Taylor to hang out with her friend group until they were seamlessly integrated. Fast forward a few years and Taylor and Snell are now what the latter calls “podcast married,” co-hosting a weekly deep-dive series entitled Secret Histories of Nerd Mysteries. Their camaraderie comes through in every episode of the show, and their easy banter makes our interview feel as if I’m listening an installment of the podcast that’s diving into their relationship and history as creators, instead of a niche nerd mystery.
Austin Taylor photographed by KP Studios
Initially launched in June 2020 during the wave of new online content released in the wake of COVID, Secret Histories of Nerd Mysteries kicked into gear with a deep-dive into the history of Chuck E. Cheese (“both of our activation Winter Soldier word, accidentally,” per Taylor), followed immediately by an excavation of the eternally loved Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise.
In addition to bringing their stores of knowledge to the show, Taylor and Snell have learned certain facts that continue to haunt them months or years later.
“A fact that sticks with me to this day is that the original cast of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers was not paid,” Taylor says. “It was bizarre to learn. It makes sense with everything else I know about labor laws, unions young actors… Everything I read, I was like, ‘Of course.’”
Snell’s most-recalled fact is that prior to creating Goosebumps, R.L. Stine co-created the Nickelodeon show Eureeka’s Castle: “It’s like an educational puppet show for preschoolers,” she explains. “I think it was post-Fear Street, so he was already writing horror and it’s just funny that someone was like, ‘Please write this for us.’ I don’t think he’s credited as R.L. Stine either. I think he’s under a different name.”
Minus a year-long break between December 2022 and November of last year, when Secret Histories joined the worker-owned “pioneering podcast network,” Maximum Fun, Taylor and Snell have delivered more than 100 entertaining episodes about a truly wild variety of topics, from the reasoning behind Saturday morning cartoon lineups to what happened to the puppets from Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.
In that time, Snell has streamlined the editing process for faster, less stressful episode production and the pair have eliminated the news portion of the show, which Taylor used to run: “Maybe one day I’ll do some sort of pop culture news in a YouTube stream or something,” they say. “It doesn’t make sense as a podcast; it’s too slow in that format.”
The Secret Histories hosts cut news entirely during their first MaxFunDrive, the network’s yearly fundraiser, which offers unique perks for new memberships and donations. Every creator and show on the network advertises the Drive while the fundraiser is happening, and for Taylor and Snell, packing in MaxFunDrive content on top of the week’s nerdy mystery on top of news didn’t make sense mainly for episode length. Moving forward, news likely won’t return to the podcast, which all in all seems like an acceptable loss for them.
The Move to MaxFun
Maximum Fun became a worker-owned cooperative on June 30, 2023, giving its creators more stake in the company and altering how it makes decisions. According to its website, MaxFun worker-owners vote directly on major company decisions and elect a Board of Directors from fellow worker-owners. The Board steers company strategy and oversees management, which tackles day-to-day choices. Original MaxFun owner Jesse Thorn became a founding worker-owner alongside 19 colleagues last summer.
Brenda Snell photographed by Kellan Photography
Since Thorn founded MaxFun in 2004, the company has established itself as a major podcast network with more than 70 shows on its roster including Black People Love Paramore, Jordan, Jesse, Go!, and My Brother, My Brother and Me. It’s a well-known brand with well-known personalities at the helm—and Snell says that aside from being asked to make the show weekly and cut “SHONM Goes to the Movies” mini-episodes, she and Taylor retain full creative reign over Secret Histories of Nerd Mysteries at MaxFun.
“They are very open to us pushing back on their pushback and they still are,” Taylor adds. “When we went to them initially, we weren’t saying we needed to be on MaxFun—we wanted to be, but we just wanted to talk to people who do this more and our old network just evaporated on us—so even if we ended up not working together, [MaxFun] has a lot of experience and was willing to talk to us. The first time we met they were like, ‘We want you on the network.’ We were like, ‘OH!’
“Then we met again to get feedback on some trial episodes and figure out how to fit into the network and do the rebrand and launch situation. Even with ‘Goes to the Movies,’ it was like, ‘If you’re absolutely beholden to that, we can try and figure out how to make it work, but we think it’d be better if you didn’t,’ sort of situation. Same thing with news,” she continues.
Since Secret Histories began releasing episodes under the MaxFun banner in November, feedback has been “very positive,” Taylor says.
“Every so often we get a little comment about the content of an episode like, ‘Oh, I remember Rocket Rods,’ or ‘Oh, I remember this thing. I really like this episode. That kind of very positive feedback,” Snell agrees.
“Any time we mention Bikram [Chatterji, MaxFun worker-owner and CEO]—it tickles me—he’ll email us and say, ‘It’s fine if you do that.’ I’m like, ‘No, Bikram, we’re making a joke. It’s funny. We know you’ll let us do whatever we want,’” Taylor continues. “'In the old episodes, we had Podcast Daddy. Now we have Bikram. I think [what prompted it] was that Brenda mentioned having an Etsy.”
“Yes,” she jumps in. “I didn’t know if I could promote it.”
“We did a whole bit,” Taylor says. “So funny. And Bikram is such a nice man and he sent us a very serious email saying, ‘Please, anything of yours that you want to promote, push your stuff, put it in the episode, put it on your website, please. We want to support you.’ And I was just like, ‘No, Bikram. That’s very nice. We were just being funny.’”
Great feedback extends beyond comments from their fellow MaxFun worker-owners as well. Snell described their first MaxFunDrive experience as “great,” if “exhausting. We're still very tired, but it was incredible to get feedback that people love our show and want to support us. We like doing it. It's fun doing it, but it is good to know that, hey, people are listening to this. People do want to support us, people do want more. It just left a little nice warm fuzzy feeling that got us through how exhausting it was.”
“It’s pretty cool,” Taylor agrees. “Internal validation is super important. People should seek that. That should be a goal to find a way to have that.” He pauses. “It is cool to know that a bunch of people also like my show, especially because it’s so much work. I think I research for five to six hours a week for an episode and then we record it and then I do social stuff and Brenda has to sit down and edit it all. It's fun but it’s essentially having a part-time job.
“We got the final count for MaxFunDrive and they sent us this little graph. I was sitting in bed refreshing the live tracker on the backend. And every time I tried to process the amount of support we're getting, I just kept crying,” Taylor continues. “And I am so lucky that Brenda wanted to do the show with me. I could not do it without them. They are so incredibly talented. They're so smart. They're so good at the production editing stuff. I just love doing this with them. It’s such a gift.”
Where Should You Start?
Because each episode of Secret Histories of Nerd Mysteries is a standalone hour (give or take) about a particular topic (with some sequels sprinkled in), it’s easy to jump in anywhere and even jump around as you listen. If you want to hop directly into the show's MaxFun era, start with “Bratz — Why Did Bratz Dolls Disappear?” Alternately, go for one of Snell’s favorite episodes, like the one from June 2022 about Neopets, or the one from November 2022 about R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps. Taylor cites the Rudolph episode mentioned above as a recent favorite, as well as an episode from March 2022 about the cultural impact of Star Wars featuring comic book editor Heather Antos.
Moving forward, the pair are eager to host more guests and do more interviews, including collaborations with other MaxFun shows. Taylor is interested in playing with format and both she and Snell want to eventually branch out into more types of media, like a limited YouTube series or maybe even a book. For now, their biggest goal is getting their logo on a t-shirt, which they’ll email Bikram about.
From here, it seems the sky is truly the limit. Snell and Taylor prefer to keep their chosen topics secret from each other to create an element of surprise when they sit down to record, but they both bring up the urban legend Polybius when I ask if they can tease any upcoming episodes. Snell explains, “Polybius is an urban legend about an arcade machine that hurts people. They say that it makes kids have seizures. People say it was put in the arcades by the government. It's bonkers. We want to do something on that closer to the Halloween season.”
Taylor wants to do an episode on former Disney CEO Mike Eisner and they’re pontificating on a new angle from which to cover board games and tabletop games. Meanwhile, Snell promises, “When the time is right, Garfield will come.” (This sounds foreboding, but I think it’s truly prophetic.)
Behind the scenes, the pair work harder than ever to achieve their dreams. Their love for each other seems to only get stronger with each milestone.
“I want to get us a live show. I want to get us on this thing and that thing. I want to put in as much energy as the show as I can,” Taylor says. “I love doing it so much. And like I said, I'm here because I'm lucky enough to be Brenda's friend and be their co-host and I'm going to do everything I can to make sure that the world knows Brenda is a fucking superstar. I couldn't do this with anyone besides Brenda.”
“I love working with Austin so much. It's truly been great. I just expected us to hang out for a while and then eventually it would taper off, but it's been years and we're still going really strong and I don't see it ending anytime soon,” Snell says. “Knock on wood. Knock, knock, knock.”
Secret Histories of Nerd Mysteries releases new episodes every Tuesday wherever you cast your pods. Follow the show on Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter for updates.
Featured image by Kellan Photography
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