Conspiracy Consultants

Fluoride, pasteurised milk, bottled water, vapes - if you wanted to control society using liquids, where would you even start? Michelle and Jamie take the long-running fear that “they’re putting something in the water” and run with it, unpacking how everyday substances became vessels for anxieties about government power, health, trust, and who gets blamed when things go wrong. With the groundwork...

Cleopatra collides with the Sydney Opera House as Michelle and guest Edward Spence spin a playful theory linking ancient curses, lost royalty, and one very suspiciously musical landmark Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We might be living in a simulation - but if we are, wow, whoever's running it is doing an astonishing amount of admin. Michelle is joined by longtime friend and game designer Edward Spence to take the simulation theory seriously and start stress-testing it, from the computing power needed to render the universe to the number of writers it would take to storyboard a single human life. As the conver...

Michelle and guest Tristan Bernays have a big task: fuse Oprah and the Titanic into a conspiracy so outlandish it practically winks at you from the depths. The result is a cheeky, free-wheeling detour where big feelings, bigger billionaires, and bottom-of-the-ocean ambitions collide. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Santa survives because we all agree to keep the magic alive. In this episode, Michelle and Jamie take that agreement seriously and start asking what would need to happen behind the scenes for Santa to actually function at scale. The North Pole quickly falls apart under scrutiny, giving way to discussions about supply chains, labour, secrecy, alternative bases, franchising models, and whether it wo...

In today’s made-up conspiracy, Michelle is joined by guest Lucy Foster to dream up how and why Beyoncé is linked to the Eiffel Tower. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michelle and her guest, writer/director Lucy Foster, pull apart the classic rumour that Walt Disney is cryogenically frozen under Pirates of the Caribbean and the idea that Frozen was named to bury “Walt Disney frozen” in search results. How did film about sisters accidentally became the internet’s greatest SEO distraction theory? The pair dig into what cryonics actually involves, whether living f...

Michelle and Dr. Leila Nashef attempt to stitch together a conspiracy between Albert Einstein and Coca-Cola, quickly landing on the idea that a teenage Einstein invented the drink before the recipe was stolen by an ominous early Big Soda. From there, the theory accelerates until, by the end - they’ve conjured a version of Einstein who isn’t just a physicist but a human drinks dispenser. Hosted on...

In this episode, Michelle and playwright Tristan Bernays pick apart the conspiracy theory of Tartaria - the super-civilisation that supposedly spanned the globe, built every great monument, harnessed free wireless electricity, lived in perfect peace, and then mysteriously vanished from history. Together they wander through its odd claims: giants, world fairs repurposed as cover-ups, and the idea t...

Is that creepy little plush on your feed secretly sowing chaos? Michelle and guest-host Jamie dive into the Labubu craze. Are they designer collectibles? Demonic vessels? A marketing scheme gone too far? Possibly all of the above. Together they trace how a doll went from niche art toy to status symbol to alleged agent of supernatural chaos, with people ceremoniously burning them over a bonfire. Al...

The mythology of Marilyn Monroe persists - not through her voice, but through the stories we keep telling about her, long after she lost the chance to tell her own. Join Michelle and her guest, Dr. Leila Nashef, as they dive into one of Hollywood’s most enduring mysteries: was Marilyn Monroe murdered? In this episode of the Conspiracy Consultants , the pair unpack not just the tangled theorie...

What if the world really is flat - and we’ve just been too round-minded to see it? In the season finale, Michelle and Anna spiral through the flat-earth theory, from biblical domes and Antarctic ice walls to penguin billionaires guarding the planet’s oil. It’s a dizzying mix of bad physics, big faith, and brain-cell attrition as the consultants try to find the edge… without falling off it. Hosted...

What starts as a fake moon landing quickly spirals into faking a trip to Mars. In part two, Michelle and Anna put the finishing touches on their DIY space hoax - from Styrofoam craters and gold spacesuits to Elon Musk’s interplanetary ego. As their 'mission' careens from cost-cutting chaos to existential dread, they ask the only question that matters: if we faked the moon landing so well, why stop...

The moon landing: one small step for man, one giant leap for conspiracy theories. Michelle and Anna tackle the granddaddy of them all: was Apollo 11 a triumph of science or a very expensive piece of theatre? As they weigh Kubrick’s camera angles, NASA’s budget, and the odds of keeping 400,000 people quiet, the consultants get to the heart of why this story refuses to come back down to Earth. Hoste...

What if the internet died years ago and no one told us (or invited us to the funeral)? This week, Michelle and Anna wade into Dead Internet Theory, where bots outnumber people, click farms run the show, and Jesus might be a shrimp. Between horny algorithms and zombie feeds, they ask: if the web’s gone soulless, are we just ghosts haunting it? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more informa...

In part two of the great Elvis investigation, Michelle and Anna dive deep into the afterlives of the King - did you know he was a gardener, a pastor and an extra in Home Alone? What starts as a hunt for hidden identities unravels into a tale of witness protection, mob informants, and our collective refusal to let Elvis go. If Elvis really did fake his exit, was it by choice - or by necessity? Host...

Elvis has left the building - or has he? In the first half of this two-part Conspiracy Consultants special, Michelle and Anna tackle the king-sized theory that Elvis Presley faked his own death and spent decades living under the radar. From twin-swapping doppelgängers and wax-body rumours to a crash course in how (not) to fake your own death, they unravel how myth, money, and a touch of madness tu...

Was Bill Gates really trying to microchip us all? Michelle and Anna crack open one of the internet’s most viral pandemic conspiracies (and immediately wish they hadn’t). From Facebook posts by self-appointed experts to the logistics of cramming a chip the size of a grain of rice into a vaccine needle, they unravel how a mix of fear, science, and boredom made this theory stick. Along the way, they...

Introducing the Conspiracy Consultants podcast. Join Anna and Michelle as they unpick your favourite conspiracy theories and see what it would take to make them a reality. First episode available 22 April 2024. Co-Hosted by Michelle Barnette and Anna Ryder Edited and Produced by Michelle Barnette Concept Originated and Development Produced by Chris Harding for Whale Song Media Music by Nicole John...