It started with Tumblr. It seemed every other post I saw was a joke about something called Night Vale. A very insidey joke. I deduced that there were characters named Carlos and Cecil and something about a dog park and glowing lights and angels and the NRA, but that was about it. After a few weeks of this, I finally had a novel thought: Google! Google could tell me what Night Vale was!

I discovered that “WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE is a twice-monthly podcast in the style of community updates for the small desert town of Night Vale, featuring local weather, news, announcements from the Sheriff’s Secret Police, mysterious lights in the night sky, dark hooded figures with unknowable powers, and cultural events.”

A week or so later, I got around to playing the first episode on Soundcloud.

My verdict: Listen to Welcome to Night Vale if you like deadpan paranormal Lovecraftian comedy and obscure indie music. Don’t listen to Welcome to Night Vale if you hate scientists with perfect and beautiful hair, if you have no need to be apprised of the Angels’ activity, or if you have any intention whatsoever of letting the dog park enter your consciousness in any way, shape, or form.

Seriously, after I listened to a few episodes, I figured out why none of the fan posts I saw really explained what Welcome to Night Vale is. In the words of Glinda the Good, this series is “unusually and exceedingly peculiar and altogether impossible to describe.” So if any of this sounds remotely intriguing to you, check it out. Just DO NOT LOOK AT THE DOG PARK.