Under Understood Delves Deep Into the Often Understood or Underreported News Stories and Curosities from Around the Country

“Coming up, Adrianne does some research, blah blah blah.”

By David Samuel

Chicago, IL — Episodes of Under Understood drop on an eccentric schedule that mirrors the show’s own chaotic energy. When episodes are released, the four—yes, four—hosts tackle topics that range from the mystery of the Pittsburgh Potty to the bizarre saga of Americans receiving mysterious Chinese seeds. Episodes typically run 30–45 minutes, but often feel much longer. Billy Disney (no relation), Adrianne Jeffries, Regina Dellea, and John Lagomarsino are able to stretch each minute through sheer underpreparedness—despite relying on a tried-and-true, if painfully predictable, format. The show expertly chooses its topics, provide some easy listening, but fails to offer compelling storytelling.

The format is familiar enough that I had to double-check my Spotify to make sure I wasn’t listening to The Dollop or If Books Could Kill. One host selects a story or topic, introduces it to the others, and they react. It’s a setup that can work beautifully when the non-selecting hosts are genuinely hearing the story for the first time—but it collapses when everyone already knows the material. Here, all the hosts seem aware of the subject before recording. Jeffries is the only investigative journalist on the show. The others are producers (one is an audio engineer), which explains why the show sounds beautiful but feels hollow. It’s so well produced it’s almost sterile—polished to the point of having no pulse.

The hosts disrespect their own format so thoroughly that they end up having to fake it. Jeffries, the lone investigator, often invents direction just to keep the
show moving, you can often hear her disappointment. In the episode “The Case of the Blah blah blahs,” about the mysterious “Blah blah blah.”s that appear in Reuters’ archives of their news wires, Jeffries says, “We got an email from a listener and I called dibs on it but I think everyone read it anyway.” “Sorry,” says Disney. It’s actually much harder to produce a podcast this way than to let the show form naturally.

One would think that a show whose entire premise is investigative journalism would employ at least 50% investigative journalists. Yet the hosts’ LinkedIn bios all list Under Understood as a significant credential—and that’s as close as the three producers will ever get to hosting an actual investigative journalism podcast. Producers have a reputation for ruining things (see The West Wing post-Sorkin). While Under Understood nails the technical aspects—a crisp mix, clean audio, sleek graphic design, meticulous editing—it lacks the more basic, creative elements: the je ne sais quoi of good podcasting. You can’t produce your way into that.

When the podcast does manage to follow its intended format, it’s genuinely engaging. The editing delivers information seamlessly, and the pacing works. The topics, to their credit, are wonderful—engaging, surprising, and often shining a light on stories or curiosities that other podcasts and investigative journalists overlook, like the episode “Closing the Loop on China’s Mystery Seeds.” Media outlets relied on the sensationalism of this story, where mystery seeds from China were showing up in American mailboxes, but Under Understood cut through this sensationalism to deliver the true story, that these mysterious Chinese seeds were simply, a mass hysteria event.

This top-notch topic selection is the show’s saving grace. Without these compelling subjects, I wouldn’t have survived the hours I spent slogging through Under Understood.

Jeffries deserves her flowers for that. In the hyperdrive of the modern news cycle, a podcast that can choose its topics this well, deserves recognition. These aren’t the ever-so-serious investigative pieces that dominate the top 100 most-listened-to podcasts. They’re lighter, more playful, and expertly selected investigations. So where, exactly, do we lose the fun?
The problem is chemistry—or the lack thereof. Despite having nearly identical professional backgrounds, the four hosts share very little spark. They don’t laugh at each other’s jokes or chase each other’s tangents. They’re that couple who’ve been together forever—no drama, perfectly comfortable, but unmistakably devoid of passion. That’s this podcast.

I could accept all of that. I could chalk it up to the podcast gold rush of the late 2010s, when everyone (including this author) thought they should have a milk-toast podcast. Most of those shows faded quietly into obscurity, never gracing The Verge’s “Best Podcasts of 2019” list—a list that included This Is Branchburg, an actually inventive, high-effort NPR satire.

Thankfully, Under Understood seems to have followed suit. No announcement. No explanation. Just… gone. The final artifact left behind is a post announcing their first live recording—a recording we may never hear. I can only speculate, but in my version of events, nobody showed up. Because really, who wants to watch that “are-you-actually-in-love?” couple make out?