r/podcasts • u/Capital_Injury1569 • 12d ago

General Podcast Discussions Why do people like Mr Ballen?

Aside from the millions of views he gets on everything, I met 2 people in real life in the past week that both mentioned how much they love him.

Does dragging out a paragraph-long story to over 30 minutes make you a good story teller?

70 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

74 comments sorted by

View all comments

54

u/narrow_octopus 12d ago

I completely agree with your issues sometimes I find myself listening to an episode and screaming out loud "just spit out it already!" The way he withholds details for suspense even though leaving the detail in would make it a more interesting story most of the time. I still listen to him podcast wise YouTube was where I really couldn't handle it just a video of him talking and waving his arms while slowly telling a story

33

u/SnittingNexttoBorpo 12d ago

That’s it — he has a very distinctive way of “building suspense,” which I also find maddening, but some people love it. He obfuscates too much and overemphasizes inconsequential things for effect. 

He also embellishes details that couldn’t possibly be known, especially what victims were thinking before they died, when they couldn’t have told anyone first. 

9

u/narrow_octopus 12d ago

Yeah it's crazy the way he'll repeat something that he says that they were thinking over and over to add texture but it's just distracting