Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Stay informed with free updatesSimply sign up to the Arts myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox.Given the wealth of entertainment accessible through our phones, are traditional podcasts starting to feel a bit staid? I ask because of the growing number of audio series boasting visual features. For the gazillions of fans of The Joe Rogan Experience, for instance, it’s no longer enough to listen to podcasting’s blowhard-in-chief and his guests talking over one another; now they can watch them doing it too. Last week, Vulture’s podcast critic Nicholas Quah noted how “video has become central to podcasting’s identity.” But while having a camera in the recording studio is increasingly the norm for chat-casts, the makers of narrative pods need to work a little harder when assembling an audiovisual package. True Crime Reports is a new pod on Al Jazeera hosted by the Scottish journalist Halla Mohieddeen and focusing on crime stories from the global south that often haven’t made international news. While the series’ title is criminally dull, its contents are not and you could argue that has to do with the mode of delivery. First, though, the plot. The opening episode concerns Johannesburg’s Thabo Bester, convicted and sentenced to life in prison for rape, robbery and the murder of his girlfriend, model Nomfundo Tyhulu. From South Africa’s Mangaung Correctional Centre, Bester managed to set up a media company through which he pulled off assorted money-spinning scams. Then, in 2022, he broke out of prison, having started a fire and faked his death by placing a dead body inside his cell. With the body assumed to be Bester’s, no one looked for him for a year until GroundUp, a South African news outlet, published a story about a man spotted grocery shopping who bore a remarkable resemblance to the dead convict. It should be said that this episode, which tells a gripping and unusual story, works perfectly well piped straight into one’s ears. But those not travelling, cooking or walking the dog — all things I like to do while listening to podcasts — have the option of watching the episodes on YouTube. In this first instalment, a dramatically lit Mohieddeen narrates while perched on a stool in a biker jacket. There are filmed contributions from investigators and journalists, as well as photographs of Bester in his many disguises (he is reckoned to have used 13 aliases). While these undoubtedly add to the storytelling, the AI-rendered images of Bester, the Mangaung Correctional Centre and his birthplace of Soweto simply look like filler. It is, of course, early days for these audiovisual projects, which will no doubt become more sophisticated with time. But the real question is why they need to exist at all. There is a reason why podcasts have soared in popularity in the past decade, and that’s to do with their focus, intimacy and ability to tap into our imaginations. If I want to watch as well as listen, I’ll just switch on the TV. aljazeera.com/audio/podcasts
