Thankfully, the show has been renewed for a second season. And I dread not having those 30-50 minutes every Thursday with Sarah Koenig when I can’t answer the phone because I’m too busy “Serial”-ing. And I think this is something a lot of Jews - who, historically, know the pain of stereotyping and discrimination - could relate to.Īs I write this, I have yet to listen to the final episode. As an Israeli immigrant in the U.S., I sometimes feel judged and typecast because of where I come from.
I really identify with the two-dimensional way he was portrayed during his trial because of his origins and religion.
It’s more than just the fact that the evidence doesn’t prove he’s guilty past a reasonable doubt. I want to come clean: I don’t think Adnan did it. Then there’s the very personal and yet universal questions it raises about our own abilities to judge people’s innocence. It shows the anti-Muslim bias, pre-9/11, that seems to have crept in during the trial and that raises questions about our legal system. It’s the story of teenagers, first generation in the United States and yet so very assimilated. “Serial” is truly a portrait of (This) “American Life.” It’s a story of immigration, integration and the American melting pot: a Jewish-American woman talking about a crime that happened in inner-city Baltimore, where the son of Pakistani immigrants is accused of murdering his Korean-American girlfriend. And there’s the harrowing silence of Hae Min Lee’s family. There’s Shamim, Adnan’s sweet and intelligent mother, with a heavy Pakistani accent.
There’s Christina Guiterrez, the chain-smoking, tough-as-nails lawyer who was disbarred a year after Adnan’s trial, and whose defense, full of pauses and meanderings, arguably cost Adnan his freedom. There’s Jay, the Dennis Rodman-ish pot dealer on whom the entire case relies. Then there’s smart, opinionated Rabia Chaudry, whose blog I’ve been avidly reading, a family friend of Adnan’s who brought his story to Koenig. You can hear the conflict and calculation in his voice (he is, after all, talking on the record with a reporter), but his candor and sweetness almost always shine through. This story comes with an amazing array of characters. She even manages to get the Innocence Project on the case, all the while never saying she definitely thinks Adnan is innocent or guilty. She goes to every kind of expert, looking for answers to questions about everything from the accuracy of cell phone records to the quality of the police investigation to the way to recognize a psychopath. She shares with us her conflicts and her confusion in language that is at times so visual, it’s like she’s mapping out the story in her head: the incriminating (Nisha) call is a “smoking gun” and testimony that alludes to a third witness “bobs” like “a disturbing buoy.” She tries to be unbiased but she struggles. She is an amazing journalist with years of experience. Koenig’s voice definitely helps make the show. The main evidence came from eyewitness testimony: Jay, Adnan’s “ex-friend” and pot dealer, claims he helped Adnan bury the body. Adnan Syed, her ex-boyfriend, also a Woodlawn senior at the time, was convicted of her murder. Sarah Koenig, who got her start with “This American Life,” is the Jewish host and executive producer of “Serial.” She depicts an “everyday crime,” one that never got much media attention before the podcast aired: the 1999 murder of Hae Min Lee, a high school senior at Baltimore’s Woodlawn High, who went missing on Januand was found dead on February 9 of that year. “Serial” is a melange of “This American Life”’-style candid, heartfelt reportage, the breadth and continuity of an audio book and the edge-of-your-seat suspense of true crime drama.
The “This American Life” spin-off is the highest-rated, most-listened-to podcast ever.