It’s Netflix Eve. Tomorrow, Thursday morning European time, the behemoth streaming service will release Unchained, its Tour de France docuseries, produced with very much the same intent and by many of the same people as the wildly successful Drive to Survive series from Formula 1.
Will it change cycling? Drive to Survive changed Formula 1, a similarly Euro-centric, technical, somewhat confusing sport. The series made F1 human – sometimes through exaggeration, but mostly by highlighting how very human even the most technical sports truly are. It made the stakes clear. Can Netflix do the same for us? Can it bring a whole new audience to pro cycling?
I don’t know. I hope so. What I can absolutely guarantee, though, is that it’s going to leave a lot of people wanting more.
Enter: the Unchained Binge Podcast. The podcast companion to Netflix’s new Tour de France series.
Eight episodes, one for each TV episode, where we go really, really deep on the characters, controversies, narrative arcs, and episode construction, using our own insight from reporting on the race in question to answer those unanswered questions and explain what we saw that the cameras weren’t pointed at.
For hardcore fans, the heavy focus on crashing (particularly in the first few episodes) and other exaggerated moments could use additional context. Was it as bad as it looked? Sometimes. Sometimes not. You’ll love the eccentricities of Marc Madiot and a few enlightening moments of team communication, particularly around Wout van Aert and Tom Pidcock. Of course, we’ll talk about Pinot’s goats.
For new fans, eight episodes is nowhere near enough to tell the whole story of a Tour de France. With each episode focusing on a particular team, the narrative jumps around, sometimes focusing on the same moment in multiple episodes and skipping entire stages when they’re not deemed useful for the greater whole. We can fill in those gaps, and explain what the heck is going on behind the scenes.
So that’s the plan. Eight podcast episodes for TV eight episodes, starting this Friday. Binge time.
Where you can find it
Subscribe to the main Escape Collective feed: iTunes | Spotify | Or search “Escape Collective” wherever you get your pods.
We’ll release two episodes per week on this main feed.
OR subscribe to the Unchained Binge Pod feed: iTunes | Spotify | Or search “Unchained Binge” wherever you get your pods.
We’ll release episodes on this feed as soon as they’re ready. The goal is all eight by the end of next week.
Listen to the brief trailer here:
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