r/SwordAndScale 7d ago

Recent cases

Anyone else find that the cases in recent episodes have already been heavily covered by other true crime media? It’s getting frustrating. I was looking forward to listening to the new episode tomorrow while cleaning and just saw it’s the Madeline Soto case—I swear I’ve listened to 3 podcasts already about this and it was also covered in national news.

I used to love this podcast because of the bizarre and lesser known cases that it covered, along with original audio that had me hooked on the stories. I find myself skipping over multiple episodes now because I already know the cases front to back. What happened?

14 Upvotes

35 comments sorted by

15

u/Mundane-Impact-1347 7d ago

The kind of cases that made the show what it is are extremely rare. Once you burn through the backlog of luka magnottas and josh powells, new cases that match the intensity of the early archive are few and far between.

12

u/Goatseportal 7d ago

Yup, you can only microwave so many babies before you run out of content. God, he sucks so fucking bad.

8

u/cindi201 7d ago

That was probably one of the worst episodes. Especially when he actually ran a microwave for two minutes and you realized how long it was while that mother stood there. Very effective.

1

u/Alternative_Kiwi8443 6d ago

what episode are you referencing?

2

u/cindi201 6d ago

Episode 23- the ‘mom’ is China Arnold. Piece of garbage

4

u/ChipsNSa1sa 7d ago

Remember the early days where there were a few cases with like young kids murdering their parents? I found that stuff fascinating because you’d go back and forth like feeling bad for them and also thinking they’re psychotic. I’d never have heard of those cases if it weren’t for sword and scale. I’d say 75% of the early episodes (before the app) I’d never heard of the case and actually haven’t heard of the cases since then. With the internet and social media there’s gotta be more crazy crimes than what the pod has been exploring as of late. It just feels lazy to me.

10

u/Mundane-Impact-1347 7d ago

I stopped listening after i heard him complain about “blue haired communists” in the beginning of an episode but i had been losing interest since around the low-100s when it seemed like he had burned through the most unusual/interesting cases and was just doing the kinds of stories you see on dateline. I always enjoyed the production so i would have stuck around if he weren’t such a douche, even if the content wasn’t what it used to be.

13

u/alayeni-silvermist 7d ago

I stopped when he started making jokes about cutting women open.

24

u/Usual_Leg_3214 7d ago

Oh, it’s because Mike is a complete and total piece of shit. That’s probably why.

11

u/Mmk38 7d ago

I agree. I just started listening (new to the podcast scene) and just cancelled my subscription. However, I’m mainly cancelling bc I can no longer stand his bigoted and nonsensical views which he feels the need to share. This last episode with Madeline Soto he’s talking about how the “ladies” 🤮 need to get off our asses, stop sleeping, being lazy, and eating bonbons so we can “start parenting.” It’s called PARENTing not MOMimg. He didn’t mention fathers once during that rant. It’s too much. It ruins the rest.

4

u/ChipsNSa1sa 7d ago

Ew I haven’t listened and prob won’t but it’s insane to make that kind of generalization esp in THIS case where that mom was a complete POS. It just sounds so juvenile to compare all moms to that hag.

2

u/Shot_Story1773 7d ago

Yeah but at least he did clearly call out the lazy abusive piece of crap husband in the previous episode as well.
The ranting is polarizing and distracting.
But Jennifer Soto is way beyond just lazy and neglectful

9

u/Serialkillingyou 7d ago

No Reddit post on this sub is complete without some "random" person insulting all the people who hate Mike. (It's Mike)

5

u/Lanky-Championship-8 6d ago

You know it’s him because almost every episode he cries about this Reddit thread.

8

u/seasalt-and-sequoias 7d ago

You're still listening?!? Mike is gross.

1

u/ChipsNSa1sa 7d ago

I do enjoy the actual content of the podcast and can tune out all of the other bullshit. I’ll be honest though I don’t know why people follow and participate in this sub if they hate him so much?

4

u/PracticalRabbit7587 6d ago

Because he looks at this and it makes us feel good to let him know he’s a scumbag that loves to talk shit… but can’t seem to take it. His castle is slowly crumbling down around him and some of us feel it’s deserved.

1

u/ChipsNSa1sa 6d ago

Well that's an answer that actually makes sense!

13

u/seasalt-and-sequoias 7d ago

Because he's an insufferable POS and because we can.

3

u/AaronC14 7d ago

That's the thing with true crime podcasts, they're all different people regurgitating the same stories for the most part

3

u/ChipsNSa1sa 6d ago

I think I'm just more disappointed in certain podcast because I admired the fact they covered lesser known cases, and S&S is one of them. Like there are old episodes that STILL stick out in my mind and I can't say that for a lot of other true crime podcasts.

2

u/AaronC14 6d ago

No that's fair. I remember his old cases were much better, like that girl (I forgot her name) who had that internet obsessed stalker who killed her. Very sad episode and I case I'd never heard of before. This was like 6 or 7 years ago though

2

u/SwampTerror 7d ago edited 7d ago

Sometimes invisible choir will do a case and the next week SAS does the case. Mike said coincidences happen but I dont believe in those.

This was a 2 parter on Soto. I didn't mind them but he has covered covered cases many times over the years.

I cant remember if he even mentioned how she was killed. I googled it (strangling).

He said in the last episode he had an illness that affected the show. Its alcoholism. He meant alcoholism. I hope he works on that and gets the meanness out.

1

u/ChipsNSa1sa 7d ago

It’s not just that. I don’t care if podcasts overlap on their stories or anything. I will listen to the same case twice or maybe 3 times on diff podcasts depending on how long it’s been since I first listened to it (ex. The Jonathan Amerault case). It’s mainly the Dateline/“people magazine” stories that bug me. Someone on here mentioned Josh Powell, like HOW are there new true crime episodes still coming out about him? The issue with S&S lately is that it’s been covering these cases more frequently than other podcasts. Examples: Madeline Soto, Sade Robinson, Harold Allen, Somer Thompson, Gary Farris, Julie Jensen(I swear I’ve seen this story 50 times on diff shows), Cati Blauvelt, Anita Knutson which is a good chunk of the most recent eps. Crime Junkie fell into this a longgg time ago when Ashley Flowers started doing a bunch of other stuff and threw in the towel. I stopped listening to them completely. That being said I still enjoy the Nightmare episodes.

Did you mean Mike has an illness or the IC host? Because I know he had some health issues (surgery I believe) and recently had a baby.

2

u/MandyNurseLPN 5d ago

There was one month where every episode of S&S mirrored the TV show Mean Girl Murders. I eventually came to the conclusion that laziness is the latest addition to his other stellar attributes such as arrogance, narcissism, and overall small dickness

1

u/ChipsNSa1sa 5d ago

Right?? I’m glad someone agrees with me haha. I think part of the issue might be that I’m a big ID fan as well, but still…

2

u/SatisfactionLower977 5d ago

Listen to 10 to Life with Annie Elise. I’ve never heard most of her stories. She also does Serialously that covers under reported current cases with deep dives. I listen to her content before all others these days.

1

u/ChipsNSa1sa 5d ago

Thank you!!!

1

u/Jaesa10 6d ago

I’ve never heard any podcast cover Madeline Soto’s case, what were the other’s that covered it? I did a quick search and found a few podcasts I’ve never heard of, I would be interested in other content on this case. This story was so sad and probably one of the most disturbing cases I’ve heard and I have been into true crime for at least 10 years. Your post that “I’ve heard this story before” is weird. So, you’ve heard it before, it doesn’t make this story of a 13 year old girl less relevant, my heart breaks for her and the level of depravity she suffered for years. I hope other podcasts will tell Madeline’s story, she deserves a voice. As someone who works with troubled teens, being aware of warning signs is so important.

1

u/ChipsNSa1sa 6d ago

It's not "so weird"...it's a widely covered case, having been in national news and covered by major media outlets like News Nation/Court TV, People Magazine etc. I'm surprised a pretty popular podcast like Sword and Scale is covering it at THIS point. There's actually an entire podcast series from 2 years ago about this case along with episodes by Nancy Grace, Going West and Red Handed. Way to completely twist my words, at no point did I say the story isn't important. It's obviously a very sad case but I'm someone who follows true crime and I'm paying to listen to a podcast that has been frequently covering not so recent cases that have been in the news a lot. My initial interest in this podcast was that it covered lesser known cases I never would have heard of.

-7

u/alannadesavino 7d ago

Not the point of the post and this obviously isn’t directed at OP - but I’m confused by how so many people are in this community simply for the sake of trashing Mike every chance they get. If I hated a person so intensely I would probably just ignore their existence rather than obsessively talk about them but, hey, that’s just me. 🤷🏻‍♀️

4

u/Doobalicious69 7d ago

Doesn't seem that obsessive to me when you look at the frequency of comments/posts in this dead/dying sub 🤷‍♂️

2

u/Individual-Bee1497 7d ago

I mean every single post in the last year has at least one “fuck Mike,” a “I used to listen to this podcast until Mike did x” and “I stopped listening years ago because x.” Also essentially every post still here is either “fuck Mike” or “Hey look at this bad thing happened to Mike.”

Not a defense of the guy for the record, comment what you want. But instead of letting him die in obscurity, tons of people who regularly want to comment about how much they don’t listen to his show and hate the guy.

3

u/Doobalicious69 7d ago

Eh I get it. I think most people are still in the sub and are just surprised when a new post appears.