[Podcast Review] Smile, It’ll Be Over Soon

After having to move into a brand-new home with her mother’s new partner, Hanna begins to be haunted by the monsters that have set their sights on her. Dealing with hard hitting issues that many young vulnerable children find themselves in, but through a terrifying horror lens, Smile It’ll Be Over Soon is a frightening four part podcast guaranteed to to worm its way into listeners’ subconsciouses.

Based on the creepy pasta Laughing Jack (a murderous jack-in-the-box clown who murders loney and neglected children), Smile, It’ll Be Over Soon tells the story of single mother Jade and her troubled daughter Hanna. Since moving in with Jade’s new boyfriend, Hanna begins to display worrying behaviour that seems to have been triggered by the discovery of a jack-in-the-box clown. After discovering their new abode was the site of a horrific murder, it becomes quickly apparent that Hanna’s vulnerability has left her open to untold terrors. Jade must attempt to save her daughter from both the horrors of the supernatural and the very real monsters that terrify Hanna in her everyday life. 

Folklore and the act of sharing stories has always been a human bonding experience  passed down through centuries and generations, constantly changing to adapt to the ever-developing story telling style of the era, and creepy pasta is exactly that for the internet technology generation. The addition of podcasting into the zeitgeist has meant the cultural custom of oral literature being teamed with a creepy pasta legend is an ideal way to continue the ritual of telling scary stories to eager listeners sitting around the metaphorical campfire that is the podcast platform. Smile, It’ll be Over Soon is a creepy series carrying on the story of Laughing Jack and bringing his story to a whole new audience. 

Directed by award winning audio drama director Jack Bowman, Smile, It’ll Be Over Soon is a creeping story that slowly builds the impending dread. Beginning with a wrap-around scene of Jade being questioned in the police story following an as yet unknown situation, we are soon introduced to the environment that her young daughter is struggling to exist in. Combining the original creepy pasta of Laughing Jack and relating it to the real-life horror that Hanna experiences is a seamless composite. Relating the child abuse she is vulnerable to from her mother’s boyfriend—whose voice actor is unsettling from the get-go— to a seemingly innocent childhood figure like a clown and a jack in the box makes for uncomfortable listening. 

The podcast is quite a short, four parter, unfortunately this is perhaps its weakness in that it feels like it hasn’t quite reached its full potential at its conclusion. To reinforce an already distressing and creepy story, it would have been ideal to have a backstory episode on Laughing Jack’s origins, especially given the lore and material for an origin story is already in existence. Despite this, the series is engaging with the clown focused setting being sufficient coulrophobic nightmare fodder.

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