Science Fiction · Bruce Wolfson
Machine Age Radio Theatre
by Bruce Wolfson
If you grew up on X Minus One, or found it later, on the internet — this is built for you. Machine Age Radio Theatre makes new science fiction in that style : an announcer who sets the scene, incidental music, a mid-century sponsor read, short episodes, and stories that turn on people rather than hardware. The whole thing is assembled by machine. The voices, the music, the sound design are all AI-generated. That's the premise, not an apology: it began as a test of whether the tools could rebuild a sound nobody records anymore, and the honest answer turned out to be "close enough to enjoy." What's left to get right by hand : the writing, the casting, the pacing, the mix is where the work goes. The first serial is CSS Vigilant : a seven-part space war story about a single aging destroyer left to hold a shipping lane after the fleet withdraws, and a captain whose plans look like gambles to everyone but her. Standalone episodes run between serials. *Every episode carries a sponsor spot for Decoder Ring, a secret message app made by the same person who makes this show.*
