140 - ROANN MCCLOSKEY - WORLD'S WORST FEMINIST

Audio Block
Double-click here to upload or link to a .mp3. Learn more

Ladies (and gents, but only if you're ready to play nice), let's march arm in arm towards a more equal, happier future. Along the way, we're likely to learn from the mistakes of some of the World's Worst Feminists that we discuss with powerhouse performer Roann McCloskey. Roann turns her ire on the disappointing lack of solidarity from the likes of Germaine Greer and Paula Radcliffe. Barry dons a hazmat suit and ventures onto the darker message boards of the internet. And Ben takes us on an actual WITCH hunt. This is a bumper episode, with some quite meaty and serious chat about feminism and equality which we didn't want to cut out so settle in as two men tiptoe gingerly around, guided by a badass lady - as it should be!

139 - DAN MUGGLETON - WORLD'S WORST PRISON

We are rattling the cages and walking the yards of the World's Worst Prison this week in the company of convict-by-birth, Australian comedian Dan Muggleton. Dan's love of prison documentaries sees him lead us into the terrifying but also porous 'Breakout Prison' of Papua New Guinea. Meanwhile, Ben squeezes into the smallest prison in the world, and Barry guides us round some of the most famous prisons on the planet, as well as chucking us into the cloaca of ancient Rome.

138 - JONNY SHARPLES - WORLD'S WORST SPORTS CLUB OWNER

Peep! The whistle is being blown this week, not just on the pitch but off it too as we turn both barrels on the World’s Worst Sports Club Owners. We are joined by ‘online joker’ Jonny Sharples who wallows alongside Ben as a fan of the long-suffering Newcastle United FC. It’s not just football clubs who get a drubbing, even though some of their owners have included the hardened criminals, arsonists and, in one case, over 50,000 crowdfunders. There’s also finally a nomination for a certain orange New York property developer and “president”…

137 - ARI ELDJARN - WORLD'S WORST FOOTBALL TEAM

Don your cardboard shinpads, make sure your studs are the right way round and prepare for some shoulder-high tackles as we present the worst football teams in the history of the game.
We're joined by Icelandic stand-up comic Ari Eldjarn: grandson of a president and son-in-law of an international footballer as we enjoy the most hapless starting XIs in history. In a game of three halves we meet a team of Portuguese criminals who terrorised their opponents, the teams FIFA won't accept in their club (big up United Koreans in Japan and Franconia) and the brave boys of early Icelandic football.

136 - ROB MULHOLLAND - WORLD'S WORST MUSICAL

We're jazz-handing, grape-vining, box-stepping and kick-lining our way through this week's episode, alongside comedian Rob Mulholland in the cast of the World's Worst Musical. It's an episode we've been looking forward to some time and, if the reviews are anything to go by, this is a surefire flop! We've got appearances by Spiderman and Hyacinth Bucket, a pile of bird poo and a motorway service station. This episode is so show-stoppingly bad, it's good.

135 - RACHEL WHEELEY - WORLD'S WORST GIFT

Since you've been very good we've saved up and gift-wrapped you this episode. Along with our guest - stand-up comic, producer and Douglas Adams acolyte Rachel Wheeley - we discover some of the worst presents in history. From diplomatic gifts like crocodile insurance, elk chairs and jellybean portraits to tasty camels, Saddam Hussein's favourite video nasties and a royal penis sheath, literally all human life is here in our enormous stocking!

THE THIRD FOOT - EUSTACE THE MONK (BONUS EPISODE)

It's time to hit the high seas (via a woodland stronghold, a monastery and a burning pentagram) as we feature one of our favourite discoveries from our time on this podcast: Eustace the Monk. Featured on our worst pirates episode with Will Seaward, Eustace lived one of the most eventful lives of medieval, or indeed any, times. Part folk hero, part swashbuckling outlaw, part servant of the dark lord and entirely unique, he packed more into his 37 years than many do in twice the time and ended up with his head on a pike for trying to play the English off against the French one time too many!

134 - ANDY BODFISH - WORLD'S WORST SPORTSMANSHIP

With elbows raised high and a steeplechase full of horseshoes crammed into our boxing gloves we spit in the face of the spirit of the game and talk to globe-trotting commentator Andy Bodfish about the world's worst sportsmen and women.

There are dastardly disguises for men, horses and racecourses, baseball bats full of cork, comfort-eating judokas and the worst ever soundtrack to warm up to.

133 - ROB TAYLOR-HASTINGS - WORLD'S WORST ROBOT

Bleep blorp, does not compute! This week, we risk infuriating our future overlords by naming and shaming the World's Worst Robots. We are joined by the implausibly handsome Rob Taylor-Hastings, actor and co-host of the podcast Roboteers Standby. He educates us about the history of Robot Wars and the magical geeky gladiators who engage in robot combat. Meanwhile, Barry stays in a hotel staffed by annoying machines and Ben looks at some terrifying attempts at real-life deep fakes.

132 - STEVE GRIBBIN - WORLD'S WORST RAILWAY

All aboard! Anyone who has ever used public transport in the UK knows that one of our favourite past times is complaining about our unbelievably sub-standard rail network, so it's about time we found out where it comes in the global and historical standing of terrible railways.

Joined by musical comedy legend and self-confessed maverick trainspotter Steve Gribbin, Ben and Barry chug along on a journey from the Corinthian in Ancient Greece to the Vatican City via New Zealand, Burma and a very creepy Victorian rail system.

131C - A VARIETY PACK OF SCHADENFREUDE

Ben's still decompressing from Edinburgh and Barry's away galivanting for his wedding anniversary, so we've thrown together a quick Worst Foot trifle of some of our favourite bits that didn't quite make the final cut over the past couple of years. We cover all the bases: Hamlet set in LA, the group dynamics of Alvin and the Chipmunks, Vladimir Putin's short-lived ice hockey career and a witch doctor pro-wrestler going ten-pin bowling.

Guest featured in this episode are Thom Tuck, Christian Tablot, Helen Arney, Tez Ilyas and Jim Smallman. Enjoy and we'll be back with a full episode next week!

THE THIRD FOOT - MADAME TUSSAUDS (BONUS EPISODE)

Come listeners! Join us in the snaking queue into the uncanny valley! Ben and Barry are a bit glassy-eyed in this month's bonus Patreon episode, as we venture into Madame Tussauds. Yes, there's no apostrophe. No, we're not happy about it either. Voted the World's Worst Tourist Attraction in our episode with playwright Camilla Whitehill, we're back for more torture in this chamber of horrors. We take a look at the real woman behind the name, learn how the models are actually made and examine the dubious presence of Hitler among the smiling famous faces.

131B - BEST OF THE WORST OF THE BEST 6

It's a Ben-and-Barry duo episode, another chance to delve back into the archives and revisit past shows. This week we flip the record on episodes 26 to 30, finding the very BEST in the subjects we covered back then. And boy, does that prove tricky when picking the Best Serial Killer... alongside that, we also look at drivers, musical duos, horror films and aliens. The whole thing has a bit of an aquatic feel, with appearances by both Jaws and space whales, while there are also chats on stunt drivers, the iconic sitcom 'Alf' and Lennon and McCartney. Yes, Ben's at it again with his Beatles agenda!

120 - JOHNNY CHIODINI - WORLD'S WORST D & D

Spellcasting - AWFUL! We are led through the dark and dingy underworld of the legendary roleplaying game Dungeons and Dragons by writer, performer, video game expert, Eurogamer content-maker, and professional Dungeon Master Johnny Chiodini. With Johnny's expertise we seek out the World's Worst Class (that world being that of D&D, not the stratified capitalist hellscape we're all currently inhabiting). There are notable appearances by the wizards of the Ku Klux Klan, the Chesney Hawkes warlocks and the vagabonds and vagrants of the United States, with shout-outs to Charlie Sheen, Machiavelli, and Cthulu.

THE THIRD FOOT - FERTILITY TREATMENTS

It’s your May Bonus Episode, thanks to our supporters on Patreon.com, and this time we are revisiting the episode with Dr Keir Shiels about the World’s Worst Doctor. Our winner was John R. Brinkley whose practice of putting goat-balls into human ballsacks to treat impotence leads Ben to take us through a history of fertility treatments. There are welcome returns for Pliny The Elder, the Malleus Maleficarum and the wandering womb, as well as plenty of animal body parts and urine - just a typical episode for us here at WFF.

119 - KATIE PRITCHARD - WORLD'S WORST ALLERGY

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATCHOOOOO!

We bring you this week's episode with streaming eyes and ruby red nose as we dip or toes tentatively into the pretty grim world of allergies.

Our guest - musical genius and comedy joy-bomb Katie Pritchard - shares her own unique tasting menu of allergies, whilst Ben fails to keep a straight face about allergies to electricity, semen and blackberries and Barry recalls the findings of our old friend Pliny the Elder and some truly horrifying dog-bothering.

096 - ANNA PLOSZAJSKI - WORLD'S WORST MATERIAL

We're joined this week by the eminently qualified Dr Anna Ploszajski - Young Engineer of the Year, Channel Swimmer, science explainer and graphene-hater to talk about the worst material on earth.

As eclectic as ever, we uncover a World War 2 plan by the British military to create aircraft carriers out of icebergs made of ice and sawdust, the blackest substance on earth, an astonishingly petty art spat featuring Anish Kapoor and how to make a prison that Ant Man could never escape from.

Follow us on Twitter: @worstfoot @bazmcstay @benvandervelde @AnnaPloszajski

Visit www.worstfootforwardpodcast.com for all previous episodes and you can now donate to us on Patreon if you’d like to support Ben’s new baby and Barry’s crippling trivia addiction: www.patreon.com/WorstFootForward

095 - SCHALK BEZUIDENHOUT - WORLD'S WORST GIG

Testing, one two one two, is this thing on…? We’re met by a mix of cricket sounds, flying bottles and scathing reviews this week as we perform the World’s Worst Gig. We have the company of South African comic Schalk Bezuidenhout who shares a first-person tale of steakhouses, strippers and stand-up. Ben takes us to the worst Beatles gig ever (those of you playing the Ben/Beatles drinking game, down it) and Barry goes to the not-so-genteel theatres of Covent Garden. 

Follow us on Twitter: @worstfoot @bazmcstay @benvandervelde @shalkiebez 

Visit www.worstfootforwardpodcast.com for all previous episodes and you can now donate to us on Patreon if you’d like to support Ben’s new baby and Barry’s crippling trivia addiction: https://www.patreon.com/WorstFootForward

094 - MIKE STUCHBERY - WORLD'S WORST EPIDEMIC

This week we're donning our sterilised plastic gloves, three face masks and a full hazmat suit as we prepare to deal with the world's most peculiar, disturbing and deadly epidemics. We're joined by outstanding historian and curator of one of the most informative and sinister Twitter feeds around, Mike Stuchbery.

Together we talk about renaissance nuns pretending to be cats, Singaporean men who think their wangers have disappeared and why it’s never a good idea to throw a smallpox party. We also discover the unusual genesis of cooties (hi America listeners!), dabble in some medieval witchcraft and discover why Portuguese schoolchildren have taken the biscuit with excuses for taking days off school.

Follow us on Twitter: @worstfoot @bazmcstay @benvandervelde @mikestuchbery_

Visit www.worstfootforwardpodcast.com for all previous episodes and you can now donate to us on Patreon if you’d like to support Ben’s new baby and Barry’s crippling trivia addiction: www.patreon.com/WorstFootForward