Back To Pop
Back to Pop Podcast: Your All-Access Pass to Pop Culture Icons
Dive headfirst into the vibrant world of pop culture with the “Back to Pop Podcast,” where we celebrate the legends and lore of the entertainment universe. From the visionaries behind the scenes to the iconic faces in front of the camera, we bring you exclusive, heart-to-heart conversations with the diverse talents that have shaped our cultural landscape.
“Back to Pop” is not just a podcast; it’s a vibrant dialogue with the movers and shakers of music, movies, TV, and comics. Each episode is a unique journey, offering you a front-row seat to the untold stories, creative inspirations, and behind-the-scenes insights from your favorite pop culture personalities.
“Back to Pop” is where nostalgia meets novelty, where we reminisce about classic moments while exploring the latest trends that are defining the future of entertainment. It’s your chance to hear from the legends you admire and the rising stars you’re curious about, all in one place.
So, if you’re looking to get your pulse on pop culture’s past, present, and future, tune into “Back to Pop Podcast.” Be part of a community that thrives on the excitement, creativity, and passion that pop culture brings into our lives. Join us, and let’s celebrate the stories that connect us all.
Episodes
96 episodes
EP: 96 Fandom Is Where It Begins: Jason Leavy
Before the movie that scares you becomes the career you build, there's a VHS cover you couldn't walk past.Jason Leavy grew up in a Staten Island house where movie night meant Freddy, Chucky, Gremlins, and a little green troublemaker with...
Ep: 95 Rainbow Brite and Beyond: The Bettina Bush Story
She was Rainbow Brite. She was Lucy Little. She was Dotty Dog. And she was only twelve years old when one of those roles began with an improvised voice for a black-and-white sketch. Bettina Bush joins Back to Pop to look back on a career tha...
EP: 94 "Dishes Are Done, Man: The Keith Coogan Story"
You've seen Keith Coogan's face a hundred times, but you might not know his name. This week on Back to Pop, I sit down with the actor who voiced Young Tod in Disney's The Fox and the Hound, got left in charge in Adventures in Babysitting, fo...
Ep:93 Batdriven West: Karen Whitfield's Bronze Age Batgirl Story
From 1978 to 1984, Karen Whitfield toured alongside Adam West and Burt Ward as DC Comics' Bronze Age Batgirl — suiting up in the cape and cowl for audiences across America and getting a front-row seat to who Batman and Robin really were when...
EP: 92 The Instrument You Can’t Hold: JP Karliak Goes Beyond the Voice
Morph. The Joker. Countless characters you’d recognize instantly, and a voice you’d never place a face to. This week, JP Karliak steps out from behind the mic to talk about what it actually means to become someone else for a living.<...
Ep: 91 Silhouettes, Shadows & Legacy Characters — Mike Goguen on the Craft of Animation
Mike takes us behind the curtain on the creative process: how a character comes together, why silhouette and shape language matter more than people realize, and what it really means to inherit a character fans already love before you ever pi...
EP: 90 “Finding Your Own Identity” with Kelly Slaughter
This week, Kelly Slaughter (aka “Slaughter Daughter”) joins Back to Pop for a raw, one-on-one conversation about discovering who you are when you grow up in someone else’s spotlight, and what it actually took to find her own.<...
EP: 89 Sugah, Politics, and Rogue: The Lenore Zann Story
Before streaming, before binge-watching, there was a voice you didn’t just recognize , you carried it with you. Beginning in 1992, Lenore Zann gave Rogue her unmistakable Southern charm, her strength, her vulnerability, and that unforgettabl...
EP: 88 Comics, Cartoons, and the Courage to Start Over a conversation w/ Chuck Patton
In 1983, Chuck Patton became the first Black artist to draw Justice League of America, and helped build one of the most divisive, and now most re-examined, eras in the team’s history: Justice League Detroit.This week...
Ep: 87 Still Open: Comics Plus and the Man Who Never Left the Counter
Before the algorithm, there was a bell over the door.For us over at Back To Pop, that door belonged to Comics Plus in Macon, Georgia — and the man behind the counter, David Roland, is still there.<...
Ep: 86 Daniel Dockery on the Batman Book Thirty Years in the Making
Kevin Conroy sat in a recording booth for thirty years playing a man who wore two faces, and somewhere along the way, that dual identity became personal. Before he ever put on the cowl, Bruce Timm was just a burned-out animator tired o...
Ep: 85 William McNamara: What Happened After the Credits And What's Happening
William McNamara joins Back to Pop for an honest conversation about the life that unfolded beyond the movie screen.Known for memorable performances in Dream a Little Dream, Surviving the Game, Copycat, Chas...
EP: 84 Lance Guest: From 🎃 Halloween 2, The Last Starfighter to Jaws: The Revenge
Every generation has a movie that finds them at exactly the right age. For a lot of us, that movie was The Last Starfighter — and at the center of it was Lance Guest, who turned Alex Rogan into one of the most quietly ...
Ep: 83 Fearless Fred Kennedy on Comics, Broadcasting, and Making Stories That Refuse to Behave
Fred Kennedy — writer, broadcaster, and professional chaos agent known to most of the world as Fearless Fred- sits down with Back to Pop to talk about making comics that absolutely refuse to stay in one genre.Fred is the writer...
Ep: 82 Adam Cahoon on Horror Fandom, LitRPG Monsters, and Vault Comics
This week on Back to Pop, we sit down with Adam Cahoon — artist, designer, and Senior Designer & former Production Lead at Vault Comics. Adam stepped into The Nasty, Vault’s horror-comedy about VHS culture and the ...
Ep: 81 One Image, One Promise: Nick Marinkovich on Covers, Comics, and Dead Romans
Some covers don’t ask you to pick them up — they grab you by the collar.That’s exactly what happened with Honor and Curse from Mad Cave Studios. One look at the cover and the search was on: who made this?This week...
EP: 80 From Plastic to Narco: Doug Wagner & Daniel Hillyard on Building Something Strange
Writer Doug Wagner returns to Back to Pop and this time, he brings his artistic partner in crime with him.Daniel Hillyard joins the conversation for a wide-ranging discussion on what it looks like when a creative partnership build...
EP:79 “Art That Feels Like Something” — Suspiria Vilchez
This week on Back to Pop, Marc is joined by cover and variant artist Suspiria Vilchez — a Barcelona-born, Toronto-based painter whose hand-crafted acrylic technique sets her apart in today’s comics industry. Her work has appeared across Vault C...
Ep: 78 Michael Tove: The Dream That Waited
What happens when the dream doesn’t die — it just waits?Michael Tove spent decades in North Carolina as a regional actor, film extra, and financial adviser. His first screen credit goes back to 1990, when he worked as an extra on the the...
EP: 77 George Vega: The Kid Who Never Stopped Drawing
George Vega grew up in Newark, New Jersey watching Voltron and filling sketchbooks with Jim Lee panels. Today he’s doing G.I. Joe cover work through Skybound and his art has appeared across Marvel, DC, Alien, Firefly, and Rick and Morty. In thi...
EP: 76. JP Mavinga: Drawing Worlds, Building Heroes, and the Art Behind White Sky
JP Mavinga has spent over twenty-five years building one of the most distinctive careers in illustration and comics — born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, trained at SCAD, and forged across three continents before landing as a senior c...
Ep: 75 Rick Burchett — The Artist Who Made Batman Move
If you grew up reading The Batman Adventures, Batman: Gotham Adventures, or Superman Adventures, Rick Burchett’s work shaped how you see those characters. His pages don’t just look good — they move, they breathe, they act.In thi...
Ep: 74 Dancing Between the Raindrops with Nelson Aspen
He’s covered the Oscars, the Golden Globes, and decades of Hollywood from the red carpet out. Now Nelson Aspen is turning the lens on himself.Nelson joins Back to Pop to talk about Dancing Between the Raindrops: Happily Ever After? —...
EP: 73 “Bob Budiansky on Building the Original Transformers Mythology”
He named 200 characters like Megatron, Starscream, Grimlock, Bumblebee, Prowl, and more . He wrote the character bibles that turned a line of Japanese toys into one of the most beloved franchises in pop culture history — and most people have ne...
EP: 72 Jeremy Robinson: Blood, Butterflies, and Building an Empire
Jeremy Robinson has written nearly 100 novels. He’s a #1 Audible and New York Times bestselling author published in 14 languages. His kaiju series Project Nemesis is in development at Sony Pictures Television with John Wick director Chad Stahel...
