Developed by the 2020 Graduate Diploma in Radio cohort. Produced and edited by Jay Gasser, Lachlan Perry and Nikki Sitch. 

Imagine a world of social distancing, border closures and quarantine. Tricky, we know, but try for us. Australia, 2028. Pandemic-era restrictions have forced the states to shut their border for years. Increasingly insular and self-sufficient, states and territories are gesturing towards secession. In a last-ditch effort to reunite the country behind a common cause, the federal government develops a new initiative: The Viral Games. Join the country’s top sports journos, Ange Abello and Doug Bueller, in the commentary box for the opening ceremony of this intranational, hyper sanitary sporting series.

Episode 1 Crowds: Optional 

A national treasure defects. A swim team benefits from human enhancement technology. An undercurrent of discontent blisters to the surface. The competition intended to bind Australia is instead driving her apart. Join Ange and Doug poolside as they attempt to rationalise the Games’ rapid devolvement.

Episode 2 Jet-skiing Judas 

A light breeze is grazing across Randwick Racecourse on day three of the Viral Games. Upon it, faint whispers of a supplement saga. Australia is set to fracture as in-fighting intensifies and undercuts, boycotts and corruption become the order of the day.

Episode 3 Dangerous A-filly-ations 

Developed by the 2020 Graduate Diploma in Radio cohort 

Lena Del Cruz, star sprinter for the NT, has everything to lose as her state announces their boycotting of the games. On this episode: distraction, deception and pandemic-era disguise as The Heart of the Territory blunders her way towards the podium. This is bigger than politics.

Episode 4 The Heart of the Territory 

The Northern Territory has boycotted; the ACT and Tasmania have merged in a geographically perplexing union. Australia is broken beyond redemption, but the government can’t get its deposit back on the afterparty, so the Games are going down swinging.

Episode 5 - Paddle Your Own Canoe 

With Northern Territory back in the fray and competition heating-up between Territorians and Victorians, the government has recognised a wholesale reuptake of interest in The Games. The women’s full-contact, no-contact hazmat suit wrestling is the deciding event as the country turn to each other and ask, can sport be enough to save all this?

Episode 6 - Is That Violet Beauregarde? 

In the not-so-distant future, pandemic-era restrictions are the way of life for Australians. Eight years of border closures witness a country on the brink of defederation. Australia’s states and territories are fast becoming self-reliant, developing distinct cultures and value-systems (bad news for Queensland). In a last-ditch effort to unite Australians behind a common cause, the federal government launches Viral Games: an intranational socially distanced, hyper-sanitary sports series.Join the country’s top sports journos, Doug Bueller and Ange Abello, in the commentary box as they try to make sense of a games unlike anything Canberra could imagine. The lines are drawn, masks tightened, anti-chafe cream applied; conspiracies, supplement sagas and PPE bungles are already underway. Only one question remains: are you ready to play?. The Viral Games is a fictional podcast series written, produced and voiced by 2020 AFTRS Radio Students.With thanks to Karla Arnall, Dr Pieter Aquila, Marty Murphy, Fyona Smith &amp; Tony Rasmussen

The Viral Games

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