Review of the new Radio 4 show parodying podcasts

Anyone who follows Alistair Green’s social media videos knows how thoroughly he gets under the skin of his alter egos, creating credible caricatures of insecure men oblivious to their flaws.

So it is with his new Radio 4 series, The Big Idea with Alistair Green, a parody podcast so tonally true to what he is spoofing that a casual listener might be hard-pressed to tell the difference.

The character who shares his name is paddling in the shallow waters of the manosphere, meeting accomplished people to unlock the secrets of their success, while piggybacking on their millions of followers he envies so blatantly.

His guest on the Diary Of A CEO-style first episode is Matt Matthews, the skateboarding founder of Punk Squirrel IPA who calls his interviewer ‘bro-ski’. The character is so close to a certain brewery chief criticised for his treatment of staff and investors that the script must have kept the BBC lawyers busy.

Even though the fawning Green tosses out the most softball questions, they nonetheless expose the grasping capitalist behind the flimsy image of a rebellious rule-breaker.

There’s no great surprise to how that all plays out, as Matthews admits to liking everything about punk, ‘except the music and the attitude’. But Green – who plays guest as well as host – skewers the archetype very effectively, with wry lines liberally spread throughout the 15-minute episode.

Even before we get to the interview – which leaves ever the starry-eyed host disillusioned –  the whole podcast genre is sardonically mocked, with astute references to overly-earnest comedians philosophising about their art, or how talk of men’s mental health is used as an attempt to excuse some less edifying opinions.

Green knows every cliché of podcasting and every defective trait of his fully rounded characters, and exposes them astutely.

• Episode one of The Big Idea with Alistair Green is on BBC Sounds now, and it continues on Radio 4 at 11pm next Wednesday.

Review date: 11 Jun 2026
Reviewed by: Alistair Green