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Make Me A Nerd with Mandy Kaplan

Make Me A Nerd with Mandy Kaplan

Auteur(s): TruStory FM
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 Hey folks. Mandy Kaplan here. I’d like to share a bit about my intentions and mission for MMAN if you’ll indulge me. You will? Huzzah!

Look, I am a lot of things. I’m a writer, actress, mother, and lover of musicals and cats, but NOT Cats, The Musical. Give me a little bit of credit, would ya? So...throughout my life, I’ve been surrounded (and intrigued) by all things nerd. A sister who plays D&D, a Star Wars-obsessed husband, friends who love anime, comic books, video games, and...well, you get the picture. Somehow, I have always held it all at arm's length. Not to get too deep, but maybe I never thought I was smart enough to follow it. Or maybe I have control issues and have never been able to embrace fantastical things like dragons and time travel. Until now!

So, with an open mind and heart, I am ready to join this massive (and beautifully inclusive) club and GEEK THE #%$ OUT! It’s time for all my wonderfully strange friends to baptize me into NERD-DOM. Please join me on this journey. Who knows? Maybe you’ll discover or remember a side of yourself along the way. Or at least make fun of me as I try!© TruStory FM Art Sciences sociales
Épisodes
  • Superman... with Homework: Smallville with John Mundy

    Superman... with Homework: Smallville with John Mundy
    Jan 26 2026
    Mandy continues her noble quest to become the kind of nerd who can say “Smallville” without immediately being asked which season she started with, and she brings in returning guest John Mundy to guide her through this corn-fed, meteor-soaked origin story of Clark Kent. What starts as “Is this just Superman: The Homeschool Years?” turns into a surprisingly thoughtful tour of what the show is really selling: not invulnerability, but adolescence—awkwardness, secrecy, and the exhausting burden of being good while everyone around you is making being normal look like a competitive sport. Along the way, Mandy clocks the show’s high-school cruelty, its very committed primary-color costuming, and the deeply specific tonal overlap with the early-2000s “monster of the week” ecosystem.John makes the case for Smallville as a long-form character experiment: what happens when Clark and Lex are allowed to be almost-friends for years, close enough to save each other, never close enough to trust each other. It’s basically an extended tragedy with great cheekbones, where the real villain is not kryptonite so much as the inability to just say the thing out loud. Mandy watches the show jump from pilot-era stiffness to later-season operatic intrigue (hello: Lana married to Lex), and the conversation gets into why “pre-Superman” is the point—because teenage Clark doesn’t always know the right thing, and that uncertainty is the actual engine.Yes, they talk about Alison Mack—because you can’t not talk about Alison Mack—and it’s handled with the weird double-vision that comes from rewatching a performance that used to read as “spunky, driven friend” and now carries a much darker cultural footnote. There’s also a genuinely moving detour into Christopher Reeve’s appearance and what it meant to have him show up as the show’s mythic, anchoring presence. Plus: romance-novel rules, gay hockey smut, and the kind of warm nerd argument that makes you want to pull up a chair, even if you’ve never once been within five miles of Kansas.Make Me a Nerd:
    • Website: makemeanerd.com/join
    • Instagram: @mandy_kaplan_klavens
    • TikTok & Bluesky: @mandymiscast

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    51 min
  • The Great Pottery Throw Down: British, Boring, & Bang-On Perfect with Jeremy Klavens

    The Great Pottery Throw Down: British, Boring, & Bang-On Perfect with Jeremy Klavens
    Jan 26 2026
    Mandy’s latest “please turn me into a nerd” assignment comes disguised as the most harmless thing imaginable: a British competition show about pottery. And yes, at first it feels like the TV equivalent of a warm cup of tea you forgot you made. But then Jeremy Klavens (return guest, television editor, and the father of Mandy’s child—pending) walks her into The Great Pottery Throw Down and suddenly everyone is emotionally invested in cheese sets, kiln drama, and whether it’s legally possible for one judge to cry at this many objects in one lifetime.What follows is a cozy, gently chaotic tour of why this show hits different: the unusually kind contestant energy, the Bake Off DNA, the “we’re all trapped in a pandemic bubble so now we’re basically family” vibe, and the strange intimacy of watching hands work wet clay on a spinning wheel (this episode contains a brief detour into “is pottery… sexy?” and the answer is: it’s complicated, but also abso-potting-lutely). Along the way, Mandy and Jeremy size up the season’s personalities, judge quirks, and the occasional challenge that feels like the producers asked, “What if we simply made everyone fail at once?”And underneath the jokes, there’s a real question humming: why are shows like this so comforting, and why do we crave “soft competition” where the prize is mostly pride, a tiny trophy, and the right to say “bang on” with authority? If you’ve ever wanted a reality show palate cleanser that still gives you something to argue about on the couch, this is your invitation to the pottery parade. Bring subtitles. Possibly cheese.Make Me a Nerd:
    • Website: makemeanerd.com/join
    • Instagram: @mandy_kaplan_klavens
    • TikTok & Bluesky: @mandymiscast

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    1 h et 7 min
  • "I Might Knock": Heated Rivalry... the Show We Can't Stop Watching

    "I Might Knock": Heated Rivalry... the Show We Can't Stop Watching
    Jan 19 2026
    Look, if you had told me six months ago that a Canadian hockey romance would become the most culturally significant television event since—actually, I don't have a comparison because NOTHING prepares you for Heated Rivalry. This is a movement. And based on Mandy's conversation with returning guest Jon Cassie (of MMAN Severance fame, but more importantly, of Heated Rivalry obsession fame), we might need to start building temples.Here's what Jon makes clear: this show kicks down the door in the first twelve minutes with full nudity, graphic intimacy, AND a deeply moving love story—all at once. Created by Crave Media (a Canadian company that rejected HBO's ridiculous notes about "saving steaminess for season two"), the series follows rivals Shane Hollander and Ilya Rosanoff through a decade-spanning secret relationship. Mandy, who wanted "some conversation before all the effing," eventually gets her Hepburn-Tracy wit in exchanges like "I might knock" / "I might open." The show delivers both physical chemistry and intellectual connection, launching four legendary careers while giving audiences a complete, satisfying journey.Jon hasn't been "swept away obsessively by a show in decades"—and he's watched this one multiple times. That's the power of Hudson Williams and Connor Finley's chemistry, the devastating beauty of feet touching under tables, and a show that respects its audience enough to be exactly what it set out to be. Heated Rivalry isn't just good queer television. It's exceptional television, period.
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    1 h et 3 min
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