This American Life

Each week This American Life picks a theme of human interest, stretching from familial struggle to pathetic optimism; they all share the commonality of hilariously inflated self-importance. On the show—adapted from the popular public radio show of the same name—host/creator Ira Glass documents the crossroads and the slices of life they've created, whether they lead to ironic morals or stirring disaster or sometimes both. Take, for example, the Texas rancher who clones his beloved dead bull expecting the science experiment to be an exact copy of the original. A Stephen King version would have you jumping, but this account will have you smugly laughing. This American Life finally gets reality TV right.