Decoder Ring is de show over het ontrafelen van culturele mysteries. In elke aflevering neemt presentator Willa Paskin een culturele vraag, object of gewoonte; onderzoekt de geschiedenis ervan; en probeert uit te vogelen wat het betekent en waarom het belangrijk is.
![Decoder Ring](https://megaphone.imgix.net/podcasts/9a4c2c2a-3e8b-11e8-bd53-9b1115bac0fa/image/230322_DecoderRingTile_final__1_.jpg?ixlib=rails-4.3.1&max-w=3000&max-h=3000&fit=crop&auto=format,compress)
Decoder Ring is the show about cracking cultural mysteries. In each episode, host Willa Paskin takes a cultural question, object, or habit; examines its history; and tries to figure out what it means and why it matters.
In the late 1970s, a new and unusual concept for a restaurant chain emerged in California—video games plus bad pizza plus animatronic characters. The result was Chuck E. Cheese’s Pizza Time Theatre, an immensely popular chain with a pizza rat for a mascot. But the strangeness only starts there. Decoder Ring dives into the formation of Chuck E. Cheese’s and its rival, ShowBiz Pizza Place; the conflict between the two; and the odd personalities of the mechanical animatronics that inhabited both stores and are still beloved by a select group of adults to this very day.
This podcast was written by Willa Paskin and was produced and edited by Benjamin Frisch, who also did illustrations for this episode. Cleo Levin was our research assistant.
Decoder Ring is produced by Katie Shepherd, Max Freedman, and Evan Chung, with help from Sofie Kodner. Derek John is executive producer. Merritt Jacob is our senior technical director.
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![Chuck E. Cheese Pizza War (Encore)](https://megaphone.imgix.net/podcasts/2798dd00-856a-11ee-b6bb-5726a1f96b0e/image/df0299b8eb1e8d2100aaa4315364d43e.jpeg?ixlib=rails-4.3.1&max-w=3000&max-h=3000&fit=crop&auto=format,compress)