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In this episode of Drawn to Darkness, we pivot back to true crime with Captive Audience: A Real American Horror Story, a three-part docuseries about the kidnapping of Steven Stayner and the traumatic ripple effect. We’ll discuss Steven’s story, how he was abducted at age seven while walking home from school and held captive for seven years by Kenneth Parnell. What makes the story even more unsettling is how “normal” his life appeared from the outside. Steven attended school, played sport, and yet could not free himself from his abuser until Parnell kidnapped five-year-old Timmy White. Refusing to let another boy endure what he survived. Steven heroically escaped, saving Timmy and himself. We discuss the psychological barriers that kept him from escaping sooner, the media’s obsession with a “happy ending” and its impact on Steven’s recovery, and the tragic fatal motorcycle accident that ended Steven’s life. Just when you think the story must be over, the Stayner curse delivers one more twist: Steven’s older brother Cary becomes the Yosemite Killer, turning this into a story not only about captivity, but about generational trauma and murder.

Content & Spoiler Warning:

This episode includes discussion of child abduction, pedophilia and child sexual assault, intergenerational trauma, serial murder, and a fatal motorcycle accident. We also spoil Captive Audience and the made-for-TV miniseries I Know My First Name Is Steven.

Palate Cleanser:

After something this bleak, we recommend something more fun: Derry Girls, Caroline’s comfort-watch of choice, Heated Rivalry, and The Mummy, because Evie and Rick are adorable.

Recommendations:

Adolescence - mandatory viewing if you’re raising a boy

Wild Crime -another national park–focused docuseries

Park Predators -for more on crime in wilderness spaces

Murdoch Murders: A Southern Scandal - another cursed-family true crime saga

Six Schizophrenic Brothers - a different kind of family horror

Bloodline and The Perfect Couple - fictional family darkness

My Favorite Murder Episode 30 - their early coverage of this case

Media Pressure (Julie Murray’s podcast) -on family tragedy and public obsession

I Know My First Name Is Steven — the original 1989 miniseries that shaped the family’s story

Untamed with Eric Bana for a Yosemite murder mystery. Also Free Solo and The Dawn Wall for that stunning Yosemite setting.

Stephen King’s The Dead Zone because Parnell is giving Greg Stillson as a Bible salesman.

The 1990s The Stand mini-series, with Corin Nemec as Harold

All Around The Town by Mary Higgins Clark

Weapons because of a scary gas station scene and a child keeping a secret at school

California True Crime, Timesuck, Casefile, and Last Podcast on the Left if you want to know more about these crimes.

Homework:

Next episode, we continue our run of cursed families, but through gothic fiction rather than documentary. Read Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Special thanks to Nancy Azano for the podcast cover art (Instagram: @nancyazano) and Harry Kidd for the opening and closing score (Instagram: @harryjkidd, Spotify).