Podcast / Disc Only Podcast

Disc Only Podcast is a talk show podcast featuring ProtonJon, Tom Fawkes, Stephen Georg, and Jerod (aka The 8-Bit Drummer). It premiered on July 2020, with episodes premiering live on Jon's Twitch channel every first Tuesday.

The idea started out as a gag: in 2018, Jon raided Stephen's charity stream and suggests the Game Boy Player. Not a game using the player: instead, he was asked to play just the disc that goes with the player. When that eventually takes the lead, Stephen would be chatting with his audience while the Game Boy Player showed the title screen. Later in May 2020, The Runaway Guys hosted the TRG Colosseum Direct, a charity event hosted by the group. During Jon's segment called Chaos Fortune Cookie, the Game Boy Player was suggested there as a Call-Back by Stephen. Tom and Jerod were also co-commentators during the segment, so they joined in. Later in the year, they decided to make it into a proper podcast.

A playlist of the episodes can be found on YouTube here, and is available on iTunes, Spotify, and Stitcher.

Tropes that appear in this podcast:

• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Episode 11 has the guys joke about Siri telling a frightening story about murder...and alert about the requested location.
• Audience Participation:
  • The first two episodes feature polls held on Twitch for viewers to vote. The first episode's poll predicts who will accidentally take down the next Colosseum stream (either AttackingTucans or Family Jules), and the second asks the chat whose house they would try to break into (the four hosts were the possible options).
  • Episode 14: When the guys discuss breaking bones and dangerous stunts, a poll ran on Twitch asking what one would rather break, with the options being arm, leg, or spirit.
  • Episode 25: When the guys discuss snacking habits, a poll ran asking whether or not viewers use a bowl for their chips.
• Based on a Dream: Invoked.
  • Stephen talks about a dream of TRG collabing on a cover for "Don't Fear the Reaper" with Chuggaaconroy on cowbell. Tom feels it would be a great idea for a future Colosseum bumper.
  • Jon shares some dreams he had on Episode 34, which includes one with Stephen being drunk. Tom wonders which one will be a future Colosseum bumper.
• Big "WHAT?!": In Episode 19, Jerod asks the guys they've seen Hellsing Ultimate Abridged.
  Tom: I'm in it.
  *Beat*
  Jerod: Wait, what?!
• Birthday Episode:
  • Episode 2 is titled "Happy Birthday Jerod!", as his birthday follows the broadcast.
  • Episode 10 is titled "Happy Birthday Dan!". To celebrate, Dan, who usually has a role as producer, becomes a Special Guest instead of occasionally chiming in at the end.
• Black Comedy Burst: In Episode 5, Stephen pitches a steakhouse (dubbed Outback Stabhouse) that will stab you depending on your order, then a breakfast joint where after every half hour a patron gets smacked with a frying pan for a chance at free eggs. Jon wants none of it. Tom later pitches a fragrance shop where you pay with your blood (dubbed Blood Bath and Beyond).
  • Due to the casual nature of the chat, changing topics and tone at different paces depending almost at random, a topic may suddenly become this trope. I can be hard to track where it comes into play or where it might be another trope, such as Bile Fascination, or a mixture.
• Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: In Episode 3, when Tom notes he doesn't have a fanart focus, Stephen asks if he wants it to be boobs, Pokémon, or Pokémon with boobs. They later settled with appliances instead for Tom. Then Stephen ends up getting houseplants mere minutes later.
• Brick Joke: The May 2022 episode is named "God Is With Us", which is explained early in the episode by Stephen claiming to his viewers that their Special Guest for the episode was God while they were trying to guess the guest's identity. This is never addressed again until the outro, where Stephen addresses MC as "God" and starts a last-second tangent about God's short-lived fling with Santa Claus.
• Buffy Speak: Stephen explains in episode 7 that an ostrich egg is "basically egg, but more egg".
  • There's also him advising Tom on how to describe haircuts to his barber with "just type in 'people's heads'."
• Call-Back:
  • When the guys talk about dreams in Episode 11, Stephen recalled the dream in which Tom "helped" him with Morning Mario, which he brought up in Episode 3. Tom's Morning Mario episode has him in snowboarding gear teaching snowboarding.
    • Brought up again in Episode 17, when Tom mentions that he is going to Colorado over the holidays.
  • Jerod's love for cereal brought up in episode 4 is brought up again in episode 13, though the focus was on Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Stephen also joins in on the cereal conversation.
• Captain Obvious: In the May 2022 episode, MC describes boxes of Diet Coke cans sold in packs of 15, which advertise "3 more than 12 cans" on the label.
• Christmas Episode: Episode 6 is titled "Marcy Kramble, Everyone!" and featured some talks about Christmas and Santa Claus. Christmas also comes up in Episode 27, "Merry Happy Everyone!".
• Contrived Coincidence: In Episode 11 we learn that both Tom and Stephen have had dreams involving Martha Stewart being and/or fighting a dragon.
• Couch Gag: The host introduction for each episode starts with Jon saying "Welcome to the Disc Only Podcast, the podcast that *insert descriptive phrase*", followed by "I'm your host, ProtonJon, and *insert follow-up phrase*". Tom, Stephen, and Jerod introduce themselves by continuing the bit with phrases of their own.
• Delayed Reaction: Of a sort; the hosts may backtrack and belatedly react to something another host said, usually because the chat reacts to it and draws their attention. A perfect example is when Jerod claims he kidnapped Santa Claus.
• Diner Brawl: Episode 2 has two anecdotal stories from Jerod and Stephen: Jerod talks about unruly Marine recruits and the restraunt's manager, a Marine veteran, kicking them out after brandishing a knife, while Stephen notes a stabbing occuring at a restaurant he once visited.
• Distinction Without a Difference: Subverted in a story Stephen told in Episode 14 where he and his wife Mal went shopping for iced animal crackers. When he goes to pick up the crackers, he finds "iced animal crackers" and "frosted circus cookies", but Stephen assumes that they're basically the same product and takes the cheaper box. This later gets him in trouble with Mal and his own chat, both of whom chew him out for not picking up "frosted circus cookies", which have a different feel and taste from the cheaper brand that Stephen bought, much to Stephen's utter confusion.
• Does Not Like Spam:
  • In Episode 20, Jon reveals that he cannot stand hot drinks or soups when the other guys ask him.
  • Episode 31 starts with Stephen proclaiming his hatred for Fanta and how he's forcing himself to drink the Orange Fanta that has been sitting in the fridge after he and Mal bought soda variety packs from Costco and no one wanted to drink the Fanta that came with them. This later turns into him admitting that "it's not that bad" as he continues drinking the Fanta over the course of the episode, causing the rest of the group to claim that he's developing a taste for Fanta.
• Ear Worm: In the May 2022 episode, Jon describes the song "Venom" by Eminem from the movie Venom (2018) as this, being unable to get the main hook of the song out of his head ever since he watched the film two months prior. Said line from the song becomes a Running Gag for the remainder of the episode.
• Embarrassingly Painful Sunburn: Two stories were told of such in Episode 10.
  • Stephen tells about a tubing trip with his wife Mal who claimed to have given him enough sunscreen only to find that she only applied it in the shape of a Z on his chest. There's even a vlog post showing the details.
  • Jerod was duped with a sunscreen that claimed to be SPF 60. The actual SPF of the sunscreen in the bottle was 5.
• Exiled to the Couch: The guys joked about this in regards to Stephen in episode 14 as Stephen talked about getting the wrong iced animal crackers. Mal was hoping for the frosted circus cookies instead.
• Forgetful Jones:
  • Stephen's notorious memory problems are discussed in episode 15, where he notes that it makes it almost impossible for him to be spoiled on the plot of a game such as Kingdom Hearts because he won't remember it by the time he comes to play it. It also factored into a gag where a title was inspired by something he said, they forgot to mention it, and Stephen has long forgotten what the joke even was.
  • Stephen later explains that he got the college nickname "Grandpa" (incidentally unrelated to how he got the same nickname in the present day) because he would tell stories to his roommates only to be told that he has explained the exact same stories multiple times and being absolutely befuddled that he doesn't remember telling them.
• Gadget Watches: The Apple Watch is a recurring topic throughout late 2022/early 2023 episodes, with Tom, Stephen and Jerod discussing how they use it and how it's affecting their daily lives. Jon, who is completely disinterested in the idea of getting a smartwatch, stays out of the discussions but wound up getting a Digimon Digivice instead.
• Gender Bender: In the June 2021 episode, "Dreams Only", Jon describes a recurring dream he used to have where either he or some random individual would be diving into an indoor swimming pool to see into the underwater window, behind which is a White Void Room only populated by a copy of Dead or Alive Xtreme 3. The person in the dream would suddenly be transformed into one of the girls from the game then attempt to leave the (now pitch dark) swimming pool building, but could only go out through the girl's locker room and any attempt to actually leave resulted in the girl's breasts inflating in size each time. Jon presumes that this dream explains the concept behind RosaJon.
• Gosh Dangit To Heck: Jerod avoids swearing, often substituting "frick" or "crap" even when referring to something that uses vulgarity (such as when he referred to a Twitter account with "shitposts" in the name as "crap posts"). Averted with the other three, though Stephen typically avoids the stronger words.
• G-Rated Drug: In Episode 4, the guys joke about giving cereal the street drug treatment, with each brand getting its own street name.
• Gratuitous Latin: The intro contains a colored drawing with scrolls featuring Latin words associated with the origin of the podcast, as well as the four guys with their personas: Grandpa Stephen, Rosajon, the 8-Bit Bunny, and Quagsire Tom. The streamer associated with Tom subverts it by having a series of A's instead to denote the screaming Quagsire.
• Hilarious Outtakes:
  • Episode 5 begins with the four retaking the intro and treating the first two as outtakes.
  • Episode 8 also begins with multiple retakes for the intro after some outtakes, including some invoked instances (such as Tom's faked crash using his voice software) and some corpsing.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: In regular Disc Only episodes, Jon is the one in control and takes any excuse to replay the intro, which annoys Stephen. In the Colosseum 2023 live version, Stephen takes over and allows donors to replay the intro for just $100, meaning it replays almost constantly, annoying Jon.
  Stephen: They were like '$100 seems low' and I said 'No it does not!'
• Hot Librarian: As Jon feels like he's becoming a librarian for video games due to his history and attachment to video games, Jerod invokes this by prompting the viewers to make hot librarian fanart of Jon.
• Insistent Terminology: Stephen has a comical habit of doubling down whenever he decides to pin a bizarre name to something even if it's blatantly wrong. For example, Episode 31 has him assuming that the Canadian equivalent of a soda variety pack is called a "many-drink", then when Jon calls him out on it he asserts his position by claiming that he knows better and that he's definitely seen that name before.
• Mood Whiplash:
  • Stephen's steakhouse pitch to Jon in Episode 5 started out tame... until he got to the part where the waiter stabs the patron for payment.
  • Episode 9 has Jules sincerely discussing parasocial relationships, but then right after he finishes talking he brings up torsion.
• Near-Death Experience: Discussed regarding Tom in Episode 2. Alcohol and allergy medication do not mix, as he learned the hard way.
• Nonindicative Name: Because the episodes are livestreamed on Jon's Twitch, he names them before recording starts and often his titles don't have any relation to what comes up in the episode.
  • Biggest example is episode 12: Murder Gym... This Week On Shark Tank Week. It never gets brought up until the very end when they realize they forgot to talk about it and decide to save it for next month. It was never brought up the following month.
  • For the podcast itself: ignoring the Running Gag that spawned it, no discs are involved in the podcast, let alone being the only thing there is. That is, until episode 13, when a significant portion of the episode is devoted to discussing a PlayStation game which creates different monsters when you put in a music CD. The actual Game Boy Player disc is also mentioned once when discussing regional differences between GameCube disc packaging.
• Off the Rails: Discussed in Episode 20, where Tom notes that while the topic somehow evolved from best-selling products at Walmart to content creation as a lifestyle, they had surprisingly managed to not get too off-track. They then immediately play it straight by allowing Stephen to say a piece on sandwich preferences, which leads to an angry rant about restaurant menus that don't have pictures.
• Once an Episode:
  • Usually near the end, Dan speaks up to say something extremely brief (sometimes just a single word).
  • Dan also makes a list of topics covered in the show at the end, which Jon reads out in a way (as one of his fans pointed out) sounds like a list of Jeopardy! question categories.
• Only Sane Man: Episode 5: Stephen pitches a steakhouse that stabs you, Tom pitches a retail store where you pay with your blood, Jerod pitches suggestions...while Jon wants none of it.
• Plane Awful Flight: The October 2021 episode has a few of these stories. Tom's involved a Screaming Plane Baby that lasted 12 hours (which was later paid off by a much better return trip), while Jerod had to deal with a man in Business Class who would not stop talking the whole four hour journey. Stephen, due to his unusual height, has had his seat kicked by unruly passengers on multiple occasions, as well as having an aisle cart slammed into his leg at least once. Jon recalls a flight with Emile where he could hear Emile (and Emile's 3DS) throughout the entire flight despite wearing headphones and being several rows away.
• Prenatal Possessions: Parodied in episode 25, when Tom joked that Stephen was born with a flip camera in hand to vlog.
• Pretentious Pronunciation: Episode 4 has the four wondering how Guy Fieri's name is pronounced. One of the possible pronounciations for his last name was Ferrari.
• Retcon: Partway through Episode 39, Jon changes the title of the episode from "The Amazing Disc Circus" to "They Allegedly Do Crimes".
• Riddle for the Ages: Fans kept demanding to know the meaning of "Murder Gym" in the title of episode 12, which Jon successfully kept putting them off for another three episodes. It eventually turns out that it was something Stephen said in passing, and being Stephen, has long since forgotten what it was all about.
• Rule 63: Discussed in Episode 3 regarding Jon. Stephen asks Jon if there was a timeline featuring all the female alt art of him, and Jon notes three: Electron Jen (started by an ex and some friends), Pon-Pon (started by AriZonia), and Rosajon (started by Jumney). Stephen was flabbergasted.
  Stephen: Why are there three boob timelines, Jon?
• Running Gag:
  • This is how the podcast originated: as a gag for charity streams complete with urging to use just the disc and talk over the screen.
  • After "Outback Stabhouse" was first introduced, it has been mentioned at least once in all subsequent episodes (typically by tying it into the topic in an extremely tangential manner).
    • In a broader sense, coming up with more questionable ideas for businesses (such as an airline that chloroforms you for the flight and a fashion chain called 'Q Sharp') and suggesting the podcast is actually broadcast from a fictional mall that hosts all of them.
  • Episode 7: "GO COCKS!"
  • Episode 8: Jon starting the intro mid-episode. He even slips it in after the outro to Producer Dan's disdain.
  • Stephen either forgetting or lampshading every time that "I talk after Tom!" in the intro, sometimes even carrying it over to other situations, such as claiming that he'd have to be behind Tom in line at a restaurant.
  • More often seen when publicising the podcast than actually during it, but both Stephen and Jon have a tendency to forget the name of Stitcher when listing all the places the podcast can be found.
  • A lot of the intros have Jon lamenting how the show shouldn't have gone on for as long as it has, or expressing surprise about it.
  • From the Colosseum 2023 special episode: "I'M TOM!"
• Santa Claus: In Episode 6, as Jerod introduces himself, he claims that he has kidnapped Santa.
• Seinfeldian Conversation: The entire point of the podcast is to have the team discuss whatever the hell comes to mind, very little of which is even remotely relevant to video games.
• Shout-Out:
  • The first segment of Episode 4 has the guys talk about Whose Line Is It Anyway? after Tom says he'll go as Colin Mochrie. Stephen follows up saying he'll be Ryan Stiles, Jerod notes he'll be Drew Carey, so Jon follows up saying he'll be Wayne Brady. They follow it by discussing the outtakes from the show.
  • When discussing the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp in episode 7, there were comparisons between the team's mascot and Trogdor.
  • The SNL style intro to TRG Colosseum 2021 features Stephen appearing immediately after Tom, which (as Stephen confirmed to a commenter) was a subtle reference to the "I talk after Tom!" Running Gag from Disc Only.
  • Episode 39 is titled "The Amazing Disc Circus" in reference to Special Guest Alex Rochon's role as Caine. The episode appropriately features references to and discussions about the gags featured in the video, which are accordingly voiced by Rochon.
• Sidetracked by the Analogy: Episode 31 has Stephen complaining about the size of the Fanta mini-cans that he's drinking relative to the size of his hands. He makes an analogy to steak for reference by claiming that if someone were to make him hold steaks in his hands at a barbeque, he would be able to hold 8 steaks at once (4 in each hand). This immediately derails the entire topic as the rest of the cast is utterly befuddled by the idea of someone holding raw meat with their bare hands and inquiring about the assumed size of the steaks (which Stephen claims are "1 Standard Steak Unit" each), which eventually turns into a bit about Jon and Tom claiming that Stephen is holding the raw meat as part of the marination process and that he either secretes marinade or dry rub from his skin.
• Skewed Priorities: A significant portion of Episode 8 is dedicated to Stephen explaining how the promise of shrimp at his parents' house was sufficient for him to make a risky journey through flooding rain that almost drowned his car.
• Something Something Leonard Bernstein: Episode 21 features karaoke stories in which they hit up karaoke venues to perform, only to know the Title Drop and nothing else for the song they chose. The songs mentioned were "When the Lights Go Out" by Five and "Who Let the Dogs Out" by Baha Men.
• Special Guest:
  • Episode 9 features one for the first time, FamilyJules.
  • Episode 10, appropriately titled "Happy Birthday, Dan!", features producer Dan participating in the entire episode rather than just speaking up once at the end.
  • Episode 16 has JoshJepson as a guest. He took the place of Stephen, who had to sit that one out to care for his wife Mal.
  • Episode 21 has Super MC Gamer as a guest.
  • Episode 23 has Chuggaaconroy as a guest.
  • The Colosseum 2023 special edition exaggerates this courtesy of a donation incentive to add an additional guest. At one point, everyone who was on location at the time made guest appearances. Some went so far as to add the lamp and Jon's cardboard cutout.
  • Episode 33 has Sab Irene take over for Stephen. She's notably the first female guest to be featured on the show.
  • Episode 35 has Carlos (insaneintherain) as a guest in Jerod's place.
  • Episode 39 has Alex Rochon as a guest.
• Squick: In-universe, Jon is repulsed by the idea of Stephen's skin flaking off into a dry rub in Episode 31.
• Suddenly Shouting:
  • Jon and Stephen get into an argument about how Jon was offered free hashbrowns at a restaurant and kept refusing them, with Stephen saying he should have taken them because they were free and Jon saying he didn't like hashbrowns. As the argument escalates, Stephen screams "THE HASHBROWNS WERE FREE, JONATHAN!" and everyone cracks up.
  • Tom tends to shout for emphasis when improvising a gag based on a topic.
• Tagline: "The podcast about nothing."
• Temporary Substitute:
  • Stephen is absent for Episode 16 as he had to take care of his wife Mal, who was diagnosed with endometriosis and in the hospital for surgery. Fellow TRG alum JoshJepson fills in for him.
  • As Jerod was away on Episode 23, Chuggaaconroy substituted for him.
  • As Stephen was absent for Episode 33, Sab Irene fills in for him for the episode.
  • Due to Jerod's absence due to travelling with his wife, Carlos (insaneintherain) fills in for him in Episode 35.
• Tempting Fate: Stephen's story in Episode 8 in which he chances going home in his car in flooding rain instead of staying overnight at his parents' house. He later finds himself and Mal underwater, and had to wait as the car drifts along the water.
• Toilet Humor:
  • Episode 6 has talks about inopportune moments when farts are let out, along with accidental soiling.
  • Jon talks about a time when NintendoCapriSun has to let out gas in a restaurant, and when he thought the area was empty, there was actually an elderly couple sitting nearby. Fortunately the elderly man thought it was Actually Pretty Funny. This was brought up again in Episode 25 while discussing restaurant horror stories.
  • Stephen also notes about "poop tells", when one would know when something's in there.
  • Episode 31 has Tom mentioning an "adult-oriented cereal" in regard to a version of Waffle Crisps that he ate, which Jon's Twitch chat proposes to mean cereal shaped like penises. This soon turns into a completely new topic about names for a fictional cereal brand based on male genitalia.
• The Tooth Hurts: The bulk of the fanart made for Episode 39 (The Amazing Disc Circus/They Allegedly Do Crimes) centers around Caine from The Amazing Digital Circus with his teeth either removed or retractable.
• Troll: Episode 7 has Jerod call out Tom as such when Tom confesses to lying to Stephen that Philidelphia Broncos and Seattle Mudcrabs were real sports teams.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Emile recalls as a child wondering why Pete didn't just kill Mickey Mouse if he hated him so much.
• Writing Around Trademarks:
  • In Episode 6, Tom introduces himself as the copyright-free "Grunch". He even has a theme song, which he says is a work in progress:
  "You're angry, Señor Grunch..."
  • The name of the podcast itself also counts, as they couldn't use the Game Boy Player screen itself due to "Game Boy" being a Nintendo trademark. Some of Jon's fans initially suggested they use the lawyer-friendly name "Video Girl Viewer" before Stephen pointed out the unfortunate implications of the name.

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"Speaking of sex, this should end."