The Edge of Sleep

Here is a premise that will keep you up at night, literally. Markiplier (Mark Fischbach) plays a night watchman who finishes his shift only to discover that everyone who fell asleep the previous night is dead. Not some people. Everyone. The survivors are all insomniacs, night shift workers, and anyone else who happened to stay awake. Now they have to figure out what happened before exhaustion forces them to close their eyes. Created by Jake Emanuel and Willie Block, the show burns through its 9-episode first season at a relentless pace. Markiplier brings his massive YouTube following to the project, but his performance genuinely works here -- there is a raw panic in his voice acting that feels authentic rather than performative. The horror elements are unsettling without being gratuitous, and the mystery of what is causing the deaths keeps you guessing. The show earned an impressive 4.9-star rating from nearly 16,000 reviews, making it one of the highest-rated fiction podcasts on Apple Podcasts. It also got adapted into a TV series, which speaks to how compelling the concept is. Fair warning: season one ends on a significant cliffhanger that has left listeners waiting for resolution.