Believe in Magic

BBC Studios

11 episodes listed below

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A charity story where belief becomes evidence.

The gist

Believe in Magic follows the rise and collapse of a wish-granting charity built around Megan and her mother Jean. Through documents, interviews, inquest material, and online traces, it asks what was true, what was misunderstood, and who was harmed.

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About Believe in Magic

Believe in Magic tells the story of a charity that became famous because it seemed to make suffering feel briefly enchanted. Megan and her mother Jean granted wishes for seriously ill children. There were parties, gifts, Disney trips, online fundraisers, and the powerful glow of One Direction support. For a while, the story worked. Families were grateful. Fans donated. Celebrities helped. Then a few parents began asking cautious questions. Which hospital? Which doctor? What exactly was the diagnosis? The show builds its investigation from those small doubts, following the people who watched, waited, and feared the consequences of being wrong. It is patient rather than sensational. Interviews with parents, sisters, neighbours, and medical voices sit beside documents, photos, tweets, doctors’ letters, and inquest material. The central questions keep shifting as the evidence accumulates. Was Megan seriously ill in the way supporters were told? Were real conditions exaggerated into something more dramatic? Why did medical treatment, celebrity attention, charity work, and family dynamics become so tangled? The series is strongest when it refuses the easiest answer. It gives weight to the good the charity appeared to do, while also tracing the harm caused by uncertainty, secrecy, and possible manipulation. Jean emerges through fragments: posts, memories, family accounts, and the search for her later whereabouts. Megan remains more complicated, both public symbol and vulnerable young woman. The episodes can be hard to hear, especially when the reporting reaches the inquest and the details of her death. But the tone stays controlled. Believe in Magic is for listeners who want an investigative story that studies evidence slowly, keeps empathy in view, and understands that belief itself can become part of the case.

Made for: For true-crime listeners drawn to medical mysteries, family testimony, online sleuthing, and carefully reported serial investigations. It suits those who prefer restraint and evidence over shock value.

What sets it apart: The series combines celebrity-era internet culture with a close medical investigation, moving from One Direction fundraisers to doctors’ letters and inquest recordings. Its power comes from testing each suspicion against the possibility of being wrong.

In their own words

Jamie Bartlett, host of the hit podcast The Missing Crypto queen, is back with another gripping, investigative serial. In his new series, Jamie tells the story of Megan Bhari, an inspirational 16 year old girl who in 2012 launches a charity to grant wishes to seriously ill children. The charity is called Believe in Magic and it attracts the support of the biggest boy band in the world: One Direction. Believe in Magic soon becomes a household name in the child cancer community, putting on parties, sending thoughtful gifts and organizing trips to Disney. Megan is adored by all those she helps...

As heard by us

Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026

Jamie Bartlett turns disputed illness claims into a careful investigation of evidence, family fracture, and the risks carried by charitable trust.

Believe in Magic follows the widening questions around Megan, Jean, disputed medical claims, and fundraising connected to the Believe in Magic charity. Jamie Bartlett treats suspicion as something to prove rather than perform.

Read our full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Medical letters, an inquest recording, and 539 One Direction tweets reward your appetite for receipts.

Press play if you want

  • Jamie Bartlett testing an extraordinary medical story against records and family testimony
  • to follow cautious online doubters as suspicion hardens into document-backed questions
Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →
wish-granting charity workmedical uncertaintyonline fundraising appealsOne Direction celebrity supportparent sleuthsfamily testimonydoctors’ letters and inquest evidenceJean’s whereabouts

Talks about

Best episodes of Believe in Magic

Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.

Episode 1: Megan

A steady look at how a charity image is built through celebrity and momentum.

Believe in Magic starts with Megan Bari as the public face of a charity built around wishes for seriously ill children, then pulls back to the mother-and-daughter team running it.

Episode 2: Sleuths

A measured, unsettling look at how doubt grows when a fundraising story stops adding up.

The piece reads as a wary look at doubt taking shape, with parents who have lived through neuroblastoma starting to question Meg and Jean's fundraising claims.

Episode 5: Sisters

A careful family portrait episode where proof matters as much as the claim.

The episode stays close to the family strain at its center, using the sisters' memories of ordinary dinners and the rolling tin to show how normal life sat next to a growing sense that something was badly wrong.

Episode 4: Doctors

A sombre inquest hour that makes the medical detail feel painfully close.

This inquest chapter moves away from broad mystery and settles into the cold procedural weight of Megan's death, with the facts laid out in a way that leaves little room for speculation.

Episode 6: One Direction

A careful look at how fandom, illness, and a charity myth became one story.

One Direction is the doorway into a wider story about celebrity obsession, online belonging, and how a partly true detail can be stretched into something much larger.

Episode 3: Proof

A careful episode about evidence, doubt, and the uneasy gap between them.

Believe in Magic works best when it stays close to the evidence: hospital letters, photographs, oxygen tanks, syringes, and the uneasy question of what any of it can really prove.

Episode 7: Jean

A patient search episode that treats uncertainty as part of the story.

Jean is followed through a quiet, uneasy search in Brittany, where a possible sighting, a house check, and repeated door-knocking make the episode feel like a careful test of how much can be learned from a trace.

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Episodes

  1. 1

    Episode 2: Sleuths

    Episode 2 of Believe in Magic follows Joanna Ashcroft—going by the alias Sarah Smith—as she and a small group of cancer-community parents known as “the sleuths” investigate whether Megan Bari, founder of the wish-granting charity Believe in Magic, is genuinely ill.

    ·24m·2 clips
  2. 2

    Introducing World of Secrets S3

    ·5m
  3. 3

    Episode 1: Megan

    This investigative podcast episode introduces Megan Bhari, a teenager who founded the Believe in Magic charity to grant wishes for seriously ill children with support from One Direction.

    ·22m·2 clips
  4. 4

    Introducing Believe In Magic

    This episode investigates the charity Believe in Magic, run by 16-year-old Megan Bari, which grants wishes to seriously ill children but faces scrutiny over potential discrepancies in Megan's story.

    ·3m
  5. 5

    Episode 3: Proof

    Episode 3 of Believe in Magic presents the moment the amateur sleuths finally get photographic proof that Megan and Jean were not in a hospital: a private detective's report and photographs of the pair walking off the Queen Mary 2 in Southampton, laughing, pushing five suitcases, with no oxygen or intravenous equipment.

    ·28m·2 clips
  6. 6

    Episode 6: One Direction

    Episode 6 of Believe in Magic traces how One Direction became the apparent motivation behind the Believe in Magic charity, with Megan's sister Kate saying she is '99% sure' the charity was set up specifically to attract the band's attention.

    ·29m·2 clips
  7. 7

    Episode 7: Jean

    Ruth is nervous.

    ·44m·3 clips
  8. 8

    Episode 4: Doctors

    The inquest tape changes the room.

    ·27m·2 clips
  9. 9

    Episode 5: Sisters

    Episode 5 of Believe in Magic introduces Megan's older sisters Kate and Rachel, who describe a pattern of illness and manipulation that predates the Believe in Magic charity by decades.

    ·27m·1 clip
  10. 10

    Episode 8: The Mother of All Cons

    Believe in Magic: Episode 8 revisits Megan Bari’s charity, the £120,000 raised for alleged brain-tumour treatment, and the parents who found her at Disney World.

    May 31, 2026·35m·2 clips
  11. 11

    Introducing…. World of Secrets: Season 1 - The Abercrombie Guys

    Oct 5, 2023·1m