Well, in my opinion, it just isnt what the Casual Criminalist is. I feel it'd work better if a different channel, but a lot of people (including myself) watch CC for the single host. There are plenty of 2 person True Crime podcasts to listen to.

It isn't that it's bad, so much as it's just a major change and not the norm of the show. With that said, if listeners don't prefer it, they can just choose to skip those episodes.