Perhaps some stories are actually about the author as well. Serial, since you brought it up, always seemed to me to also be about Sarah Koenig's relationship to Adnan, how she feels about him and whether he's telling the truth, and her journey along the way. I really don't think "it's simply a lack of discipline of the writers to take themselves out of the story" is a fair representation of what the story is about. You might think it it would have been better presented a different way, but I don't think it's the way it is because they were sloppy, but because that's the type of story they wanted to tell.