PewDiePie Reflects on His Career

PewDiePie is one of the biggest examples of a society that is Hell bent on destroying itself and making the people who occupy it as stupid as possible.  While he is not the person who has single handedly destroyed serious video commentary, he has contributed to it's fall more than any other YouTuber I can think of.  I have no love for this talentless hack and believe he is a cancer of the internet.  So why am I embedding one of his videos?  Has he finally said something so stupid that I have no choice but to join in the haters?  No, I am not.  While I do find the man reprehensible, I largely do not hate for hates sake.  He's not hurting me personally and he doesn't appear to be a mean guy or anything like that.

While I am very concerned about how he is affecting the industry I work in, I believe that is another topic for another day (and, again, he's not the sole contributor to the current problem of video criticism).  Yesterday he uploaded a video where he looked back on old videos he uploaded.  He's been doing this for five years (God, has the world been blind to real entertainment that long?), and with anyone that has been doing something for a substantial period of time, he has fans who wish he would be more like his old self.  His videos have apparently changed throughout the years.  I have no idea how true this statement is, but apparently his videos have changed drastically, and people want him to go back to “the good old days.”  So how does the Pewds respond to this?  Why, by watching some of his old videos and commenting on them.  He laments over how young he used to look.  He jokes about how playing certain games helped catapult his career.

Then the video takes an interesting turn as he squirms over old jokes he used to make.  He gets uncomfortable every time he uses the words ‘retarded’ and ‘gay’ in the form of a joke.  He wishes he could go back and edit his videos.  He admits that he had no editing skills and believes it’s a miracle he got famous at all.  The video ends with him thanking people for the support, acknowledging that he understands where the fans are coming from when they want the old stuff back, but he stands firm and says that he has changed, he wants to believe he makes better stuff these days, and he wants to continue to make better videos.  This is not only a self-examination of his career up to this point; it is a bold statement from a man who doesn’t want to rely on his old tricks to make money.  He wants to perfect his craft and grow in this career he’s found himself in.

And you know what?  I 100% agree with him.  Not that his videos are that much better than his old ones (they still aren’t my thing to be honest), but I do agree that just because you find something that works doesn’t mean you have to stand still.  You have to experiment.  You have to grow.  Sometimes you have to look over previous works and groan at the mistakes you’ve made.  I make it a point to re-read old reviews every several months.  I read my old stuff not because I think highly of my writing, but because I want to see if I’m growing as a writer.  I want to go back to my old work, with some distance between myself and the time I wrote it, and see what works and what doesn’t.  Like the Pewds, I laugh at certain things I still like, I cringe at stuff that doesn’t work, and I wish I could do some things differently.

I thankfully don’t have to worry about using words like ‘retard’ and ‘gay’ in the form of jokes because I have always strived to make my sites as family friendly as possible (gets hard when you have to write about “Fifty Shades of Grey”), but there are spelling errors and sentence structures that are just…just embarrassing.  I mean, when I look at some of my older stuff I think “no wonder the Online Film Critics Association hasn’t accepted me as a member yet.”  Looking at the past is painful, but it is nessicary so that you can know where you used to be with your craft and give you ideas of where to go in the future.  So, for once, I think PewDiePie is absolutely right in his commentary.  I also need to mention that this is the first time I’ve watched one of his videos and felt like he was being genuine and sincere.

There was no outrageous commentary to be found, no forced jokes to be heard.  Just a guy looking at his past work frankly and honestly.  Admitting that he understands the appeal but that, ultimately, he has to do the stuff that makes him happy and work to improve on past mistakes.  This is something every critic must do.  Heck, it’s something you must always do regardless what career path you take.  I still don’t like PewDiePie’s videos, but for once I sort of admire the guy, and I’m curious to see where his career goes from here.  If Pewds is reading this blog post (and there’s a good chance he will because one of his fans will probably forward it to him) I want to assure him that I don’t hate him or his fans.  I don’t even hate what he does.  I hate what it has done to a craft and industry I take very seriously, but after this video I know that he is not malicious in his intent, and I look forward to him improving.

That said, I do believe he HAS contributed greatly to devaluation in YouTube commentary, and we’ll discuss why in my next post!

Writing for YouTube

If you've subscribed to my YouTube channel, you are aware that I've been pretty busy making content for that site.  More so than I have been when it comes to writing print reviews (though I AM redesigning my website in the background, so that takes up a lot of time).  Most of the time I don't write my YouTube rants.  I simple turn on the microphone, say my peace, edit out parts of the argument that don't fit or get too much off topic, and then add some pictures and videos to the audio before posting it for the world to see.  On occasion though I will need to sit down and write a script for a video.  This is when I want to tackle a subject that requires many points to be made and has lots of little details I can't mess up on or else the comment trolls will jump all over you.  These videos I need to write down so I have a frame of reference when I record.  If I'm on camera I need to put them on the computer screen and move my head in a way that doesn't give off the impression I'm reading a script.

Here's the thing though... I'm not a screenplay writer.  For all the skills I have in writing, editing, and forming a proper sentence, screenplays have always given me trouble because they are too vague and brief.  You don't spend a lot of time detailing scenarios because that's what the director will be doing.  Dialog can't go on too long because there are other characters on screen.  I have written screenplays for unproduced shorts, but they were by far the most difficult things I had to write.  Yet I now find myself in a situation where writing scripts are necessary sometimes.  So how do I write them?  How do I recommend you write them?  Honestly, this is the one subject that you are on your own with.  There is no proper way to write a script for a YouTube video.  No one is going to see what you write (unless there is a cast).  The formatting doesn't matter because no one will be able to pick it out when the final video is produced and uploaded.

The way I write my scripts are very much like I would write any other blog post.  This makes sense because I write reviews and columns, and my videos consist mostly of rants and editorials.  With very few exceptions, I am simply writing a blog post that I will be reading out load.  On some pages I will make a note of certain images I need to have on screen at the time or certain sound effects I want to edit in for a humorous effect.  I don't edit them to the extent I do with my print material because I know no one will ever read them.  The thing is, I really don't like writing scripts because they are so much like blog posts that I am usually tempted to just clean them up and upload them as is.  I can sometimes forget the reason these are being written for YouTube is because a visual element is required to really drive the point home.

As much as I love the written word, we live in a generation of people who get their information visually and on little mobile devices.  I don't like to encourage that (which is why The Movie Wizard.com has not been mobile friendly up to this point), but I do have to follow the audience to a certain extent because that's where the money is.  I still update these crusty old blogs and websites because I do believe words have meaning.  Plus, when I have to write a script, I feel bad because I know the thing is just going to get tossed in the garbage once the video has been filmed.  Maybe this is an unjustified phobia, but it almost feels like I'm throwing away hard work when I do that (I wonder if that makes me a writing hoarder...).  Ultimately for me the process of writing a review and a YouTube script isn't much different, but depending on the type of video content you produce, your mileage may vary.

Taking A Review Break

 

I haven't posted a written movie review for two and half weeks now.  I could probably chalk this up to writers block, but the reality is much more scary: I needed a break from writing reviews.  Honestly, this is far worse of an admission for most film critics to make than that they have writers block.  With writers block you can honestly say you can't write anything, the words aren't coming, anything to justify why work isn't getting done.  When you have to admit that you need a break you are essentially saying that you aren't enjoying the job at the moment, you can write but you don't want to, and for those reasons you need to just stop for a little while.

This can be a dangerous thing, but I think it's necessary once in a while.  After all, this is your livelihood you are talking about.  Your main draw to your website, YouTube channel, and Tumblr account.  For some, it is even what puts food on the table.  Needing a break from analyzing movies may be natural, but shouldn't a critic just keep pushing forward if this is what's paying their bills?  After all, that's what most people have to do anyway, right?  Well, yes and no.  While it is true you have to work many mundane jobs whether you feel like it or not, the key difference is your real job doesn't always depend on you being invested in it to be done properly.  Writing, on the other hand, can suffer greatly when your heart isn't in it.

When your writing suffers, your audience notices, and if the mediocre writing goes on too long, you could start to lose visitors.  Plus, real jobs do allow for employees to have time off from time to time, because people do need to recharge, and they do need to take a breather or else do work that will suffer as a result.  Critics, thankfully, tend to have understanding readers who will understand the need to step away for a moment.  So just be honest with your readers.  Explain why you need to step away from the reviews for a few weeks.  They'll understand.  Not only that, but as a writer you can do other things for your readership so that you can funnel your traffic into something else.  Remember, you are suffering from review burnout, not writer's block.

Personally, I've been writing more articles for Examiner, mainly about animation.  One article I worked on recently (which broke my heart to work on) was about behind the scenes drama for a website I like to visit called Channel Awesome.  The article is very different from most things I write in that it was mainly about people, not content.  I also had to do some research and send out e-mails asking for comments to see if I got my facts straight.  These are the sort of things that you normally don't do when writing reviews, and changing up the flow of writing can be fun.  It prevents the job from being stale.  The other break a critic can take is from PUBLISHING reviews!  That too, I feel, is a valid thing for us to do.

This is where you don't necessarily stop writing reviews, but for a time period you stop publishing them.  Why would a critic do this?  Easy: Because that deadline can be so stinking intimidating.  When you take a break from publishing reviews you are essentially giving yourself the freedom to write reviews for the films you want to review, when you want to write them, without stress of having to have something up by a certain date.  When I'm on one of these breaks I save the reviews I do write in a folder to be edited and published at a later date.  They may be late, but you put yourself on the break so that you only write what inspires you, and when you return to reviewing full time you've done nothing but writing stuff you want to write.  This, somehow, can help make the job fun again.

So yes folks, I put myself on a review writing vacation.  It was so hard to write that "Furious 7" review that I just knew that if I didn't force myself to have some time to myself I was going to crash and burn, and then my break would result is something much worse.  So I evaluated the situation.  April is typically a bad month for movies.  Most of the movies are terrible, and most of the movies people have little to no interest in seeing anyway.  I decided to take the month off publishing, work on other projects, and whatever reviews I wrote would be stored in a folder and saved for my return.  I decided a month would be long enough, and when I return on May 1st I'll be returning with my review for "The Avengers: Age of Ultron."

That sounds sensible right?  I'm confident my reviews will return to their usual quality now that I've had this time to work on other things, and it's not like you needed a forcefully written review of "Paul Bart: Mall Cop 2" to know not to see it (though I have done a quick video review to fill the gap).  Now then, while I have just written about why it is healthy to take breaks in reviewing when you feel fatigued, there are some sensible restrictions and rules to keep in mind if you decide to do this.  That will be the focus of my next post, which I will have up by either the end of this week or early next week.  Just depends if any major news pops up about "The Simpsons" DVD situation pops up that needs to be covered.

The Film Critic on YouTube

This is the first blog post I've had time to write in a few weeks.  There are a couple reasons for this.  The first is that, starting in May, I want to be able to have new content available to publish on a near daily basis (minus weekends), and I've decided the best way to achieve that goal is to write a series of articles that are not time sensitive so that I can have a buffer ready when the month starts.  Wouldn't it be nice if, in addition to the weekend reviews of the new movies, I can have a review of an archive movie every day?  Or at the very least an article that will be the basis of a weekly series?  At the very least I'd like to get the monthly "Great Directors" feature back on track (I love Ang Lee, but he's hogged my home page far too long).  The other reason is because I've decided to get serious about making videos on YouTube.  So far they've been, well...

...let's just say I've still got a long way to go.  The truth is, I'm a much better writer than a video performer.  I've always been introverted and even when I had dreams of actually making movies it was as a director or screenwriter.  The only time I've ever made videos are on occasion when I had something I really wanted to rant about, and even then the rant had to be heavily edited because I would just pause and take too many deep breaths.  So why am I focusing some of my efforts on YouTube?  Well, partly because the few videos I do have uploaded bring in pretty good money, and if I had more there'd potentially be a bigger financial payoff.  The other reason is that video reviews have been a force in this business since "Siskel & Ebert" was popular, and in some ways, it's the only reason there still IS a review industry!

Yeah, Rotten Tomatoes might calculate written reviews and there is no doubt that written reviews tend to be more insightful and thoughtful, but people are watching more videos than ever before.  Mobile devices and video game systems with streaming capabilities have more or less given people access to tons of video reviews with quirky critic "personalities" and sound byte blurbs.  The reviews on these videos are even more animated than any writer could be (and they have to be, since many of their reviews are going to be viewed on six inch screens).  It might not be real film criticism (though Chris Stuckman and Doug Walker are exceptions to the rule), but it sure is entertaining.  To ignore it would be to ignore what has been the crux of the business for the past forty years.

What happens if, like me, you aren't much of a video editor?  Well, much like writing a review, there isn't a right or wrong style in composing your review, just an effective one.  So long as the argument is expressed in a way that is well thought out and spoken clearly out it should work.  While the above video review I did might be weak, I'm much more happy with a recent editorial rant I did...

...which I feel works much better despite there being even less editing involved.  Chances are because I was more passionate about making that video, it came out better than a couple other videos that felt forced.  I'm writing this post as much for me as for people who are interested in getting involved in this business, but video content can't be ignored.  To ignore it would be to ignore a huge chunk of the market this market is built on.  Video reviews are NEVER going to replace written reviews, and in many ways we critics would prefer you read our pieces than watch our videos!  Also, while I will work on my video reviews, I think I'll be focusing on making videos that are poor retreads of my written stuff.  Focusing on rants and cool stuff commentary seems more logical.  So here's to my YouTube career: Hopefully it won't be TOO embarrassing!

Oh, and if you want to continue to support my site, please consider subscribing to my channel!  Thanks!

Can a Critic Be Too Political?

If you read movie commentary of any kind chances are you read Awards Daily.  Run by Oscar guru Sasha Stone, Awards Daily (formerly Oscar Watch) is far and above the biggest Oscar commentary site on the internet.  It was one of the first blogs to seriously comment on the Academy Awards race, getting so big that opinions from the site have been rumored to sway the race in certain directions (many Academy voters read the site).  I don’t read Awards Daily anymore.  Whenever I make the occasional return to the site I’m reminded why.  It’s not because the articles are poorly written or trite (because they certainly aren’t).  It’s not that I consider her (and co-editor Ryan Adams) to ruin movies by their overanalyzing of films (can you truly overanalyze a film).  No, I don’t read Awards Daily anymore for one reason: Too much politics in their writing.  This also happens to be the subject this blog post is about.

Yes, I’m going to use Awards Daily as a punching bag here, but what I want to discuss is politics in reviews and blogging.  For the most part if you run a personal blog or website you are pretty much free to write whatever you want.  Though you may have gotten into this business to write about your lifelong passion you – like everyone else – have to return to the real world at the end of the day.  If you primarily write online (and really, who doesn’t these days) chances are you use Twitter, Facebook, and all those other social media apps.  It’s pretty easy for the world to intrude.  You’re sitting there writing your review of “Captain America: Winter Soldier” when a news article pops up on Twitter to remind you that women feel like their rights to choose are being taken away by the Hobby Lobby case.  You go back to your review and realize that for how many years we’ve gotten superhero movies we have yet to get one starring a woman (no Wonder Woman or Sailor Moon).

It’s little things like this I notice in my daily routine that can sort of sour the mood on what I’m writing about sometimes.  Do this long enough and soon you’ll want to use your voice for more than just talking about movies; you’ll want to write about movies with purpose.  This I understand because I, in many ways, watch movies to help understand the world and people better.  Some movies are more important than others and I feel the urge to say something I feel is “important.”  Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.  When talking about documentaries it’s hard to keep politics out of the discussion.  So yes, I understand the dilemma critics and bloggers face when there comes a time or two where you want to shout to the world what you feel is a great injustice in your eyes.

Whether it be Obama, Bush, healthcare, religion, or whatever you want it to be, once in a while you will say something about your personal beliefs that will rub someone the wrong way.  So the problem isn’t that you are going to say something at one point the question is how MUCH will you say?!  This is where things get to be a lot murkier.  This is also where we return to Awards Daily.  Sasha Stone pays for Awards Daily and thus has every right to say what she wants to say.  So in 2009 she is all for Kathryn Bigelow winning Best Director because a woman has never won before.  When “Django Unchained” wins Best Original Screenplay and Best Support Actor she’s online the next day complaining to Hollywood that only white people from the film won awards while the black people didn’t (were any of them worthy of awards in the first place?).

She always makes sure to mention that the Academy voting membership is mostly white, old men (to her credit there ARE stats to back this up, but why bring it up every other day).  She’s extremely anti-religious.  The last big thing was she wanted to see was Steve McQueen winning Best Director and Picture for “12 Years a Slave.”  Because it was her favorite film of the year, right?  Nope, she wanted him to win because it was time for the Academy to start making up for their mistreatment of black people by giving him these awards (her favorite film that year was “The Wolf of Wall Street”).

If you disagree with her on any of this in the comments she will block you on the site.  If her co-editor Ryan gets to you first he will do no less than make you feel like a bully because you have the nerve to actually DISAGREE with her!  Again, this is her site and she has every right to do this.  For me I should mention my site gets enough readers (and now YouTube viewers) that if I were to start getting political I could probably stand to lose a few readers and the results wouldn’t be felt very much.  I try not to do that though because what would that prove?  Would I gain converts?  Not likely, most people reading my site are looking for movie opinions not what I think about how Obama is handling nuclear talks with Iran…maybe if there is a documentary on the subject I can talk about that, but otherwise my readers don’t care.

I doubt many of the people who go to Awards Daily cares to get the daily dose of anti-Republican, anti-religious, militant feminist views they get.  Chances are they just want to know things like whether or not Steve Carell will get an Oscar nomination for “Foxcatcher” (Note: I can’t confirm or deny anything, but…yeah, I’d place money on that happening this year if I were you).  For me being political on your site is not about being right or wrong, it’s about respecting your readers.  You have an audience of various people from different religions, political parties, and age groups.  You most likely have Brony’s reading your site as well.  I feel that film critics should bring people together to help better understand and love film, not antagonize them because they don’t support birth control or don’t believe in that “big sky bully.”

If you want to be a film critic or blogger I feel you must use these talents to do good with them.  Write good reviews, engage is positive discussions, and use the films you watch to expand your mind.  Don’t use your site as a political soapbox.  Awards Daily does this but I think what people feel above all else when they visit sites like that (whether they agree with the author or not) is disrespected.  Most of the posts on that site are meant to make people feel bad about themselves.  If this is what you want to do then I can’t stop you.  Obviously there’s a market for it.  If there wasn’t chances are Rush Limbaugh and Michael Moore wouldn’t be making money doing what they are doing.  For me though I think you are using your gifts to do more harm than good.

If you want a more streamlined example I suppose you can just think of what you feel when your Facebook friends flood your news feed with their political rants…hmm, I think I might have saved myself a few paragraphs if I had used that example instead. -_-;

The Process of Writing a Review - Scenes and Names

The process for how a critic writes a review varies from person to person.  I have spoken with other fellow critics and I am usually fascinated by their methods in writing.  Most of them take notepads to the movies so they can make notes about certain scenes, dialog, and other stuff that they don't want to forget when it comes time to writing their review later on.  I don't do this.  Several of these friends look at me with disbelief, as if this was am impossible feat.  I'm different from most critics in that I have Asperger's Syndrome, which presents a unique skill and a unique handicap.  The handicap is that I can't take notes and pay attention to something at the same time.  My brain will only allow me to focus on one thing at a time.  If I stopped to take a note I would have to hope that nothing too important happened during the next minute or else I would miss some vital information.  Not an ideal situation to be in when watching something like "Michael Clayton."

The unique skill this presents though is that since Asperger's is a mild form of Autism I have a much more detailed memory than most people.  That means if I make it a point to remember something I usually do.  If I forget something then as far as I'm concerned the detail probably wasn't worth remembering in the first place.  One thing that I do have trouble with though is names.  Boy oh boy do names throw me off.  It's not just movies either; I have a huge problem remembering names in real life and when someone usually says "hi Kevin" it's not uncommon for me to respond "oh...hi there" and true to avoid using the persons name until I can get a clue as to what it is.  For this I always have the IMDB movie page in the corner to reference when I need to look someones name up.

Does this mean I would have been lousy film critic before the Internet?  Not likely.  I think people use whatever tools they have at their disposal to do their job effectively regardless what time period they were born into.  If I was a film critic before the Internet I would be none-the-wiser of what I would be missing and just find other tools to use.  Besides, one thing that has been around since film criticism became a business are press releases, and those are still used today.  Chances are that's where I'd get my names.  Despite having a process that works I do wish I could take notes sometimes.  There have been a few times I have forgotten something important, wrote the review, and then have woken up later in the night realizing my mistake.  Well, no one ever claimed movie critics were movie God's when it came to information.