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"Channel Not So Awesome" - Ex-contributors of Channel Awesome detail a history of abuse (READ OP)

Arcia

Arcia

Member
Oct 27, 2017
661
Houston, TX
You know, I have been fighting a fever for 3 days staight and this thread is not helping me feel any less delerious. I think I need a break.
 
deepFlaw

deepFlaw

Knights of Favonius World Tour '21
Member
Oct 25, 2017
23,494
Sorry if my post contributed to it further; did not see people questioning further already when I posted.
 

Deleted member 9306

Self-requested temporary ban
Banned
Oct 26, 2017
962
So this is my first time posting in this thread, but I've been watching it since page 15 or so...

This is seriously getting out of control now. I used to watch a lot of Nostalgia Critic, and was still sort of "keeping up" as of January this year, although I stopped because I was a bit disappointed in the fact that they didn't do a Black Panther review, and the fact that they said a couple of problematic things during their informal review of it. But I didn't think it was this bad.

I agree with some people in this thread saying that their website was going to go down eventually with Patreon being a thing, and in retrospect, I think by now the entire "Angry Media Reviewer" shitck is really, really outdated. From Angry Joe (who I still respect) to even re-watching old Spoony videos, I just find it really tiring and not containing the depth that I want it to despite those reviews being really, really long. I hope all their past contributors eventually get better though, and I specifically hope that this drama doesn't dig into Lindsay's success. Her, FoldableHuman, Errant Signal, Noah Caldwell-Gervais and MovieBob are my go-to Youtube Reviewers for media now.

And as an aside, is there really nothing legal that they can do if some of the past contributors were sexually harassed? I'm not familiar with American Law (Canadian here.)

EDIT: Removed some parts after reading the Mod Post.
 
Sketchsanchez

Sketchsanchez

Attempted to circumvent ban with alt account
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
2,702
I became the biggest fan of lupa cuz of CA. Everyone I've shown her to has loved her, it's really sad how this has gone down.
 
Meatwad

Meatwad

The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
3,653
USA
You inow it's sad, All Channel Awesome had to do was address the former producer's concerns and issue a sincere apology and just own up to the fact that they've been shitty and this would be over right now. That's all the Ex-Producers wanted from this. Instead Channel Awesome just continues to make things worse with Non- apologies and attacking the former producers. This is like a masterclass in shooting yourself in the foot. Guess that's what happens when you don't even have proper PR to tell you not to make idiotic statements
 
Veelk

Veelk

Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,705
SaturdayAwe said:
So this is my first time posting in this thread, but I've been watching it since page 15 or so...

This is seriously getting out of control now. I used to watch a lot of Nostalgia Critic, and was still sort of "keeping up" as of January this year, although I stopped because I was a bit disappointed in the fact that they didn't do a Black Panther review, and the fact that they said a couple of problematic things during their informal review of it. But I didn't think it was this bad.

I agree with some people in this thread saying that their website was going to go down eventually with Patreon being a thing, and in retrospect, I think by now the entire "Angry Media Reviewer" shitck is really, really outdated. From Angry Joe (who I still respect) to even re-watching old Spoony videos, I just find it really tiring and not containing the depth that I want it to despite those reviews being really, really long. I hope all their past contributors eventually get better though, and I specifically hope that this drama doesn't dig into Lindsay's success. Her, FoldableHuman, Errant Signal, Noah Caldwell-Gervais and MovieBob are my go-to Youtube Reviewers for media now.

And as an aside, is there really nothing legal that they can do if some of the past contributors were sexually harassed? I'm not familiar with American Law (Canadian here.)

EDIT: Removed some parts after reading the Mod Post.
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I really do agree with this.

Even the Star Wars prequels RLM reviews, which I held as the apex of reviewing a bad movie, have aged pretty poorly in certain regards. They're still good overall, but not unimpeachable, like I previously thought they were.

I think it's more because anger is not a feeling you should sustain the entire way through your reviewing career. Sure, bad movies make anger entertaining to watch, but when your responding with anger to EVERYTHING, it just doesn't work as well. It's too singular.
 
JonnyDBrit

JonnyDBrit

God and Anime
Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,015
It's been frustrating to mull over this the last few weeks, though much of my sentiment has thankfully been already put into words by SaturdayAwe - indeed, I follow almost all the same reviewers.

It's just... bizarre to see something I used to almost religiously follow as a young teen, coming to terms with what ostensible quality in fiction even was, go down in flames just this badly. Sure, I'd grown distant from the site as I realised how drastically my tastes and general approach to consumption was differing to that of the reviewers - particularly Doug - but it was formative for me. It mattered. And now it just... it's a pile of incompetency, deceit, and downright cruelty.
 
sangreal

sangreal

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
10,890
TheLostBigBoss said:
Errr, I'm a little behind on the latest developments.

When was stuff like "grooming" mentioned?
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It's in the original full doc

but the person who accused someone of grooming was an adult at the time (they said their emotional age was younger or something to that effect) and that is probably why the phrasing was changed in the summaries
 
Murkas

Murkas

Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
615
Just caught up to this shitshow to find that Angry Joe has left, their sponsor pulled out, and Channel Awesome responded in the most dumbest way possible.

Like from best to worst:
1) Apologise for what happened and aim to do better
2) Hunker down, keep quiet, and hope it all blows over
3) We regret you felt that way BS
4) Literally anything else
5) What they're doing now attacking the former staff

Like, I'm pretty sure the subscriber drop was slowing down before they did this...
 
JCHandsom

JCHandsom

Avenger
Nov 3, 2017
4,218
SaturdayAwe said:
So this is my first time posting in this thread, but I've been watching it since page 15 or so...

This is seriously getting out of control now. I used to watch a lot of Nostalgia Critic, and was still sort of "keeping up" as of January this year, although I stopped because I was a bit disappointed in the fact that they didn't do a Black Panther review, and the fact that they said a couple of problematic things during their informal review of it. But I didn't think it was this bad.

I agree with some people in this thread saying that their website was going to go down eventually with Patreon being a thing, and in retrospect, I think by now the entire "Angry Media Reviewer" shitck is really, really outdated. From Angry Joe (who I still respect) to even re-watching old Spoony videos, I just find it really tiring and not containing the depth that I want it to despite those reviews being really, really long. I hope all their past contributors eventually get better though, and I specifically hope that this drama doesn't dig into Lindsay's success. Her, FoldableHuman, Errant Signal, Noah Caldwell-Gervais and MovieBob are my go-to Youtube Reviewers for media now.

And as an aside, is there really nothing legal that they can do if some of the past contributors were sexually harassed? I'm not familiar with American Law (Canadian here.)

EDIT: Removed some parts after reading the Mod Post.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

JonnyDBrit said:
It's been frustrating to mull over this the last few weeks, though much of my sentiment has thankfully been already put into words by SaturdayAwe - indeed, I follow almost all the same reviewers.

It's just... bizarre to see something I used to almost religiously follow as a young teen, coming to terms with what ostensible quality in fiction even was, go down in flames just this badly. Sure, I'd grown distant from the site as I realised how drastically my tastes and general approach to consumption was differing to that of the reviewers - particularly Doug - but it was formative for me. It mattered. And now it just... it's a pile of incompetency, deceit, and downright cruelty.
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Yeah, that's pretty much exactly where I'm at too
 
Brian McDoogle

Brian McDoogle

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,927
Murkas said:
Like, I'm pretty sure the subscriber drop was slowing down before they did this...
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It was! Prior to them putting out the response, the daily subscriber loss was probably going to end up around -1200 for the day, which would have made it the second smallest drop since this started. The trend line was slowing down.

JCHandsom said:
Yeah, that's pretty much exactly where I'm at too
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There's great irony in us being nostalgic and critical of the site and old videos when the damn site is centered around being critical of nostalgia.
 
Cow Mengde

Cow Mengde

Member
Oct 26, 2017
12,697
I know this is weird to say as a long time fan -- but seeing the people on the site being outraged by the crappy statement released makes me feel a whole lot better about the fandom. I was genuinely worried people would latch on and defend them. I've seen rabid fans before. Hell, I've seen rabid fans in CA, that's actually one of the reason I stopped going to the site year ago due to how aggressive the fans seem. Now, it seems tons of fans, while still aggressive, is aiming their frustration in the right direction. Oh, I'm sure there will be the minority of diehards who'll defend everything, but vast majority of people speaking out in the comments section shows that most won't tolerate this shit. Good on the fans!
 
Seiniyta

Seiniyta

Member
Oct 25, 2017
521
Tamara's and Malcolm's replies are really unfortunate. However, I do understand where they are coming from and are probably just really scared of what's going to happen to their livelihood and probably just trust the people they interacted on a daily basis for I think a couple of years now. Malcolm's initial statement had been really solid too.

I won't hold it against them (yet), but I do hope they just stay off twitter for now.

It's crazy but also rather fitting how their own incompetence and hubris dealing with this situation lead to this AwesomeApocalypse whilst a genuine apology and promise to do better would have been all it took for them to defuse the fire somewhat and let it blow over.
 
Wanderer5

Wanderer5

Prophet of Truth
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
10,982
Somewhere.
Man, it was indeed looking to be dying down before CA just went to dig even deeper. What a shit show this is continuing to be.
 
CelestialAtom

CelestialAtom

Mambo Number PS5
Member
Oct 26, 2017
6,037
Cow Mengde said:
I know this is weird to say as a long time fan -- but seeing the people on the site being outraged by the crappy statement released makes me feel a whole lot better about the fandom. I was genuinely worried people would latch on and defend them. I've seen rabid fans before. Hell, I've seen rabid fans in CA, that's actually one of the reason I stopped going to the site year ago due to how aggressive the fans seem. Now, it seems tons of fans, while still aggressive, is aiming their frustration in the right direction. Oh, I'm sure there will be the minority of diehards who'll defend everything, but vast majority of people speaking out in the comments section shows that most won't tolerate this shit. Good on the fans!
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Yeah, the diehard community took a bad turn around To Boldly Flee and killed my love for the site. I still support the producers that I loved back then, but this whole thing is a major shit show and has pushed me to stay away from a few that I really enjoyed (NC being one of them).
 
caliph95

caliph95

Member
Oct 25, 2017
35,155
the subscriber loss was going down too and people probably would have forgotten if they shut up

it went a bit up now thanks to the statement
 
Strider_Blaze

Strider_Blaze

Member
Oct 28, 2017
7,957
Lancaster, CA
Good fuck, to think they made things even worse for themselves! I'm pretty sad for Malcom and Tamara's responses, I mean they didn't go through the grievances of the former contributors, but wish they were more understanding of the situations.
 
lunarworks

lunarworks

Member
Oct 25, 2017
22,116
Toronto
iUCRWB1.gif
 
Dekuman

Dekuman

Member
Oct 27, 2017
19,026
To be fair to CA here, the anniversary movies probably were just meant to be Doug/Rob having fun and shooting a movie. But because they were the face of CA, it morphed into 'let's invite all these other people on our channel' but the site wasn't profitable enough or management didn't want to make it into a paid thing.
As far as I understand they did pay for hotel stays and air fare, but in an oddball universe where all CA producers lived in the same city, the same terms would likely still be offered because I always get the sense to intent of these films were for Doug and Rob to make movies and if everyone was local and available , it would not have been a big deal. The accidental happenstance of doing giant cross-over productions with all these characters/personalities from all over the US/the world seem to be something that came later and they tried to fit into their original mold.
 
PlanetSmasher

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
115,496
Dekuman said:
To be fair to CA here, the anniversary movies probably were just meant to be Doug/Rob having fun and shooting a movie. But because they were the face of CA, it morphed into 'let's invite all these other people on our channel' but the site wasn't profitable enough or management didn't want to make it into a paid thing.
As far as I understand they did pay for hotel stays and air fare, but in an oddball universe where all CA producers lived in the same city, the same terms would likely still be offered because I always get the sense to intent of these films were for Doug and Rob to make movies. The accidental happenstance of doing giant cross-over productions with all these characters/personalities seem to be something that came later and they tried to fit into their original mold.
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A little clarification: The very first crossover special was literally just a crossover fight between Doug and the Angry Video Game Nerd with all of Doug's friends included. The crossover thing was always intended even before the idea to make them into full movies was added to the equation.
 
Dekuman

Dekuman

Member
Oct 27, 2017
19,026
PlanetSmasher said:
A little clarification: The very first crossover special was literally just a crossover fight between Doug and the Angry Video Game Nerd with all of Doug's friends included. The crossover thing was always intended even before the idea to make them into full movies was added to the equation.
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That wasn't Kickassia right? I think I saw the avgn/doug feud video.
 

Deleted member 176

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
37,160
JonnyDBrit said:
It's been frustrating to mull over this the last few weeks, though much of my sentiment has thankfully been already put into words by SaturdayAwe - indeed, I follow almost all the same reviewers.

It's just... bizarre to see something I used to almost religiously follow as a young teen, coming to terms with what ostensible quality in fiction even was, go down in flames just this badly. Sure, I'd grown distant from the site as I realised how drastically my tastes and general approach to consumption was differing to that of the reviewers - particularly Doug - but it was formative for me. It mattered. And now it just... it's a pile of incompetency, deceit, and downright cruelty.
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Yuuuup. Weirdest part for me is that Lewis and Lindsay's videos exposed me to a lot of progressive ideas for the first time, and it turns out the site I watched the videos on was just awful.
 
Brian McDoogle

Brian McDoogle

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,927
PlanetSmasher said:
I am fairly certain Captain S crossed over with the Nerd but not Channel Awesome, but I might be wrong there.
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No, Captain S was involved. He did do a solo episode with AVGN later, but I think it was only posted on the PBC Productions channel. It was a holiday one-off.

Sidenote: If you like Saved by the Bell (and, heck Strangers with Candy since it is lampooning similar stuff, albeit more crudely), The New Adventures of Captain S is charming, wholesome fun. Shame we never got a sequel season.
 
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