Details on Upcoming "Homestar Runner" Reviews
Nov 9, 2013 14:44:20 GMT -5
Douay-Rheims-Challoner, 🐍 huss 🐍, and 4 more like this
Post by Roy Batty's Pet Dove on Nov 9, 2013 14:44:20 GMT -5
Oh, hello. Welcome to Homestar Runner Tolerability Index TV Reviews. It's dot com!
So, basically, @scottbaio and I (Roy Batty's Pet Dove) have decided to review Homestar Runner, which for those of you who may not know was a web series hosted on the almost-aptly-named homestarrunner.com, which was created in 2000, and last updated in 2010. Although Matt and Mike Chapman (better known as The Brothers Chaps) originally conceived of some of the characters (among them Homestar Runner and Strong Bad, and as an aside, apparently the children's books were the idea of Mike and his friend Craig Zobel) for several children's books, the idea evolved into a series of cartoons about this group of weird, vaguely humanoid characters. These cartoons became quite popular through word-of-mouth/computer, and The Brothers Chaps were able to make a living off of selling Homestar Runner-related merchandise on their site. Although the site appears to be on a more-or-less permanent hiatus, Matt Chapman, who voiced the majority of the site's characters, now works on the TV shows Yo Gabba Gabba (writer, director producer) and The Aquabats Super Show (writer, director, actor). Mike Chapman lives with his wife Missy Palmer (voice actress for the character Marzipan) and their children.
When Will Reviews Be Posted?
For the time being, we're thinking about uploading reviews on Fridays. The first review will probably be posted this coming Friday (November 15th).
Where Can I Find the Episodes?
All Homestar Runner cartoons are available to be viewed on the website homestarrunner.com. If you want to watch online, this is the way that I would suggest you do it, as the vast majority of the easter eggs embedded in the Flash format used on their site are unavailable on other formats (and you'll be missing a lot of great jokes and gags, some of them quite elaborate, without the easter eggs). But, if for some reason you can't access or are averse to visiting The Brothers Chaps' site, then most (possibly all) of the episodes can also be found on YouTube; you can simply search for any particular cartoon and I expect you should be able to find it pretty easily, and this user would appear to have uploaded most of the cartoons (given the lack of identifying information, I would hazard a guess that this user is not representing the real Brothers Chaps in any official sense). If you want to own your own physical copy of the cartoons on DVD, there are DVDs of all of the Strong Bad Emails (through #200) and three volumes of "Everything Else", which are available through the official Homestar Runner Store.
What Kind of Commitment is This?
By my count there are somewhere around 400 cartoons on homestarrunner.com, which from a sheer numbers perspective seems overwhelming. But it's a little more manageable when you consider the fact that a typical toon runs anywhere from one to a little over five minutes. And we plan on reviewing somewhere on the order of five episodes a week, meaning that on a week-by-week basis, you should rarely, if ever, expect to devote more than half an hour to the cartoons being reviewed each week. As of now, we plan to start from the oldest cartoons and progress from there in roughly chronological release order. But if you ever miss or want to skip a single cartoon, a week's worth of coverage, a month's worth of coverage, or more, feel free to do without feeling the need to "catch up" when you resume following our coverage. There's no central plot to Homestar Runner and not being privy to the occasional callback is likely to be the biggest issue that you might face if you skip a few (or lots of) cartoons.
Our first review might be a little more time consuming than most, as it contains a lot of introductory material and knocks out a couple of the older cartoons that don't quite capture the tone that the show would come to adopt. If you feel like skipping any of these episodes, then as I said above, feel free to do so, especially if you've already watched them. For newcomers, the introductory stuff might be kind of helpful, and I'd like to point out that the quality of the series will improve with time, in terms of animation, humor, and to a certain extent narrative structure. But anyway, here is what we will be reviewing on Friday (November 15th):
Intro
homestarrunner.com Welcome Speech
Characters (easter egg alert: click the eject button on the VCR)
Where My Hat Is At? (children's book, and the first thing posted on the site)
Super NES Cartoon (the first animated Homestar Runner Cartoon)
In Search of the Yellow Dello
The King of Town
Why Should I Watch?
If you've never seen Homestar Runner before, then you've missed one of the most influential and beloved web series of all time. I've heard it called the Peanuts of web series for its cast of memorable characters, and ability to appeal to and be appropriate for, both children and adults. I've heard it called The Simpsons of web series for its quotability. The Brothers Chaps turned a weird idea for a series of children's books into an impressively detailed fictional universe, replete with callbacks to minor characters, easter eggs, subtle self-references, pseudo-alternate universes, some surprisingly catchy songs, and pop culture references/parodies that were playful and familiar with their source material rather than mean-spirited, lazy, and rote. But most importantly, they were very funny.
If you've already seen Homestar Runner, then you can refresh your knowledge of the series by re-watching, race to be the first one to post your favorite quotes when the situation calls for it (or race to be the first one to post your favorite quote apropos-of-nothing-other-than-the-fact-that-this-is-a-Homestar-Runner-subforum), reading two fans' analysis of the series and give your own analyses, etc. Plus, is there ever a good reason not to watch HSR?
Yeah, so that's that our introduction. Do you have any suggestions, requests, complaints, splenic hate-speech-fueled rants (please don't have any hate-speech-fueled rants), etc.? Anyway, we're looking forward to this, and if you choose to follow these reviews, hope you enjoy (re)watching the show, reading our analyses, and discussing the show about everyone's favorite knock-kneed weight-lifter, Homestar Runner!
So, basically, @scottbaio and I (Roy Batty's Pet Dove) have decided to review Homestar Runner, which for those of you who may not know was a web series hosted on the almost-aptly-named homestarrunner.com, which was created in 2000, and last updated in 2010. Although Matt and Mike Chapman (better known as The Brothers Chaps) originally conceived of some of the characters (among them Homestar Runner and Strong Bad, and as an aside, apparently the children's books were the idea of Mike and his friend Craig Zobel) for several children's books, the idea evolved into a series of cartoons about this group of weird, vaguely humanoid characters. These cartoons became quite popular through word-of-mouth/computer, and The Brothers Chaps were able to make a living off of selling Homestar Runner-related merchandise on their site. Although the site appears to be on a more-or-less permanent hiatus, Matt Chapman, who voiced the majority of the site's characters, now works on the TV shows Yo Gabba Gabba (writer, director producer) and The Aquabats Super Show (writer, director, actor). Mike Chapman lives with his wife Missy Palmer (voice actress for the character Marzipan) and their children.
When Will Reviews Be Posted?
For the time being, we're thinking about uploading reviews on Fridays. The first review will probably be posted this coming Friday (November 15th).
Where Can I Find the Episodes?
All Homestar Runner cartoons are available to be viewed on the website homestarrunner.com. If you want to watch online, this is the way that I would suggest you do it, as the vast majority of the easter eggs embedded in the Flash format used on their site are unavailable on other formats (and you'll be missing a lot of great jokes and gags, some of them quite elaborate, without the easter eggs). But, if for some reason you can't access or are averse to visiting The Brothers Chaps' site, then most (possibly all) of the episodes can also be found on YouTube; you can simply search for any particular cartoon and I expect you should be able to find it pretty easily, and this user would appear to have uploaded most of the cartoons (given the lack of identifying information, I would hazard a guess that this user is not representing the real Brothers Chaps in any official sense). If you want to own your own physical copy of the cartoons on DVD, there are DVDs of all of the Strong Bad Emails (through #200) and three volumes of "Everything Else", which are available through the official Homestar Runner Store.
What Kind of Commitment is This?
By my count there are somewhere around 400 cartoons on homestarrunner.com, which from a sheer numbers perspective seems overwhelming. But it's a little more manageable when you consider the fact that a typical toon runs anywhere from one to a little over five minutes. And we plan on reviewing somewhere on the order of five episodes a week, meaning that on a week-by-week basis, you should rarely, if ever, expect to devote more than half an hour to the cartoons being reviewed each week. As of now, we plan to start from the oldest cartoons and progress from there in roughly chronological release order. But if you ever miss or want to skip a single cartoon, a week's worth of coverage, a month's worth of coverage, or more, feel free to do without feeling the need to "catch up" when you resume following our coverage. There's no central plot to Homestar Runner and not being privy to the occasional callback is likely to be the biggest issue that you might face if you skip a few (or lots of) cartoons.
Our first review might be a little more time consuming than most, as it contains a lot of introductory material and knocks out a couple of the older cartoons that don't quite capture the tone that the show would come to adopt. If you feel like skipping any of these episodes, then as I said above, feel free to do so, especially if you've already watched them. For newcomers, the introductory stuff might be kind of helpful, and I'd like to point out that the quality of the series will improve with time, in terms of animation, humor, and to a certain extent narrative structure. But anyway, here is what we will be reviewing on Friday (November 15th):
Intro
homestarrunner.com Welcome Speech
Characters (easter egg alert: click the eject button on the VCR)
Where My Hat Is At? (children's book, and the first thing posted on the site)
Super NES Cartoon (the first animated Homestar Runner Cartoon)
In Search of the Yellow Dello
The King of Town
Why Should I Watch?
If you've never seen Homestar Runner before, then you've missed one of the most influential and beloved web series of all time. I've heard it called the Peanuts of web series for its cast of memorable characters, and ability to appeal to and be appropriate for, both children and adults. I've heard it called The Simpsons of web series for its quotability. The Brothers Chaps turned a weird idea for a series of children's books into an impressively detailed fictional universe, replete with callbacks to minor characters, easter eggs, subtle self-references, pseudo-alternate universes, some surprisingly catchy songs, and pop culture references/parodies that were playful and familiar with their source material rather than mean-spirited, lazy, and rote. But most importantly, they were very funny.
If you've already seen Homestar Runner, then you can refresh your knowledge of the series by re-watching, race to be the first one to post your favorite quotes when the situation calls for it (or race to be the first one to post your favorite quote apropos-of-nothing-other-than-the-fact-that-this-is-a-Homestar-Runner-subforum), reading two fans' analysis of the series and give your own analyses, etc. Plus, is there ever a good reason not to watch HSR?
Yeah, so that's that our introduction. Do you have any suggestions, requests, complaints, splenic hate-speech-fueled rants (please don't have any hate-speech-fueled rants), etc.? Anyway, we're looking forward to this, and if you choose to follow these reviews, hope you enjoy (re)watching the show, reading our analyses, and discussing the show about everyone's favorite knock-kneed weight-lifter, Homestar Runner!
