Feel so bad for Keiran - He was lumped with the insurmountable task of having to write material to compete with Classic AVGN. He should never have been put in that position. And to get so poorly paid that he is considering selling his car, and all of the death threats and constant abuse from fans, and from inside the company. It’s amazing he lasted as long as he did. It speaks to his passion for creating and love for AVGN. Wanna shoutout Kieran writing the AVGN Resident Evil review, it’s excellent, and you can tell he’s a huge fan of the series. It also quietly announced that James doesn’t write his own stuff, as he admitted to his indifference to the franchise in the two Resident Evil 2 promotional videos (ignoring Kieran’s gleeful playthrough while dropping easter eggs and lore!). Even if he hated his time with Screenwave I hope in time he comes around to being very proud of what he has produced.
That was the saddest thing I heard. As a fan of RE games, when James said that he couldn't get past the 1st screen of RE2 as a college student I was dumbfounded. 1st off James who's whole job is to play videogames why would you admit that. Second it's just embarrassing he couldn't and just gave up. Plus he's a big horror fan. That's really when I stopped really watching Avgn
I definitely get what you're saying. While the only screenwave guy I ever really liked was Tony. I really only think I disliked them so much was because of the power James gave them. So i think it's fair that they shouldnt have as much hate directed at them as they have. James definitely deserves a lot more for hiring people that arent that talented to take over his very successful and long running youtube channel
@@JohnSmith-yd5wq He's a retro gamer, he never seemed particularly interested in anything past the SNES. He also says he doesn't even play games casually anymore, he's just playing a character and reading script. Also loving Horror films doesn't always translate to Horror games.
I think James needs to fall in love with his content again. He’s in a position where he can forgo needing an MCN and go back to producing content that he’s passionate about. He can return Cinemassacre to its former glory, and share his passion for films, the obscure, and the celebrated indie flicks.
@@kcozz7368 James really tried with the AVGN movie, it failed, he still hasn't gotten over it, and at this point he's just going through the motions and defends himself by saying he needs to make a living for his family.
It’s clear to me that he loved his creative endeavors for a long time, and then fell in love with family and just totally became uninterested in creative pursuits as a result. I get the impression he’s not even really a consumer of film anymore. He’s kinda put film and filmmaking behind him. The problem is, when our children grow up, we have several decades to ourselves we still have to live…
@@RedCowArcade I just think it’s crazy how back in the day, before the movie, before ScreenWave, Cinemassacre was a website that celebrated films. And that even though James was The Nerd, and that it was, and still is, his most popular series, the show always came second to everything else he was passionate about. Nowadays, Cinemassacre doesn’t stand for anything. It’s merely the channel that hosts AVGN content and nothing else. The name went from being a declaration of everything he loved and held dear to an embarrassing URL that he can’t change.
@@RedCowArcade honestly i think the movie took away his passion because everything was different after that time. I dont think he knew what he was getting into and was way more effort than he expected and it bombed and he never recovered fully
The guy being treated the worst, getting the lions share of the work and making the least money?.........shocking!!! Kieran was always my favorite when they had group discussions. Just by the tone of his voice you can tell how genuine he is.
I can't remember his name, but the really fat guy is the one I didn't care for. And the podcats in the basement were boring. James barely contributed to those conversations as well. I actually liked rental review though.
Yep! In the past, whenever I'd be discussing how crappy Screenwave is, I'd always be sure to mention that I *do* like Kieran. I'm also one of the few people who watched the Cinemassacre Podcast and I always noticed that Justin seemed to always belittle him or treat him like some dumb kid or something. I really hope Kieran's ok and gets back on his feet soon. It would be a damn shame if he actually quit editing because of all this
7:44 As a zoomer (who dislikes a lot of social media except here) and a writer/editor, don't force your comedy for a certain demographic, always stay true to yourself and be honest to those around you or follow you, because even if you lose job opportunities, people respect honesty and transparency when it comes to entertainment and/or entertainers.
My philosophy is if, as a writer, I don't find my own writing entertaining or funny or enjoyable, then it would be condescending to expect my audience to enjoy it.
need more zoomers like you. once the gen x comics retire will be stuck with "comedians" looking for agreeing applause on their views instead of going for laughs because of an edgy joke
Hahaha I used to see Bootsy all the time. He would walk by my work on the way to the post office and I would open the front door of the store and try to say, “Hey Bootsy!” because I just wanted to tell him that I thought he was hilarious on the Board James episodes. But he probably hated that name or thought that I wanted to harass him and take up a bunch of his time so he would just ignore me even though I would say it pretty loud. Which is a shame.
@@jestawell Yes 100%. I’m not saying that he isn’t a nice guy if you know him personally. But he would never stop and I was nearly right next to him within a few feet a couple of times. So he just came across as a bit of a dick. But I also understand not wanting to be associated with that character since he could have left on bad terms.
It's interesting to see the parallels between James (AVGN) and Doug Walker (Nostalgia Critic). Leaving aside their similar shtick they both tried to use their channel as a platform to break into filmmaking and failed spectacularly, being forced to come back to their grind with far less enthusiasm than they used to have. The thing is, despite being way more marred by controversy, Doug seems to have taken it much more gracefully than James. He still uploads at least once a week and for better or worse he still puts effort into it. He actually seems to have rekindled some passion for reviewing whereas you can tell James' heart is just not into it anymore.
but that nostalgia critic's The Wall probably made a lot of people say like :::::::: ok... im done with this guy forever ... this is the funniest thing ive seen in weeks but not for the reasons he thinks it is
@@CypheroXIt seems like James mostly stopped gaming when he was in high school. SNES was probably the last platform he really spent a good amount of time with and even then he definitely wasn’t passionate about it compared to the NES
James has just been going through the motions for years, and lets face it, the new AVGN episodes are baaaad. It’s an embarrassment. But hey, if it sells, who needs integrity and dignity?
Well... James has known Ryan for a while. And we know how well James researches things beforehand. Filming the AVGN movie in CA, climbing the Rocky IV mountain with worn out shoes... James simply went for his most convenient option, which is Screenwave. As long as they feed him a script and handle all the editing, he's cool with it. He doesn't care... Put in the bare minimum and cruise along.
Like the guy above me said, I think he didn't want to reach out or do much research into finding people, and he already knew Ryan so he picked screenwave. It's honestly sad, he could have picked ANYONE with talent from his fanbase and they probably would've been better. Hell, he could've hired JonTron or someone as a ghost writer lol and he would probably have a much larger channel now
avgn is like most things that become popular. it starts out organically and simply for the love of doing it. once big money is involved it becomes forced and soulless
I give Cinemassacre at most, two years before it completely folds. James's heart hasn't been in it in a while, and Screenwave's takeover has been a disaster.
I'm really surprised it's still going now TBH. You're absolutely right, you can tell James has kinda just ran out of steam, and understandably so. I tried watching a newer episode fairly recently. I honestly can't stomach it anymore. It has been done to death.
@@VideoJamesNZ I thought I read somewhere the Earthbound episode was originally supposed to be the last one. I think it was before the Screenwave takeover.
@XtraMint Yeah. I gave The Screenwave era a fair shot. I thought Rental Reviews was OK at first. Then I realized James didn't contribute anything other than "Yeah", "Uh ha", and the crew just read whatever was on IMDB. I tapped out when the Rex Vyper videos began. They were a bridge too far.
Keiran is kidding himself on the weight thing. As a former fat slob myself, it was like night and day. Nothing was worse than being 24 years old and sweating going up stairs and being out of breath like an old man and always being uncomfortable in jeans and in car seats and some public settings. Keiran put that weight back on and is trying to make it sound like he wanted to, not that he lost control again. Like he's trying to minimize the failure of keeping it off by saying "I didn't care anyway". Otherwise, I felt for everything he had to say. The problem is in the geeky social media climate Big Ryan will hire anyone who will work for cheap just by dangling pseudo web fame in their face and getting to meet The Great James Rolfe. A lot of single, young dudes with no kids will hop on that job in a second regardless of what it pays. Until they get older and realize it sucks.
Yeah, I seriously call bullshit on his excuse for loosing and gaining weight back. When you loose a lot of weight it feels INCREDIBLE. The guy's an alcoholic and he's trying to blame others for his own problem.
If he still felt like crap after losing the weight, the likely culprit is that his overall diet didn't change much. You can lose a lot of weight just by starting to exercise and making no other changes to your diet, sure, but if you _don't_ change your diet then you're likely to both hit a weight loss plateau and still feel like crap. Doesn't really matter if a big-ass cheeseburger fits into your daily calories, the sodium still bumps up your blood pressure (which leads to lethargy) and the grease still isn't good for you. Not that I claim to know what Kieran's diet was like while on his weight loss kick, just saying that continuing to eat like shit even while introducing exercise into your life is a common factor in "losing weight, but still feeling like shit".
@@thethrashyone he also quit drinking at the time too and has since taken it back up long with putting the weight on. I refuse to belive that going sober and dropping like 70 pounds didn't make him feel any better. That's BS. He's just downplaying his weight gain and failure at sobriety.
Very sad he currently regrets half a decade of his life. Hopefully one day he'll be able to look back on it with a bit more fondness, or at least feel he learned from it.
i regret all my decaeds of my life. my life seems miserable. regret is strong word but miserable it is. AVGN should play I wanna be theboshy though, I think that'd be funny maybe since he is retro nerd.
I hope Kieran’s ok. And I really hope he quit drinking. I worked a very stressful job full of toxic people and the constant alcoholism across everyone including myself made it so much work. It took me over a year to get over it. Despite making insane money for a short while, it crushed my soul. Was also fat and miserable. I just cannot lose weight while drinking no matter what I drink. These days I’m lean, sober, and loving life. And when I left my toxic job, I had to start over from the beginning and it was absolutely worth it. Hopefully Kieran builds a new life for himself as a Chad instead of a slob!
Thats what's up dude. I went was into some... slightly harsher....chemicals, but that was more than a decade ago since I got rid of that bs life and things are so so so so so much better. Got my shop in Pittsburgh and I'm loving life. It's always good to see when another person got off the wagon and is happy.
From my understanding kerian was editing the avgn episodes. If James rolfe had anymore heart in video making he would edit. Editing a video is a real craft.
@@cerisejones8061 It certainly is. It's like putting together a puzzle where the pieces keep changing shape, and you have to get rearranging it. It's maddening, but it's a blast.
This is harsh man, I’m literally watching James’ soul get sucked away the longer Screenwave goes on. I hope he retires gracefully. But he’ll probably go dramatically :(
A raise to 50k is still nowhere near enough to put up with all that. Working with Screenwave, under James the absent-minded boss, and being a public punching bag for the internet? Hell no man. I don't think that's worth it even for the mainstream celebrities who make millions. I can't believe he's making that pittance, if he's telling the truth. But hey, at least he got paid, unlike Kyle and Bootsy.
James is pretty much left alone at this point, right? Man, that 2021 with Rex Viper, bobcast, and the all-new Plagiarism Madness looks so bizarre in the retrospect - it's really obvious that Screenwave desperately wanted James to do anything for his brand (that would preferably involve them at the forefront, let's not kid ourselves) before they just went "You know what? Fuck it" and left him.
You realize t he only reason they were 'at the forefront" is because James has 0 personality, doesn't want to do anything, can't do anything by himself, and is incapable of anything unscripted right? What options did they have NOT to be at the forefront? MIKE couldn't even make James interesting/engaging in anything on James and Mike mondays, what the hell were they going to do? At least if there was 4 of them on the shitty podcast they could keep it moving to try and hide the fact the only contribution James has is "mmm hmmm. Ya." Let's not forget the fact that they: write, plan, film, make the set, edit, do the internet stuff, pick the games, etc. and James STILL complains about how he's being abused and has no time to spend TWO HOURS A WEEK IN HIS OWN HOUSE. What James-exclusive projects do you think they had the chances to get going? And on the (non-existent) chance they could ever convince him to do it (once), what could it be that he'd have any engagement in? The only one that desperately wanted limelight was Justin, but even still that was a benefit to James because at least he could hold a conversation.
Kieran was treated like Butters in the SafeSpace episode of South Park. He had to gobble up all that toxic shit BY HIMSELF, and was used as a lightning rod. I seriously hope he'll be okay, despite the doxxing and garbagestabbing.
James is just in a much more competitive era of UA-cam, there are countless channels that do humorous game reviews, and if he's going to phone it in, people will just watch something else instead. He's not only burnt on the AVGN thing, but he clearly has no passion for Movie Madness or anything, he's tired of youtube, but gotta keep doing it because it brings the dosh home. It's the classic tale of people don't have what they want, and can't appreciate what they currently have, many would do anything to have the online audience he has.
he better start getting passionate about making money with his subscriber base, or he'll be a guy in his late 40's working a low wage job that he despises even more.
There's a huge difference between prioritizing your time and having no passion. That's an ignorant comment, of course he's got passion for it, He's a pioneer of youtube with the game reviews and monster madness and all that he does, but he's also a father and husband ya moron.
I'm a genuine James Rolfe fan. The man has provided me with more entertainment the better part of two decades than just about anyone else in any media. He's a fascinating guy, genuinely talented in many ways, and I personally love the idiosyncrasies that make him seem strange. He's authentic. In a world full of Doug Walkers, be a James Rolfe. But I love the fact that Bimmy has become a nickname he's widely known by. 😂 Also I think your takes on AVGN/Cinemassacre are quite fair, and always entertaining. It's great that you don't lose sight of the person/people behind the UA-cam brands. I'm not a big fan of Screenwave, but of course I wish all the best to Kieran and I hope he finds a way to rekindle his passion in a way that contributes to his happiness and mental health.
I think the golden age of AVGN was 1-100. I still load up the oldest to newest playlist to fall asleep to just because they're so cozy to listen to. After the movie there's been some gold here and there like MegaMan games, Ikari Warriors and Tiger games but anything done in the last 5 years or perhaps more most I cant even finish. His real passion is movies and his movie reviews when its him alone talking about his favourite things are amazing. Wish he just cut AVGN loose and did more of that. Sadly, AVGN is his money maker.
Lmao I'm sorry, but the thought of you falling asleep to an AVGN episode is absolutely hilarious. Are the sounds of the cowardly lion stapling The Wizard of Oz with his shit to the ceiling soothing to you?
If James and his producer just introduced this guy and the other slobs honestly ("hey we're collaborating with screenwave now, expect some changes," etc) he wouldn't have gotten all the hate. Instead cinemassacre went with the "let's gaslight our fans into acting like they already know these guys" approach. Nobody responds well to that. It's just human nature.
They seriously just popped up out of nowhere. I remembered Justin from that awful AVGN Roast that he threw for Silvermania (where James couldn't even be bothered to come up with a rebuttal at the end), and that was it. Then he was suddenly in every nerd video with a crew, I assumed they were friends, yet he never introduced them.
Has there ever been an introduction to the whole team? I had watched almost all AVGN content but the Screenwave guys just showed up and I thought 'who are these guys?'. It was nice for James to have some helping hands regardless of how people perceive them but, uh... who were they? Heck, the only reason I found out the group name was because of the Reddit thread where everyone was bashing the hell out of the guys. First AVGN video I saw was his NES collection 14 years ago and was hooked. The man is a gem. Not perfect, but like anyone he has to reach out for a little assistance because doing the shows has kicked his ass in the past, leading to at least one long hiatus.
I started watching cinemassacre for avgn, i stayed at cinemassacre for James Rolfe. Hes a normal guy doing the best he can. I feel bad that often james is in the middle of everybody elses choices, ie bootsy being a jerk, controversy around his theme song and then mike flashing his junk on the internet apparantly (rumor).
It's an interesting contrast. James claiming on his inside writing video he wrote all the 2022 episodes without help, while Kieran claimed on his quit-stream that he was the head writer on all of those
Just for what you guys have covered, James clearly lacks communication skills and has an inability to confront confrontation which would be required to resolve the issues with Kieran. It also seems like James doesn't want to be involved in AVGN anymore. I watched AVGN as a kid here and there, up to what I would assume would be season two, and then was surprised to see it still going years later when a co-worker brought it up. I watched a few a few of the newer stuff and never understood why Kieran and Tony would get hate. In retrospect, it seemed like they would carry the Rental Review episodes. It's sad to hear that about Kieran, he deserves better.
+Smashedbrothersgaming James needed to take a paycut and let a piece of his earnings go to Kieran. Kieran was paid very little compared to James despite doing more of the actual "work".
Yeah, James really lacked communication skills. If not for this video, I would not have even know that one of the slobs just quit. These was no post or even anything regarding any announcement of Kieran leaving in any of Cinemassacre's Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and their other social media accounts. No surprise there though, when James can't even properly announce the departure of both Kyle Justin and Bootsy from the channel.
30:33 weed is awful. I was addicted for almost a decade. So much time, money and my health absolutely wasted. It’s a serious epidemic in the USA’s youth that’s not being taken seriously
All these comments praising Kieran it's ridiculous. Him and screenwave are what killed Cinemassacre. Cinemassacre was at its best when it was just James, Mike, Bootsy, and Kyle Justin.
So James’ iconic silver flat Sanyo CRT, which was the centerpiece of his retro gaming set-up for years, was moved and mounted in a corner in his new videostore basement stage set-up here. The TCL Roku flatscreen replaced it. My question is this… how the heck did Justin manage to fit in the staircase leading down to his basement?
Say what you want about Mike Matei, but he's genuine and loves video games and golden-age media it's a sin to say that he's not the real angry video game nerd. James and Mike met in college and were the true heart of Cinemassacre and even though Mike said he left, he's the heart and soul as well as James.
Ohhhh! Look at Cazzy getting a plug from them big boys! Been watching your AVGN content, (as well as Brown Electrons, of course) since the beginning and, I know you read this a lot, but your editing honestly did make the vast majority of it watchable. So, you do great things with what you're given I will say, and I hope it takes you somewhere you need or want to go. Have a great day, and as always, HIIIYYYAAAH!
James is basically that band or solo artist that put out a string of classic albums, but, as time went on, their output got weaker and weaker. It's been 20 years and they're still releasing music, but you can't remember the last time any of it was good.
I find it interesting that all the haters accuse whoever just left of "Being AVGN and the source behind it." When Mike was around he was constantly harassed by people online for ruining things, he leaves? "Mike WAS the AVGN. He wrote everything and did all the game play footage! It won't be the same!" Then they turned to straight up harassment, personal harassment, of Keiran and Justin. They harassed Tony so much that he started yelling in one of his chats: "I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH AVGN, I'LL NEVER BE ON ANOTHER EPISODE OR HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH IT AGAIN. LEAVE ME ALONE!" And now Kieran leaves: "He was the heart of the show, he wrote all the stuff!" Shock: People leave when the 'fans' who seem to want James to abandon his family and only re-write the first 50 episodes over and over until he dies harasses in every way the people around James. Kieran was paid $40k a year? That's pretty decent in the area he is in. Could he have been paid more? Yup, he should have been for sure due to all the hats he wore. But this needs to stop with "They did it all while James did nothing" every time one of the people are driven away. Either enjoy the channels content or leave, but the harassment and stuff needs to straight up stop.
To me it is 2 separate crowds, but I'm not all up in the meta conversation enough to know for sure. Basically: 1. this shit isn't as good as it used to be and it is all kieran's/mike's fault 2: this shit is as good as it can be and that's because of people like Mike and Kieran Interestingly it seems like neither really puts much onus on James.
It's weird how James never bothered properly introducing his staff. Meanwhile JonTron, who started much later and was originally inspired by his work, was completely transparent in letting his audience know "this is the format now, I have a whole team, I have writers and a producer". Did James not realise the importance of that, or does he just prefer to have more people assume he still does most of the work? Who knows.
@@OSW I agree. It's all a bit fishy. Also I gotta say, love your content. I have been watching your back catalog and just got to WrestleMania IV. Stellar work guys.
@@DONKEYKONG260jeez that's like one of our worst episodes 😂😂 but thank u matey! I hope osw never gets so bad there's a truth subreddit! Whenever it's the 2043 Tatanka Redemption Arc
Tony is gone too...took Hack The Movies and went solo...rumor is he got laid off from there...which is why you've seen Screenwave pivot from making content to making video games
Mike was the real AVGN, the real passionate about classic games, James is just passionate about movies and rock music, so of course he wants to move on, but can't, nothing takes off as highly as AVGN did. James is like Kurt Cobain writing and writing but most of people just cares about Smells Like Teen Spirits, the song he wrote as a bad joke and took off like non of his more serious, passionate songs. AVGN was a small gag that took off like he wasn't expecting and now he can't escape it. Like imagine Kurt alive, balding, old and sad still singing a song about a teenager deodorant. That crap is depressing. James outgrown AVGN and his indiference about the character is understandable. He is a prisoner of his own sucess.
You realize many people live like that though, right? A lot of people are remembered for the worst gimmicks ever and won't be looked as anything else to humanity. Do you think Timur the Mongol is remembered for his decisions to make new chess? I feel so miserable. Like this will happen to many youtube influencers too, they took the bait and now they will also be stuck with this shit for the rest of their life because they wanted, a lot of them will end up dying and becoming irrelevant. I remember liking a youtuber for making eu4 video content but now he completely went down and gets 24 views oon average, yet he was BIG youtube channel before. So many of the "videogame nerds" will die because one day everyone will forget them, but the AVGN will live on since he's OG. he's lucky in his own case. unironically, he is lucky despite the fact it feels miserable for someone, there is always way to fall. So here's my message - do not be ungrateful, even if you're a woman or a tyrant, do never be ungrateful because it will bite you mfers.
@@whiteingale I think of Peter Hinwood always being remembered for Rocky Horror. Now that is an embarrassment and one he is sick of to this day. Rocky fans call him a recluse. He is not lol. He has an antique shop, does interviews about it, etc. He is within the public. He is just embarrassed by that role AND how he was dubbed over, and lets be honest...the fans that to this day who wont leave him alone.
I got really annoyed with AVGN for many years. As James started asking for donations for his movie. And I just assumed it would be released on UA-cam, which made sense why he'd be asking for donations to help fund it. So I ended up donating like $75. Then later on is when he started the Indiegogo, which I didn't follow as I didn't know what that was. Then years later, he releases the movie, and he released it to sell it on blu-ray and digital. And I asked them through email if they could send me a digital code or something since I had donated $75, and they never responded. So I ended up pirating it, and the movie was terrible. And then I realized it was lame that James used his fans to help fund his movie where his fans didn't participate in any of the profits. I'm talking the period before he started Indiegogo making videos asking for donations for his movie without even disclosing that the movie would be for-profit via blu-ray and digital sales.
lol, cause your $75 paid for a year of film crew, equipment and food? welcome to the world of crowdfunding. Minecraft was crowdfunded, can you go get a free copy of it?
@@lostconciousness4255 When AVGN first started asking for donations for his movie, I had assumed it would be released on UA-cam, which made sense why he was crowdfunding. So I donated and then didn't pay a lot of attention to it for the years he was off making it. Though at first, I was annoyed when Mike took over the channel, but got to liking some of his content. Anyways, after I donated, James later started a Go Fund Me where I guess people who donated got a copy of the movie or whatever. And then I had got annoyed when the movie was done and he announced he was selling the movie. So I ended up watching it on a 3rd party website so I didn't have to pay more for this movie and the movie was terrible. I did send them a couple of emails asking if they were going to give digital codes to the early backers, but they never responded. And when I'd complain about it on the AVGN website message board, they'd always delete it, which made it more annoying. At the end of the day, it wasn't that big of a deal. Just wish he had did a Go Fund Me from the get go letting people know early on it was a for profit venture.
Avgn definitely jumped the shark when James changed the outfit and tried to be a badass by showing off his awful trashy upper arm tattoo. At least we have the early days...
As a stoner who has a loyal fan base of other stoners, red cow scratched my itch for various types of content and humor. You guys may be 2 squares but us stoners love you. We’re good people, we just enjoy getting lost.
I'm a "truther" and would never contact/message/whatever anyone. Some people take things waaaay too far and those people are simply assholes of the assholish variety. I've also never made fun of Justin's weight, never called Kieran a caveman, etc.
Tony from Hack the movies left and redid his set i believe at his house. Kieran had a actual stalker "Rex Viper Rigs" that approached him multiple times at CONs and screenwave did nothing for his protection. Those are some of the breaking points. Apparently Ryan Schott's sister has a lot of pull
Never cared too much about him, was the one I'd rather keep from the bunch, though. Remember one talk he had with Mike and Ryan... he brought up that he had some action figures and the others totally ignored him, until Ryan in an ironic tone said something like: "Yeah? Cool story..." and laughed like he stood on higher grounds. I had the feeling then that the chemistry wasn't too good.
If there's anything to take away from this, it's that the cinemassacre podcast was their biggest mistake because the ripples of it will haunt them forever. I hate Justin.
For as great of a job James did for the first 10ish years of AVGN, he really made some poor decisions as of the last few years. He should've just kept putting out one episode every couple of months, written by him, and continued with James and Mike Mondays. That's nothing crazy for a guy with two kids to accomplish, and he still got tons of views and likely made good money. But, instead, he acted like having kids made him too busy to have any kind of job. What else has he been doing? Screenwave handles 90% of AVGN and then James puts out a random easy video now and then. I just don't get it. He ditched the stuff his fans liked most, James and Mike Mondays, and writing his own AVGN scripts.
Ironically, I had the least negative things to say about Keiran. He wasn’t the most… charismatic person on earth but he wasn’t even in the same league of annoying as those other screenwave dudes.
You hit the nail on the head,if they had just been open and honest and had James say something to the effect of "from this point I'm reducing my role to onscreen talent,these guys will be writing,producing etc." Everyone,or at least most people would have accepted that,by trying to cover it they drew more attention to it and put themselves under more of a spotlight,they basically Streisand effect-ed themselves
24:10 my interest in the Toxic Crusader game has more to do with nostalgia for Troma in their heyday than any affiliation with avgn (which, honestly, I was previously unaware of) Also Handsome Tom was the other ScrewAttack host's nickname.😅
What's sad is that when Lloyd Kaufman is a guest on AVGN/Screenwave stuff, it looks like he's trying to boost Troma with their popularity, as if he has the smaller fanbase. Which might be true today, I don't know. But it's certainly depressing. (Autocorrect on my phone is killing me.)
I don't know that hack the movies is still under screenwave, it is filming in Tony's, or his dad's basement now from what I understand. The set dressing was his before he went independent, the tapes were his grandfather's; so it would be relatively easy to relocate.
I was a graphic designer for over 14 years on a really low wage and got very badly bullied by my boss (who also owned the company). I got very depressed and turned to drugs as a way to cope resulting in my wife leaving & divorcing me. I eventually got so bad I left the company to go on the sick. That was several years ago and I have worked since but I'm still recovering, but I lost any and all passion I ever had for design and haven't done it since. My advice, get professional help before it gets that bad.
@@RedCowArcade a lot of therapy, video games (of course) and my little dog helps. I was thinking to myself after I wrote that comment that that was the first time I actually admitted out loud so to speak about what happened to me. My ex wife doesn't even know what was happening to me at work. I moved back into my parents to help with my dad who had cancer and just recently lost. That obviously didn't help matters but I'm staying sober? After watching your video it just made me aware that's a dark side to UA-cam channels that I just never realised? I just always figured that if you had a lot of subscribers then it was all positive? I hope that everything goes well for you guys and that your channel continues to grow 👍
I wish Kieran the best. He is talented and could do way more with his life. I hold James as culpable in this situation. The guy just doesn’t care. The sole man responsible for his content quit and nothing from Bimmy. James has given up and doesn’t care. He’s lazy. Mike works hard streaming hours and hours.
The thing is, James basically backed into internet fame/becoming a meme. The early AVGN stuff wasn't meant to be sustained, but James ended up playing that character for years hoping it would help him with his film career since his real passion is movies, not video games. Then the AVGN movie came out bad, the word was that James basically didn't know what he was doing on set, and James ended up being very bitter that his attempt at being a filmmaker failed.
lol how many hours do you hang with James each day? Or Mike? Or anyone? You're just piecemealing information on the internet like everyone else who ain't directly involved. How about not take sides and just wish the best for people?
I didn't realize so much of the criticism had been thrust upon Kieran, nor how much shit people were giving him. It shows how blissfully out-of-the-loop I am. I wish Kieran luck on whatever he does next.
If I remember correctly on Tony's podcast a few weeks ago he mentioned that he's moved the set to his basement and has gone full time with his channel. So I think even he's left screenwave. Sounds like a sinking ship
It's just crazy to me how normal James seemed for so long. Maybe it's because there were always crazier personalities on the internet so I never really looked to deeply into him. But now looking back it is so obvious how aloof and kinda slow he is.
lol I still remember those posts of Kieran losing his shit in my Twitter DMs. I personally have no real issue with Kieran but he is clearly a broken guy that needs to find his passion in life.
James chose quantity over quality and went "off brand" along the way. These 2 things essentially ruined the AVGN character image. James tries to make AVGN episodes like mini crappy movies and scripts everything to death. Its sad to see the AVGN character melt away and become something no-one wanted or asked for. James could focus on quality (and fix his character changes, persona, wardrobe, etc...) and make 4 videos a year supplemented with "filler" content videos and it would be great. No-one wants pumped out crap. I really want him to succeed. Currently its like a sitcom that went 3 seasons too far and its very very sad to see...
When I first found this channel I kinda was like wtf man why hate on James but then I starting realizing that we are prolly the same age range grew up in your late teens early 20s watching AVGN so it’s kinda got a special spot in our hearts
Great overview. Some people do a channel per concept but I like the openness of Red Cow as it is. To me its “all over the place” insofar as it’s essentially a vlog between “this group of friends”. I think of you all the way people think of barstool. It’s more about seeing these personalities than it is the specific themes or kinds of content you make.
Cinemassacre has not been the same ever since Mike left. Say what you want about him personally. But on a professional level he was the backbone of that franchise. He was the guy that made AVGN the powerhouse it was. The COVID pandemic and Mike leaving doomed the chanel. James and Mike Mondays was better than the AVGN episodes. I should add the ending of Rental Review as another blow. As well as the podcast which was great but lasted 6 months unfortunately.
Maybe like a day before this video posted, Stuttering Craig interviewed James for his new Side Scrollers podcast, and then aired that interview 2 hours ago. Mainly just talking about the old days together, nothing about screenwave at all. But I do like your guys' idea, of screw attack reforming. Even though Craig said that'll never happen.
So he doesn't have a problem with James and the others. Also I've noticed a lot of people say things about James that they couldn't even know are true or not. Yet they state them as if they know.
james wont show up to his own funeral because he just doesent have the time.
Feel so bad for Keiran - He was lumped with the insurmountable task of having to write material to compete with Classic AVGN. He should never have been put in that position. And to get so poorly paid that he is considering selling his car, and all of the death threats and constant abuse from fans, and from inside the company. It’s amazing he lasted as long as he did. It speaks to his passion for creating and love for AVGN.
Wanna shoutout Kieran writing the AVGN Resident Evil review, it’s excellent, and you can tell he’s a huge fan of the series. It also quietly announced that James doesn’t write his own stuff, as he admitted to his indifference to the franchise in the two Resident Evil 2 promotional videos (ignoring Kieran’s gleeful playthrough while dropping easter eggs and lore!). Even if he hated his time with Screenwave I hope in time he comes around to being very proud of what he has produced.
i agree with ........ Mooooooost of that
death threats from avgn fans dont mean much.
who are those guys gonna hurt? 🤣🤣🤣
That was the saddest thing I heard. As a fan of RE games, when James said that he couldn't get past the 1st screen of RE2 as a college student I was dumbfounded. 1st off James who's whole job is to play videogames why would you admit that. Second it's just embarrassing he couldn't and just gave up. Plus he's a big horror fan. That's really when I stopped really watching Avgn
I definitely get what you're saying. While the only screenwave guy I ever really liked was Tony. I really only think I disliked them so much was because of the power James gave them. So i think it's fair that they shouldnt have as much hate directed at them as they have. James definitely deserves a lot more for hiring people that arent that talented to take over his very successful and long running youtube channel
@@JohnSmith-yd5wq He's a retro gamer, he never seemed particularly interested in anything past the SNES. He also says he doesn't even play games casually anymore, he's just playing a character and reading script. Also loving Horror films doesn't always translate to Horror games.
I think James needs to fall in love with his content again. He’s in a position where he can forgo needing an MCN and go back to producing content that he’s passionate about. He can return Cinemassacre to its former glory, and share his passion for films, the obscure, and the celebrated indie flicks.
I agree , I want to see the effort and passion for these projects . Not a half attempt
@@kcozz7368 James really tried with the AVGN movie, it failed, he still hasn't gotten over it, and at this point he's just going through the motions and defends himself by saying he needs to make a living for his family.
It’s clear to me that he loved his creative endeavors for a long time, and then fell in love with family and just totally became uninterested in creative pursuits as a result. I get the impression he’s not even really a consumer of film anymore. He’s kinda put film and filmmaking behind him. The problem is, when our children grow up, we have several decades to ourselves we still have to live…
@@RedCowArcade I just think it’s crazy how back in the day, before the movie, before ScreenWave, Cinemassacre was a website that celebrated films. And that even though James was The Nerd, and that it was, and still is, his most popular series, the show always came second to everything else he was passionate about. Nowadays, Cinemassacre doesn’t stand for anything. It’s merely the channel that hosts AVGN content and nothing else. The name went from being a declaration of everything he loved and held dear to an embarrassing URL that he can’t change.
@@RedCowArcade honestly i think the movie took away his passion because everything was different after that time. I dont think he knew what he was getting into and was way more effort than he expected and it bombed and he never recovered fully
The guy being treated the worst, getting the lions share of the work and making the least money?.........shocking!!!
Kieran was always my favorite when they had group discussions. Just by the tone of his voice you can tell how genuine he is.
I can't remember his name, but the really fat guy is the one I didn't care for. And the podcats in the basement were boring. James barely contributed to those conversations as well. I actually liked rental review though.
@@pdmayton Justin I think. I liked the rental reviews too
Yep! In the past, whenever I'd be discussing how crappy Screenwave is, I'd always be sure to mention that I *do* like Kieran. I'm also one of the few people who watched the Cinemassacre Podcast and I always noticed that Justin seemed to always belittle him or treat him like some dumb kid or something. I really hope Kieran's ok and gets back on his feet soon. It would be a damn shame if he actually quit editing because of all this
Kieran was the best of them justin and tony were unbearable.
@@pdmaytonHI I'M JUSTIN
7:44 As a zoomer (who dislikes a lot of social media except here) and a writer/editor, don't force your comedy for a certain demographic, always stay true to yourself and be honest to those around you or follow you, because even if you lose job opportunities, people respect honesty and transparency when it comes to entertainment and/or entertainers.
My philosophy is if, as a writer, I don't find my own writing entertaining or funny or enjoyable, then it would be condescending to expect my audience to enjoy it.
maybe they wanted to sell it to certain advertisers, so it had to be nominally the specific thing that they could sell
The best videos are the ones where James just talks about things he's passionate about.
Good to hear a younger person say that. I'm turning 40 this year and rarely ever hear that ever!
need more zoomers like you. once the gen x comics retire will be stuck with "comedians" looking for agreeing applause on their views instead of going for laughs because of an edgy joke
I remember Bootsy leaving because of money problems.
Always thought it was because he was seeing Mike's girl Claire at the time or something like that. >_>
Hahaha I used to see Bootsy all the time. He would walk by my work on the way to the post office and I would open the front door of the store and try to say, “Hey Bootsy!” because I just wanted to tell him that I thought he was hilarious on the Board James episodes.
But he probably hated that name or thought that I wanted to harass him and take up a bunch of his time so he would just ignore me even though I would say it pretty loud. Which is a shame.
@@Tomofdahook17 Awww, I understand but maybe he wouldn't mind, just maybe.
@@Tomofdahook17 are you sure It was him lol, he always seemed like a nice guy
@@jestawell Yes 100%. I’m not saying that he isn’t a nice guy if you know him personally. But he would never stop and I was nearly right next to him within a few feet a couple of times. So he just came across as a bit of a dick. But I also understand not wanting to be associated with that character since he could have left on bad terms.
It's interesting to see the parallels between James (AVGN) and Doug Walker (Nostalgia Critic). Leaving aside their similar shtick they both tried to use their channel as a platform to break into filmmaking and failed spectacularly, being forced to come back to their grind with far less enthusiasm than they used to have.
The thing is, despite being way more marred by controversy, Doug seems to have taken it much more gracefully than James. He still uploads at least once a week and for better or worse he still puts effort into it. He actually seems to have rekindled some passion for reviewing whereas you can tell James' heart is just not into it anymore.
but that nostalgia critic's The Wall probably made a lot of people say like :::::::: ok... im done with this guy forever ... this is the funniest thing ive seen in weeks but not for the reasons he thinks it is
To be honest the Cinema Snob is the only rage reviewer who some how keeps going with the same energy no mater his personal failures.
Thing is James is not a gamer and he doesn't care about games one bit. SNES was his last platform.
@@CypheroXIt seems like James mostly stopped gaming when he was in high school. SNES was probably the last platform he really spent a good amount of time with and even then he definitely wasn’t passionate about it compared to the NES
James has just been going through the motions for years, and lets face it, the new AVGN episodes are baaaad. It’s an embarrassment. But hey, if it sells, who needs integrity and dignity?
There are so many talented young people out there and James picks Screenwave. I'll never understand that.
$€££¥ Outty, that's why.
If you worked on something for 20 years you'd probably want to get some return on it too.
They're all his wife's boyfriends and he just wanted to feel included
He probably picked them cause he thought he'd be able to pay them dog shit wages
Well... James has known Ryan for a while. And we know how well James researches things beforehand. Filming the AVGN movie in CA, climbing the Rocky IV mountain with worn out shoes... James simply went for his most convenient option, which is Screenwave. As long as they feed him a script and handle all the editing, he's cool with it. He doesn't care... Put in the bare minimum and cruise along.
Like the guy above me said, I think he didn't want to reach out or do much research into finding people, and he already knew Ryan so he picked screenwave. It's honestly sad, he could have picked ANYONE with talent from his fanbase and they probably would've been better. Hell, he could've hired JonTron or someone as a ghost writer lol and he would probably have a much larger channel now
avgn is like most things that become popular. it starts out organically and simply for the love of doing it. once big money is involved it becomes forced and soulless
Starwars
Thing is: James lost out on a LOT of money. He's a Thousand-aire who should be a millionaire.
@@mrmusickhimself was that a cm punk reference
@@mrmusickhimselfhow did he lose out on money?
I give Cinemassacre at most, two years before it completely folds. James's heart hasn't been in it in a while, and Screenwave's takeover has been a disaster.
The hour of Five-Forty is upon us⏳💀
I'm really surprised it's still going now TBH. You're absolutely right, you can tell James has kinda just ran out of steam, and understandably so. I tried watching a newer episode fairly recently. I honestly can't stomach it anymore. It has been done to death.
@@VideoJamesNZ I thought I read somewhere the Earthbound episode was originally supposed to be the last one. I think it was before the Screenwave takeover.
@XtraMint Yeah. I gave The Screenwave era a fair shot. I thought Rental Reviews was OK at first. Then I realized James didn't contribute anything other than "Yeah", "Uh ha", and the crew just read whatever was on IMDB. I tapped out when the Rex Vyper videos began. They were a bridge too far.
Yep I agree. It’s on fumes
Keiran is kidding himself on the weight thing. As a former fat slob myself, it was like night and day. Nothing was worse than being 24 years old and sweating going up stairs and being out of breath like an old man and always being uncomfortable in jeans and in car seats and some public settings. Keiran put that weight back on and is trying to make it sound like he wanted to, not that he lost control again. Like he's trying to minimize the failure of keeping it off by saying "I didn't care anyway". Otherwise, I felt for everything he had to say. The problem is in the geeky social media climate Big Ryan will hire anyone who will work for cheap just by dangling pseudo web fame in their face and getting to meet The Great James Rolfe. A lot of single, young dudes with no kids will hop on that job in a second regardless of what it pays. Until they get older and realize it sucks.
Your body reflects what you put into it and what you do.
Yeah, I seriously call bullshit on his excuse for loosing and gaining weight back. When you loose a lot of weight it feels INCREDIBLE. The guy's an alcoholic and he's trying to blame others for his own problem.
its very weird you care about his weight
If he still felt like crap after losing the weight, the likely culprit is that his overall diet didn't change much. You can lose a lot of weight just by starting to exercise and making no other changes to your diet, sure, but if you _don't_ change your diet then you're likely to both hit a weight loss plateau and still feel like crap. Doesn't really matter if a big-ass cheeseburger fits into your daily calories, the sodium still bumps up your blood pressure (which leads to lethargy) and the grease still isn't good for you.
Not that I claim to know what Kieran's diet was like while on his weight loss kick, just saying that continuing to eat like shit even while introducing exercise into your life is a common factor in "losing weight, but still feeling like shit".
@@thethrashyone he also quit drinking at the time too and has since taken it back up long with putting the weight on. I refuse to belive that going sober and dropping like 70 pounds didn't make him feel any better. That's BS. He's just downplaying his weight gain and failure at sobriety.
Very sad he currently regrets half a decade of his life. Hopefully one day he'll be able to look back on it with a bit more fondness, or at least feel he learned from it.
i regret all my decaeds of my life. my life seems miserable. regret is strong word but miserable it is. AVGN should play I wanna be theboshy though, I think that'd be funny maybe since he is retro nerd.
I hope Kieran’s ok. And I really hope he quit drinking. I worked a very stressful job full of toxic people and the constant alcoholism across everyone including myself made it so much work. It took me over a year to get over it. Despite making insane money for a short while, it crushed my soul. Was also fat and miserable. I just cannot lose weight while drinking no matter what I drink.
These days I’m lean, sober, and loving life. And when I left my toxic job, I had to start over from the beginning and it was absolutely worth it. Hopefully Kieran builds a new life for himself as a Chad instead of a slob!
Boo boo…MAN UP
@@mr.smithgnrsmith7808 Sounds like he did. You could really learn something.
@@mr.smithgnrsmith7808 that’s the toxic shit he was talking about dude
Thats what's up dude. I went was into some... slightly harsher....chemicals, but that was more than a decade ago since I got rid of that bs life and things are so so so so so much better. Got my shop in Pittsburgh and I'm loving life. It's always good to see when another person got off the wagon and is happy.
@@Twi66e 😱
Controversy aside, I hope Kieran does well for himself. I get the feeling SW wasn't the most.... non-self sabotaging place to work at.
From my understanding kerian was editing the avgn episodes. If James rolfe had anymore heart in video making he would edit. Editing a video is a real craft.
@@cerisejones8061 It certainly is. It's like putting together a puzzle where the pieces keep changing shape, and you have to get rearranging it.
It's maddening, but it's a blast.
SW?
@@madcapmakov2 screenwave. now they go by retroware or something
This is harsh man, I’m literally watching James’ soul get sucked away the longer Screenwave goes on. I hope he retires gracefully.
But he’ll probably go dramatically :(
I will finally sign up for the pateron if y’all get Karen on the podcast.
Call the Caveman!
@@Supersquigi 1-800 ooga booga!
Karen for life.
Lol Karen
UA-camr simp
A raise to 50k is still nowhere near enough to put up with all that. Working with Screenwave, under James the absent-minded boss, and being a public punching bag for the internet? Hell no man. I don't think that's worth it even for the mainstream celebrities who make millions. I can't believe he's making that pittance, if he's telling the truth.
But hey, at least he got paid, unlike Kyle and Bootsy.
He could just not act like an idiot and actually groom himself
@@cmdrfunk I think he and Justin prefer another kind of grooming
He's an adult if you can't handle online idiots that's in him.
James is pretty much left alone at this point, right? Man, that 2021 with Rex Viper, bobcast, and the all-new Plagiarism Madness looks so bizarre in the retrospect - it's really obvious that Screenwave desperately wanted James to do anything for his brand (that would preferably involve them at the forefront, let's not kid ourselves) before they just went "You know what? Fuck it" and left him.
They’ll just hire more people, who everyone will dislike and then probably leave in a similar manner
It would be interesting if he half-assed it on purpose so that he can get out of contract. Golden handcuffs if you will.
You realize t he only reason they were 'at the forefront" is because James has 0 personality, doesn't want to do anything, can't do anything by himself, and is incapable of anything unscripted right? What options did they have NOT to be at the forefront? MIKE couldn't even make James interesting/engaging in anything on James and Mike mondays, what the hell were they going to do? At least if there was 4 of them on the shitty podcast they could keep it moving to try and hide the fact the only contribution James has is "mmm hmmm. Ya."
Let's not forget the fact that they: write, plan, film, make the set, edit, do the internet stuff, pick the games, etc. and James STILL complains about how he's being abused and has no time to spend TWO HOURS A WEEK IN HIS OWN HOUSE. What James-exclusive projects do you think they had the chances to get going? And on the (non-existent) chance they could ever convince him to do it (once), what could it be that he'd have any engagement in?
The only one that desperately wanted limelight was Justin, but even still that was a benefit to James because at least he could hold a conversation.
@Diss Raps
uh oh, wrong opinion alert!
@@dissraps
Kieran was treated like Butters in the SafeSpace episode of South Park.
He had to gobble up all that toxic shit BY HIMSELF, and was used as a lightning rod. I seriously hope he'll be okay, despite the doxxing and garbagestabbing.
AVGN getting guest directors/writers would actually be a draw IMO lol
All the hate that guy had to deal with on a 40k salary. That's brutal.
That's allot of money for supposed that's he could just not read. God you people are so weak
40k? Are you shitting me? How the fuck am I making almost twice that sitting on my ass writing custom software?
James is just in a much more competitive era of UA-cam, there are countless channels that do humorous game reviews, and if he's going to phone it in, people will just watch something else instead. He's not only burnt on the AVGN thing, but he clearly has no passion for Movie Madness or anything, he's tired of youtube, but gotta keep doing it because it brings the dosh home. It's the classic tale of people don't have what they want, and can't appreciate what they currently have, many would do anything to have the online audience he has.
he better start getting passionate about making money with his subscriber base, or he'll be a guy in his late 40's working a low wage job that he despises even more.
Many would do anything to put their career on the backburner to be present in their kid's lives as well. It's all about perspective.
Yeah it's pretty obvious that James deals with depression anxiety and self doubt
@@takerdustno chance guys set for life financially
There's a huge difference between prioritizing your time and having no passion. That's an ignorant comment, of course he's got passion for it, He's a pioneer of youtube with the game reviews and monster madness and all that he does, but he's also a father and husband ya moron.
I'm a genuine James Rolfe fan. The man has provided me with more entertainment the better part of two decades than just about anyone else in any media. He's a fascinating guy, genuinely talented in many ways, and I personally love the idiosyncrasies that make him seem strange. He's authentic. In a world full of Doug Walkers, be a James Rolfe.
But I love the fact that Bimmy has become a nickname he's widely known by. 😂
Also I think your takes on AVGN/Cinemassacre are quite fair, and always entertaining. It's great that you don't lose sight of the person/people behind the UA-cam brands.
I'm not a big fan of Screenwave, but of course I wish all the best to Kieran and I hope he finds a way to rekindle his passion in a way that contributes to his happiness and mental health.
He’s a pants peeing spazz who lets others prop him up so he doesn’t cry on the floor in his on waste
James?.. Is that you?
@@Blowncaraudio yes certainly
lol Doug Walker is way more authentic than James Rolfe, at least Doug is actually into the content he creates, and he creates it himself
Authentic? Not so much anymore...
I think the golden age of AVGN was 1-100. I still load up the oldest to newest playlist to fall asleep to just because they're so cozy to listen to.
After the movie there's been some gold here and there like MegaMan games, Ikari Warriors and Tiger games but anything done in the last 5 years or perhaps more most I cant even finish.
His real passion is movies and his movie reviews when its him alone talking about his favourite things are amazing.
Wish he just cut AVGN loose and did more of that. Sadly, AVGN is his money maker.
Lmao I'm sorry, but the thought of you falling asleep to an AVGN episode is absolutely hilarious. Are the sounds of the cowardly lion stapling The Wizard of Oz with his shit to the ceiling soothing to you?
@@dwenzybenzy I do the same
If James and his producer just introduced this guy and the other slobs honestly ("hey we're collaborating with screenwave now, expect some changes," etc) he wouldn't have gotten all the hate. Instead cinemassacre went with the "let's gaslight our fans into acting like they already know these guys" approach. Nobody responds well to that. It's just human nature.
They seriously just popped up out of nowhere. I remembered Justin from that awful AVGN Roast that he threw for Silvermania (where James couldn't even be bothered to come up with a rebuttal at the end), and that was it. Then he was suddenly in every nerd video with a crew, I assumed they were friends, yet he never introduced them.
This channel is fair with criticism involving James and everyone else.
We are all aware
Don’t you guys ever worry you’re wasting your life focusing on inconsequential pointless B***S***???
@@Hack_The_Planet_ telling on yourself a bit aren't ya?
@@Jeremo-FD LOL I’m not the one projecting, you are. I don’t like my own comments either, you do. Weirdo
@@SINfromPL Good. Then you know.
Has there ever been an introduction to the whole team? I had watched almost all AVGN content but the Screenwave guys just showed up and I thought 'who are these guys?'. It was nice for James to have some helping hands regardless of how people perceive them but, uh... who were they? Heck, the only reason I found out the group name was because of the Reddit thread where everyone was bashing the hell out of the guys. First AVGN video I saw was his NES collection 14 years ago and was hooked. The man is a gem. Not perfect, but like anyone he has to reach out for a little assistance because doing the shows has kicked his ass in the past, leading to at least one long hiatus.
I started watching cinemassacre for avgn, i stayed at cinemassacre for James Rolfe. Hes a normal guy doing the best he can. I feel bad that often james is in the middle of everybody elses choices, ie bootsy being a jerk, controversy around his theme song and then mike flashing his junk on the internet apparantly (rumor).
Sounds like Ryan is a terrible boss, and Justin falls in line right behind Ryan
Ryan is a terrible boss and Justin is an adequate yesman.
You mean Rian?
@@thewhitematstudio maybe that's why Justin has become the face of Screenwave lol
not sure if he is a terrible boss, but based on the last talk about games he is transitioning.
@@SPQR101010 Like... "TRANSITIONING" transitioning? lol
Nothing like the algorithm showing me this right after the “inside writing AVGN” episode dropping
It's an interesting contrast. James claiming on his inside writing video he wrote all the 2022 episodes without help, while Kieran claimed on his quit-stream that he was the head writer on all of those
Just for what you guys have covered, James clearly lacks communication skills and has an inability to confront confrontation which would be required to resolve the issues with Kieran. It also seems like James doesn't want to be involved in AVGN anymore. I watched AVGN as a kid here and there, up to what I would assume would be season two, and then was surprised to see it still going years later when a co-worker brought it up. I watched a few a few of the newer stuff and never understood why Kieran and Tony would get hate. In retrospect, it seemed like they would carry the Rental Review episodes. It's sad to hear that about Kieran, he deserves better.
+Smashedbrothersgaming James needed to take a paycut and let a piece of his earnings go to Kieran. Kieran was paid very little compared to James despite doing more of the actual "work".
Yeah, James really lacked communication skills. If not for this video, I would not have even know that one of the slobs just quit. These was no post or even anything regarding any announcement of Kieran leaving in any of Cinemassacre's Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and their other social media accounts. No surprise there though, when James can't even properly announce the departure of both Kyle Justin and Bootsy from the channel.
I think james as straight up said that if it were up to him, avgn would have ended in like 2018
@Alf's leftnut he originally planned to end it on episode 100
I think Mike was the reason a lot of the original nerd episodes worked so well.
I think he needs to get more involved.
Disagree
he ruined most if not all episodes
Mike is the angry video game nerd
Most of the gameplay was actually coming from MIke and I loved the Last Ninja episode which was co written by Mike (He also plays Ernie).
They have good chemistry
It's all good. James will duct-tape another camera to a chair and sally forth.
30:33 weed is awful. I was addicted for almost a decade. So much time, money and my health absolutely wasted. It’s a serious epidemic in the USA’s youth that’s not being taken seriously
it's not for everybody, but many people use it responsibly and live good lives. of course, I'm only speaking of adults 21 and over.
All these comments praising Kieran it's ridiculous. Him and screenwave are what killed Cinemassacre. Cinemassacre was at its best when it was just James, Mike, Bootsy, and Kyle Justin.
100%
So James’ iconic silver flat Sanyo CRT, which was the centerpiece of his retro gaming set-up for years, was moved and mounted in a corner in his new videostore basement stage set-up here. The TCL Roku flatscreen replaced it. My question is this… how the heck did Justin manage to fit in the staircase leading down to his basement?
They buttered him up, which was also time consuming because he kept eating the butter.
@@AarturoSc HAHAHAHAHA
Say what you want about Mike Matei, but he's genuine and loves video games and golden-age media it's a sin to say that he's not the real angry video game nerd. James and Mike met in college and were the true heart of Cinemassacre and even though Mike said he left, he's the heart and soul as well as James.
agreed! i still watch mike on twitch almost every day and the dude is a genuine gamer.
He’s awesome I watch him all the time. Him as the joker was hilarious along with the other characters he played.
the 5:40 meme will never die
Eyo thanks for the shoutout guys! 🙌
We definitely have to collab again! 😄
Collaborate = buttsex
You-know-whats would be HUGE
Ohhhh! Look at Cazzy getting a plug from them big boys! Been watching your AVGN content, (as well as Brown Electrons, of course) since the beginning and, I know you read this a lot, but your editing honestly did make the vast majority of it watchable. So, you do great things with what you're given I will say, and I hope it takes you somewhere you need or want to go. Have a great day, and as always, HIIIYYYAAAH!
The guy on the right looks like Paul McCartney in the thumbnail.
James is basically that band or solo artist that put out a string of classic albums, but, as time went on, their output got weaker and weaker. It's been 20 years and they're still releasing music, but you can't remember the last time any of it was good.
I find it interesting that all the haters accuse whoever just left of "Being AVGN and the source behind it." When Mike was around he was constantly harassed by people online for ruining things, he leaves? "Mike WAS the AVGN. He wrote everything and did all the game play footage! It won't be the same!" Then they turned to straight up harassment, personal harassment, of Keiran and Justin. They harassed Tony so much that he started yelling in one of his chats: "I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH AVGN, I'LL NEVER BE ON ANOTHER EPISODE OR HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH IT AGAIN. LEAVE ME ALONE!" And now Kieran leaves: "He was the heart of the show, he wrote all the stuff!"
Shock: People leave when the 'fans' who seem to want James to abandon his family and only re-write the first 50 episodes over and over until he dies harasses in every way the people around James. Kieran was paid $40k a year? That's pretty decent in the area he is in. Could he have been paid more? Yup, he should have been for sure due to all the hats he wore. But this needs to stop with "They did it all while James did nothing" every time one of the people are driven away. Either enjoy the channels content or leave, but the harassment and stuff needs to straight up stop.
To me it is 2 separate crowds, but I'm not all up in the meta conversation enough to know for sure. Basically:
1. this shit isn't as good as it used to be and it is all kieran's/mike's fault
2: this shit is as good as it can be and that's because of people like Mike and Kieran
Interestingly it seems like neither really puts much onus on James.
It's weird how James never bothered properly introducing his staff. Meanwhile JonTron, who started much later and was originally inspired by his work, was completely transparent in letting his audience know "this is the format now, I have a whole team, I have writers and a producer". Did James not realise the importance of that, or does he just prefer to have more people assume he still does most of the work? Who knows.
I think it's so he feels he's hoodwinking his audience having a "written by, directed by and starring" credit.... of his UA-cam video
They are so close he rammed a massager up on one of them
@@OSW I agree. It's all a bit fishy. Also I gotta say, love your content. I have been watching your back catalog and just got to WrestleMania IV. Stellar work guys.
@@DONKEYKONG260jeez that's like one of our worst episodes 😂😂 but thank u matey! I hope osw never gets so bad there's a truth subreddit! Whenever it's the 2043 Tatanka Redemption Arc
Season 6 is where he stopped putting credits
Tony is gone too...took Hack The Movies and went solo...rumor is he got laid off from there...which is why you've seen Screenwave pivot from making content to making video games
Hack the movies has surpassed cinemassacre in my opinion
James is too busy not working to work
He's got personal errands to run, do you want him to suffer?
Man, that's a real shame. Kieran was the one person out of the Screenwave guys that I actually LIKED appearing on James' shit
Mike was the real AVGN, the real passionate about classic games, James is just passionate about movies and rock music, so of course he wants to move on, but can't, nothing takes off as highly as AVGN did. James is like Kurt Cobain writing and writing but most of people just cares about Smells Like Teen Spirits, the song he wrote as a bad joke and took off like non of his more serious, passionate songs. AVGN was a small gag that took off like he wasn't expecting and now he can't escape it. Like imagine Kurt alive, balding, old and sad still singing a song about a teenager deodorant. That crap is depressing. James outgrown AVGN and his indiference about the character is understandable. He is a prisoner of his own sucess.
Not really. The Nerd is James’s character. Mike is just an obsessive retro gamer that lacks charisma, but he isn’t really playing a character.
You realize many people live like that though, right? A lot of people are remembered for the worst gimmicks ever and won't be looked as anything else to humanity. Do you think Timur the Mongol is remembered for his decisions to make new chess? I feel so miserable. Like this will happen to many youtube influencers too, they took the bait and now they will also be stuck with this shit for the rest of their life because they wanted, a lot of them will end up dying and becoming irrelevant. I remember liking a youtuber for making eu4 video content but now he completely went down and gets 24 views oon average, yet he was BIG youtube channel before. So many of the "videogame nerds" will die because one day everyone will forget them, but the AVGN will live on since he's OG. he's lucky in his own case. unironically, he is lucky despite the fact it feels miserable for someone, there is always way to fall. So here's my message - do not be ungrateful, even if you're a woman or a tyrant, do never be ungrateful because it will bite you mfers.
@@whiteingale I think of Peter Hinwood always being remembered for Rocky Horror. Now that is an embarrassment and one he is sick of to this day. Rocky fans call him a recluse. He is not lol. He has an antique shop, does interviews about it, etc. He is within the public. He is just embarrassed by that role AND how he was dubbed over, and lets be honest...the fans that to this day who wont leave him alone.
@@AarturoSc Of course Mike is not a character, but AVGN is based on him and his tantrums while playing games.
@ Yeah, like you said “based off of”. As a character is funny. As a real person acting like that is pathetic and sad.
I got really annoyed with AVGN for many years. As James started asking for donations for his movie. And I just assumed it would be released on UA-cam, which made sense why he'd be asking for donations to help fund it. So I ended up donating like $75. Then later on is when he started the Indiegogo, which I didn't follow as I didn't know what that was.
Then years later, he releases the movie, and he released it to sell it on blu-ray and digital. And I asked them through email if they could send me a digital code or something since I had donated $75, and they never responded. So I ended up pirating it, and the movie was terrible.
And then I realized it was lame that James used his fans to help fund his movie where his fans didn't participate in any of the profits. I'm talking the period before he started Indiegogo making videos asking for donations for his movie without even disclosing that the movie would be for-profit via blu-ray and digital sales.
lol, cause your $75 paid for a year of film crew, equipment and food? welcome to the world of crowdfunding. Minecraft was crowdfunded, can you go get a free copy of it?
@@lostconciousness4255 When AVGN first started asking for donations for his movie, I had assumed it would be released on UA-cam, which made sense why he was crowdfunding.
So I donated and then didn't pay a lot of attention to it for the years he was off making it. Though at first, I was annoyed when Mike took over the channel, but got to liking some of his content.
Anyways, after I donated, James later started a Go Fund Me where I guess people who donated got a copy of the movie or whatever.
And then I had got annoyed when the movie was done and he announced he was selling the movie. So I ended up watching it on a 3rd party website so I didn't have to pay more for this movie and the movie was terrible.
I did send them a couple of emails asking if they were going to give digital codes to the early backers, but they never responded. And when I'd complain about it on the AVGN website message board, they'd always delete it, which made it more annoying.
At the end of the day, it wasn't that big of a deal. Just wish he had did a Go Fund Me from the get go letting people know early on it was a for profit venture.
@lostconciousness4255 some backing sites do send things to backers that give a certain amount.
Looks like Big Ryan is going to be dropping a few spots down on the Cinemassacre Universe tier list.
Keerin has been such a cool dude to watch streem. I knew what he was doing and feel bad for the situation he was put in. Hopefully he's happier now!
Personally loved all of Kieran’s writing, consistently one of the best additions to Rental Review, and a true AVGN fan through and through
Can I find a video of Kieran saying these things? I'm just curious.
Avgn definitely jumped the shark when James changed the outfit and tried to be a badass by showing off his awful trashy upper arm tattoo. At least we have the early days...
Can’t wait til Kieran is on the show!
As a stoner who has a loyal fan base of other stoners, red cow scratched my itch for various types of content and humor. You guys may be 2 squares but us stoners love you. We’re good people, we just enjoy getting lost.
0:29 a Freudian slip if there ever was one!
Kieran mentioned you Guys - I really hope you get to have an interview with him??!!
The thing he mentioned was that he refuses to do an interview with us! 🤣
I'm a "truther" and would never contact/message/whatever anyone. Some people take things waaaay too far and those people are simply assholes of the assholish variety. I've also never made fun of Justin's weight, never called Kieran a caveman, etc.
Tony from Hack the movies left and redid his set i believe at his house. Kieran had a actual stalker "Rex Viper Rigs" that approached him multiple times at CONs and screenwave did nothing for his protection. Those are some of the breaking points. Apparently Ryan Schott's sister has a lot of pull
No, he's still there. They were only doing episodes at his house because the HTM set was being rebuilt.
To be fair, Kieran didn't "rage quit".
He quit.
We address this in this clip:
ua-cam.com/video/9t7KtC2mteE/v-deo.html
@@RedCowArcade- I didn't think you did...
Thanks for the additional info.
never done weed either, 31 years old, respect for standing up with your opinion!
I just think "slob" is the funniest thing
Never cared too much about him, was the one I'd rather keep from the bunch, though. Remember one talk he had with Mike and Ryan... he brought up that he had some action figures and the others totally ignored him, until Ryan in an ironic tone said something like: "Yeah? Cool story..." and laughed like he stood on higher grounds. I had the feeling then that the chemistry wasn't too good.
If there's anything to take away from this, it's that the cinemassacre podcast was their biggest mistake because the ripples of it will haunt them forever. I hate Justin.
2009 just called, it wants AVGN back.
For as great of a job James did for the first 10ish years of AVGN, he really made some poor decisions as of the last few years. He should've just kept putting out one episode every couple of months, written by him, and continued with James and Mike Mondays. That's nothing crazy for a guy with two kids to accomplish, and he still got tons of views and likely made good money. But, instead, he acted like having kids made him too busy to have any kind of job. What else has he been doing? Screenwave handles 90% of AVGN and then James puts out a random easy video now and then. I just don't get it. He ditched the stuff his fans liked most, James and Mike Mondays, and writing his own AVGN scripts.
I hated James and Mike Mondays, just fyi. Mike has always got under my skin for some reason.
Has anyone got the clip of him quitting ?!?!
Ironically, I had the least negative things to say about Keiran. He wasn’t the most… charismatic person on earth but he wasn’t even in the same league of annoying as those other screenwave dudes.
That's crazy, with bonuses, I made more than the legendary Kieran, working at Wal Mart. He was an amazing member of Screenwave and Cinemassacre.
You hit the nail on the head,if they had just been open and honest and had James say something to the effect of "from this point I'm reducing my role to onscreen talent,these guys will be writing,producing etc." Everyone,or at least most people would have accepted that,by trying to cover it they drew more attention to it and put themselves under more of a spotlight,they basically Streisand effect-ed themselves
If the writing wasn't so BAD
Anybody know where I can watch video of kierans rage quit?
24:10 my interest in the Toxic Crusader game has more to do with nostalgia for Troma in their heyday than any affiliation with avgn (which, honestly, I was previously unaware of)
Also Handsome Tom was the other ScrewAttack host's nickname.😅
What's sad is that when Lloyd Kaufman is a guest on AVGN/Screenwave stuff, it looks like he's trying to boost Troma with their popularity, as if he has the smaller fanbase. Which might be true today, I don't know. But it's certainly depressing.
(Autocorrect on my phone is killing me.)
Can't say I recall Handsome Tom. Wasn't Nervous Nick one of them too at some point?
Kieran needs to do an AMA in CT.
A shame that AVGN has gone the way it has.
I don't know that hack the movies is still under screenwave, it is filming in Tony's, or his dad's basement now from what I understand. The set dressing was his before he went independent, the tapes were his grandfather's; so it would be relatively easy to relocate.
I was a graphic designer for over 14 years on a really low wage and got very badly bullied by my boss (who also owned the company). I got very depressed and turned to drugs as a way to cope resulting in my wife leaving & divorcing me. I eventually got so bad I left the company to go on the sick. That was several years ago and I have worked since but I'm still recovering, but I lost any and all passion I ever had for design and haven't done it since. My advice, get professional help before it gets that bad.
Josh, I’m sorry to hear that. What are you doing to stay straight and recover?
@@RedCowArcade a lot of therapy, video games (of course) and my little dog helps. I was thinking to myself after I wrote that comment that that was the first time I actually admitted out loud so to speak about what happened to me. My ex wife doesn't even know what was happening to me at work. I moved back into my parents to help with my dad who had cancer and just recently lost. That obviously didn't help matters but I'm staying sober? After watching your video it just made me aware that's a dark side to UA-cam channels that I just never realised? I just always figured that if you had a lot of subscribers then it was all positive? I hope that everything goes well for you guys and that your channel continues to grow 👍
@@joshoshea3194 Thanks for sharing. I'm rooting for you. It's okay to have scars, they mean that you healed.
I wish Kieran the best. He is talented and could do way more with his life. I hold James as culpable in this situation. The guy just doesn’t care. The sole man responsible for his content quit and nothing from Bimmy. James has given up and doesn’t care. He’s lazy. Mike works hard streaming hours and hours.
The thing is, James basically backed into internet fame/becoming a meme. The early AVGN stuff wasn't meant to be sustained, but James ended up playing that character for years hoping it would help him with his film career since his real passion is movies, not video games. Then the AVGN movie came out bad, the word was that James basically didn't know what he was doing on set, and James ended up being very bitter that his attempt at being a filmmaker failed.
lol how many hours do you hang with James each day? Or Mike? Or anyone? You're just piecemealing information on the internet like everyone else who ain't directly involved. How about not take sides and just wish the best for people?
He's a producer for all intents and purposes. He should be getting a cut of ad revenue especially for baked in promotions.
To be fair, a wrestlemania pizza party with tony n kieran would be more fun than hanging out with james, ... hes not cool, his stuff is.
If you are being disrespected & belittled by the Screen Wave guys, I can see how it would mess you up mentally… 😂
There goes the Kieran!
I didn't realize so much of the criticism had been thrust upon Kieran, nor how much shit people were giving him. It shows how blissfully out-of-the-loop I am. I wish Kieran luck on whatever he does next.
If I remember correctly on Tony's podcast a few weeks ago he mentioned that he's moved the set to his basement and has gone full time with his channel. So I think even he's left screenwave. Sounds like a sinking ship
It's just crazy to me how normal James seemed for so long. Maybe it's because there were always crazier personalities on the internet so I never really looked to deeply into him. But now looking back it is so obvious how aloof and kinda slow he is.
His passion project being a failure messed him up
Yeah he’s slow af
I’m on the Spectrum, and I can see that his “strangeness” obviously comes from that.
This is my favorite podcast where I can find a hand-me-down Harley Morenstein and a progeria kid obsessing over one subject.
Keep up the good work!
Bring him on for an interview guys. Ppl love kieran and tony when they do reviews of resident evil movies on hack the movies
Bring Cooper Folly on too!
Yeah ask him why he's proud of how he got himself fired from Gamestop
lol I still remember those posts of Kieran losing his shit in my Twitter DMs.
I personally have no real issue with Kieran but he is clearly a broken guy that needs to find his passion in life.
Also, I would probably get into contact with Stuttering Craig because he appears to be making waves again online (see: DSP interview).
Is there an archive upload of Kieran's stream anywhere? Can't find it
That AVGN Shrek episode was horrendous
I just want Silverman,give me Gengar or give me death
I actually liked Kieran,not Justin though ,NOT Justin.
Justin takes up a lot of screen time 😂
James chose quantity over quality and went "off brand" along the way. These 2 things essentially ruined the AVGN character image. James tries to make AVGN episodes like mini crappy movies and scripts everything to death. Its sad to see the AVGN character melt away and become something no-one wanted or asked for.
James could focus on quality (and fix his character changes, persona, wardrobe, etc...) and make 4 videos a year supplemented with "filler" content videos and it would be great. No-one wants pumped out crap. I really want him to succeed. Currently its like a sitcom that went 3 seasons too far and its very very sad to see...
James should have made Kieran an offer he couldn't refuse.
*leaves a headless Rob the Robot in his bed*
With a note pinned underneath, “now what?”
@@RedCowArcade "YEAH!"
“We all need a job,” the future has no employers, just worker cooperatives
hot damn! thank god it's friday with red cow
When I first found this channel I kinda was like wtf man why hate on James but then I starting realizing that we are prolly the same age range grew up in your late teens early 20s watching AVGN so it’s kinda got a special spot in our hearts
Exactly. It’s a point of interest as longtime fans. Hopefully you know now there’s no hate. I would love to see this dysfunction repaired.
@@RedCowArcade I am also a huge TESD fan your Kevin video made my day with all the Walt love he is sooo much more to that show then Kevin’s weed .
Great overview. Some people do a channel per concept but I like the openness of Red Cow as it is. To me its “all over the place” insofar as it’s essentially a vlog between “this group of friends”. I think of you all the way people think of barstool. It’s more about seeing these personalities than it is the specific themes or kinds of content you make.
Cinemassacre has not been the same ever since Mike left. Say what you want about him personally. But on a professional level he was the backbone of that franchise. He was the guy that made AVGN the powerhouse it was. The COVID pandemic and Mike leaving doomed the chanel. James and Mike Mondays was better than the AVGN episodes. I should add the ending of Rental Review as another blow. As well as the podcast which was great but lasted 6 months unfortunately.
The problem with "Rental Reviews" was that James clearly didn't watch the movies they reviewed and stood there awkwardly on a weekly basis.
@@rossomac21 I dunno about that. I feel like James kept up on movies. But he rarely played video games after N64. Meanwhile Mike kept up on both.
Maybe like a day before this video posted, Stuttering Craig interviewed James for his new Side Scrollers podcast, and then aired that interview 2 hours ago. Mainly just talking about the old days together, nothing about screenwave at all. But I do like your guys' idea, of screw attack reforming. Even though Craig said that'll never happen.
Craig sold ScrewAttack to RoosterTeeth. And many of the guys that were in SA moved on with their lives.
So he doesn't have a problem with James and the others.
Also I've noticed a lot of people say things about James that they couldn't even know are true or not. Yet they state them as if they know.
@@MyPixelatedPast Agreed
Love what you guys do. Hope you aren’t burned out.