Remembering The Unknown Reviewers

Oh, you wacky super villains, you.

With this comic I announced that I had been asked to join Reviewers Unknown. I had never been asked to join something that didn’t require a fee. That was new to me, that somebody liked my work enough to say “hey, bring you work here and join our group”. I was invited to join a Voiceover email group and I still don’t know why, but that was it.

Saturday was the final night RU was in operation. Due to server costs and not enough return in ad revenue to cover it, Ozzie Arcane couldn’t keep the site up. I was hoping my final posting would be the tribute article you’re reading now, but last week was something of a mess and if you’ve been paying attention you know why. However, I always planned to cross-post here to the Spotlight after the site went down so I can at least keep that plan going. But first my history with the site.

It all began when I asked Eli Stone, also known as The Cartoon Hero, if I could post his review of the live-action Scooby-Doo movie. He agreed and apparently poked around the site afterwards. He told Ozzie about my articles. At the time he was planning a revamp of RU and it would include article writers as well as the usual video producers. Interestingly, around this time I was producing videos, although the reviews were few compared to convention footage and interviews (still is like that, actually) but it still counts. Anyway, I tuned in to Ozzie’s streaming of a Godzilla movie (I posted the tribute video to Ozzie below, and if you’re wondering why I had him next to Godzilla’s foot, that’s why) and he mentioned Eli recommended me to the site. By the time my brain caught that it was a awhile. I was watching Godzilla after all.

Sometime later Ozzie contacted me and officially invited me to join Reviewers Unknown. While I couldn’t write anything original for the site, since at the time I was trying to write articles and maintain a goofy work schedule at the paying job I had at the time (and no longer do), he had no problem with that. I also started posting my “video article” as well, the video reviews and convention footage.

Ozzie started RU about four years ago, gathering a group of his friends to cross-promote their work much like the people at That Guy With The Glasses was doing. They weren’t alone in that plan. Other reviewer collectives had started up, people who at the time weren’t ready to join Channel Awesome, although a number did, including some of our membership. They learned from each other and grew as reviewers and video producers. Ozzie even helped me with my first video review by suggesting the DVD-ripping software. If you wondered why he was credited in my review of Godzilla Vs. King Ghidorah now you know. Now that I think about, Godzilla and Ozzie are more connected to my RU experience than I thought.

But all good things come to an end. I would usually make a joke about my arriving leading to RU’s downfall, but I would trade it for anything. I’ve been welcomed into a fold only three times in my life, not counting the few friends I had in school. One was the Transformers newsgroup alt.toys.transformers. The second was part of a sprite comic team called Save Sytel’s Sanity, and I can’t even find it anymore. The last was Reviewers Unknown. I lost touch with the first two due to life events but the last one went on its own. It’s kind of sad.

Some of our group have ended up on other site, sometimes at the same time as RU. However, due to my limited self-esteem I never applied for any of them, even if I knew they were recruiting, not being sure if my videos are good enough and nobody taking the articles in the video reviewing communities. Plus I still can’t post anything new, just tweaked articles like I did RU. So for now BW Media Spotlight and The Clutter Reports are the only sites I have left to showcase my reviews and commentaries. Maybe someday some other site will pick me up, either by stumbling on my work like RU did or my getting the guts to apply and end up being better than I thought. At least I have these venues. I’m trying to follow my former comrades, especially the shows I enjoyed and ones where I’m friends with the producer in question. I won’t forget my time there, a chance to be part of something. I’d say I’ll miss them but I’m still in contact with them. I will miss being able to say I’m a contributor to a group project.

And the last time one of my productions will end with the Reviewers Unknown stinger: