If you watch Schaffrillas on YouTube, then I have bad news. Him, his brother, and his friend got into a really bad car crash Sunday. His brother Patrick and his friend Chris died and James (aka Schaffrillas) is in critical condition in the hospital. This comes from one of Schaffrillas's editors. So far there is no news on a GoFundMe from his family, but yeah. Keep the family in your hearts.
For context, a Youtuber by the name of Schafrillas Productions (you may have heard of 'em) just posted a 'theory' that Reggie and Jake from Free Birds are actually Sans and Papyrus.
Me when contrapoints, some more news, jessie gender, tommyinnit, schaffrillas productions and philosophy tube all post within the same 8 days of one another:
Im so fucking shocked to hear about Schaffrillas, his brother and friend, I’m hoping nothing but a swift recovery to him and my absolute condolences to family
Hey can someone remind me on Friday 18:00 GMT to go get pizza? A schaffrillas video about which smash characters have canonically eaten pizza just released and as someone who has ate many a pizza while watching schaffrillas videos it will be very funny to eat pizza while watching this one
So a lot of people are confused on what a kicktoon is, basically a kicktoon (which I named after the crowdfunding website Kickstarter and the Nicktoons line of marketing used by Nickelodeon for their cartoons in the 90s and 2000s) is a crowdfunded indie animated web series that uses the exact same formula that was created by Hazbin Hotel and appeared as a result of the “boom” created by it. And for those of you who don’t know what the difference is between a kicktoon and a normal indie web cartoon is, then here’s the controversial meme I made to point out the formula:
Personally I’m not a fan of the genre because I think it’s the animation equivalent of the mascot horror genre of video games and the megamusical genre of stage plays, but in some ways it’s worse than mascot horror and the megamusical genre, because instead of starting out with heavy hitters like FNaF and Cats respectively, it essentially started out with Garten of Ban Ban and the broadway version of Starlight Express. I haven’t seen any other kicktoon outside of Helluva Boss and the test pilot for Hazbin Hotel, but if that’s the catalyst and gold standard for the genre, then I’m not holding my breath for one’s like Lackadaisy and The Amazing Digital Circus.
Now don’t get me wrong, I technically don’t hate the idea of kicktoons, in fact I actually see a lot of potential in the genre, however, I feel like this potential has been largely ignored in favor of people trying to replicate the success of Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss, and that was largely the case with the mascot horror and megamusical genres, that was, until the release of these:
My Friendly Neighborhood and Rent+Wicked basically served as a breath of fresh air for for the mascot horror genre and megamusical genre respectively, because instead of trying to replicate the success of previous entries in the genre, they all tried to do their own unique things to stand out from the rest. That’s because they weren’t made with the intention of replicating the success of other works, but rather they were made without those works or their respective genres in mind. MFN was made to be a spiritual successor to both the works of Jim Henson and Resident Evil style horror games (similar to how the video game Cuphead was made with the intent of being a spiritual successor to the golden age of animation and video games from the nes and Super Nintendo era of gaming) and both Johnathan Larson and Stephen Sondhiem had personal grudges about the megamusical genre and decided to make plays that wouldn’t follow the formula set by the genre, and surprisingly, all three were big hits. But I feel like that the kicktoon genre has yet to receive it’s MFN or Rent/Wicked style saving grace. If we don’t try to point out how this genre is slowly starting to ruin indie web animation, then there might never be a saving grace for the genre if people keep at it and keep listening to Saberspark, Cellspex, and all the other shills of the genre:
Of course, this is all just my opinion so feel free to (respectfully) disagree with me if you like.