The other day I was doing what I've been doing a lot lately, sitting near my computer, pretending to work, when I decided to open up the Musical.ly app for the first time in a while. I go on Musical.ly about once every two months, and it always goes the same way: I'll spend about an hour or so having the time of my life relishing in all of the ridiculous content this app has to offer. But, inevitably, every time I end up stumbling upon something that makes me so angry, so confused, I have no choice but to delete the app. The thing I came across this time was #acting and it's when someone takes a scene from a movie or a TV show, and they lip-synch along to the dialogue. [Dramatic slightly off lip sync with gnash's "i hate u i love u" in the back] [Dramatic slightly off lip sync from Cat in "Victorious" with dramatic song in background] "I will not sit here anymore and listen to you talk bad about yourself! "You're adorable." Ohmygod thaank you. Now, these Musical.ly's can be split up into two distinct genres: there's "for funsies," and "for serious." The "for funsies" ones are fine. They're literally just for fun, most of them are kids just acting along to like, "Wizards of Waverly Place" or some shit I don't really get it, but that's not just cuz I don't get it doesn't invalidate it, you know? Everyone does whatever they want for fun. Where I think this starts to across the line into like, pretentious territory is with these very serious monologues done by like, these pretty boys, "It wasn't all your tape!" "So just put everything on your tape?" [Dramatic silence] "You didn't deserve her!" who are fully grown adults, but instead of like creating their own content, or doing anything original at all, they get on camera and they do this: [Dramatic music] [Mouthing words] And then they add like sappy music, and they make the caption "I love acting so much😭" it's almost as if they think they actually are acting. So we're gonna watch a few these together now, but I need you guys to make me a promise, and I will do the same for you. No matter what happens, no matter what we see in the next few seconds We will not cringe. "What?" "I didn't say anything!" "Why are you looking at me like that?" "Because you're beautiful" QuQ ugh "omygah" "I enjoy looking at beautiful people" ughh "Every day you spend in here has been because of him, until today... Now you're in here because of me and I'm so sorry" did you actually cry? cus dont cry [German but it doesn't match up] "I Love acting!" But you're not! I think the biggest reason that this bothers me more than like regular Musical.ly's is because I think when people do regular Musical.ly's, They aren't like, oh, wow. I'm such a good singer. They just accept that it's like a performance. They're just lip-syncing. But with this they're like, no! I'm acting! This is acting! This is what acting is! "You like the idea of me! You like the idea of having a girlfriend, but really you're just using me to make yourself feel better about everything! in your life that sucks!" 230,000 people like this! I'm not saying this is bad. I'm not saying she did a bad job pretending to say words. I'm just saying what's the point? Here's a few of the comments: "Get your own show. You are so good pretending to say 14 words, I think you deserve your own television show." Are you kidding me? Can you even imagine what would happen if one of these famous musically #actors went to a real audition for like a real acting role. How do you think that would go? Next! Hi! Hi. Sorry, I'm just a little nervous. Hey, everybody's nervous, okay? Don't worry about it. Yeah, you're gonna do great. Thank you. I'm gonna try! So today I have prepared for you guys a monologue from an Elle Mills YouTube video. Okay, uh, interesting, well whenever you're ready. [Feminine voice from phone] "Hi! I'm Elle Mills!" Oh... "And Valentine's Day is my favorite holiday!" This isn't... "But to be fair, I spend every year alone. But this year, this year's gonna be different!" ♫ Don't go breakin' my heart ♫ Alright, pause, stop for a second. Could you maybe do it without the phone playing? Yeah, we can't hear you over the video... Oh, that's because I wasn't saying anything. Wha? You weren't talking? No, no, I think Elle does a great job, I didn't want to step on her toes Okay, but Elle isn't the one auditioning, you are. Uh, idea! Maybe for this, instead of doing an Elle Mills video, you could read the lines from the script we gave you. Oh, that was the script? I thought that was a landmine! I destroyed it. Okay. Well, here's another copy. All of your lines are highlighted, so just go ahead and read that over and give it another shot. [Mumbling] All right, I think I got it. Perfect all right whenever you're ready. [Clears throat] "Hi" Not Elle Mills! This is all I know! All right. Well, I think we've seen enough. Um, you can go ahead and leave Thank you. You won't regret this. Okay, and this is the exit right here? No, that's the ceiling Oh, ok You can just go out the way you came in. Guys! I got the part! Man, that guy sucked I know I thought he'd never leave! You wanna make out? You bet! At least that's what I thought would happen But it turns out musically stars have been acting this whole time on a YouTube channel called Brat. This channel is home to some of the funniest shit I've ever seen in my life. According to this article I found on Business Insider, Brat was created as a way to make TV quality scripted shows for kids That would rival Netflix and YouTube by casting pretty much exclusively Musically and Instagram stars. from a business standpoint, it makes a lot of sense, you throw a bunch of teenagers with large online following all in one place You had them each promote it individually and you're gonna get hella views. However, it seems that popularity might have been their one and only goal because as you can probably imagine The shows are terrible, and it goes beyond bad acting. Let's start by watching a little bit of Brat's flagship show The Chicken Girls. Now the chicken girls has been around for a little over a year now. It's by far their most popular series I was amazed that it took me so long to hear about this show because each Episode pulls in an average of about 10 million views which is like insane. But Drew what's the show about could you tell us? Okay, the chicken girls is a show about three best friends who may all be four years apart in age But the one thing they have in common is an unbreakable bond over their lifelong passion for dance They all go to high school together despite this girl being 12 and drama ensues moments into the show when they realize there's not enough Spots in the dance team for all of them. So that's the plot but this show isn't about the plot In fact, the plot is totally secondary to the real appeal of the chicken girls: [Bell] There goes the Bell, you know what that means! It's time to continue sitting in the middle of the hallway. That was always my favorite bell in school. After school, everybody goes to the arcade, where this guy must be getting mad because the game is asking him to press Start Later, the same guy takes a picture of these girls without even opening the camera, and this girl is enthusiastically playing a game that isn't on. Then the three main girls hear a song that I guess we're supposed to believe is coming from the speakers But it's never explained I mean there wasn't music playing before so it doesn't make sense for this to start playing out of nowhere But whatever they then do what anyone would do here, throw down their jackets and dance in the middle of the arcade. They must be doing a good job because literally everybody in the room has stopped what they're doing to watch including this guy who in just a few seconds goes from Standing across the room to playing skee-ball directly behind them. Who edits these? In the next episode the youngest chicken girl and this weird guy flirt for a little bit I don't know who thought that was a good idea Then where introduced for the first time to the greatest actor in the world. "You guys be adults somewhere else? I need to get my chemistry book." Who grabs a notebook from his locker, and then walks away without closing it! Not that it matters, I guess, because apparently none of these lockers have locks on them like this girl was able to open someone else's locker to put a letter inside and Unlike what the guy did this wasn't a mistake. This was written into the show Let's just skip to the next episode where one of the girls is in the guys bathroom. He'll probably just say something normal, right? "Are you here to do the makeout?" Are you here... to do the make-out? Has anybody ever said that? unfortunately we're not gonna have time to figure out the answer for that because this makeout session is getting cut short by, once again, the greatest actor in the world All right well I've made it through four episodes and there are 18 more so I don't think I'm gonna finish this but lucky for us Brat is about way more than just the chicken girls You guys know Tessa Brooks right the former team ten super star turned vlogger Danny Gonzalez has a great video about her Revolutionary style of low energy vlogging and if you've seen that you probably think she'd be perfect playing the role of an authoritative figure And that's exactly who she is in this show the leader of a cheer team made up of a bunch of people in their 20s And one eleven-year-old. This show makes no goddamn sense. Also, I love how vague the dialogue always is. "I can't go back to my job at the restaurant. Especially not after how I left." No one who works at a restaurant would say, "my job at the restaurant!" They'd say "my job at Chili's" or "my job at LongHorn Steakhouse." No one's that vague in real life Hey Drew, what do you do for a livin? I make videos on... the website... Baby doll records is a show about babyariel, One of the most famous musically stars trying to open her own record label despite constantly getting grounded by her terrifying mother the shortcomings of the Brat channel start to get more apparent in this show like I love this establishing shot of a very real and Nice-looking library filled with students and books and then they immediately Cut to the actual set which could look more different than the shot from two seconds ago. The shelves are different colors There's only like 60 books. I love it Also, there's this scene where Ariel is being yelled at by her parents, but everyone is facing the same direction It's probably because the other side of the set wasn't finished or was left open to leave room for the cameras But it just ends up looking so unnatural like have you ever had a conversation like this? Whaddya mean I'm grounded? But there's so many things I need to do this week. I've gotta hang out with my friends every single day. You know how much I love to make music after school! (Man, you think you're so tough bein' a kid) It's my passion! (Try bein' a grown-up!) Plus, there's a guy I like who's clearly gay but I can convert him! (I gave birth to you! That hurt!) And I'm a dad! That being said baby doll records is easily the best show on this channel the one and only reason for that being that the main character's name is my name. "Good night, Drew!" My favorite moment in the show is in Episode two They're laying down a sick new track, but Drew isn't satisfied, Drew knows there's something missing, so she gives everyone a mission: at school tomorrow, listen to all the distinct sounds you may hear and we're gonna use those in the background of the song To make it stand out So that's what they do and then they listen to the song at the end and dance along to the newest hit That's honestly fine. That's a good plot point. It makes perfect sense considering like their age I'm not gonna argue with that, but hold up. Can we listen to the song? [Song with normal digital instrumentals and repetitive vocals plays] Where are the sounds they recorded? I don't hear a pencil or some guy chewing gum couldn't the producers have thrown just One of these sounds into the background to make the entire plot of this episode makes sense No, they couldn't do that because why would they? "Good night, Dr-" Brobot is the coolest and most intense show on the Brat channel This shows about a family of hackers hoarding a powerful technology from the CIA What's the powerful technology you ask? It's Brent Rivera as a hologram! I can't believe I'm not making that up What's funny about this is that they never explain what exactly it is that Brent does like he's supposed to be this Revolutionary state-of-the-art technology the government is trying to hunt down But all you really know about him is he's just like a charismatic guy who makes jokes sometimes and can do math quickly Why is the CIA so hell-bent on stealing him? What is he gonna do for the US government? Help them talk to boys? "Bobby's coming! Try the choke!" Oh and all the show has potential but brent never takes his shirt off so you can probably skip it. Found this one hard to watch much of I think because it's supposed to be based in the 50s and all that really means is They're wearing costumes and the color grading is a little bit different The only thing I really need to show you from this is this real moment from the show? I did not edit this you can go see this for yourself. It's about eight minutes into the first episode "What are you looking at?" these guys should win an award And lastly we have the overnights this is a show about four teens who have absolutely nothing in common and four distinctly different tastes in music and So naturally they start a band "Nah" "Let's find a groove!" "Nah" "I really really loOove-" "More coffeehouse crap?" "Better than your top 40 nacho cheese fest" Seriously though, none of them agree on anything Do you know how much planning and coordination it takes to start a band? That's not just something that happens Especially not with four people who are practically strangers and one of them isn't even allowed to be here "Crap man, I gotta go" But let's just fast-forward to the end of the first episode. It's now Friday night and it's their big gig They've been waiting for all week, unfortunately though things turned south pretty quickly [Disapproving crowd] You know when you go to a bar and a band is playing music and you're not really a huge fan of it so do you and Everybody in the room boo at them such a common thing to do So the band is having a rough night so far not to worry though, because Instagram star Jordan Jones is here to save the day [Band starts up again] Man they've really improved in just a few days. They went from cluelessly holding instruments in a garage together to performing an entire song They've never practiced before. That's the power of friendship! Alright, we're almost done great job production team Now, let's just close it out strong with a solid shot of everyone looking happy and enjoying their triumph Er, okay I guess we could use a shot of Jordan struggling with a microphone and everyone in the audience Totally stone-faced despite the sound of thunderous applause. All I gotta say is, Now is it mean to make fun of these kids? Yes. Does that make me a bad person? Yes, am I going to hell for this? Yes, but do I care about any of that? Yes. Oh. I think what I realized while making this video and watching more and more of these Shows is that the kids have very little to do with like the shitty quality of the shows it 100% traces back to the production team themselves because it's very apparent while watching all these shows that no one involved in the production gives even half a shit in the quality of What they're making I went into this thinking that all of these musically and Instagram stars would just be atrocious actors and honestly some of them aren't even that bad even like Brent Rivera was okay in his show the problem with these shows is because they're entirely motivated by money and money comes from views views come from having as many Instagram stars as possible how they write these shows is, how can we fit the most characters into the show? because we've more characters than we have more people promoting them and we have more viewers because of it as a Result every series ends up with this convoluted web of secondary characters. None of which really stand out from each other It's kind of like the Marvel movies Except instead of superheroes. It's just a bunch of angsty teens The last thing I'll say about this is in response to what I imagine a lot of you maybe thinking drew These shows are made for kids. Why do you care? These shows aren't made for you. Why does it bother you so much sure That's a good counter-argument. But in my opinion just cuz you're making shows for kids doesn't mean the shows have to suck I feel like every company involved in making children's content whether it's a YouTube channel like Brat or a Big a big company like the Disney Channel realized several years ago That kids are so dumb that they'll just put anything in front of them and kids will like it So no one tries to make anything good because in their eyes, it doesn't matter and I hate that I hate that mentality! Part of the reason I'm so passionate about this is because Amanda and I just watched the the Mister Rogers documentary and it was so insightful and just I don't it's so wonderful to see Someone who whose number one motivation with the content he created was that he wanted to teach values to children He saw what kids were watching and saw how empty and corruptive It was to their young impressionable brains and he was inspired to make things that would that would stick with him and make them better people and it sucks that Everyone involved in these shows doesn't give a shit about what they're making It's just a mass production of a barely passable content I guess all I'm really getting at is Mister Rogers was amazing and now that he's gone The world is missing someone like that. And that's where I come in. I, Drew Gooden am gonna take the place of Mister Rogers and I'm gonna make a show that's good for kids and it teaches them lessons and when I'm done with that I'm gonna run for president of The United States. No, not really I think I've just gone insane because I spent like 12 hours this week watching shows on the Brat Channel And I don't know how to be a person anymore because of it. I also don't know how to end this video So let's just cut to a commercial Hi, have you ever gone to a sport or maybe a music? Me too. but sometimes it's hard to know exactly how much you should pay for your ticket or what seats are the best and that's why I'm Here today to tell you guys about SeatGeek, a App. If you're going to a live event SeatGeek will show you all the seats you can choose from along with their price, a rating generated by all the other people who've sat in that seat before, and even a picture of what your view would look like from that seat! Nice! I just use SeatGeek myself to order two tickets to see my favorite sports team, the Miami Dolphins, get their butts kicked by a far superior Vikings team in Minnesota, in December. Touchdown! It may be the worst decision I've ever made in my life. But hey, at least I got a great deal on the tickets. Thanks SeatGeek. So next time you're going to the big game, or the big... song, Remember to use the SeatGeek app! It's free, It's good and you can save $20 off your first purchase when you use my promo code "drew." That's 2000 pennies! Once again that's promocode drew. It's named after me. Thank you so much to SeatGeek for sponsoring today's video and remember guys, its a app. Well, guy, that's it! Thank you so much for watching today's video If you liked it, remember to subscribe down in that comment section, and leave a like on that bell! It's 12:30 p.m And it's dark as fuck outside. I'll be back next week, like I always am with some more spicy content uh Follow me on instagram and buy my merch. Goodbye
That was pretty good acting you did during that mock audition. You should get your own show.
Drew's skits are always pretty funny