Tubefilter News

We’ve said it before, but this whole web series movement isn’t just an American thing. Sure, it’s quite the rage here in the states and especially in our own backyard of Los Angeles. But still, there are web series created daily all over the world, some of which we can’t understand what’s being said, and we do our best to keep you fine readers up to speed on these foreign gems.

News out of Australian web series scene today is twofold—first, that indie drama OzGirl has inked a deal with Virgin’s V Australia to be on the seatback screens of all its flights (and trust us, those are really long flights) starting in Novemeber for a one year run of its 23 episodes through its free on demand video service.

The low-budget indie series, which was shot for a reported $7000 (AUS), is no stranger to US web series fans however since it launched last fall, with its production team and stars making the trip out to LA this summer for ITVFest where it scored best web series and best acting honors.

The Web Files interviewed OzGirl creator Nicholas Carlton, his DP Shaun Crawford and stars Sophie Tilson (“Sadie”) and Shanrah Wakefield (“Megan”) during their recent LA trip (below)

Most people equate San Francisco based Revision3 with unscripted, net-friendly hosted web series—Diggnation, TekZilla, Film Riot. Some of the series clock in over the hour mark, firmly rooted in the vein of freeform tech video podcasts. And it’s around that techie niche that the company has built out an online network of dedicated fans, and incidentally, loyal sponsors like Netflix and GoDaddy looking to make waves in that scene.

But with the launch of its latest series, Web Zeroes, Revision3 is taking the leap into scripted comedy with what it calls its first “sitcom.” Truthfully, its closer to an Office-style single-camera comedy, than a multi-camera TV sitcom. The geek comedy was a pickup from indie creators Eddy Rivas, Nick Comardo and Daniel Miller, who together make up Houston-based Smooth Few Films. Their previous series, The Leet World, was a machinima series shot in Counter-Strike: Source.

The trio of web series creators in fact play themselves, or, as they see it, “amp-ed up versions of themselves”—the control freak Alex (Eddy Rivas), the jaded filmmaker Ray (Daniel Miller), and the nerdy fanboy, Nate (Nick Comardo).” In true modern geek fashion—a blend of online dependency tweaked with a relentless desire to be internet famous—the three are pining to become the next great web stars in hope of “making the big bucks” (and meeting Diggnation host Kevin Rose).

And God presented to Noah his new creation, ‘The Reverse Zebra’ and Noah told God, “It looks exactly like a regular zebra…don’t worry about it we all get into ruts sometimes.” And so God decided to flood the earth and start over with a clean slate. This is the Gospel according to Stephen and Joel Moss Levinson, the writers of the award winning animated web series, God & Co.

According to a recent JTA.org article, the show is based on the Levinson’s seder skits from their hometown of Dayton, Ohio. Stephen tells me it took a UCB theater show in NYC to push him into animation, which he’d been planning on doing for a while, spurring he and his brother to make their pilot, ‘Let My People Grow’. This so far four episode series that comes out with eps a ‘couple times a year’ retells Biblical stories that, I won’t lie (it’s a commandment), is sometimes over my head because I didn’t always pay attention in Sunday school and I’m not Jewish. That said, I’ll assume the things I didn’t get were just as funny as the things I did get were I a better student of the Bible.

The ‘Reverse Zebra’ exchange happens in ep 4 of the series (above) when God, played by Jonathan Katz in a sublimely matter-of-fact voice, visits Noah and gets the bright idea for the flood to start anew. I laughed within the first thirty seconds of this four minute cartoon and continued throughout while watching paired animals in various stages of seduction, copulation or utter rejection. Only to finish off this little masterpiece with Noah, played by Bob Balaban (another stellar perf) telling God that his latest creation, the rainbow, was, ‘a little gay.’ That’s funny.

Anyone else notice that there seem to be a lot more deals going on this month? We’re not calling this economy out of the crapper just yet, but Q4 has brought with it some nice reasons for optimism.

Kodak backed its first original web series (other than the Streamy Awards..), Woke Up Dead, which premiered this week on Crackle.com. The Jon Heder led zombie comedy is worth your time watching the first 5 episodes this weekend.

Netflix decided it has the distribution network and, why not start making its own web series too—signing 80′s film star Corey Feldman on for its first horror series, Splatter. Then Wednesday came the news that Babelgum snatched up sci-fi comedy The Crew for a second season, after previously being on online network KoldCast TV.

Illeana Douglas’ IKEA-backed indie web series, Easy to Assemble, kicked off its second season on Wednesday with a star-studded premiere that mixed web and traditional stars in a 500-strong launch party. Even Keanu Reeves was on hand, helping promote the show’s spinoff series Sparhüsen. Reeves said he is on board for more episodes which are planned to start shooting next month.

Today Showtime announced that it will be premiering a twelve-part exclusive animated web series entitled Dexter: Early Cuts. Written by Dexter producer and writer Lauren Gussis and driven by voiceover by Michael C. Hall, viewers see the beginnings of Dexter’s methods, watching his process evolve to the methodical and calculated rituals he currently employs. The audience will have their questions answered about tidbits of Dexter’s life such as when he started collecting slides of his victims and how he acquired his boat, the Slice of Life.

And we now have Reason #127 Why you need to come to the Tubefilter Hollywood Web Television Meetup on the 19th: Free high-end gear giveaways from our new sponsor, AMD! (We can’t reveal exactly what the giveaways are just yet, but trust us, you’ll want to win these.)

Going LIVE! is the theme this month—we’re talking to some of the top LIVE streaming experts on the web—the brains behind (COIN-OP TV, TheStream.TV, This Week in YouTube, The Streamy Awards). More and more web series are realizing that live streaming isn’t as hard as it seems and that it actually works in terms of growing an interactive and engaged audience. If you’re even thinking about live streaming a web show – you need to be there.

This month’s Meetup is the first time we’re breaking out the panel and mixer into two separate tickets. So you can RSVP for both or come a little later (you rowdy ones) and just hit up the mixer. Naturally, we’re going to be live streaming this panel for those not in Los Angeles.

I woke up Sunday morning, slid into my skinny jeans, a low-cut, tight black shirt, and stilettos; and slipped on a pair of shades. There’s something about going to visit the set of a series that has been labeled “slick,” “sexy,” and “dangerous” that just makes a gal want to look good…even at 7:00 a.m.

And just why was I dragging myself out of bed at such a god-awful hour on a weekend? To get a first-hand glimpse of the shooting of The Bannen Way, the highly anticipated new web series from Sony Pictures Television set to debut on Crackle.com this January. In case you missed the story: Jesse Warren and Mark Gantt debuted the trailer last August, the cybersphere went wild over the racy action series, ICM signed the duo and then Sony snatched up the project based on the strength of the trailer and the scripts the pair had written. Plus, they landed a group of high-profile sponsors, including Jaguar, Ray-Ban and Apple.

Fast forward to October 6th, 2009. It’s the second to last day of the 19-day shoot near downtown Los Angeles. As I head into Lacy Street Studios, the door to the stage is slightly ajar. All I can see is a plaid-clad arm in flannel stretched across the opening, beckoning to a dark space beyond. My blood starts to race in anticipation of what I’m about to see. I expect cool, sexy, high stakes…instead, I get the most mellow action shoot ever.

U.P.M Shea Farrell walks me through the maze of a stage over to the monitors where director Warren is watching a hospital scene play out between Gantt, who plays title character Neal Bannen, and Michael Ironside, who plays Chief Bannen, Neal’s father. Extras in hospital scrubs and stethoscopes chill on the side while Warren calls out direction to the dolly crew and the actors. It’s one of the simpler shots – no sassy vixens or Jaguars here – but both Warren and 1st AD Andy Flinn are quite particular about the framing and movement. Flinn has earned the right to be specific – he’s AD’d hundreds of hours of episodic television, including The Practice, Gilmore Girls and Hawthorne.

Gantt is grateful that this project has given him the opportunity to work with talent such as Ironside and Robert Forster, who plays his mafia boss uncle. “Working with Michael and Robert raised my game. They are mensches – they care about the work. The bring 150%. It doesn’t matter to them whether it’s on the web or on TV.”

I don’t speak Portugese, but I still found myself sucked into watching a whole chunk of the newly released Castigo Final (Final Punishment) episodes. The horror web series and alternate reality game (ARG) launched last week in Brazil following 8 women thrown into an experimental maximum security prison for violent crimes they didn’t commit. The ARG elements include a race-against-time style hunt for clues through the characters social media accounts and web sites to find the password to save each prisoner before they are killed off.

There’s also a mobile phone angle with an IVR system that lets viewers call the fictional prison and tale to the warden and even have him call you back. To cap off the series and the game, they will be airing a 4-part faux-documentary created with footage from surveillance cameras inside the prison block on Brazilian TV channel OI TV in late November.

beActive, the Portuguese outfit behind the series, might be the most successful non-US based web creators going right now. Last summer they successfully spun off their Portugal-based Flatmates into an English-speaking UK version. Their last series, Sophia’s Diary was an international licensing gold mine, spinning off British, Irish and Brazilian versions before penetrating China with its first major web series. The Chinese version, dubbed Sufei’s Diary, took the model of young college age girls finding their way in the world with a local Mandarin-speaking cast and some westernized product integration from Estée Lauder’s Clinique brand along for the ride. As of a March feature in the Wall Street Journal, the series had notched over 20 million views on Chinese web sites Sina, Youku and Cernet.com.