Tubefilter News

Last August, we took a look at Call Center Series, a comedy that puts the spotlight on a group of “tracking specialists,” i.e. customer support and sales. At the time, creators created by Reagan Peterson, Galen Carter-Jeffrey, and Barbara Clark along with WPFG Studios had only released 3 of 13 episodes. Though a tough critic of web series mockumentaries, I enjoyed those three episodes. Now, all 13 episodes of the show have been released. Here are my final thoughts.

First, the good: The characters in Call Center are still very compelling and it is hard not to sympathize with their plight as they field phone calls from irate racists and sex-charged southerners. Actor Luke McClory really shines in this web series as Tommy, a sarcastic but honest worker-drone who is to Call Center what Ron Livingston is to Office Space. Still, it is actor Adrienne Harrell who steals the show as 72-year-old Jo-Ann, a former English teacher turned customer support rep. Her nonchalance and blatant disregard for customer care puts her at the top of my funny list.

However, the show isn’t perfect.

Call Center has a few continuity issues. At the beginning of the show in the company breakroom, actor Jean-Paul Daemen (Darren) has a goatee. Two episodes later, presumably the same day, the tracking specialist is clean-shaven, only to have the facial hair reappear in episode 7. One episode, titled “Valentine’s Day,” seems to indicate, alongside wardrobe changes, that time goes by between episodes but the audience is never told this. As a result, we are left wondering when in the show we are. While switching days isn’t a problem per se, if something changes with our characters we need to know why. If Ryan in The Office shaves his beard, or Michael grows one, the audience is told why.

Rocketboom correspondent Ella Morton launched a new web series this week, The Elegant Guide, with light hearted style and etiquette tips from the graceful and dare we say, elegant British native. [TheElegantGuide.com]

Taryn Southern has a new live web chat show on Ustream: The Taryn Ten at 10pm EST every Tuesday. After a few experimental preview eps, the series begins 2010 tonight with guest Jaime King (Sin City, My Bloody Valentine) joining Southern. For now the series shoots via web cam in Southern’s home, but future weekly episodes will head to a 3-camera studio. [TarynSouthern.com]

The Beautiful Life, the cancelled CW show from Ashton Kutcher’s Katalyst Media that found a second life on YouTube—with new sponsor HP on board—has been doing better online than it had on TV according to new numbers reported today by CNN. 2.7 million people have watch the five episodes online so far, compared to just 2.5 million on the CW. “I want this to be the first show ever that gets more viewers on the Web than it did on terrestrial television,” said Kutcher said in a recent video on YouTube. Kutcher and company are now exploring options to keep the series alive with new episodes as an online-only show. [CNN.com]

RISE a new daily “non-boring web show for entrepreneurs and marketers” from St. Louis-based creator and host David Siteman Garland launched this week packing reviews, tips, whiteboard sessions—and sponsor shoutouts—into tightly cut three minute episodes. So far it’s content rich and living up to its tagline: “If you want fluff, go pet a bunny.” [therisetothetop.com]

Slate TV has a gem of an animated editorial cartoon from Mark Fiore that takes “an amusing look back at what we did and didn’t accomplish in 2009.” [Slate TV]

There’s nothing particularly interesting about the building blocks of The Bitter End. It’s an online sitcom that follows the lives of a few urban twentysomethings as they deal with the identity crises, professional stagnation, awkward cohabitation, and sexual frustration endemic to life as an urban twentysomething. But The Bitter End is a perfect example of execution trumping concept. It’s a really funny show.

The series begins as Bernard (Daniel Beirne), a nebbishy aspiring novelist, welcomes his fresh-from-rehab older brother, Les (Brent Skagford) into his apartment for what we sense will be an extended stay. Bernard takes a liking to Eden (Vanessa Matsui), a coffee shop employee and working actress whose greatest achievement is a tampon ad in which she proclaims “Because it’s my life!” Bernard wants to be part of that life and it becomes clear in the first episode that his brother is going to make a habit of unintentionally hindering that quest.

The Bitter End is reminiscent of pre-DeVito Always Sunny, featuring an accidental ecstasy trip and a misguided effort to flirt with the gay teacher in an attempt to pass night school. Seinfeld-grade intersecting plot lines result in hilarious, if sometimes painful to watch, moments that separate The Bitter End from the slew of one-dimensional comedy series on the web.

It’s not all chuckles and cringes, though. The Bitter End generates just as many audible ‘aww’s as it does ‘haha’s. Bernard is nothing if not earnest and his courtship of Eden is sweet. And each time he takes a leap and falls on his face, we root him on until he gets up and does it all over again.

Written and produced by Beirne, Skagford, and Etan Muskat (who also directs), The Bitter End got its start as a weekly improv show at Montreal’s Theatre Ste. Catherine. The improv backgrounds of the series’ writers and lead actors is apparent. Even at its zaniest, the show maintains a natural vibe. Due to their tight shooting schedule, though, the dialogue is mostly scripted, one exception being a poem Bernard recites in episode two. The supporting characters are all well cast and expertly played, particularly Eden’s ex, Victor (Graham Cuthbertson) and Les’ barely-legal love interest, Ashley (Erin Agostino), whose chemistry with Skagford is hilarious magic.

Writers Guild of America, East, (WGAE) announced today that the New York based union has signed an additional 13 digital media production companies in the fourth quarter of 2009, bringing the total new media signatories to 22 for the year. The new additions join the previous group from earlier this fall, though some of the new signatories were inlcluded in our in-depth look at the WGAe’s efforts in new media, dubbed The Writer’s Guild 2.0 Initiative.

The announcement, part of the Guild’s effort to organize the bevy of new original web series productions, included some light hearted joking from the comedy writers in the group. 9am Meeting’s co-writer Matt Koff quipped, “I joined the guild for the same reasons as everyone else: respect, recognition, and Joss Whedon’s eternal friendship.”

While some creators have griped at the idea of sharing scare digital revenues for other people’s pension plans, for now the stamp of legitimacy for the young creators, along with some degree of health care benefits, seems to be enough to jump on board with the 98 year-old labor union. “I joined the WGA so that I wouldn’t die; out-of-pocket health care, just like my failed attempts at sustaining a Hollywood drug addiction, is just way too expensive,” joked Don Hooper, writer and owner of Jamtown Films Productions.

WGA West, the sister union of WGA East, also has a new media contract in place which some web series, like Joss Whedon’s Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog have chosen to use. But so far the East has been much more active in engaging new media productions than the West.

Full list of new WGAE signatories:

9am Meeting – Award winning and “disarmingly laid-back” animated web series from creator Dan McCoy on Channel 101 NY. (Ep. 1 below)

Alex Bloom and Ben Zelevansky – Creators of Unleashed, a popular animated web series follows the trials and tribulations of animal actors in Hollywood. The series is ranked #16 in the iTunes directory of Top 100 comedy podcasts. (Episode 7.6 below)

Escape. The web isn’t clamoring with that many series that truly rip us out of our office chairs. Often we’re given mere momentary amusement. But I’m talking about the ones that suck us through our laptop screens and into a world so refreshingly different yet intimately familiar we actually feel transported.

Everyone has something that gives them this kind of escape. For me, it’s a show that propels me into the land of ski tracks in fresh powder, vertical drops and climbing 5.10′s. Pure adrenaline daydreaming. Luckily, I may have just found my new episodic winter escape.

Fitz Cahall is a natural storyteller, crafting 20 episodes of an NPR-worthy podcast of outdoor adventures called The Dirtbag Diaries. His real life human tales of triumph are This American Life for REI junkies. But now, Cahall is taking the leap into web series, with the upcoming premiere of The Season later this month. It’s 22 episodes of outdoor goodness, all shot in HD, following the unique stories of five individual dreamers from the Pacific Northwest. Guys like Paul Kuthe, a kayaker who overcame a difficult past and rock climber Matt Maddaloni who invented a new camera rigging system for filming climbs.

“The idea, or maybe the question, behind the series is this,” wrote Cahall in a recent blog post about the series. “Could we take compelling stories from our community, combine it with tightly crafted footage and create small installments that reveal a bigger story?”

Cahall and his producing partner Bryan Smith of Reel Water Productions managed to score high-end outdoor clothing line Arc’teryx along with microbrewer New Belgium Brewery to sponsor the series.