So what is "Spill.com"? Spill.com is a movie review and news website that excels in community involvement and comedy. How did this all start? Well, Spill began life as a public access show in Austin, Texas called "The Reel Deal" with Korey Coleman, Chris Cox, Martin Thomas, C. Robert Cragill, and Tony Guerrero. These five guys reviewed films, took calls, and performed skits in-between for many years. In the mid 2000's, Korey decided to end the "Reel Deal" because he didn't want to do access television for 10 more years. While he did end that show, he still wanted to continue it in a new format, through the internet. Thus, "Spill.com" was born, with the same critics as before. While all of them returned, they came back under different aliases, all except for Korey. Chris became Cyrus, Martin became Leon, Cargill became Carlyle, and Tony became the Co-Host 3000!
Since 2006, Spill.com has been delivering audio and video reviews of the newest and latest films. Their rating scale goes in order from highest to lowest; Better Then Sex, Full Price, Matinee, Rental, Some 'Ol Bullsh*t!, and the rarely used F*CK YOU!!. As you can see, this is one of the many ways Spill inspired me in my movie reviews. The audio reviews are uncensored and can go on for over 30 minutes, while the video reviews are animated, censored, and 5 minutes or less. The video reviews were just shortened versions of the audio reviews, but since last Fall, have become their own thing. Don't knock these video reviews, though, because those are what got me interested in the first place. In 2009, I was looking up a review for "Resident Evil: Apocalypse", why? I don't know, but that's not important. What is important is that I found Spill's video review of that movie and was instantly hooked. It was funny, had great personality, and looked like it had some production value behind it. I began to watch every Spill review I could find on Youtube, and then I watched them again, and again, and so and so forth. Then in the spring of 2009, I made the leap and went to their website. Once I did that, my world was never the same. I became obsessed with website, rabidly awaiting each new video review, attempted each new audio review, and joining the website proper. Yet, I never could fully become involved because I never had an i-pod to listen to the audio reviews, that is until that fall when I finally had an i-Pod nano. I began to listen to every review I possibly could and I soon delved deeper into the rabbit hole by picking up the podcasts.
Spill really thrives and becomes something else once you listen to their podcasts. At the time of me starting to listen to these, they included A Couple of Cold Ones (ACOCO), Let's Do This!!(LDT), The League of Extremely Ordinary Gentleman (LEOG), and the Spill Call in Show. ACOCO has Korey and Carlyle having a free-form discussion, the Top 5 movies at the box office, and reading tweets and e-mails. In 2011, Leon joined the two and soon took over Carlyle's spot when he left to focus on his novel and screenwriting career. The strength of this podcast is the chemistry between the hosts, first being Korey and Carlyle and later Leon. They all seem like close friends and know how to keep a show going and entertaining. ACOCO has been going on since January 2008 and seems to be going strong.
Let's Do This!! is the podcast that first hooked me. LDT includes Korey and Co-Host, and later Billy
.jpg)
I would go into more detail about the other podcast on the site, but there's a problem. A few weeks ago, Spill.com went through a serious shake-up. Korey felt that the site, while great, could be greatly improved. He felt that his complaints made to their parent site, Hollywood.com, were being ignored. While they're the reason the site even exists and he's extremely grateful, the site just wasn't up to snuff. After a week of phone calls and personal meetings, Korey was left with a tough decision. If he wanted to improve the site, he would need to make some major cuts including beloved shows and staff. Korey ultimately decided this was the right, if toughest, choice for the site. With that, four shows, The Loading Bar, Remote Viewing, LEOG, and the newly formed Untitled Billy and Korey Show were canceled.
This change is not a bad one. While it was sad and we had time to grieve, the Loading Bar did come back as Rage Select on YouTube, and it appears that Remote Viewing is going to have a spiritual successor as well. Even the LEOG lives on in a way, since almost everyone on the show has their own podcast now. Also, all of the podcasts can still be seen and listened to on Spill.com. This change also brought new podcasts, like The Daily Spill, which is a daily podcast with Korey and Cyrus where they go over the day's news and discuss a special topic specific to each day. The other new one, at least at this point, is Spoiled! which is a show with Korey and Co-Host where they discuss the newest in entertainment and can spoil it all to hell. Sadly, I haven't been able to listen to it yet since everything they've talked about is stuff I don't want spoiled.
This change is also great for new comers. It gives them a whole new and less crowded group of podcasts to listen to and if they're interested, they can still see all of the old stuff too, which if you have the time I highly recommend. But, through all of this I feel I haven't gotten across what makes Spill so great, and honestly, it's the people. They all of such great personalities, are such close friends, and are aren't afraid to be personal or open with the fans that you eventually feel apart of the group. I honestly feel that if it wasn't for my discovery of this website, I wouldn't be the person I am today. I may not have adopted my sense of humor, discovered my love of film, or realized that being nerdy doesn't mean I have to be a socially awkward recluse. If you don't mind crass language and wild opinions, Spill is the perfect place for any nerdy or comedy loving individual who loves some crass with their intellectual conversations.
UPDATE
As of last December, Spill.com has sadly shut down. Now when you type in Spill.com, you're redirected to their ex-parent site Hollywood.com. It's incredibly sad to see it go, especially since this site has influenced my life for 5-6 years. Even worse, all of their content is gone. All their reviews, podcasts, videos, blog posts, everything, is gone. While I do have a ton saved on my computer, there's still a lot that I don't.
Thankfully, it's not all doom an gloom. Right now, the founder of Spill, Korey Coleman, has a Kickstarter going to fund a new, better website that will have all of the stuff us fans have come to love. While the project has well exceeded it's $30,000 goal ( it's currently over $100,000), it still helps to contribute, especially if you want to see this community continue in a new form. The project ends on January 12th, so you have one week to contribute.
Here, I'll even leave a link to help you out: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/573779592/it-aint-going-down-like-that-korey-colemans-new-si?ref=live
No comments:
Post a Comment