Geoff Thew

YouTuber & Creator of Mother’s Basement

What’s up basement dwellers, I’m Geoff Thew, anime critic and strong believer in reading the tags above an article before reading the rest of it. I’m here today to talk about your recent complaints about my Sword Art Online videos. Just last week I put out yet another video analyzing and criticizing Sword Art Online, leading to yet another flurry of complaints about how I focus on the series too much. And look, to some degree I get your complaints, but I think that these issues pale in comparison how much Sword Art Online sucks.

Having to come up with new ways to criticize the same subject material bogs me down just as much as it bogs you down to watch me do it. It can be difficult to try to figure out a new angle to focus on to make each video seem fresh, but at least I try. The same cannot be said for Sword Art Online, which despite adding a new aesthetic and a new girl each season is still the same old juvenile power fantasies and harmful tropes every time.

Some people complain about the length of my videos, saying that surely I do not need upwards of 30 minutes to explain how I could improve Sword Art Online’s story, but they’re wrong on two counts. First off, YouTube pays based on how many minutes you watch the video for, so length is actually very important to the goal of these videos. And second, it’s still substantially less time than it would take to watch Sword Art Online. There may still be people who are unaware of how much SAO sucks, and as long as my videos are not as big of a waste of time as SAO is, they are ultimately a public service.

And hey, I’m with you, I’d rather spend time on the insightful analysis of anime openings that I initially created the channel for. But this is my career now, and if you look at my most-viewed videos list, the top 3 videos are all SAO-related, and they’re more popular than my other videos by a wide margin. Hell, the one I just released already has over 500,000 views, which is important for me in January when revenue is down. I need to make a living, just like A1 Pictures feels they need to continue making adaptations of Sword Art Online despite how terrible it is on every level.

So yes, I am also annoyed by how many videos I have to make about Sword Art Online, but I will continue to make them as long as they keep making SAO because my hatred for the series is that much stronger. It’s almost as strong as my love of Loot Anime, a wonderful service that sends you a collection of anime merchandise every month, which you can sign up for at the link http://www.lootcrate.com/basement and use the promo code “basement” to get 10% off!

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