Giant rant made for the intention of venting incoming.
So last year, I got partnered with the autistic kid in my class for something in gym class. While we were waiting around or something, he told me about how he wants to make a review show where he reviews cartoons. I knew he was a fan of the Nostalgia Critic, so I could tell he wanted to make the show in the vein of NC. I really hoped that he would just forget about it, because he's a good kid, and I really don't want him to become a lolcow like so many other people that make awful NC clones. I never heard him talk about it again, so I assumed he just stopped caring about it.
Until a few months ago. Back in January, one of my teachers let him show a video in class. It was a short 'test-run' of his show, where he tried to review Rise of the Guardians. I knew he was fucked when the video opened up with him doing the typical NC intro (with the catchphrase changed to 'Hello, I'm the Cartoon Critic. I watch cartoons, so you don't have to!' or something similar to that) wearing sunglasses and a god-damned fedora. The next five minutes were of him "reviewing" Rise of the Guardians without having any idea of how to review a movie. The video ended with his mom (or supervisor, I don't quite remember) complimenting him on how cool he looks in his costume or whatever. Right there, I knew it was over for him.
Now fast forward to last month. My best friend is hanging out with me in my art class, when suddenly, the kid walks up to us and asks us if we want to help him with his series. My weird-ass friend loves the idea, and even though I'm screaming internally, I say yes because I don't want to hurt his feelings, and because I can't think up a good excuse as to why I can't, but I tell him that I want to be uncredited. A week or two later, my friend and I have to go over to his house to watch Rise of the Guardians with him, because he wants to do a full review of it, and wants help writing the review or something. We disliked it at best, but that kind of conflicted with the kid's own opinion of it (he loved it, of course), so writing a script for him is going to be a pain in the ass when he won't even agree with half of what I'm writing for him. The kid also wanted my friend to make a theme song for him, as my friend writes songs. He didn't really like the one that my friend wrote, though, so he's writing a rap with his own god-damn lyrics. Good lord, this whole thing is a spectacular mess. Now he wants us to come over on the 25th to film the first episode, which we're not ready to do at all, because not only do we not have a camera as far as I'm aware, but I'm not even sure if he wants me to write a script or if he wants to just do it unscripted.
/ventrant