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Freddie Wong

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Freddie Wong
Wong at South by Southwest 2024
Born (1985-09-13) September 13, 1985 (age 39)
Seattle, Washington, U.S.
Alma materUniversity of Southern California
Occupations
  • filmmaker
  • VFX artist
  • podcaster
Years active2006–present
Known forVideo Game High School
Notable work"RocketJump: The Show"
Relatives
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese黃穀子
Simplified Chinese黄谷子
JyutpingWong4 Guk1Zi2
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinHuáng Gǔzi
Yue: Cantonese
JyutpingWong4 Guk1Zi2

Freddie Wong (born September 13, 1985)[1] is an American internet celebrity, filmmaker, VFX artist, podcaster, and competitive gamer.[2] Wong has participated in at least three YouTube channels; with RocketJump, his production company's main channel, sporting over 9 million subscribers;[3] BrandonJLa, a channel including behind the scenes videos and other content, which holds over 1.1 million subscribers;[4] and Node, a gaming channel with over 3.2 million subscribers.[5] He is also known for creating the web series Video Game High School.[6]

Early life

Wong was born and raised in Seattle, Washington. He graduated from Lakeside School in 2004[7] and later from the University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts.[1] Wong owns and manages Overcrank Media, a Los Angeles–based media production company specializing in feature film and online video content, having produced an independent film titled Bear. Wong met his future collaborator Brandon Laatsch in college.[8]

Career

2006–2010: Competitive gaming, YouTube breakthrough

Wong launched a YouTube channel in 2006, initially uploading gameplay footage to wide success, and competed in the World Series of Video Games in Dallas in July 2007.[9] He won first prize in the Guitar Hero 2 competition, playing the song "Less Talk More Rokk" by Freezepop.[10][11] It was around this time that he began uploading videos to YouTube and finding popularity with his comedic or video game-related content.

During MTV's "Gamer's Week" celebration in November 2007, Freddie appeared as a guest on Total Request Live.[12] Participating in the program with his newly formed band Hellanor Brozevelt, Wong was part of a country-wide search to find the best Rock Band ensemble. After receiving tutelage from well-known rockers Good Charlotte, Brozevelt performed at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York against Chicago-based Carrie Me Home.[13]

In 2010, Wong helped Joe Penna, known as MysteryGuitarMan on YouTube, shoot a commercial for McDonald's,[14] and assisted Wong Fu Productions in actions scenes of Agents of Secret Stuff.[15] In 2011 Wong produced, co-directed, and acted in a TV commercial for Battlefield 3 at the request of Electronic Arts.[16][17]

2011–2017: RocketJump shorts and Video Game High School

Wong at VidCon 2014

In 2011, along with his partners Matt Arnold and Desmond "Dez" Dolly, Wong formed the production company RocketJump. They began work on the web series Video Game High School,[18] which began releasing episodes on May 11, 2012, achieved over 100 million views across various online platforms. The series was based on a concept by Will Campos and Chris Pappavaselio. The team was able to raise funding for the series through Kickstarter, where they set a funding goal for $75,000 to be raised in a 30-day period. That amount was quickly pledged in less than 24 hours and continued to climb from there. On October 22, 2011, pledging came to a close, with $273,725 raised for the project from 5,661 backers.[19] The series ran for three seasons, with the final season having a crowd funded budget of over $2.4 million. The final episode of the series was released November 17, 2014, on the RocketJump website and YouTube.

Wong's videos would sometimes feature celebrity cameos, with Jimmy Kimmel in a bathroom tie battle, Andy Whitfield appearing in a Time Crisis tribute video, Kevin Pollak appearing in a Hypnotism stunt, Shenae Grimes in a romantic gun action scene, Ray William Johnson in a troll infestation video, Eliza Dushku appearing in an action scene, Jon Favreau featuring in his video based on Cowboys & Aliens, the glam metal band Steel Panther appearing in his video based on the Crossfire board game, and Smosh appearing in his video "Huge Guns (with Smosh)".[20]

In late 2013, Wong's channel, freddiew was renamed to "Rocketjump", and freddiew2 was renamed to "BrandonJLa". Brandon Laatsch also announced that he and Wong would no longer work together on projects, and any short videos or "shorts" would be posted on either NODE (a gaming channel run by Laatsch and Corridor Digital's Niko Pueringer and Sam Gorski) or BrandonJLa. This was done because they wanted to work on separate projects, as Wong was busy with Video Game High School,[21] and Brandon started working on a VR engine and game Boneworks.

In 2017, Wong announced that RocketJump would be pivoting away from regular shorts, in favor of other projects.[22] RocketJump stopped uploading videos altogether in 2018, after the second season of Anime Crimes Division.[23]

Since 2017: Podcasting and feature film

From April 2017 to October 2021, Wong co-hosted the podcast Story Break on the Maximum Fun network.[24][25] As described on the RocketJump website, the show features "[co-hosts] Will Campos, Matt Arnold, and Freddie Wong sit[ting] down in the RocketJump writer's room and attempt[ing] to 'break' a story for a ridiculous concept, property, or idea that [they] in NO way have any rights to." The podcast concluded in 2021, both due to the hosts feeling creatively satisfied with the show and to allow them more time to work on upcoming projects.[26]

Since January 2019, Wong has been a collaborator on a Dungeons & Dragons actual play podcast called Dungeons & Daddies, along with Will Campos, Anthony Burch, Matt Arnold, and Beth May. The podcast is about four dads from Earth that are transported to the Forgotten Realms (one of the official settings for Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition) and go on a quest to search for their lost sons. Wong edits the show and is one of the four players, with Burch as the Dungeon Master.[27][28][29]

On October 21, 2021, RocketJump revealed on Facebook that they were beginning work on their first feature film.[30] Shooting took place in late 2021 in Southern California and Utah. The film, We're All Gonna Die, is set to premiere at South by Southwest in March 2024. Wong co-wrote and co-directed the film with his Dungeons & Daddies co-star Matt Arnold.[31]

In 2023, Wong appeared in Dimension 20's sidequest Mentopolis, where he played the character Dan Fucks.

Personal life

Wong is the older brother of actor and YouTuber Jimmy Wong, who co-starred in Video Game High School.[32][33] His father is Chinese, from Canton, and his mother is of Chinese and Mongol ancestry.[34] His uncle is Corey Yuen, a film director and stunt choreographer.[35][better source needed]

Filmography

Year Title Role Other notes
2010 Bear Producer
2010 BDS9 Himself
2011 Chuck Freddie TV series; guest appearance in "Chuck Versus the Hack Off"
2012–14 Video Game High School Himself Web series; also co-creator, co-director, story writer, executive producer
2013 MyMusic DJ Elephant TV series; episode: "Ghosts!!!"
2013 Bee and Puppycat Tim Wizard Web Series; episode: “Donut”
2013 Key & Peele Ping TV series; guest appearance in episode 3.07
2013 The Gauntlet Himself Web series; season 2 regular
2014 Rob Dyrdek's Fantasy Factory Himself TV series; episode: "Fully Uploaded"
2015 The Strongest Man Jimmy Yoon Film
2015 RocketJump: The Show Himself Also co-creator, co-director, writer, executive producer, editor
2016 Red vs. Blue Guest writer and director of "The #1 Movie in the Galaxy: 3" episode
2017 Dimension 404 Director ("Impulse") and executive producer
2017–18 Anime Crimes Division Director and co-creator[36]
2019–present Dungeons & Daddies Glenn Close, Taylor Swift, and others Actual play podcast; main role[29]
2023 Dimension 20: Mentopolis Dan Fucks Actual play web series; 6 episodes[37][38]
2024 We're All Gonna Die Director Film; co-director and co-writer

References

  1. ^ a b Rolph, Amy (July 16, 2007). "Seattle's 'Hero' struts into rock stardom". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved July 23, 2010.
  2. ^ Wong, Freddie (September 13, 2012). "Hitting 27 today – thanks everyone!". Twitter. Retrieved September 13, 2012.
  3. ^ Statistics retrieved on March 18, 2016, at RocketJump's channel on YouTube.
  4. ^ Statistics retrieved on March 18, 2016, at BrandonJLa's channel on YouTube.
  5. ^ Statistics retrieved on October 16, 2016, at Node's channel on YouTube.
  6. ^ "Here's How Freddie Wong Used $2,435,434 To Make 'VGHS' Season Three". Tubefilter. May 12, 2015. Retrieved January 16, 2017.
  7. ^ Owen, Rob (November 30, 2015). "Seattle filmmaker Freddie Wong's work makes jump to Hulu". The Seattle Times. Retrieved March 16, 2024.
  8. ^ Orzeck, Kurt (December 21, 2011). "YouTube Sensation Freddie Wong: 'Hollywood Is Out of Date' (Exclusive)". Reuters. Retrieved June 21, 2017.
  9. ^ "This Channel Still Exists? (The Script!)". August 24, 2017.
  10. ^ Freddie Wong 10 on STYLE -Less Talk More Rokk on YouTube video of the second half of Freddie's winning performance
  11. ^ World Series of Video Games Archived July 11, 2011, at the Wayback Machine- Freddiew's blog post dated July 16, 2007.
  12. ^ "The Going Thing- freddiew.com". Archived from the original on July 11, 2011. Retrieved October 10, 2010.
  13. ^ "'Rock Band' Rock Off". MTV. Archived from the original on January 16, 2009. Retrieved July 21, 2014.
  14. ^ Freddie Wong Twitter Update – Twitter, 2011.
  15. ^ Nigahiga (November 24, 2010). "Agents of Secret Stuff". YouTube. Archived from the original on December 21, 2021. Retrieved July 1, 2012.
  16. ^ Battlefield 3 – FreddieW TV Commercial on YouTube, 2011
  17. ^ 10 Days to Air – -BF3 TV commercial Behind the Scenes on YouTube, 2011.
  18. ^ "Video Game High School Archives".
  19. ^ "Video Game High School". Kickstarter. October 21, 2011. Retrieved May 13, 2012.
  20. ^ FreddieW (January 13, 2011). "Huge Guns (with Smosh!)". YouTube. Archived from the original on December 21, 2021. Retrieved August 6, 2012.
  21. ^ "Phase Two". www.youtube.com. Archived from the original on December 21, 2021.
  22. ^ "This Channel Still Exists? (The Script!)". www.rocketjump.com. August 24, 2017.
  23. ^ "RocketJump - YouTube". www.youtube.com.
  24. ^ "Story Break". Archived from the original on July 19, 2018. Retrieved July 19, 2018.
  25. ^ "Story Break". November 14, 2017. Retrieved July 19, 2018.
  26. ^ "Story Break | #169". Maximum Fun. October 8, 2021. Retrieved October 25, 2021.
  27. ^ Koss, Nakiesha (June 1, 2020). "Stepping into the Adventurous World of Podcasting with "Dungeons & Daddies"". Adobe Blog. Retrieved August 8, 2023.
  28. ^ "Interview with D&D Podcast "Dungeons & Daddies"". Cosplay Realm Magazine. April 8, 2020. Retrieved January 10, 2021.
  29. ^ a b "Dungeons & Daddies". Dungeons & Daddies. Retrieved December 12, 2020.
  30. ^ RocketJump (October 21, 2021). "We're shooting our first feature, and we're looking for anybody who owns a 90s era import tuner (the more tricked out the better!) in the SoCal/Utah/Arizona area. We'd pay to use it for our shoot in November - hit us up!". Facebook. Retrieved November 7, 2021.
  31. ^ "We're All Gonna Die". SXSW Schedule. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  32. ^ Roderick, Kevin (March 24, 2011). "Jimmy Wong as Internet savior". LA Observed. Retrieved May 9, 2012.
  33. ^ "Never stop working. If you're doing something you love, then it shouldn't be a problem". The Other Asians. July 7, 2011. Archived from the original on April 12, 2013. Retrieved May 9, 2012.
  34. ^ Nguyen, Stacy (April 7, 2011). "Hit singer Jimmy Wong on Alexandra Wallace and why angry responses are unproductive". Northwest Asian Weekly. Retrieved June 20, 2021.
  35. ^ Stuntwomen React to Bad & Great Hollywood Stunts 9. Corridor Crew. April 3, 2021. Event occurs at 9:33 – via YouTube.
  36. ^ Wong, Alex (December 24, 2017). "Crunchyroll Isn't Worried About Netflix and Amazon Focusing More on Anime". www.inverse.com.
  37. ^ Carter, Chase (July 26, 2023). "Dimension 20's new Mentopolis series is a noir-flavoured RPG mind romp featuring Hank Green and Freddie Wong". Dicebreaker. Retrieved August 8, 2023.
  38. ^ Sheehan, Gavin (July 27, 2023). "Dropout Announces Next Live-Action Series Dimension 20: Mentopolis". Bleeding Cool. Retrieved August 8, 2023.

Further reading

  • Slater, Grant (July 7, 2007), "Mild-mannered gamers become rock stars for a day", Associated Press Newswires
  • Sperounes, Sandra (February 23, 2008), "Internet phenomenon a Guitar Hero for hire", Winnipeg Free Press, p. c13
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