Red vs. Blue
Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles | |
---|---|
File:RvB general poster.jpg Red vs. Blue official promotional image | |
Game(s) | Halo trilogy Marathon Trilogy |
Genre(s) | Comic science fiction |
Running time | Five minutes per episode (average) |
Created by | Burnie Burns Matt Hullum Geoff Ramsey Gustavo Sorola Jason Saldaña |
Directed by | Burnie Burns |
Voices | Burnie Burns Jordan Burns Yomary Cruz Joel Heyman Rebecca Frasier Dan Godwin Matt Hullum Geoff Ramsey Ed Robertson Jason Saldaña Gustavo Sorola Nathan Zellner Kathleen Zuelch |
Release(s) | April 1, 2003 – June 28, 2007 (original run) June 16, 2006 - Present (Other series) |
Format(s) | DivX, WMV, QuickTime, DVD, Flash |
No. of episodes | The Blood Gulch Chronicles: 100 Out of Mind: 5 Recovery One: 4 Reconstruction: 19 Relocated: 4 Recreation: 19 Other special videos |
Website http://rvb.roosterteeth.com/ |
Red vs. Blue, often abbreviated as RvB, is a set of related comic science fiction video series created by Rooster Teeth Productions and distributed through the Internet and DVD. The story centers on two opposing teams of soldiers fighting a civil war in the middle of a desolate box canyon (Blood Gulch), in a parody of first-person shooter (FPS) games, military life, and science fiction films. Initially intended to be a short series of six to eight episodes, the project quickly and unexpectedly achieved significant popularity following its Internet premiere on April 1, 2003. Rooster Teeth therefore decided to continue the story. The fifth and final season of the original Red: vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles series ended with episode 100, released on June 28, 2007. Three mini-series—Out of Mind, Recovery One, and Relocated—and the full-length Reconstruction and Recreation series have extended the plot.
Red vs. Blue emerged from Burnie Burns' voice-over-enhanced gameplay videos of Bungie Studios' FPS video game Halo: Combat Evolved. The series is primarily produced using the machinima technique of synchronizing video footage from a game to pre-recorded dialogue and other audio. Footage is mostly from the multiplayer modes of Halo: Combat Evolved and its sequels, Halo 2 and Halo 3, on the Microsoft Xbox and Xbox 360 video game consoles. Minute sections of the series were also achieved using the Microsoft PC version of the same game.
Both within the machinima community and among film critics, Red vs. Blue has been generally well-received. Praised for its originality, the series has won four awards at film festivals held by the Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences. It has been credited with bringing new popularity to machinima, helping it to gain more mainstream exposure, and attracting more people to the art form. Graham Leggat, former director of communications for Lincoln Center's film society, described Red vs. Blue as "truly as sophisticated as Samuel Beckett".[1] While special videos continue to be released online, the completed series is also available on DVD, making the series one of the first commercially released and successful machinima products. Rooster Teeth has created videos, some under commission from Microsoft, for special events, and Red vs. Blue content is included with the Legendary Edition of Halo 3.
Synopsis
Setting and overview
Red vs. Blue centers on the Red and Blue Teams, two groups of soldiers engaged in a supposed civil war. Originally, each team occupies a small base in a box canyon known as Blood Gulch. According to Simmons (Gustavo Sorola), one of the Red Team soldiers, each team's base exists only in response to the other team's base. To the soldiers' ignorance, there is no actual civil war; both the Red and Blue armies are under the same command, Project Freelancer, and only exist as training grounds for Freelance Agents. Although both teams generally dislike each other and have standing orders to defeat their opponents and capture their flag, neither team is usually motivated to fight the other. Teammates have an array of eccentric personalities and often create more problems for each other than for their enemies.
The Red vs. Blue storyline so far spans seven full-length seasons and three mini-series. Rooster Teeth periodically releases self-referential public service announcements (PSAs) and holiday-themed videos, which are generally unrelated to the main storyline. In these videos, however, the members of both teams claim to be from Red vs. Blue.
Although the visual background of Red vs. Blue is primarily taken from the Halo series, Rooster Teeth consciously limits connections to the Halo fictional universe. A special video made for E3 2003 portrays Master Chief, the protagonist of the Halo series, as a larger-than-life member of the army, and the Red vs. Blue trailer and first episode establish that the series is set between the events of the two games. Beyond these references, the storyline is independent, a decision that, according to Burns, is intended to increase accessibility to those unfamiliar with the games. For example, even though the season 4 and season 5 casts include characters from the alien Covenant Elite race, Rooster Teeth never portrays those characters in their original Halo context.[2]
Plot
Initially, the Red Team consists of Grif (Geoff Ramsey); Simmons (Gustavo Sorola); their leader, Sarge (Matt Hullum); and a robot, Lopez (Burnie Burns). The Blue Team consists of Tucker (Jason Saldaña) and the self-appointed leader, Church (Burnie Burns). Donut (Dan Godwin) soon joins the Red Team, and Caboose (Joel Heyman) and an artificially intelligent (AI) tank named Sheila (Yomary Cruz) join the Blue Team. After Donut manages to capture the Blue Team's flag, Caboose and Sheila accidentally kill Church. A mercenary named Tex (Kathleen Zuelch) recovers the flag, but is captured shortly after. Although an apparition of Church returns and rescues Tex, Donut mortally wounds her. Just before she dies, she informs Church that her AI, O'Malley (various),[3] is gone; meanwhile, Caboose ominously insists that his real name is O'Malley.[4] DuFresne (Matt Hullum), a medic soon nicknamed "Doc", arrives three months later, intending to help both armies because of a lack of resources. However, both teams become annoyed and reject him. Tex returns as a ghost to confirm that her former AI, O'Malley, now possesses Caboose. When she and Church enter Caboose's mind to evict O'Malley, the AI flees to control Doc. Later, the Blues capture Donut and force Sarge to build robot bodies for Church and Tex in exchange for his return. During a standoff, Tucker concludes that one Command secretly controls both teams through a common contact named Vic (Burnie Burns). O'Malley appears, kidnaps Lopez, and escapes through a teleporter. The Red and Blue Teams join forces to pursue O'Malley.[5] However, the teleporter malfunctions,[6] and the teams become scattered outside Blood Gulch.[5]
The teams regroup and confront O'Malley, but a bomb in Church's robot body detonates. Suddenly, everyone except for Church wakes up in a wasteland. The soldiers jump to the conclusion that they have been sent into the future, and Church into the past. It is revealed later in the series that although Church was indeed sent back in time due to an apparent malfunction in Wyoming's time-altering ability, the rest of the group stayed in the present, although it remains a mystery how they were rescued from the explosion. In the "future", the Reds and Blues battle O'Malley at his new fortress and meet Andy (Nathan Zellner), a sentient time bomb. In the past, Church waits one thousand years until Gary, a computer that he meets, can teleport him back to Blood Gulch. There, he attempts to prevent the problems previously faced, but realizes that his own actions cause these issues, and allows himself to be blown into the future with everyone else. Unknown to the Blues, the Reds leave during a battle with O'Malley and his robot army and arrive back at Blood Gulch. An unknown being destroys O'Malley's army and confronts O'Malley.[7] As the Red Team re-explores Blood Gulch, the creature, named the Alien (Nathan Zellner), forces Tucker, Andy, and Caboose to join his sacred quest. During the quest, Wyoming kills the Alien and flees.[8] With help from York (Sean Duggan) and his AI, Delta (Mark Bellman), Tex pursues Wyoming to discover O'Malley's current host, but Wyoming escapes through a teleporter built by his AI, revealed to be Gary.[9] Meanwhile, Church returns to Blood Gulch and accidentally contacts Vic Jr. (Burnie Burns), a supposed descendant of Vic who informs Church about past events. After the quest, Blue team returns to Blood Gulch, and Tucker becomes ill; Church calls Doc, whom O'Malley still controls, for help. Doc diagnoses Tucker with male pregnancy; Andy explains that the Alien had impregnated Tucker,[8] who gives birth to an alien child, Junior (Jason Saldaña),[9] off-screen.[8] O'Malley leaves Doc after Sarge contacts Command for reinforcements, and a ship crashes into the gulch, on top of Donut,[8] who falls into an underground cave.[9]
Grif's sibling, Sister (Rebecca Frasier), emerges from the ship and reveals that she is assigned to the Blue Team, which Grif eventually allows her to join. In the cavern, the Reds find Donut alive, and find an underground computer spying on Blood Gulch. Meanwhile, the Blues move Sheila's AI to the crashed ship and deal with Junior. Tex returns, and Vic urges the Blues to attack Red Base via the caves; instead, they split: Doc, Junior, and Sister find Lopez, who had returned to the gulch with O'Malley, in the caves; Church, Tucker and Tex attack the Red Base, but Wyoming and Gary, now controlling the Blues' tank, ambush them. Tucker thwarts Wyoming's attack and kills him. The villains intend to exploit the alien race through Junior, the supposed ruler of the aliens. Realizing an opportunity to win the war by enslaving the aliens, Tex coaxes O'Malley into infecting her, and tries to flee on the ship with Wyoming's helmet and Junior. However, the Reds place Andy on board, and an explosion is seen. The survivors return to their bases and repeat dialogue from the first episodes, thus concluding The Blood Gulch Chronicles.[9][10]
After Agent Washington (Shannon McCormick), also known as "Recovery One", retrieves Delta,[11] he encounters twin freelancers, South Dakota and North Dakota. Although ordered to kill South Dakota, he spares her to enlist her help in defeating an unknown enemy targeting the remaining freelancers. South betrays Washington and convinces her attacker to steal his enhancements, giving her time to flee. Washington's commander instructs South to return to the base, but she refuses and leaves. After Tex's ship crashes in an outpost named Valhalla, apparently killing Tex, O'Malley infects the local soldiers, leading them to kill each other. The unknown enemy, who identifies himself as the Meta, shows up and captures O'Malley and takes Tex's cloaking ability from her armor. Washington, who has survived, tracks down Caboose and Church, who have experience with O'Malley, while the Meta manipulates communications to order the Reds to attack them. Attacking Agent South, The Meta escapes when Washington, Caboose, and Church intervene, and Washington kills South. The Reds interrupt a second confrontation with the Meta, allowing the Meta to recover, attack, and escape. To help Caboose, rendered unconscious off-screen, Church enters his mind and finds a message left by Delta. Based on the message, Washington directs them to visit Command; the Meta sneaks inside with them. Inside, Washington and Church find Washington's former AI partner, Epsilon, and Washington deems Church to be the remnants of the Alpha AI. The base alarm triggers, and Recovery agents attack the team. Washington orders the Reds and Caboose to escape with Epsilon and turn the AI in while he and Church remain to detonate an electromagnetic pulse (EMP), rendering the Meta's stolen abilities and AI useless, in turn weakening him considerably. Initially defiant, Church ultimately stays as his ghost-like apparition, while the others take his body. The Meta pursues and shoots Washington, demanding to see Alpha as promised. Church occupies the Meta long enough for Washington to activate the EMP. Caboose successfully escapes with Epsilon, but Church's and Washington's fate is left unstated. Narrating the epilogue of Reconstruction, the Director of Project Freelancer reveals himself as the real Leonard Church, stating that the Alpha (Private Church) is based on his mind and memories.
After the Reds settle into a new base, Sarge attempts to improve his new Warthog and eventually calls Lopez for help after getting the base's power online, while Caboose works on a secret project at his own base. Donut arrives at Red base, collapsing from thirst before telling Grif that "he needs help... it's under the sand... find him!" Grif decides that it sounds too bothersome and dismisses it. Not long after, in Recreation, Donut awakes, but passes out again at Blue Base, telling Caboose that Tucker is in trouble. After calling Washington, who is still alive but imprisoned and unable to help, Caboose reveals he is trying to build a new friend, and Donut offers to lend Sarge's secret facility to Caboose. After sneaking in, Epsilon activates and explains to Caboose that he must go to the place Donut was at. The Reds, upon discovering Caboose, decide to aid him for their own reasons. Sarge and Grif go with him to aid his mission, while Simmons, Lopez and Donut remain behind. Upon arriving at a dig site they run afoul of the local soldiers and encounter Tucker. In Tucker's bunker, Caboose finds a mysterious, highly powerful robotic drone which he uploads Epsilon into. The memories act as a back-up of Alpha, who acts and sounds like Church, although with no recollection of any of the events that have happened throughout the series. While fleeing from an unknown group of human soldiers, Sarge, Grif, Caboose, Tucker and Epsilon-Church are ambushed by an alien taskforce. Meanwhile, the new Chairman of Project Freelancer tells Washington that he can be released if he can find Epsilon, the only loose-end in Washington's attack on Command. Concurrent to these events, Simmons, Donut and Lopez come under attack from the Meta, who is once again running rampant for unknown reasons. Washington arrives as the Reds in Valhalla attempt to escape, dispatching Lopez and Donut while demanding Epsilon, whom he wants in order escape his past of deceptions and betrayals
Characters
Red vs. Blue features characters whose personalities are skewed in different ways and to varying degrees. Character interaction and dialogue, rather than action, drive the story.[12] The series has centered on eight main characters, four per team. Other characters, both team-affiliated and unaffiliated, human and non-human, have played significant roles throughout the story.
Main characters
- Sarge (Matt Hullum) - Staff sergeant[13] and leader of the Blood Gulch Red Team. A military man with a Southern United States accent, he is the only Blood Gulch soldier on either team consistently serious about the Red versus Blue civil war. His sociopathic battle plans often entail unnecessary casualties of his own men, especially Grif.
- Dexter Grif (Geoff Ramsey) - An unlucky draftee who displays disinterest in fighting and is habitually lazy and irresponsible. These characteristics earn him the disrespect and ridicule of both Sarge and Simmons
- Dick Simmons (Gustavo Sorola) - Sarge's sycophantic, insecure, right-hand man. Despite this, Simmons, and Grif are often seen together, either chatting or bickering.
- Franklin Delano Donut (Dan Godwin) - An eager rookie who joins the Red Team in episode 3. He tends to annoy his teammates with his naïveté, garrulousness, and cheerfulness and becomes more effeminate as the series progresses.
- Leonard L. Church (Burnie Burns) - Cynical de facto leader of the Blue Team, and is found to be what is left of the Alpha AI. Often shouldering the responsibility of actually solving the various crises that the Blood Gulch teams encounter, he often ends up taking their brunt, leaving him increasingly disillusioned and antisocial. His serious, reasoned approach conflicts with the personality of Lavernius Tucker.
- Lavernius Tucker (Jason Saldaña) - The longest serving blue soldier. Snide, averse to work and battle, and obsessed with women. Later becomes pregnant from an encounter with an alien and following this, becomes more responsible and knowledgeable, though he retains his womanising traits.
- Michael J. Caboose (Joel Heyman) - The Blue Team's new rookie. Although physically strong, he exhibits ever-increasing degrees of stupidity and childishness throughout the series, to a point of a virtual divorce from reality.
- Allison "Tex" (Kathleen Zuelch) - An elite soldier in Project Freelancer and Church's former girlfriend. She is hired by Blue Command to join the team as a mercenary in episode 10. She is able to eliminate entire teams of soldiers by herself, and is described as "the most lethal soldier in Blood Gulch".[14]
Significant supporting characters
- Lopez: A robot built by Sarge that, due to a damaged speech unit, can only speak Spanish. After the explosion that propels the cast into the future, only its head remains, until given a new body in Reconstruction.
- Sheila: The Artificial Intelligence inside the Blue Team's tank for most of the series, until it is transferred into a ship, which crash lands prior to Reconstruction.
- O'Malley: Also known as Omega, it is an evil, megalomaniacal AI fragment originally implanted in Tex during a military experiment as part of Project Freelancer.
- Andy: A foul-mouthed bomb originally built by Tex to destroy O'Malley, capable of translating the Alien's language and Spanish.
- Alien: A creature who leads Tucker and Caboose on a "sacred quest". Killed by Wyoming.
- Gary: A computer terminal who explains The Great Prophecy and tells Church about the Great Destroyer, later revealed to be Wyoming's partner AI, Gamma.
- Wyoming: A Freelancer hired by O'Malley to kill Tucker. Wyoming was part of Project Freelancer alongside Tex and was given his own AI fragment. This AI fragment is designated Gamma, but is known as Gary throughout much of the series.
- Vic: A sardonic, unhelpful communications officer for both Red and Blue armies in Blood Gulch.
- Junior: Tucker's alien baby, conceived parasitically by the Alien and Tucker.
- Captain Butch Flowers: The Blue team's former leader, later resurrected from the dead, and killed again shortly after.
- Sister: Grif's color-blind sister, who was sent to aid the Blues during the events of the Blood Gulch Chronicles, and remains in Blood Gulch during Reconstruction, later allegedly killed by Lopez in Relocated.
- Washington: A former Freelancer who worked as a Recovery Agent for Project Freelancer. He was tasked with tracking down AIs and later the Meta as well. He was at a UNSC Maximum Security Detention Facility for a while, but he just cut a deal with the chairman of the oversight committee concerning the AI epsilon in return for his freedom.
- South: A Freelancer who teamed-up with and later betrayed Washington in Recovery One. She is later killed by him in Reconstruction.
- The Meta: The former Freelancer Agent Maine, who hunts down other Freelancers and their AI fragments. He is nearly mute except for growls and the voices of the AI fragments he has captured.
- The Director: The director (Dr. Leonard Church) of Project Freelancer, the organization responsible for the Red vs. Blue combat simulations and the implantation of AI fragments into Freelancer agents. Revealed to be the origination of the Alpha AI.
- 'Unknown character "C.T.". Please see Template:Rvbchar/doc for usage.': A character in the Recreation series who is looking for a mysterious alien weapon at a desert base.
Development history
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a2/Burnie_Burns_at_ROFLCon_2008.jpg/170px-Burnie_Burns_at_ROFLCon_2008.jpg)
Series or season | Start date | End date | Episode numbers |
---|---|---|---|
The Blood Gulch Chronicles season 1 | April 1, 2003 | September 28, 2003 | 1–19 |
The Blood Gulch Chronicles season 2 | January 3, 2004 | June 11, 2004 | 20–38 |
The Blood Gulch Chronicles season 3 | October 12, 2004 | May 18, 2005 | 39–57 |
The Blood Gulch Chronicles season 4 | August 29, 2005 | April 1, 2006 | 58–77 |
Out of Mind | June 16, 2006 | September 4, 2006 | 1–5 |
The Blood Gulch Chronicles season 5 | October 2, 2006 | June 28, 2007 | 78–100 |
Recovery One | October 28, 2007 | December 7, 2007 | 1–4 |
Reconstruction | April 5, 2008 | October 30, 2008 | 1–19 |
Relocated | February 9, 2009 | March 9, 2009 | 1–4 |
Recreation | June 15, 2009 | October 26, 2009 | 1–19 |
Resolution | 2010 | 2010 | 1-19 |
Red vs. Blue emerged from Burnie Burns's voiceover-enhanced gameplay videos that he created for a website called drunkgamers.com, which was run by Geoff Fink (later Geoff Ramsey) and Gustavo Sorola. Having played Halo: Combat Evolved extensively, the drunkgamers crew discussed one day whether the Warthog, an automobile in the game, looks like a puma. This discussion, re-created in episode 2, was "the spark for the whole series".[15] Seeing potential for a full story, Burns created a trailer for Red vs. Blue, but it was largely ignored, and, for unrelated reasons, drunkgamers soon closed. Four months later, Computer Gaming World contacted Ramsey for permission to include a different drunkgamers video in a CD to be distributed with the magazine. Ramsey granted permission, but he and Burns felt that they needed a website to take advantage of the exposure from Computer Gaming World. They therefore resurrected Red vs. Blue and re-released the trailer to coincide with the Computer Gaming World issue. The first episode proper was released on April 1, 2003.[16]
Rooster Teeth was initially unaware of the broader machinima movement. In 2004, Co-producer Matt Hullum stated in an interview with GameSpy, "When we first started Red vs. Blue we thought we were completely original. We never imagined that there were other people out there using video games to make movies, much less that it was a new art form with a hard to pronounce name and an official organization."[17]
The nature of Red vs. Blue was different from Burns's initial expectation. A partial character introduction released between the original trailer and the first episode featured extensive action and violence, set to Limp Bizkit's song "Break Stuff". However, as work continued, the focus shifted to situation comedy rather than the heavy action initially implied.[18] Although the series parodies video games, Ramsey noted, "We try not to make it too much of an inside joke. And I think we use more bureaucracy and military humor than anything else, which everybody working in an office can identify with."[19] Rooster Teeth has stated that Red vs. Blue was influenced by Homestar Runner,[20] Penny Arcade,[2] and possibly Mystery Science Theater 3000.[19]
Rooster Teeth initially envisioned Red vs. Blue to be short, but the series grew beyond their expectations. Burns and Ramsey had preconceived a list of jokes for which they allocated six to eight episodes. By episode 8, however, they realized that the series had fleshed out more than expected; they had covered only about one third of their original list.[21] Later in season 1, Burns estimated a series of 22 episodes; however, driven by the series' popularity, he realized that there was more potential story than could be covered in that length,[22] and was able to conceive an extension of the season 1 plot. The whole production team eventually quit their jobs and began to work full-time on the series; to generate revenue they created an online store to sell T-shirts.
On June 16, 2006, Burns announced a five-part mini-series, Red vs. Blue: Out of Mind, which chronicles the adventures of the mercenary Tex after her disappearance in season 4. The mini-series premiered exclusively on the Xbox Live Marketplace,[23] but Rooster Teeth later made it available on their official site.[24]
The original series, The Blood Gulch Chronicles, ended on June 28, 2007, with the release of episode 100. On April 4, 2008, Burns announced a new series, Red vs. Blue: Reconstruction,[25] the group's first Halo 3 series. Several voice actors returned in Reconstruction,[26] which ran from April 5 to October 30, 2008. Rooster Teeth announced plans for new Red vs. Blue series, each separated by a few weeks' break. The first mini-series, Relocated, ran from February 9 to March 9, 2009. A second series, Recreation, began on June 15, 2009 and ended on October 26, 2009.
During a the podcast Late Nite Jenga Jam, Burnie Burns unofficially confirmed that the title of the eighth Red vs. Blue series was "Red vs. Blue: Resolution".
Production
The writing process for the series has changed over time. Early in season 1, Burns wrote the episode scripts from week to week, with minimal planning in advance;[2] major plot events were conceived shortly before they were filmed.[27] For the second season, Matt Hullum became a main writer.[28] A rough plot outline is now written before a season begins, although the actual content of an individual episode is still decided on a more short-term basis.[29] Because Red vs. Blue is loosely based on the Halo universe, Rooster Teeth encountered some difficulties when trying to synchronize events in the series with the release of Halo 2.[30]
Except for a few scenes created with the Marathon Trilogy and the PC version of Halo, Red vs. Blue is mostly filmed with interconnected Xbox consoles. As the series title suggests, the videos are largely set in the Halo map Blood Gulch and its Halo 2 counterpart, Coagulation. However, some episodes have been filmed on other maps, including Sidewinder and Hang 'Em High from Halo and Zanzibar and Waterworks from Halo 2. One special video used the public Beta of Halo 3 as a special introduction video. Within a multiplayer game session of any of the games used for filming, the people controlling the avatars "puppet" their characters, moving them around, firing weapons, and performing other actions as dictated by the script, and in synchronization with the episode's dialogue, which is recorded ahead of time.[31]
The "cameraman" is simply another player, whose first-person perspective is recorded raw to a computer. To work around in-game limitations, bugs and post-production techniques are exploited to achieve desired visual effects. In particular, Adobe Premiere Pro is used to edit the audio and video together, impose letterboxing to hide the camera player's head-up display, add the titles and fade-to-black screens, and create some visual effects that cannot be accomplished in-game.[32]
Trocadero provides the music for Red vs. Blue, which did not feature any originally. According to a journal entry on Rooster Teeth's official site, Nico Audy-Rowland, Trocadero's bandleader, was introduced to the series and enjoyed it enough to submit a song about it. Burns liked the piece and requested more;[33] he stated in the season 1 DVD audio commentary tracks that the music added a "whole new element to the series".[34] To create other sound effects, Burns used Foley artistry, in some cases to replace cinematically awkward counterparts from the game engine.[35]
Reception
Red vs. Blue attracted interest immediately; the first episode had 20,000 downloads within a day.[36] Shortly after episode 2, Bungie Studios contacted Rooster Teeth. Although the crew had feared that any contact would be to force an end to the project, Bungie enjoyed the videos and was supportive;[37] one staff member called the production "kind of brilliant".[38] A deal was arranged to ensure that the series could continue to use Bungie's game properties[1] without license fees.[38] Red vs. Blue continued to attract more attention, and, by April 2004, Kevin J. Delaney of The Wall Street Journal estimated that weekly viewership was between 650,000 and 1,000,000.[1] In a 2006 interview, Strange Company founder Hugh Hancock called the series probably "the most successful machinima productions [sic]" and estimated that it was generating almost US$200,000 annually.[39] Red vs. Blue content was also included with a premium "Legendary" edition of Halo 3.[40]
Red vs. Blue was widely acclaimed within the machinima industry. The first season won awards for Best Picture, Best Independent Machinima Film, and Best Writing at the Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences' 2003 Machinima Film Festival.[41] Two years later, at the 2005 festival, the third season won an award for Best Independent Machinima and was nominated for five others.[42] At the 2006 Machinima Festival, the series was nominated for awards in voice acting and writing, but won neither.[43]
Among film critics, the response was generally positive. Darren Waters of BBC News Online called Red vs. Blue "riotously funny" and "reminiscent of the anarchic energy of South Park".[22] Reviewing the three season DVDs for Cinema Strikes Back, Charlie Prince wrote, "Red vs. Blue is hysterical in large part because all the characters are morons, and so the seemingly intense conflict with the opposing base doesn't exactly work the way you'd think it would."[44] Leggat described the series as "[p]art locker-room humor, part Beckett-like absurdist tragicomedy, part wicked vivisection of game culture and sci-fi action films and games".[45] Ed Halter of The Village Voice dismissed the humor as shallow and described the first season as "Clerks-meets-Star Wars".[46] Leggat defended the humor, arguing, "The literary analog is absurdist drama."[1]
Another common criticism of Red vs. Blue was that its season 3 plot was too far-fetched and out-of-character. Charlie Prince wrote, "By the third season, however, the Red vs. Blue idea seems to be running out of steam.... It's not funny so much as just odd."[44] Writing for the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Wilma Jandoc agreed that the first part of "season 3... throws the teams into a ridiculous situation and has limited member interactions, leading to a lack of witty dialogue".[12] In an about.com review of the season 4 DVD, writer Eric Qualls thought that season 3 was "a little too long, and too complicated, and the jokes were a bit too far apart".[47] Nevertheless, both Prince and Jandoc were optimistic that the series would improve, and Qualls stated that the fourth season had "returned to the series' roots" as "some of the funniest stuff you’ll ever see".[47]
Rooster Teeth Productions has created special Red vs. Blue videos for various events. For example, Microsoft has commissioned Red vs. Blue videos for Xbox demo kiosks found in game stores and for a developer conference.[48] Barenaked Ladies has also commissioned videos for their concerts.[1] Other videos have been specifically created for gaming magazines, including Electronic Gaming Monthly and Computer Gaming World; gaming conventions, including E3 and the Penny Arcade Expo; and the Sundance Film Festival.
Red vs. Blue has also received praise from soldiers stationed in the Middle East. An August 2005 blog entry by Kimi Matsuzaki of 1UP.com displays photographs of soldiers holding various weapons, as well as copies of the first and second season Red vs. Blue DVDs.[49] Geoff Ramsey later stated in an interview, "We get a lot of merchandise and DVDs out to Iraq and get a lot of great e-mails back."[19]
The notability and impact of Red vs. Blue extends to video games outside the Halo series. The developers of the Xbox 360 video game Gears of War, Epic Games, made a reference to a Red vs. Blue gag through an in-game achievement called, "Is it a spider?"; the award is earned for tagging opponents with grenades. Another reference to the series appears on Bungie's website. On a player’s Halo 3 profile screen the description of a kill or death with a flag is “Right next to the headlight fluid”.[50] In Halo 3 itself, the second campaign scenario features a Red vs. Blue skit, wherein two cast members voice over a soldier attempting to bypass a locked door.
Impact on machinima
Red vs. Blue is widely credited with attracting public attention to machinima. Although examples had existed since the 1990s, Clive Thompson credited Red vs. Blue as "the first to break out of the underground".[51] Tavares, Gil, and Roque called it machinima's "first big success",[52] and Paul Marino noted that "the series proved so popular that it not only transcended the typical gamer, it also claimed fans outside the gaming world".[53] In 2005, Thompson wrote that "Microsoft has been so strangely solicitous that when it was developing the sequel to Halo last year, the designers actually inserted a special command—a joystick button that makes a soldier lower his weapon—designed solely to make it easier for Rooster Teeth to do dialogue".[38] The series has inspired other machinima productions, including The Codex.[54]
In machinima, Red vs. Blue has been mentioned as the most successful example of the trend toward serial distribution. According to Hugh Hancock, this format allows for gradual improvement as a result of viewer feedback, and gives viewers a reason to return for future videos. Hancock argues that this model was necessary for Red vs. Blue's success: "Sunday night is Red vs. Blue night, just as (in the UK) Thursday used to be Buffy. Had RvB released their films as single downloads of an hour and a half, they'd have had nowhere near the success they currently enjoy."[55]
Distribution
Public | Sponsor |
---|---|
Seasons 1–4 | |
320×240 or 360×240 |
640×480 or 720×480 |
Out of Mind and after | |
320×180 | 640×360 |
Videos are typically available in QuickTime (QT) and Windows Media Video (WMV) formats. All released episodes of the latest season are freely available from the official site. A few episodes from the previous seasons are available from a rolling archive; each week, the videos are rotated to the next set. This setup is intended to help to control bandwidth costs;[56] as of September 2005, the official Rooster Teeth website was serving 400 terabytes of data monthly.[57] However, nearly all freely released episodes of Red vs. Blue are also available from websites such as Machinima.com, Archive.org, FilePlanet, and Google Video. From the Xbox Live Marketplace, Out of Mind is available as a free download, and some Red vs. Blue episodes can be purchased for 80 Microsoft Points each.[58]
Members of the official website can gain sponsor status for a fee of US$10 every six months. Sponsors can access videos a few days before the general public release, download higher-resolution versions of the episodes, and access special content released only to sponsors. For example, during season 5, Rooster Teeth began to release directors' commentary to sponsors for download. Additionally, while the public archive is limited to rotating sets of videos, sponsors can access content from previous seasons at any time.[59]
Episodes are released in different resolutions; higher resolutions are reserved for sponsors. Beginning with the Red vs. Blue: Out of Mind mini-series, Rooster Teeth began to film and edit video in 720p high-definition,[60] and to release episodes in widescreen format, instead of hiding the game HUD through the letterboxing seen in full-screen releases. On the January 8, 2007, release of episode 87, Matt Hullum announced that videos would be viewable in Macromedia Flash format. He stated that the change allowed Rooster Teeth to release public videos in a higher resolution "while keeping the file size low", and that the entire video archive would be updated. Code to embed the Flash video on other websites was also distributed.[61] In a site journal entry, Burns clarified that downloadable versions would continue to be released, but after their Flash counterparts.
Although it is distributed serially over the Internet, Red vs. Blue is also one of the first commercially released products made using machinima, as opposed to a product merely containing machinima. DVDs of the five completed seasons are sold through Rooster Teeth's official website, as well as at most EB Games, GameStop and Hot Topic stores in the United States.[62] For the DVDs, the episodes of the main storyline are edited together to play continuously as a full-length film. Because the episodes as individually released often contain dialogue that continues into or past the fade to black at the end of the video, Rooster Teeth either removes that dialogue entirely or films extra footage to replace the original fade to black.[63] On April 1, 2008, Rooster Teeth released a box set of all five seasons, including a DVD of new bonus content.
A third version of the season is further edited for time for showing at the Lincoln Center and at other film festivals. In a 2005 interview, Burns noted that the first season, normally 75 minutes in length, was cut to 55 minutes for these venues, with an entire episode omitted.[64] Burns stated in a website news post that the 135-minute season 3 DVD version had to be shortened to "a watchable-in-a-theater runtime of 100 minutes".[65]
Notes
- ^ a b c d e Delaney 2004
- ^ a b c Smith 2006
- ^ O'Malley is voiced by the actor responsible for whichever character he is possessing at the time.
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003
- ^ a b Burns, et al. 2004
- ^ Burns, et al. 2005, episode 51
- ^ Burns, et al. 2005
- ^ a b c d Burns, et al. 2006
- ^ a b c d Burns, et al. 2007
- ^ Six alternate endings were released on the season 5 DVD; two were available on the website since the release of episode 100
- ^ Red vs. Blue: Recovery One Part One commentary.
- ^ a b Jandoc 2004
- ^ Burns, et al. 2005, Character profiles, Sarge.
- ^ Burns, et al. 2005, character profiles, Tex
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, episode 2
- ^ Rooster Teeth Productions & n.d. a; Konow 2005, 2
- ^ Kosak 2004
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, introduction
- ^ a b c Konow 2005, 4
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, episode 16
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, episode 4
- ^ a b Waters 2003
- ^ Burns 2006a
- ^ Burns 2006b
- ^ Burns 2008
- ^ http://rvb.roosterteeth.com/info/?id=2
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, episode 8
- ^ Burns, et al. 2004, audio commentary
- ^ Konow, 2005 & 3
- ^ Burns, et al. 2005, audio commentary, episode 39
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, Audio Commentary; Delaney.
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary; Moltenbrey 2005
- ^ Audy-Rowland 2005
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, episode 10
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, episode 11
- ^ Thompson 2005, 1
- ^ Konow 2005, 2
- ^ a b c Thompson 2005, 3
- ^ MacGregor 2006
- ^ Gameworld Network staff 2006
- ^ Machinima.com staff 2003 harvnb error: multiple targets (2×): CITEREFMachinima.com2003 (help)
- ^ Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences 2005 ; Machinima.com staff 2005
- ^ Choi 2006
- ^ a b Prince 2005
- ^ Leggat 2006
- ^ Halter 2003
- ^ a b Qualls 2006
- ^ Bungie staff 2005; Delaney 2004
- ^ Matsuzaki.
- ^ Hsu 2008, 106
- ^ Thompson 2005, 2
- ^ Tavares, Gil & Roque 2005, 4
- ^ Marino 2004, 19
- ^ Whitley 2006
- ^ Hancock 2004
- ^ Rooster Teeth Productions & n.d. b; Rooster Teeth Productions & n.d. d
- ^ Totilo.
- ^ Surette 2007
- ^ Rooster Teeth Productions & n.d. c
- ^ Sorola 2006
- ^ Hullum 2007
- ^ Rooster Teeth Productions & n.d. e
- ^ Burns, et al. 2003, audio commentary, episode 18 .
- ^ Marks 2005
- ^ Burns 2005
References
- Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences. "2005 Award Nominations and Selections". 2005 Machinima Film Festival. Archived from the original on 2006-04-27. Retrieved 2009-05-25.
- Audy-Rowland, Nico (March 24, 2005). "Well, it started like this..." Red vs. Blue. Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2007-01-30.
- Bungie staff (2005). "Red vs. Blue : The Interview Strikes Back". Microsoft Corporation. Archived from the original on 2005-12-23. Retrieved 2006-01-08.
- Burns, Burnie (August 10, 2005). "It's Official". Red vs. Blue. Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2006-02-20.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Burns, Burnie (June 16, 2006). "Out of Sight". Red vs. Blue. Retrieved 2006-06-19.
- Burns, Burnie (August 1, 2006). "Out of Mind on RvB". Red Vs Blue. Retrieved 2006-08-02.
- Burns, Burnie (October 2, 2006). "Season 5 Public". Red vs. Blue. Retrieved 2006-10-03.
- Burns, Burnie (January 10, 2007). "LoRes Downloads online". Retrieved 2007-01-15.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Burns, Burnie (April 4, 2008). "RVB:Reconstruction". Red vs. Blue. Retrieved 2008-04-04.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Burns, Burnie (writer, director) et al. (2003). Red vs. Blue Season One (DVD). Buda, Texas: Rooster Teeth Productions.
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(help) - Burns, Burnie (writer, director) et al. (2004). Red vs. Blue Season Two (DVD). Buda, Texas: Rooster Teeth Productions.
{{cite AV media}}
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(help) - Burns, Burnie (writer, director) et al. (2005). Red vs. Blue Season Three (DVD). Buda, Texas: Rooster Teeth Productions.
{{cite AV media}}
: Explicit use of et al. in:|authors=
(help) - Burns, Burnie (writer, director) et al. (2006). Red vs. Blue Season Four (DVD). Buda, Texas: Rooster Teeth Productions.
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: Explicit use of et al. in:|authors=
(help) - Choi, Jason. "2005 Machinima Film Festival: Winners". Machinima.com. Retrieved 2009-05-25.
- Delaney, Kevin J. (April 9, 2004). "When Art Imitates Videogames, You Have "Red vs. Blue": Mr. Burns Makes Little Movies Internet Fans Clamor For; Shades of Samuel Beckett". The Wall Street Journal.
{{cite news}}
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(help)CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Gameworld Network staff (October 29, 2006). "Halo 3 Details Explosion". GameWorld Network News. Retrieved 2006-11-12.
- Halter, Ed (December 31, 2003). "Tracking Shot: The Blood Gulch Chronicles". The Village Voice. Village Voice Media. Retrieved 2006-01-09.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Hancock, Hugh (November 23, 2004). "Editorial - Serialise This!". Machinima.com. Archived from the original on June 13, 2006. Retrieved 2009-06-01.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Hsu, Dan (2006). "War Journal". Electronic Gaming Monthly (209): 106.
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ignored (help)CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Hullum, Matt (January 8, 2007). "RvB 87 in a Flash". Red vs. Blue. Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2007-01-10.
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: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Jandoc, Wilma (December 5, 2004). ""Red vs. Blue" mines game for comedy gold". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Retrieved 2006-10-12.
{{cite news}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Kohler, Chris (June 26, 2007). "Machinima Series Red vs. Blue Ends Tour of Duty". Wired News. Condé Nast Publications. Retrieved 2007-06-26.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Konow, David (September 24, 2005). "The Cult of Red vs. Blue". TwitchGuru. Tom's Guide Publishing. Retrieved 2006-02-28.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Kosak, Dave (November 16, 2004). "GameSpy Examines the Teeth of the Rooster". GameSpy. Retrieved 2006-02-22.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Leggat, Graham (2006). "Cock Byte: Masters of Machinima". San Francisco International Film Festival. San Francisco Film Society. Retrieved 2006-06-11.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - MacGregor, James (2006). "Hugh Hancock, Machinimateur". Shooters Films. Shooting People. Retrieved 2006-08-21.
- Machinima.com staff (October 26, 20903). "Machinima Awards 2003 Results". Machinima.com. Retrieved 2007-09-24.
{{cite web}}
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(help) - Machinima.com staff (November 5, 2006). "2006 Machinima Film Festival: WINNERS & Nominees". Machinima.com. Retrieved 2007-09-24.
- Marino, Paul (2004). 3D Game-Based Filmmaking: The Art of Machinima. Scottsdale, Arizona: Paraglyph Press. ISBN 1-932111-85-9.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Marks, Chris (July 9, 2005). "Interview - Burnie Burns and Gus Sorola". The Unofficial Rooster Teeth Productions Resource Site. Retrieved 2006-03-06.
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: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Matsuzaki, Kimi (August 4, 2005). "Big booms and big guns". Kimi Matsuzaki's 1UP Blog. Ziff Davis Media Inc. Retrieved 2006-03-02.
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: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Moltenbrey, Karen (2005). "Out of Character". Computer Graphics World. COP Communications. Retrieved 2009-03-01.
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ignored (help) - Prince, Charlie (August 23, 2005). "Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles is Hysterically Funny (But Skip the 3rd Season)". Cinema Strikes Back. Retrieved 2006-01-09.
- Qualls, Eric (May 22, 2006). "Red vs. Blue Season 4 DVD Review". about.com. The New York Times Company. Retrieved 2006-06-09.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Rooster Teeth Productions. "The History of Red vs. Blue". Red vs. Blue. Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2006-01-08.
- Rooster Teeth Productions. "Red vs Blue FAQ". Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2006-06-09.
- Rooster Teeth Productions. "Video FAQ". Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2006-06-09.
- Rooster Teeth Productions. "Where to Buy Rooster Teeth Products". Red vs. Blue. Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2006-02-20.
- Rooster Teeth Productions. "Sponsorship FAQ". Red vs. Blue. Rooster Teeth Productions. Retrieved 2006-06-09.
- Smith, Bryan (February 21, 2006). "Burnie Burns Interview". HaloGrid.com. Retrieved 2006-06-03.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Sorola, Gus (June 16, 2006). "Out of Mind". Red vs. Blue. Retrieved 2006-08-01.
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: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Surette, Tim (2007-04-13). "Red vs. Blue yuks it up on XBL". GameSpot. CNET Networks. Retrieved 2007-04-25.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Tavares, José Pedro; Gil Riu; and Roque, Licino (2005). "Player as Author: conjecturing online game creation modalities and infrastructure" (DOC). Retrieved 2006-08-03.
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(help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - Thompson, Clive (August 7, 2005). "The Xbox Auteurs". The New York Times. Retrieved 2006-01-08.
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: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Thompson, Clive (December 2008). "100% Cotton. 20% Profit". Wired Magazine.
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(help)CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Totilo, Stephen (September 28, 2005). "Machinima Pros Make a Living Playing "Halo" — With Their Feet". MTV.com. MTV Networks. Retrieved 2006-03-03.
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: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Waters, Darren (August 7, 2003). "Animators turn to video games". BBC News Online. BBC. Retrieved 2006-01-09.
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Further reading
- Chien, Irene (2007). "Deviation / Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles". Film Quarterly. 60 (4). 24–29. doi:10.1525/fq.2007.60.4.24.
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Kushner, David (July 2008). "Machinima's Movie Moguls". IEEE Spectrum. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Retrieved 2009-04-01.
- Machinima.com staff (December 22, 2003). "Red vs Blue Interview". Machinima.com. Retrieved 2009-04-01.
External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fa/Wikiquote-logo.svg/34px-Wikiquote-logo.svg.png)
- Red vs. Blue official site
- Red vs. Blue at IMDb
- Template:Machinima.com series
- Red vs. Blue show on YouTube
- The Unofficial Red vs. Blue Resource Site
- Red vs. Blue Wiki, an external wiki