Why Epic Meal Time (Eventually) Failed
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- čas přidán 22. 12. 2021
- At one point in time, Epic Meal Time was receiving millions of views an episode, these days, their video's average around 50,000 views each. Harley Morenstein and the Epic Meal Time channel were a powerhouse peaking as CZcams's 9th most subscribed channel, a title that feels like a distant memory after a slow downfall lasting approximately 10 years. This video will explain why Epic Meal Time's career died.
This is, Why Epic Meal Time (Eventually) Failed.
Thank you guys for watching, like and sub if you enjoyed, SunnyV2 XO ❤ - Zábava
Been watching this channel for ages. Always wondered if we would get one!
You did a great job and it was accurate too! I really enjoyed watching this.
Lol
Hope your doing good Har.
i hope u do drake colab
Give bobux?
Holy shit 🐐
I have to admit; hearing someone describe the early 2010s as "the early days of youtube" makes me feel so, _so_ old.
I know right?! I remember it being 2008 and I wanted to start my own beauty CZcams channel but I didn't because I felt it was 'too late' and there were already too many on the platform. Lol
@@waitforit45 I know exactly what you mean!! It's like every year that passes that feeling gets more intense , I've completely let go of that idea but I still feel it
Truth
Watching the way things were as a culture in 2010 makes me feel old, you couldn't get away with half of that stuff nowadays.
@@waitforit45 You still can! If it wasn't late then, it sure isn't now lol
I was obsessed with Epic meal time when it was at its peak. I don’t think they did anything wrong, there’s just only so long you can make that type of video before people lose interest. They still killed it during their time.
Poor treatment??
How so??
" Hey I am bring in views. Pay me more. "
" Listen bro you are under contract stop being a pussy."
Yeah, when they started we were in our early 20s, still had that college frat noy immaturity, but then we got into our late 20s and early 30s, lot of my friends settled down, had kids, got married, bought homes, and we just grew out of EMT
@@neoasuraexactly. The college and fratty feel of the videos also limited their audience and appeal to a younger audience. Dude Perfect always remaining PG and having a wider range of potential concepts and potential celebrity guests has given them virtually limitless concept material. They’re super bros, but without the relative vulgarity, so they can appeal to kids and have way more staying power
EMT was and is a cool concept and will always be fun to look back on, but the appeal has passed audiences by
"watch me eat 45 strips of bacon!" is entertaining for about 3 minutes, and this guy made it work for 10 years. Honestly, hats-off to him. That's amazing.
indeed!
Nah. This jewish guy swindled his friends. He's not a good human.
TL;DR: They basically kept making food abominations until there were no more abominations left to create.
"When Alexander saw the breadth of his domain, he wept, for there were no more worlds to conquer."
I dunno, I always felt where it fell off was not the food but the guys involved. When they shed the first crew it just didn't feel the same.
No
No
Wrong, Jesus wept for there were no more worlds left to conquer.
yeah it was a disgusting waste of food. glad its over.
"business just got in the way of it being fun" this literally describes modern youtube videos compared to how it was when it started.
I sure have seen it plenty! :( It used to feel like such a different place, detached from the rest of life and loads of fun. How I miss it.
Except it underestimates how bad it's gotten. Now it's devolved to the point where it's like "business is actively getting in the way of me having a semblance of mental health, buuuut based on the last views on my vids I think I'm about to blow up, so hopefully it will be worth it"
Bs argument .. only immature ppl talk like that ... What u discover when u grow up is not to always have "fun" especially in bussiness .
true
@@LighTsHunTerz Bs argument .. only immature ppl reply like this
Credit to him where credit is due. A lot of these huge creators that decline go off the rails and become massively bitter but this guy seems to be very humble and relaxed about it. Good for him!
I obviously didn't watch EMT when it aired around in the good old days but my friends did talk about it a lot and when I watched one of his videos in 2012, I can see that he was a genuine. His "downfall" isn't as terrible as most CZcamsrs on here, it's just times were changing and he couldn't keep up. I respect him for keeping everything calm and collective
@@falcon8105 dude sold out his friends who helped make the channel.
Likely made a good chunk of cash from the good old days, and the smaller channel at 30k average views isn’t horrible compared to most creators. And likely still pays halfway decent. He ended with a very humble yet substantial amount of money.
Buddy of mine is a dentist. There’s a video we watched where Harley’s first line was “call up your dentist-tell em he’s a bitch!”.
To this day!, whenever I see my dentist friend I still drop this line and we still, to this day, laugh is if we heard it for the first time.
Thanks Harley!
I feel like we set youtubers to higher standards than other mediums. Epic Meal Time didn't fail, it had a run longer than most tv shows, and many many more viewers. It was a gigantic success. I think its cause we see CZcams channels as people rather than seeing them like shows.
Excellent point. It lasted longer and was more successful than “Firefly” and “Freaks and Geeks” combined. The difference between CZcams and television is that there aren’t network executives willing to cancel a CZcams channel if the views dip 5%.
Well said
I mean... TV & movies have very strict labour talent laws, advertising restrictions, language restrictions, laws surrounding children (audience & actors)
There is also the fact that not everyone can be in or create a show or movie. Massive funding is needed.
So I think we hold the people behind the CZcams channel to higher standard, not everything else
@@biancat7761 You seem smart.
this man is as smart as me...
Epic Meal Time wasn't a failure, all good things eventually come to an end and EMT ran its course. There's nothing wrong with that. I don't know a single person who didn't love EMT.
Cap Pewdiepie has been doing the same shit everysingle day for the past trillion years. Harley was just stubborn thinking he can continue making the same videos without the main people who made it fun. There is no value in a million dollars if you remove all the zero's. The same would happen with mrbeast if he started doing videos solo with out the main people
Hah, *emt*
What's EMT
Emergency Service Technician
@@YouveBeenBlitzed thank you!
It’s crazy that 2010 is looked at as “the early days of CZcams” considering the fact that I was in college at the time. I always considered 2006-2009 to be the early years of CZcams for me.
2006-2009 was early adopters. 2010-2012 was when YT started going mainstream.
Id say the early days were definitely 2006-2009. 2010 was definitely when kids were slowly using it more so it's more or less nostalgia
You're correct. 2010 is more of these mid-era of CZcams. The early days were when the biggest stars were asian-americans making mediocre jokes into their webcam or digital camera.
I didn't make this account until 2008, but I remember watching entire pirated series' on youtube back in 07. The days before anyone bothered making accounts or subscribing and every video had may 6 comments on it, if it had any at all. :P
As well as Ventrillo harassment and Freeman's Mind of course. :P
Thank god for Accursed Farms.
@@KuntaKinteToby I just learned I was an early adopter then lol
It's not entirely Epic Meal Time's fault why they declined, people just move on and sometimes things that used to be fun and interesting don't hit like they used to.
In other words, we old af. Hate to see it happen
same thing happened to the annoying orange
@@abdurrahmanqureshi3030 Eating 100 strips of bacon in a single course isn't gonna be a good idea either when you get older and your metabolism ain't what it used to be.
i'm a year late but, is it a good idea to microwave this? also another channel that can only get stale after awhile, but they did end the channel with a bang, microwaving microwaves
@@bigstopowens Will it blend? Was the same too, in its time period it was awesome but just lost momentum when everything caught fire or was a grey powder.
Harley needs to understand that his personality was a big part of it. He can do other things that aren't food related and people will watch
Exactly, the guy could have easily branched out into being a comedian or film and television actor.
@@Nelis1324 Do a skit based show as Harley's super serious character in the style of "Terry Tate: Office Linebacker."
@@Dakarn thanks, now I need to rewatch Office Linebacker.
Funny thing is he does do other things that arent food related. People watch but probably not as many as you would think. Alot of people dont know he streams for example.
@@bencastor9207 "That's a long distance call, DOUG!"
Nowadays we have Nick Avocado trying to eat an entire beached whale
among us
Didn't expect u to be here lemon
sounds like cannibalism to me
Don't talk about your mom like that
ohhhhhhh i thought he iiiis the beached whale xD
Alex Perrault saying " I was'nt treated fairly considering the value i brought to the show" is one of the funniest shit ever , the dude was just there , like an NPC , not moving, not talking , just eating , not much more lmao
I disagree. As a kid, I loved watching Muscles Glasses just stand there. For some reason, him just standing around and being called by that name was hilarious to me and one of the reasons I kept watching. He should have been appreciated more as a member of the crew.
he wanted more than just a member of the crew. he wanted extra for being muscle glasses, at a time when their content was already starting to dry up @@Alias3141
@@Alias3141 He got paid fairly, but wanting more than the creator of the channel and the main personality is a bit silly. Notably there were never accusations of paying less than they agreed on, he just wanted more. Greed played a role there.
To be fair, I personally stopped watching the show once MG stopped appearing.
@@brandon-yuhas he done anything of note since leaving?
This basically describes the difference between early 2010 youtube and late 2010 youtube, it shifted from fun videos with friends to businesses. It’s still entertaining but just isn’t the same
exactly what i’ve been feeling for a long while
there’s definitely a lack of authenticity
kids are now growing up with dreams of using youtube (and other sns) as a job. its crazy to think about
god I'm so glad to see other people that feel the same.
@@DemraSynfata word
\
100% - Back then, there was no obsession with pleasing a dubious "algorithm". Epic Meal Time just happened to be a channel that put out videos people would watch for the full ten minutes. At some point, that became the standard, *everyone's* videos were suddenly ten minutes long even if they didn't need to be. Shoot, it got so bad I remember some creators inserting 2 or 3 minutes of still images to pad their videos and make them last ten minutes. This new standard ended up killing every channel that couldn't repeatedly pump out 10+ minute videos on a frequent basis. Bye bye sketch channels, animation channels, music channels, etc. and hello hordes of shitty vloggers.
That's just the whole ten minute thing too. Add in the click bait thumbnails, misleading titles, sponsored ad placements on top of unskippable CZcams ads and nowadays it just feels like we're watching a shitty, outsourced version of reality TV.
I remember when youtube first came out, people got youtube famous just from making a rant on webcam. Like boh3m3. The bar was set very low.
Same with Annoying Orange and Channel Awesome. They both seemed like fun novelties initially, but they began feeling trapped in an alorythm that they couldn't control, and with many key figures leaving the company due to mistreatment they had recieved. And now barely anyone talks about them anymore.
Harley was my substitute teacher in highschool lol
Hes a great guy im glad for his success
No way for real?!
honestly, props to him to staying true to the channel even if it's receiving less views. 9/10 content creators in his situation would have quit ages ago.
Either that or just panicked and taken a sharp turn into whatever content is trendy to stay relevant. Reaction videos, ASMR, Lets Plays, Mukbangs etc.
Maybe it would have kept it alive slightly longer, but it would have ruined the legacy
Sure, there is honor in that. It's a horrible business model - And the definition of insanity - to keep looping the same thing and expecting different outcomes.
im pretty sure these guys also invented the term "youtube money"
they also took 'mukbang' to the next level
l o l money, money l o l
@@rossritchie7611 sup rozzah!
@@keratos92 mukbang before mukbang
@@GorillaFan_32 hell, they MADE thier own mukbang
Met Harley at a LA comic con, he was just hanging out and me and my friend asked to take a picture with him and he politely obliged. He was a really nice guy.
I remember a coworker showing me this channel in early 2012 and fell in love with it. We’d always talk about the latest episode at work. Good times.
Man, i remember these guys back in the day. At my office we used to watch their new episodes at one guys cubicle.
love how verified accounts get top comment with 10x less likes than unverified accounts.
gg
@@hokage1997 take a like
@@SilverPaladin hahaha
Gays
Yo, your content is awesome and I love that you cover more obscure bands
This happened to me too! You can only sing Smashmouth over so many songs until it gets old. I'm very lucky that I was able to slightly rez my channel a few years ago with my drumming videos. I really enjoy making those and the response has been pretty great.
I just subscribed my guy, you are an angel
I've enjoyed your recent shorts Jon, You should definitely make more of those!
Dude I always wondered what would happen to you, glad it's working out :)
Your neck beard, and your neck beard alone is what revived your channel.
Loved your content man, glad you're doing well!
Basically what I am learning from SunnyV2 is that everything on youtube is a cycle of rise and fall....eventually the world just sorta...gets tired of you and moves on.
it's sad that most of the current generation will never experience so many channels at the start of CZcams. Makes you think about how your parents feel when you don't understand their 'heroes'.
That’s true. I mean what was there to understand about the Lone Ranger?
Damn remember machinima?
It's crazy that at one time everyone at a lunch table was was watching a Ray William Johnson video and talking about , I doubt some newcomers know who that is
CZcams also didn't punish creators like they do now
"at the start of CZcams"
Eh? CZcams started 5 years before EMT joined. The start of CZcams was porn, parodies, music and Smosh. CZcams was truly lawless before the Google buyout.
What made EMT great for me was Harley, his jokes, quips, attitude and personality is top notch.
In its prime EMT was the most hilarious channel on youtube by miles.
But all good things have to end
Go watch EMT now lol, Harley hasn't changed and he is more unhinged now.
I think the muscles guy was right he was a pretty big part of the show but maybe he was asking for too much. But he was a fan favorite. It was doomed from the start anyway business was going to ruin the friendships always
I lived right next to those guys. That OG mcdonalds ( RIP it was remodeled into the modernist hell Mcdonalds ) was literally at the end of my street.
Although it would have been great if the show kept running forever, I get that it probably got very hard to keep that level of sarcastic, over the top passion going. Honestly, I'm also kind of glad the show ended, in that, although it was fun to watch this crazy stuff get eaten, I always felt this twinge of "Man, if they keep doing this, their health is going to suffer longterm", kind of the way it has with mukbang stuff.
I do think it would be cool if they got back together to do some kind of activity together, maybe just hang out and catch up, or some kind of outdoor competition. The chemistry and atmosphere was so fun to watch. It would be cool if they recaptured some of that.
I knew these guys a few years ago but I never expected them to go down like they did. CZcamsrs in 2010 are now failing because they can’t keep up with the new trends and algorithms
Nowadays cringy and clickbait stuff get pushed into algorithms.
@@WizardAmbrose I dont get crying i get CNN NBC in my recommended section and that makes me cry.
@@WizardAmbrose cuz it makes YT the most money
@Grisella L 👇💋 Nobody cares
CZcams has turned to shit ever since Smosh turned into a corporate business.
10 years is NOT a failure, I will always watch the EMT videos with love and hunger.
so you're saying failure doesn't exist? thanks man
@@rigormortiz5357 Where in my post did I say that? Strawman much?
@@rigormortiz5357 I thought that failures doesn't existed...until i read your comment
This was one of those huge channels that would show up in your feed every now and then over a couple of years. You took it for granted as a part of your social media environment, then one day it's gone and you slowly forget about it, flash forward a couple of years and it takes stumbling upon a random video like this highlighting what happened to ever even get the memo.
imagine feeling so entitled to a piece of the pie when all you do is wear glasses and ear food that's put infront of you
💀
fr how the hell did the chemistry crumble THAT hard because one dude who wore sat there and wore glasses eating food wanted more money 😭
Harleys voiceovers were comedy gold. So many quotable lines that made the videos so funny and rewatchable
I'm from the same town as them, and it was crazy to see it blow up. I was 16-17 years old and working with Alex Perrault at a burger joint and by the next year Muscles Glasses was a "household name".
Naw he was just a prop. Crazy that he wanted to be paid as much as Harley, when he didn't write any of the content or even have any speaking lines.
@@blastofo instead of getting a salary he shouldve gotten a cut of the revenue. Actors are usualy paid a fixed amount + residiuals if the work keeps on making money.
@@ssuuppeerrbbooyy Yeah actors in movies not actors in internet sketches. Don't have a single clue as to why, but it is what it is.
Say word
Question.
After they would create a massive sandwich.
What would they do with the sandwich??
This is something I've heard about quite a few times, where people started off making videos just for the fun of it but then once it started bringing in money they got more and more serious about it and it became more about business than having fun, and other people can notice that too. It seems like when people have success with their videos it's important for them to also keep having fun.
It’s like Smosh
That honestly seems the case for most pre 2015 CZcams celebrities. They get signed with some old legacy company and make TV shows/movies when they were putting out their content on a (at the time) radically different viewing platform compared to TV that old legacy companies just don't understand.
Imagine all you have to do is sit still, look tough and say nothing while eating whatever food you given. Audacity to say you're integral to the show and demand a salary lol. You're doing it once or twice a month and you're eating food they're not making you eat dirt and drink sewage for you to demand a compensation. Makes me absolutely livid.
The creatures were another youtube group of friends who each had individual channels and a joint channel. Eventually disbanded because og members left sue to conflict with one or two of the members and it wasn't fun for them anymore. Or left because of family stuff. Eventually the group had to shut down because their joint channel wasn't bringing in as many views or money while another channel that 2 of the members had created was blowing up. Eventually that channel had to shut down because of the same reasons. It became too serious and corporate like and members started leaving.
@@aibalta6340 I guess you could call that the Hollywood attitude.
Loved their content. But omg what a different space the internet was.
Fast food lasagna will remain one of my favorite CZcams videos of all time. Just with the natural reactions of the fast food workers alone when they hear all the food they are ordering 😂
i couldn't really agree with the term "failed" They had their moment in the sun and did well with it, not many channels can do the same cookie-cutter content for 10 years and still be as successful at their peak. Epic meal time had a great fun and was amazing to watch when it first came out!!
captain sparklez?
More like a decade in the sun.
yeah, it's a weird metric when making videos about specific super-sized foods get's a billion views and is called a failure. It's the same with games nowadays which people quit playing after years and hundreds of hours, as if everything had to be stretched forever way beyond any reason.
They hit success on YT early. If they had became successful now theyd have a lot more staying power. It was like a flavor of the week situation on YT early on. I can name a lot of channels I watched that are basically nothing. Channels now don't seem to go away since yt is as big as it's ever been.
@@IDiggPattyMayonnaise I disagree. I think it they'd arrived much later then their success would have been far more limited. Their type of content wasn't really done by a lot of channels back then, which gave them much more appeal. Nowadays there are more hardcore cooking channels than I can count.
Why is it that when a successful CZcams channel eventually falls off everyone says that they eventually failed? Yet when a successful TV show eventually runs its course(not goes out with its own planned written finale) people still consider that TV show to be a success? I don't see this channel as failing at all. It just ran it course. Maybe there was things behind the scenes complicating things, but that is true of almost every successful business in the world. Besides to this day Harley is still pretty active on CZcams and social media and I'm sure is doing just fine. As I'm sure are the others. To say it failed is misleading and I honestly never even really watched their channel, so I don't really care much about them. They just basically reached their end game, or their final season, if it was a TV show.
Exactly. And I can’t call a channel getting 30-50k views per video to this day a failure.
youtube channels don't have a finale that people can look at and go "wow that channel was good"
@@Fr00stee 2 words. Unus Annus
@@Bladedcloud6159 pretty sure that is the only channel that did that
I’m guessing that channels that were once pulling in millions suddenly barely hitting 100k are considered fails.
I see it as a river hitting the ocean and becoming a part of the expanse tbh. Never a failure but a new beginning…..
*NOW GABBIE HANNAH ON THE OTHER HAND….*
My brother and I would spam watch EMT's videos when we were younger because we always dreamed of making those giant calorie intaking foods but we never did end up making any of them. Im glad the channel ran its course and is now in the sweet sweet life of retirement which means they can do whatever the hell they want!
Epic meal time did not fail. It lived a full life. They still post lesser extreme food vids. Their run was legitimately epic
If you compare it to TV shows... even thirty years ago, TV shows rarely went longer than 7 seasons/years, if they were not soaps that had an ever changing cast and story lines anyway. Viewers just grow out of it and move on.
“Businesses just got in the way of being fun” is probably the case for every “successful CZcamsr”
Too true.
Twitch too.
We can see that happening in real time with channels like mr beast and nelk. They’re getting too big into the business aspect of things to actually produce real entertaining content. I’d rather see a bunch of smaller give away videos instead of these over the top challenge videos with other youtubers with a huge payout from mr beast
I always wondered why the epic mealtime guys didn't partner up with some of the food challenge channels - Watching them cook an epic meal, and then watching a professional eater scarf it all down as a challenge would have been fun to see
Hell yea good idea
They did a couple videos with Furious Pete
@@chrism45 ah yeah but even he got a dip in views, unfortunately
This video aged like wine now that Harley is self destructing
This is another one of your videos, in a very short binge, after which I feel compelled to check out ExACTly the thing that you're talking about. I had always heard of Epic Meal Time but never watched, for some reason. Some of their featured guests and cooking techniques look legit and interesting, so yeah, I'm going for it.
Thx very much! 😄👍
Epic Meal Time was great, but it was something that couldn't last forever. The fact that it got on like it did and lasted as long as it did is just a testament to how well Harley and Co. did their jobs. I don't think anyone could have expected that to become a full time gig when they started. It was also an idea that could only be taken so far. There's only so much you can do with a straightforward concept like that, and they did it. From what I understand they've all moved onto different projects from that jumping off point, so I don't think Epic Meal Time failed. I think it ran its course.
I remember showing this to my friends a decade ago and they seemed unstoppable at the time, but a decade later (literally became a doctor in that time) they have hardly any views and it sucks. I really feel like the cooking lessons ruined the channel imo.
They showed the audience how magic works
Way to go on becoming a DR!
@@Ryan-te3sw ty
Are you postcall rn?
@@Sam-rc7wd dude good job being a doctor thats hard asf
I didn’t even know this existed like half your videos but you do such a great job they are entertaining as hell bruh and on top that your voice is soothing.
2030: What happened to SunnyV2?
I remember watching Epic Meal Time with the boys at their place after school, talking about the ridiculousness, the grossness, laughing until my stomach hurt, etc. It really was good. Then, after some point, we all just stopped talking about it. I don't remember when, but it came and went like a flash in the pan for me in school. I remember looking up the channel some time later in college and thinking "dang, this is kinda boring". I wasn't there for the transition to their later videos, but for me it really felt like the show was missing everything that made it great in the first place.
It wasn't serious - regardless of Harley's character's attitude; it was super silly and absurd. This gave it exceptional meme value, even at a time when meme culture was just coming around. And the gravitas of the earlier videos really made them feel "Epic" while, as you pointed out, the newer stuff just kinda felt casual. That Epic-ness was what made them all the funnier, because even though the show was absurd and over the top, the characters taking it all seriously only made it funnier.
In hindsight, trying to keep a meme show going for 10 years probably wasn't the optimal route. But I sympathize with Harley who had to think about his employees, his friends, his family, and himself. It's very easy to get stuck in a "known" format and trying to expand into actual serious content would've been very difficult. It's the reason that a lot of creators have second and even third channels, to help them find new formats that work and capitalize on them.
Yeah, their vids these days feel more like a bunch of school kids flailing around attempting to make parodies of a proper EMT video.
5:43 Important note: when Harley says Muscles Glasses wanted to be paid more than Harley himself... that is meant to mislead you. Harley drew a modest salary for his work on the show, but as owner all the profit after expenses went to him (and his brother). The bulk of the money went to ownership, and salaries were relatively small business expenses.
It sounds like he wasn't even involved in making most of the videos, though.
@@TrTriTrippin so replacable, they couldn't replace him but ok
@@transfixit I think that the point is that his departure didn't negatively impact the viewership like he claimed it would.
@@StabStabStabStabby except it did?
@@transfixit the viewership tapered off naturally as the show delicined in popularity.
Ahhhhh, glad I got to see Epic Meal Time through the entire course of its run... Such an Iconic channel! Loved it!
Couldn't trust a couple JEW brothers? Get outta town!
You vile cr3tin
sunnyv2 is great, ive never known a youtuber of an intro or outro whcih they are not talking about sponsorships or themselves, good on you sunny, this is half the reason why i watch sunnyv2, other half is coz im interested, its easy to watch a straight to the point, i love it
They were the "Jackass but food oriented" of my college years, lmao.
I had acquaintances from uni who actually met Harley as he lived in Toronto at the time around when they were gaining popularity.
Wow thats a good point. Maybe I should invent the jackass of something else like investing guru
I thought this too
I think it at least partly has something to do with viewers growing up, getting over wastlefulness as well. When I was 15, sure yeah I loved all that stuff. Now I'm closer to thirty and my interests have changed. I feel like we're all trying to become less wasteful so EMT is a bit passé.
I remember back in the day I wore an EpicMealTime shirt walking into Pluckers. It was like a celebrity had walked in. People screaming “EpicMealTime!!” High fives, point and laughing “wooo’s!” It was so much fun. RIP
I’m 24 and don’t really come to CZcams to watch huge lots of food being made. At 11-13 years old, this is all i would watch. It was so fun ! Me and buddies in middle school did nothing but binge watch these guys.
This guy right here was my substitute teacher in highschool! Dudes a fricking legend in my eyes and always will be
Should have partnered with mukbangs and pivoted that way. It would feel authentic and benefit from a fresh audience and energy. Could do themes and each request for a cuisine would stave boredom. It would be a win-win.
No they just need to end the channel . They don't have the ideas to keep up with this new generation of youtubers. It's like Dr Dre dropping an album now and making 1/10 of what he did in his NWA days and his solo career in the 90s .
The chad Guga food channels vs the virgin internal fighting bullshit
And these days Harley likes to subscribe to Anisa’s only fans, and try to actively hinder froggy fresh from taking part in CC 2.
Damn Shame.
Same problem Smosh had, they went corporate, got fired, lost their fanbase immediately afterwards.
"Business just got in the way of being fun". Wow. I feel like for a lot of the channels that were amazing in the beginning when they were just friends having fun and showing organic relationships which eventually collapsed, this has been a recurring problem
I love that the video ended with a small clap for Harley. He really never did give up or blame anyone for the channel's decline. It will always be a fond memory of early CZcams.
THINK IT. DREAM IT. DO IT.
EpicMealTime coming back and beating world records for "the biggest" of different foods and then giving it out to the homeless in the area they cooked it, would be an amazing comeback story.
Completely forgot about this guy, excited to hear what happened to him and stuff, thanks for another epic documentary Sunny
Lmao he goes on twitch podcasts now where he shares hilarious stories
You definitely nailed this one. It hit during a specific cultural boom that accelerated them to the top, but that bubble burst and they didn't pick up anything that would keep the attention of their audience for the long term. It was definitely possible, but they probably felt like it was too much of a gamble to shy away from what made them successful in the first place.
They should have gone down the hot-sauce route. seems like that became the food meta
CZcams is not a career you can do forever.
The fact that anybody can start a channel and share their idea for entertainment is awesome!
Good things will come to an end. I will always remember Epic Meal Time. Salute
depends on the content, the person, the will to adapt (if you adapt right, even), and luck.
This video made me think about how difficult it probably can be for bands to stay together once they experience success. The ones that continue to improve and maintain healthy relationships are probably the ones that keep the same desire to create and enjoy music as they had in the beginning.
Rammstein has had all 6 members stay together since 1994 as an example 🤘
Hi Sunnny, been watching you since your Boogie Vids, still remembering your Fortnite Vids, just wanting to say I still highly enjoy watching your videos. Idk if you need to hear this but nothing but respect for your incredible rise. Greetings from Germany!
This comment is top tier wholesome
Yooo which part. I too live in germany
Me too I watched him since march
Same duuuuude he just BLEW UP
@Dream shut up
Sounds like he went out gracefully, which can't be said for many other CZcamsrs. At least he can say he was significant at one point in time. It seems like a real challenge to stay, not alone trendy, but productive consistently without a break. Kudos to those that are still relevant today, I don't know how they do it. Otherwise, it seems only natural that somebody be popular for a short period of time before being forgotten...circle of life.
2:25 no way this dude !!! I absolutely die at his short “we selling weeeeeed and doing bad shit, N” 😂😂😂😂
It was never a sustainable business, and Harley went all in. Reminds me of the death of microwave show. Dude hated what put him on the map. I'll admit I flat out forgot EMT until this video popped in my recommendations. Muscles Glasses was his Teller, and he didn't get that.
Oh my god yes. The “Is it a good idea to microwave this?” Yes yes yes. I remember they wanted to end it and once it did the channel just ended as a result. People were there for that, once it wasn’t there people gave up.
The series lost views because it's novelty eventually wore off and more and more competition sprouted up all over the site. heavily gimicked stuff like this(which is basically a food version of Jackass) always will have a shelf life, it's the nature of the beast.
Muscles Glasses was never a big part of it. he was a meme. A funny running gag people liked seeing because he was there from the start and it became a sort of tradition, not because he truly brought anything unique to the show. Comparing him to an actual skilled entertainer like Teller, who doesn't speak but does just about everything else possible, is pretty insulting.
Glasses stood there, crossed his arms, and ate stuff. literally anyone could do what he did, he filled the role simply because he had it from the start.
@@Criminalupper2200 I absolutely agree. It was a niche thing like Ray William Johnsonand other og popular CZcams channels. It's hard to stay relevant when something that makes you big gets copied and improved upon. It's just like any TV show that's run its course like The Simpsons.
@@redwolfe7049 except =3 would be absolute copyright nightmare even moreso than it already was for the time and it wouldnt have continued to exist if made today unfortunately.
It immediately went to crap when he left and the gross cousins started to be the whole show
This shows that it's really, really hard to stay relevant on CZcams. You gotta give it up for some of the top dogs that have managed to grow year after year because you can't just pick a format and sit on it. You gotta be changing, evolving all while handling all the business behind the scenes. It's a crazy business, if anyone thinks being a CZcams personality is easy, they're kidding themselves.
I honestly wonder how long raywilliamjohnson could've lasted if he stayed with it. His channels decline was mostly because he walked away, but he was always my favorite tuber
Also the platform grew so fucking much in so little time. Like check out the rank at 0:34 1st place had close to 6M subscribers but tenth had only 2.7M, for today's standards that's a big channel but there are literally over 22k channels with over 1M subscribers, that's absolutely insane! And it only takes minor changes to the algorithm to make a channel grow super fast or just die (think the biggest recent example is Dream who just exploded last year and was getting 1M subscribers every month)
@@CrumbsLamond i just checked and he still has lots of views on his recent vids
I mean, I think there's only soo much you can do with the premise of "Make incredibly unhealthy food behemoth, then eat it" for it to remain interesting forever, times change after all and people change.
Every great channel out there was great due to the fact that the creators behind the content did it for FUN, and that it was something they enjoyed doing and did it without expecting it to be so popular or big in the CZcams community, once something becomes mainstream and you start to go down the road of having to come up with new ideas just to generate income is gonna eventually go down in flames...
Harley taught history at my high school… but I never got to have him as a teacher since I came in a year after he left. I missed out big time.
?
L
@@notjonahmc3477, I’m holding it.
Me and my friend sometimes talk about EMT. It’s like the perfect case study. Let’s be honest, CZcams wouldn’t be the same if they never made EMT. I think they really hold a special spot in a Lot of peoples heart.
Right in the arteries lol
@@Freebuss, they use to be in my heart but the doctor finally found the problem during a triple bypass.
nah youtube woud be the same, nobody alone is that impactful
I went back and looked at their channel, it feels like a lot of their old videos got deleted. Their collab with smosh, the video with Arnold and his tank, the Jamie Oliver filet o fish, maybe they just got lost in there but I swear they’re totally gone. They were a lot of my old favorite videos too. Glad I got to watch them at their peak
I wouldn't call it fail so much as it concluded, like any good show eventually should.
too bad it didn't end on a high note
Respect to the entire crew for keeping the channel going for so long with such a limiting format, like you said
If you were to look at this like a TV show, 10 years is a MASSIVE success!
We have done adaptations of some of their recipes. It was fun, but they tended to be a lot more expensive than you might realize, until you start to add it up. We did the "Fast Food Lasagna", the "Breakfast Of Booze", and the "TurBaconEpic Thanksgiving".
I remember when Epic Meal Time blew up in 2011. It was nothing anybody has ever seen on CZcams before. It was absolutely outrageous. I think the main thing was the repetitiveness. You can only watch it so many times before you just get bored of it. I think it’s great how Harley accepts how his channel has basically died and is grateful for what he had.
The breakup part of it is reminiscent of what happened with Super Best Friends in a way. Hearing that Matt and Pat no longer got along was heartbreaking.
Definitely one of the saddest things to happen for me in recent memory. Their I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream LP was the first one to come up when I searched for one back in the day, and I instantly loved their dynamic.
aye i was watching one of matts new videos and i was like yeah i was hanging out with my friend liam and i was like darn i miss the old gang but they all seem happy with their new gigs
I remember my interest going down the toilet with Epic Meal Time when they had that episode where they got a limo, women, and started throwing money around, yelling “bacon strips” at passers by. They went from dudes you wanted to drink, chill, and have a greasy meal with, to a bunch of rich, entitled looking douchebags in one video. That is the image that sticks with me.
Same. That's the video that made me unsubscribe.
whats wrong with being rich?
@@inmotion9396 being rich is inherently morally wrong for starters. You cant be a good person and be rich. By keeping wealth instead of using it they've become part of the problem.
@@rogerdalzell Uh...I don't know about all that, chief.
@@Cepheus773 Why should someone have more than enough wealth to live luxuriously for a century when people are dying on the streets? do you honestly think jeff bezos or any other billionaire needs that much money?
the music in the old videos really brings back that nostalgia
Pretty sure once they stopped being your “average Joe” and their wealth started to show, they no longer became relatable.The foundation of college misfits without any regards to their health, eating booze infused deep fried meats of every walking animal, was the appeal of their videos. As soon as they started showing off food that most people can’t afford, they stopped being relatable. They stopped being an old drinking buddy and just became someone you hated being around.
When your primary stars are college kids, they’ll eventually age out. It’s not the same after nearly a decade of the same antics, rinse and repeated, without a secondary “talent”.
weird timing, had a youtube night with mates trying to answer this question - great story :)
Ok
Hey it's you parkour guy I'm a fan btw
He streams on twitch and has explained what happened to many times lol it's unfortunate he gets such low view on twitch cause he's genuinely hilarious
@@BodieMoto who?
I was just watching all this channels videos and just finished. Definitely crazy timing lol
Awesome analysis, SunnyV2. I remember when Epic Meal Time was in the top 10 most subscribed and have always wondered why the channel fell off, so I really appreciate this video.
damn, ur on this vid?
Why do you type like your sending him something in the mail
Verified alert
Chad fucking wild clayyyy
Give bobux?
seeing that list at :33 gave me chills. Prime of youtube imo
The time that you took for this vid is a masterpiece
I still remember finding this channel in June of 2020 and thinking how great the content was. Now he’s at 3/4 to a million subs and I’ve realized how far he’s come
Hey guys so I’m on epic meal time
I remember watching the videos when they came out back then and thinking to myself after they had gotten popular just from the way the host looked and acted that things were about to fall apart. Whether or not the booze was making his eyes dark and sunken or working too hard or a combo of the two he was definitely giving a stressed-out a****** vibe. Plus I've known guys like that there just to unhinged as a personality trait to keep something going steady long term. Finally with entertainment it Ebbs and flows nobody stays famous forever.
imagine thinking you deserve a raise for wearing glasses and eating bacon XD
I feel bad for Harley because it sounds like his friends really didnt understand that he was the main act and they were just paid supporting characters. Ego kills and it sounds like their ego couldn't handle being in his shadow, even if it meant a good pay for no work.
Thanks bro! Even I understood back then that the concept was bigger than all of us. We were young and foolish though haha
Ayo what
@@epicmealtime ahem fellas just replied like that
@@epicmealtime i did not expect to see a reply from the man himself here
@@epicmealtime Harley you seem pretty shady the way you throw all the blame on your exfriends and hold no responsibility to the downfall
wow, that was a painful comparison between the old and newer videos. Like everyone else, I loved these guys in 2010-2011. I remember looking up their channel in like 2015 or so and was blown away by how soulless the content seemed. Hope they are doing well
They are not doing well lol.
They are doing great! Go watch new episodes.