Last week I talked about not going it alone, particularly finding and surrounding yourself with individuals even more talented than yourself. Just because you can do something yourself it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t find someone else for the job. This week’s show, I Am Tim is an example of what you can accomplish if you build yourself a great team.
For those of you who follow the blog you might remember I Am Tim being featured back in January for season one. I typically try to limit the weekly featured review slot to series I have never seen, or at least have yet to be featured on #WebSeriesWednesday. In the case of I Am Tim I simply had far too much fun the last time around for me to turn them down!
This all ties together. Both times I’ve featured the show I’ve been treated to an exceptionally funny show with a high level of production value (this time I was impressed by some bloody, pulsating intestines!) and perhaps most importantly by a great group of fun team members. It’s that group of energetic and engaged people that has helped I Am Tim stand out for me. There are other series out there with talented teams but I have yet to see so many actively participating in the promotion of a show, and clearly enjoying it.Last time around I talked about how the show made use of a run and gun style using a small group that impressively looked quite polished and well planned out. The same still applies so this time I want to talk about some differences between season one and season two.
The most notable difference between the two seasons is the casting change for main character Tim Helsing, although technically we see this at the end of season one. Casting changes are a fairly common occurrence in web series but this might be the first time I’ve seen a show use it to their advantage.
In season two Tim becomes a slightly different person, and the early plot lines follow the characters getting to understand him as well as Tim getting to know himself. It’s a little awkward but I felt it was believable within the story presented and it opened the show up to a little additional character development, if that’s what you want to call it.
Series two feels a little smaller than one, although it could be simply because I’m only watching the first half. The quality and number of locations and extras didn’t quite seem on the level of the first series. The only note I can really give here is that the show seemed to dial it down a little bit, rather than dial it up, as is the case with most shows. The decreased intern death rate was a mild disappointment – although I have been promised 15 intern sacrifices in future episode number twelve.
The small step back in scope might have helped in some ways as my favorite episode of the second season was one that takes place almost entirely in a kitchen. “Night of the Living Bread” is likely the single greatest collection of bread puns ever assembled on the internet. Tim and his brother must exercise a possessed toaster in the home of an awkward toast advocate and sweater enthusiast. The episode left me questioning whether or not the whole thing was concocted around the climatic Battlestar Galactica reference.
Perhaps the most interesting take away from the show is that I can see I Am Tim being a pseudo-self sustaining model. The run and gun, weekend shooting style and the comedic format make it easier for the group to just go out and shoot something cool for fun. Each episode only costs them their time and a few hundred bucks, and here we are just a few months after I reviewed season one talking about season two. A lot of credit here has to go to the editing. While the production is quite fast paced there is clearly a lot of time, effort and thought put into the edit, each episode taking anywhere from two days to two months to finish. There are so many nice details from the youtube thumbnails to ambient music, graphical overlays and creative presentation. The show is so much more than the sum of all of its shots strung together chronologically.
So here we are in the middle of another season of I Am Tim and the show is still the standard bearer for no budget web series production. Find your team, work together for awhile and take a look at I Am Tim for an idea of what you can accomplish.