Image via Complex Original
After years of false starts, web series are finally hitting their stride. The advancement of video camera technology occasioned by the rise of DSLRs has given rise to high-quality low budget work, while the shifting television landscape has led networks and tech companies alike to invest meaningfully in web-based content. Web series film festivals and contests are on the rise as well: the New York Television Festival (NYTVF) and LA WebFest are just two of the more prominent outlets for video artists from all over the world to show off their craft.
Network television execs are diving into their fox holes, resorting to easy, big-tent shows to shore up dwindling ratings while web content is becoming better and more daring all the time. From newlywed serial killers to dinosaur journalists, web series are deeply creative. From gay professional athletes to wheelchair-bound actresses, online programming is telling important stories that you would never see on the bigger small screen.
In short, the Internet is now good for more than cat tumblrs and Condescending Wonka memes; these are The 25 Best Web Series Right Now.
Written by Brenden Gallagher (@muddycreekU)
25. Your Dad's Friends
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We all imagined that as soon as college ended, we would waltz into our dream jobs. Just look at our GPAs! Aaron Eisenberg, Alex Forstenhausler, and Austin Breslow channeled their post-collegiate frustrations into My Dad's Friends. The six-part web series follows Ben Hurwitz (Eisenberg) as he tries to pursue the few connections his dentist father can offer him. This goes just about as well as your might guess: Hurwitz does a lot of squirming, but finds very little traction as he meets dad's buddies, including a travel agent and a plumber.
24. Kicking Dan Out
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"It was a one-night stand. Three nights ago." Stand-up comic, Dan St. Germain has found a way to channel his bad roommate memories into comic gold with his MyDamnChannel web series, Kicking Dan Out. As the worst roommate (and high in the running for worst person) ever, Dan manages to get kicked out of apartments, one-night stands, and even an ICP fan club. St. Germaine is hopeful for the production of more episodes, though in the mean time, he is keeping up that stand-up grind with a soon to be released comedy special, and a podcast called My Dumb Friends, which he runs with Sean Donnelly.
23. CTRL
It's been a few years since NBC released CTRL, starring Arrested Development fan-favorite, Tony Hale, but rumors of a possible second season are swirling. Reportedly, Yahoo! has recently taken interest in reviving the show. The sci-fi comedy series follows Stuart Grundy after discovering that he has the ability to use keyboard commands like "undo" on his life. Though the series only got one season, and was removed from NBC's website only to live on Hulu earlier this year, CTRL remains one of our favorite web series. Hopefully, a second season comes to fruition, as few shows, on the web or elsewhere, have experimented with narrative as cleverly and hilariously at CTRL.
22. Whole Day Down
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Out of work actors have been the impetus for many web series over the years, but that doesn't mean new mileage can't be wrung out of the premise. Industry veterans Patrick Breen and Tai Fauci partnered up to produce Whole Day Down, a series that takes shots at the art gallery world.
Whether you are an actor, writer, or painter, every artist knows that art can cause as much pain as pleasure. As Breen put it, describing how each episode is created, 'What should the art in this episode be? How does it injure or kill them? And how do they ruin the show?' They are fated to fail." It is a pleasure to watch the cast, anchored by Breen and Steve Bloem, fail their way through the pretentious world of Whole Day Down.
21. Break-ups
Chicago-based filmmaker and improvisor, Ted Tremper understands that improv doesn't always have to be funny. Each episode of Break-ups is a simply shot exploration of the last moments of a relationship. Though the public image of improv is broadly comedic, like you see on Who's Line is it Anway and Wild 'N Out, Tremper and company prove that drama is not only possible in improv, but can co-habitat with comedy. The result of this fusion in Tremper's material is work that is deeply hilarious, yet deeply affecting. Tremper has followed up Break-ups with Shrink, another great web series that exposes dark truths and induces laughter.
20. Ted & Gracie
Mockumentary has become a dirty word in some circles lately. Even the once beloved The Office is taking heat for the boom-mic-hug heard round the world. Jenna Friedman's Ted & Gracie has proven that there is still room for mockumentaries in our rotation if done right.
The series plays out as a set of New York Times wedding video parodies with a twist: the groom is a serial killer. The show smartly eases us into this fact, careful to withhold violent moments at first. Once we do get harshly acquainted with Ted's (Ben Kronberg) true nature, Gracie's (Friedman) love for him has been established and what began as light satire takes on a strangely human dimension, as we are reminded that each of us has immense capacity for denial.
19. Very Mary-Kate
College Humor's Very Mary-Kate has been garnering much deserved praise for a while now. Elaine Carrol's portrayal of one half of the Olsen twins has provided some of the funniest Internet comedy in recent memory. Carrol's ditzy take on ex-Full House star takes aim at the most vapid moments of modern life. Whether she is meticulously posing for Instagram photos or offering to replace her sister's wrecked blimp, the satire is rapid-fire and hilarious. We've gone on record saying that we think Carroll deserves her own show, but we have to admit a gap would be left in our web video viewing if she ever stopped making the series.
18. The Booth at the End
Some web series don't look much different from a full-fledged television programming. Of course, the Netflix recent House of Cards has further blurred the line between web series and television, but Hulu has been developing projects that do just that for years.
The Booth at the End follows the exploits of a mysterious man (Xander Berkelely) sitting in the back of diner, who is rumored to fulfill desires, provided he gets something in return. The series took top honors at the 2012 LAWebfest and has become a fan favorite.
Hulu has created several dozen series and they are showing no signs of stopping. They just announced a new slate of series, including several with high-profile talent attached, to be released this year.
17. Wainy Days
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Stella veteran turned feature comedy director David Wain is behind one of the most successful web series to date, Wainy Days. Comedy nerds love David Wain, and after watching his absurd web series, it's evident why: Wain's experimental sensibilities bring a fresh feel to familiar formulas.
It is easy to see why Wain chooses to keep up his low-budget series despite his feature opportunities. It's hard to imagine a big-budget feature in which Amanda Peet dates David for his small penis or Elizabeth Banks designs a book about "how to make a tree out of your finger." Though, at times, the series is more ridiculous than it is funny, there are few artists with the profile of Wain making work as unique as Wainy Days.
16. The Trivial Pursuits of Arthur Banks
AMC has stumbled since they had their back-to-back successes with Breaking Bad and Mad Men. It might be that all they have to do to revitalize their programming is make shows as strong as their web content. Much of the web series content produced by big leaguers feels like the same fair that we see on cable already.
The Trivial Pursuits of Arthur Banks does exactly what we would hope big-time players will do in the web space: experiment. From the film noir shooting style, to the piano-aided voice over, Banks brings something unique to the web landscape. It looks like this show might be an aborted experiment, as AMC has only produced three episodes to date, but we would like to see more content in this vein from premium cable players.
15. High Maintenance
For a show about stoners, High Maintenance is precisely crafted. Creators Katja Blichfeld, Russell Gregory, and Ben Sinclair have made the most out of the short web series format. The impulse among online program creators is often to tell a continuous story in tiny chunks, but the High Maintenance team takes the opposite approach, honing in on one specific moment in the life of each episode's guest star and dispensing with exposition and continued character development.
The show's narrowed focus allows for a product that's visually rich and thoughtfully performed. High Maintenance is a hit of fresh air, and we can only hope there are more high times to come.
14. I Hate Being Single
The winner of the audience award at NYTVF last year, Rob Michael Hugel's I Hate Being Single reminds us of all what we already know: Being single sucks.
Hugel has a legit web series pedigreee, as he directed and edited some of Broad City's episodes before striking out to make his own cramped Brooklyn apartment web series. Thankfully, there's more humor than pain in watching Hugel struggle through meeting women and trying to make ends meet. Rather than giving us the same old meet-cutes, Hugel gives us sympathetic bankers and Snuggie-averse hook-ups in one of the most original takes on single life on or off-line.
13. Big Country Blues
The idea for Big Country Blues came to Brian A. Ross when he was thinking about a childhood friend who he thought had the chops to make it in Nashville but just never put it together. The melancholy world of men who get in their own way is familiar terrain for Southern stories. Ross's series reminds us of television shows like Friday Night Lights and films like Crazy Heart.
Luckily, Ross isn't the kind of person who gets in his own way. He maxed out his credit cards and Kickstarted his way to producing his $30,000 first season. After a good showing at LAWebest, he earned himself noteriety and a manager. We look forward to what Ross comes up with next.
12. My Gimpy Life
Fans of The Guild are already familiar with Teal Sherer, the wheelchair-bound actress behindMy Gimpy Life. Getting your acting career off the ground is tough no matter what, but it's even more difficult if you are in a wheelchair.
Sherer's un-self-conscious web series makes light of the ups and downs of her journey through Hollywood. The show never shies away from the hard (and hilarious) truths of Sherer's fictional real life. When she has a conflict with a little person of the same name (Teale Sperling) at a bar following an audition, Sherer's uncompromising vision comes into full view.
We would like to see the vision continued with a second season, and so would Sherer. Donate to her efforts here.
11. Waco Valley
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Smart-ass, inept dinosaur newsmen struggle to get their scoop and live their lives in Waco Valley. You can't argue that the series is a fresh concept, but, more importantly, the show never fails to deliver laughs with its unique style.
Created by New York-based artist Ben Warheit, in partnership with Landline TV, the show has found a home on Lorne Michaels' Above Average channel and has gained a cult following. Reminiscent of the best Adult Swim and Fox cartoons, Waco Valley is an addictive treasure.
Whether the hapless dinosaurs are dealing with a childish mayor or local bodyguards, more successful human news teams are always waiting in the wings to simultaneously best and mock them. It's clear that the creative team has jokes to spare, as each episode is bracketed by hilarious interludes in which the newsmen cover the day's most ridiculously mundane stories.
10. Husbands
Respected television veteran Jane Espenson and Internet-savvy newcomer Brad Bell have created one of the most successful web series to date with Husbands. The show chronicles the trials and tribulations of a gay newlywed couple: Cheeks (Bell), an actor, and Brady (Sean Hemeon), a professional baseball player.
Their marriage begins after a crazy night in Vegas, and after they decide to stay together, the two of them weather the storm of being the first high-profile gay couple in athletics. Much of the material centered around gay characters on network television is muzzled—sure, we love Cam and Mitchell on Modern Family, but how often do you see them talk about sex?
Though Husbands is doing important work, the creators never lose touch of story, offering consistently hilarious and well-plotted tales while blazing digital and social trails.
9. Sugarboy
There's nothing quite as entertaining as a little kid telling you a story. Sugarboy, another creative series from Above Average, illustrates the rambling, hyper tales told by a child in his bedroom. The result is one of the most creative, hilarious, and well-executed web series we've seen.
Each episode tells the tale of a superhero created by the boy in his bedroom. Rendered in an inspired style that sometimes borrows from '70s action films and sometimes mimics the modern Hollywood fare, every episode is slickly realized and moves at a joke-a-second pace.
As Lorne Michaels' Broadway Video is behind this series, some of our favorite comedy stars pop up from time to time as well. And unlike with SNL, every guest star who's appeared so far has been funny.
8. F to 7th
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Following the success of her first web series, The Slope, Ingrid Jungermann released F to 7th last month. What few lesbians we see in mainstream media are young and confident, and often only lesbians insofar as they are satisfying the fantasies of horny teenage boys. Jungermann's series, however, offers a view into the insecurities of a gay woman as she grows into middle age, and though there is sex, it isn't always sexy.
One of our favorite episodes, "Tweener," shows a refreshingly frank discussion between Jungermann and a friend on how they express their identitiy as gay women that ironically takes place at a softball game.
7. Divine
One of a group of four Canadian web series to take top honors at last year's LA Webfest, Divine pulls off the rare feat of doing something unique and challenging in the web series space. Relationship comedies dominate the landscape right now, which makes sense: The lowest budget location you can find is your apartment or your parents' house.
Divine, a daring production from Vancouver-based Maple Blood Productions, has sought to move the web series format outside of living rooms, kitchens, and bedrooms. It opens as a young priest witnesses the resurrection of a divine being and it is off to the races from there. As soon as the being wakes up from his near-death (or, perhaps, post-death) experience, he begins his work of showing lost souls their true destiny, and you'll likely be along for the ride.
With its high production values and crisp storytelling, Divine shows that web boundaries can be pushed without major studio backing.
6. H+
The long-awaited web series H+ is one of the most amibtious and impressive original cyber programs to date. Sure, it helps when Bryan Singer and Warner Bros. are behind it, but there's no denying that the series—which originated from a project that began in 2006, and was finally released late last year after shooting in 54 different locations—would be tough for anyone to pull off.
H+ imagines a world that seems more believable every day: The Internet is implanted inside of the brain of every member of society, creating a global hive mind. The events kick off with a virus having infiltrated the system. While H+ shows us a nightmarish version of the future, the series itself might be a hopeful look into an exciting prospects for fresh media programming.
5. Neil's Puppet Dreams
It's hard to imagine a world where a collaboration between Nerdist and Henson Studios goes poorly. Put living legend Neil Patrick Harris in the mix, and the project has no choice but to be amazing.
With the perfect mix of dirty humor and classic, Muppet-style gags, every episode hits on all cylinders. The show carefully tows a line with its sensibility, pulling off potentially off-putting concepts like "To Catch a Puppeteer" with ease. It's nice to see Harris working with fresh material again after years of keeping How I Met Your Mother afloat. Plus, it's obvious that everyone involved in having fun, which only adds to the joys of puppetry.
4. The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl
You've likely already heard of Issa Rae, who's become the poster child for D.I.Y. Internet success. The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl offers an image of black femininity that's different from those stereotypically portrayed in the media. Rae's character, J, is neither smooth nor quick-witted—like most of us, she's socially uncomfortable and just trying to get by.
What began as an idea that struck Rae while she was working a day job at a theatre turned into a massively successful Kickstarter campaign that earned almost $60,000. Her message has continued to resonate, generating a strong buzz that continues to grow: prime-time soap giant Shonda Rhimes recently helped Rae sell a pilot called I Hate LA Dudes, which we hope hits TV soon.
3. The Guild
The conversation about web series begins with Felicia Day and The Guild. Now in its sixth season, The Guild has tapped into the world of gamers for maximum comedic value.
Day was one of the first breakout web series stars, and her rags-to-riches story has inspired scores of creators to grab a DSLR and create their own shows. After scraping together the scratch to make three episodes out of pocket, Day never had to self-finance The Guild again. Initially, the series was supported by donations, then it was financed by a series of sponsors. Today, it's a part of Geek and Sundry, Day's own gaming-centric YouTube channel.
Day truly embodies the best aspects of Internet fame: She's become a female nerd icon and a web mogul by honestly connecting with a passionate fan base. And it all started with The Guild.
2. Broad City
For the last several years, Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Galzer's Broad City has been a favorite for web-savvy New Yorkers. Funnier and faster than that other comedy series about twenty-something women in Brooklyn, Broad City offers faced-paced and witty takes on those little treasures of bohemian life, from bedding a guy to using his washing machine and platonic sleepovers in cramped apartments.
Last fall, Comedy Central announced the ordering of a Broad City pilot, after the initial recommendation of Amy Poehler. Though you may only know Ilana from she and her brother Eliot's viral Shit New Yorkers Say video, it looks like Glazer and Jacobson may soon be household names.
1. Burning Love
We love web series that serve as springboards for undiscovered talent, but we can't hate on comedy all-stars getting into the act. Michael Ian Black, Rob Huebel, and Nick Kroll and a host of other indie comedy legends show up in season two of Burning Love.
This hilarious The Bachelor parody—which had a successful and hilarious season one anchored by Ken Marino, who you may remember from Party Down—is back, and in rare form this season, now with a bachelorette (June Diane Raphael) in the lead role. The series has been a crossover success for both Yahoo and Ben Stiller's production company, Red Hour Digital. In addition to web success, the series began running on E! at the end of February.