Earlier reports of geek culture cartoon studio Rooster Teeth Productions’ demise turned out to have been premature.
But now, the Time-Warner subsidiary’s general manager has issued a statement confirming that the animation company has indeed given up the ghost.
Dear Rooster Teeth,
Since our founders created and uploaded their first video on the then-called World Wide Web in 2003, Rooster Teeth has been a source of creativity, laughter, and lasting innovation in the wildly volatile media industry.
We’ve read the headlines about industry-wide layoffs and closures, and you’ve heard me give my perspective and updates on the rapidly changing state of media and entertainment during each of our monthly All Hands meetings.
Since inheriting ownership and control of Rooster Teeth from AT&T following its acquisition of TimeWarner, Warner Bros. Discovery continued its investment in our company, content and community. Now however, it’s with a heavy heart I announce that Rooster Teeth is shutting down due to challenges facing digital media resulting from fundamental shifts in consumer behavior and monetization across platforms, advertising, and patronage.
Rooster Teeth’s descent into wokeness can be traced as far back as 2020, when they made this announcement:
“Laney Ingram, our Head of Legal & Business Affairs, has expanded her responsibilities to include Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI). She is partnering with Senior HR leader Stephanie O’Connor, who comes to us from Fullscreen,” they continued.
Rooster Teeth then added, “We have also hired an outside DEI consultant, Ingrid Hadley. Together, Laney, Stephanie and Ingrid are laying the groundwork for our DEI strategy and initiatives going forward.”
Less than a year later, the company was sold.
Now, less than three years after that, they’ve been shut down.
A lot of folks in our thing are celebrating Rooster Teeth biting the dust.
But dig back through the strata of time, and you find a tragedy.
Maybe this is – finally – an instance of a woke company going broke. But it should have happened to Time-Warner instead of just a fan startup from Texas they’d bought.
Don’t get me wrong. Any company that alienates its audience and pays Death Cult witches to enforce woke dogma while subtracting value is asking to go under.
But anyone who remembers these guys from their days of dubbing over Halo gameplay footage can’t help but feel a pang of sorrow.
The saddest part is how Rooster Teeth and its corporate masters have disgraced the memory of visionary web animator Monty Oum.
This guy started out making video game mashups and busted his hump until he earned the right to make his dream project.
That project was the animated web series RWBY, which contrary to the name, has mainly Japanese, and not Welsh, influences.
By all accounts, Oum was a master of influence management. Which is why the industry gave him a turn in the driver’s seat.
And he got his shot at a time when every weeb and JRPG fan had an idea for his own anime series that he fantasized about getting made.
Monty Oum was the Fanboy Who Did Good. But tragedy first struck in 2015, when he died at the age of 33, having completed only two seasons of his masterwork.
Bereft of the creator’s guidance, Rooster Teeth fumbled with the show’s influences, losing subtlety for on-the-nose references.
Perhaps the studio’s closure is a severe mercy.
But let all creators take warning: Selling the rights to your work in the current climate will eventually deliver it into the hands of companies that hate you.
Much better to take the alternative path of Neopatronage.
Let me show you the way.
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