The 5: The Web Series Pioneers

This Week on The 5: The Web Series Trailblazers That Started it All

Today, the web series is the norm. Cameras and bandwidth are cheap enough that nearly anyone can be as creative as they want and share their work with the world. But it wasn’t always like this. In a time long ago, almost 10 years ago, there were brave men and women who took to Youtube to bring their ideas to life. Below are 5 web series that blazed the trails and set the standards for everything that came after them.

• California Heaven (2005). Considered the first scripted series for online viewers, California Heaven was way before its time. It was around before Youtube, which set the standard for streaming online video. it was a supernatural drama series that told the story of a mysterious California family. It launched and aired on the entertainment site The SFN, which doesn’t seem to be in working condition anymore. This thing is so old you can’t even find video of it anywhere online. Unfortunately, when you’re first, you don’t always succeed.
• Lonelygirl15 (2006).  Lonelygirl was a web series that people didn’t even realize they were watching. Originally shown as an authentic girl named Bree who blogged about nonsense, it gained huge hits in the early days of Youtube. A few months into its run, it was outed as being pure fiction, the brain child of a screenwriter and film maker. Eventually, Lonelygirl15 received over 100 million views combined. Even in the early days of Youtube, having a pretty girl on screen guaranteed you huge hits.  Watch a clip on youtube.com.
• SamHas7Friends (2006).  Sam has 7 Friends was a 90 episode web series that got over 3 million views during its run. The tag line of the show was “Samantha Breslow has seven friends. On December 15, 2006, one of them will kill her.” it was conceived by a production company that wanted to created daily content for people with short attention spans. Eventually the show was bought by Disney while they were scouting for online content.  Watch a clip on YouTube.com.
• Clark and Michael (2007).  Real life friends Clark Duke and Michael Cera conceived one of the first comedic web series, Clark and Michael, as a part of Duke’s film school studies. With Cera coming right off of Arrested Development, they got the green light from CBS to make the web only series and have it distributed online by the network.  Watch a clip on YouTube.
• Jake & Amir (2007).  Jake & Amir, employees of College Humor, began making comedic videos in their free time and posting them to Vimeo. Eventually College Humor began posting them and a series evolved between to the tow coworkers. It’s now one of College Humor’s longest running series and they’ve been picked up by TBS to adapt the series for television, Ed Helms will be producing it.  Watch a clip on YouTube.