And that would be me.
From the time that I first saw the trailer, I fell in love. I actually went for a period of time, in which I watched the trailer over again at least twice a day. Then I met M Dot Strange [yes I met him, in the chatroom]. Nice guy, he really is. I have nothing against him. I subscribed to him on Youtube to make sure I would catch each of his videos asap. And I watched EVERY one of them.
However...
My concern is, that he's delaying WATS to be seen where EVERYONE can see it. I mean, EVERYONE. What does he have to offer to those, who live in obscure states [like myself, NC], or distant countries even? Some of us cannot afford to travel all the way to CA or wherever he's gonna show WATS. He keeps delaying and DELAYING the DVD release... dare I say it? So that he can get MORE fandom, or so it seems. What's wrong with his original, tight little group of original fans, such as myself, or people whom have been keeping up with him from the MOMENT he first started on the movie, even?
I'm sorry, I really am. But I'm not the first one who lost faith. I mean, look at some of the comments he's got on Youtube:

"Just release the damn thing via torrent."

"Same here... As long as you don't plan theatre screenings all over the world and you declare not careing about the holywood world and having a warm place in the heart for the youtubers why not take care of the DVD stuff?
I mean if you had taken one linux guy to do the dvd_menu_stuff, coloured pencils, some paper and a xerograph to do the cover, you could have a coulple tons of dvds right now...
Well my point is your fans might really grow tired of waiting..."

At any rate, I'm on hiatus from this forum until furthur notice. It's obvious that M Dot's forgotten all about his true fans.

And I would like to leave you with this one last thought?
Does WATS really exist? Or is it just a bunch of random video clips thrown into trailer form, in order to stir up some excitement? After all, only about 1% of his 'fandom' has actually 'seen' the movie...

Well. I can understand your reasoning. So...I won't "cast you down". I'm a little dissapointed too. But I'm still not going to give up on the film. I'm just worried that if he doesn't release it soon...that everyone is going to just give up...or forget about it.

Quote :

MadsterAya wrote : Well. I can understand your reasoning. So...I won't "cast you down". I'm a little dissapointed too. But I'm still not going to give up on the film. I'm just worried that if he doesn't release it soon...that everyone is going to just give up...or forget about it.

I feel sort of the same. I certanly will not give up waiting, i will wait forever if i have to, but alot of people wont be as patient as me.

Distributing movies is not as easy as people make it out to be. He is putting his movie into film festivals so that maybe some one might pick it up for distribution. Thus making the DVD sales even easier. And getting it to reach tons of people.

Whats happening to his movie happens to ALOT of other movies, it shows up in a festival, then floats around for several months and ends up distributed to theaters or DVD. Then you have to work in all of the technical and professional aspects into the mix.

And also, of course its real. Its been reviewed by several different people, and there was a Vlog about on the sundance channel's youtube page.

M dot has made a lot of good decisions and bad ones in reguards with his fanbase.

When I first helped to offer to help market n' promote the film with the aid of these board members I noticed he was a pretty bright guy who knew that he could use youtube to create a more personal connection with his fanbase.  He's also a great guy with a great personality that's easy to like.

But his problem was he released information way too quickly and got his fanbase's hopes up.  There was talk of a DVD March release for a while.  Talk of releasing on Youtube via "cam", and torrent.  Now--this would be all good if he actually went through with it.

WATS interest is, almost, pretty much can be viewed on by the board.  We were most active when the movie was constantly in the "almost coming out status".  People were crazed and people were having fun talking to other weird people.  But, March came along and here was no DVD.  M dot said one festival was going to be his "last festival" but he keeps going on with them.

It's not really that he's deceptive...he's just new to the whole director with a decent fanbase size thing.  And the personal level he took with fans on youtube backfired a bit.  He said what was on his mind at the time and created an unrealistic goal.

And well...NOTHING PISSES OFF FANS MORE THEN DELAYS x.x

Another problem which I'm going to contact him about his he's not whoring out WATS enough.  His work on other projects is causing WATS interest to die out--when traditionally he should be focusing on promoting and keeping his fanbase happy.

BUT...this is one thing.  M dot strange IS NOT A DIRECTOR....He's a GUY who creates crazy movies.  :0 He's going to make a lot of bad moves along the way.  But that's because he's a guy who just wants to make movies, make some cash, n' move on.  At least that's my take on the situation.

IF YOU GUYS REALLY WANT TO SEE M DOT STRANGE and are a bit off.  :0 Tell him that you are so-on-so on the board and you want to see WATS!

Or wait patiently...o.o whichever you prefer.

Anyhoo...Mod.  I can understand your feels. :0 Even I have lost a lot of interest in WATS. There's other reasons but I won't go into that for reasons.  :0 I wouldn't be doing my job well if I went off talkin' about that.

exactly, most indie movies end up going through the same exact process, and the same exact waiting period. The only difference is that we were along for every step of the way, so when it gets to the agonizing wait for it to be distributed or placed on DVD, we got shafted.

a good example of this would be the movie Brick.

Brick sat around for AGES before it could get distributed. Nobody complained, cause nobody knew a goddamn thing about it, and then it just came out of nowhere and had solid DVD sales.

This is why I continue to wait, because I know that this is almost the normal process for movies like this.

Hey hey I haven't forgotten anybody! Ok here's the triple scoop... Here's why I haven't been able to release the movie yet....

Before I went to Sundance I was being contacted by all these movie types New Line Cinema, Lions Gate etc... So because of that everyone around me, including me because I had never been in the situation before thought that WATS would be sold at Sundance soooo... I had to get a Lawyer and a Sales Rep and a publicist for Sundance.... So what does that mean exactly? Well so I signed a contract for one year with a sales rep...So what does a sales rep do you say? They try to sell the movie to distributors, its they're job....once they do it they get a percentage of the sale so like they want to sell it and get the best deal they can as fast at they can... So as of a month a go a distributor came forward that really likes WATS and wants to put it out on DVD, now its just up to the sales rep and the distributor to work out the details I'm hoping they do soon because its a cool company and I don't want to make you all wait forever...

So why haven't I sold DVD's you say?

WATS is still playing film festivals... If I starting selling DVD's it would not make the distributor happy and cause me to get a crappier deal and it would disqualify me from most big film festivals... So do you see how I'm like stuck?

I just came up with an idea right now... Although I can't sell the DVD right now or put the whole thing online... I have been sending "screener" DVD's to press people and film festivals... A screener has all this copyright crap on screen and is only meant for private official use...

How bout if you guys set up little screening events in your area's... where ever you could...at people's houses what ever... and once you had them set up I would send you a screener DVD to watch... and like a festival you would watch it and mail it back Or you maybe you would mail it to the next house party screening? YES I'll only send out one DVD so you all have to take care of it and make sure it gets around to all of your screenings XD... How about something like that?

I want to let you all know your not forgotten and it frustrates me every day that the people that really want to see the film can't...so lets do something about that ay?

oh my goodness, that seems like a freakin' awesome idea!

I think it could work

I'll see what I can do in terms of organization.

oh...idea, in Connecticut, there is a jazz/rock club called "The Space", only thing is I would have to find a way of renting a projector and a screen to project on.  Advertising would be easily done by hitting every stop and shop, Craigslist, and college bill board.  Any ideas?

I'd definitely do that.

For the record, the idea M dot suggest has yet to be fully disproved or approved.

Reason being is concern that some people may decide to keep the disc for themselves.  Meaning the only way to get the DVD back n' sent out would be to show up at their house and rough them up.

And that leads to jailtime.

That would definitely be a problem. Some people will do anything for free stuff. If only there was away to destroy a disk remotely, like in the movies...

Quote :

Maxlord wrote : That would definitely be a problem. Some people will do anything for free stuff. If only there was away to destroy a disk remotely, like in the movies...

haha that would be awesome.


Computer Voice: "Thank you for watching We are The Strange. This Digital Video Disk will now self destruct in ten seconds."

*BOOOM!!!*

i so want to do that

If that happens then the person who receaves the dvd must post a pic of them with the dvd on the forums just so we know that they have it and if they don't bring it back we can bomb here house with giant nerf darts.

Well...that idea's being worked upon.

If only self destructing discs were legal in this country.

BURN THE WITCH!