The Spoony Experiment/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
/wiki/The Spoony Experimentcreator
  • Adorkable: Spoony himself, to a large number of fans.
  • Alas, Poor Scrappy: It's hard not to feel for Spencer D. Bum during his brutal death.
  • Non Sequitur Scene: Deliberately invoked with his rant about the lack of logic in Highlander II the Quickening, which concludes with "AND WHY AM I IN A STARFLEET UNIFORM?!"
    • He also likes to take isolated clips from films that seem particularly bizarre and random, such as the Insane Troll Logic scene "How to Battle Communism" from 1900.
    • Pumpkinhead's appearance in the final battle against Black Lantern Spoony. He walks through the door to Ominous Latin Chanting and the fight halts in its tacks, stares grimly at BL Spoony... and peppy music starts playing, to which Pumpkinhead starts dancing. BL Spoony blows him up with an energy blast and the fight resumes.
      • Note that this is a joke about the particularly insulting A Winner Is You ending of Pumpkinhead's Revenge.
    • In his Final Fantasy X-2 review, while listening to some bad in-game music, he remarks "This music is almost as bad as the time I got tricked into going to the Nostalgia Chick's accordion recital". Cut to The Nostalgia Chick playing the accordion while Spoony awkwardly sits on a nearby couch holding a dog.
  • Colbert Bump: He has been responsible for a few of these:
    • He was the first pre-established internet celebrity to join That Guy With The Glasses, in summer 2008, drawing attention to the site from people who weren't already fans of The Nostalgia Critic, and opening the floodgates for other producers to join the community. He is currently the anchor talent of their "Blistered Thumbs" section about Video Games.
    • His early and frequent crossovers with Linkara probably contributed to the latter's rapid rise in popularity.
    • In his review of Bloodwings: Pumpkinhead's Revenge, he went on to note that it was almost impossible to find hints, reviews or any information at all about the game, touting that game as being the one game that the Internet forgot. The problem was quickly rectified when the video was released. He mentioned in the commentary that the game had suddenly become harder to find after the video as fans bought copies to try. He begged them not to, it really was as bad as he said.
    • After YouTube suspended The Cinema Snob, he hosted a few of his videos, boosting his popularity immensely and paving the way for him to join That Guy With The Glasses as well.
      • He briefly did the same for Guru Larry when he was dropped from Screwattack.
    • In general, Spoony likes to occasionally host videos that he hasn't produced, such as tribute videos and responses to his reviews, including at least one YouTube Poop.
    • There wasn't a Mazes and Monsters trope page until Spoony did a review of it.
  • Complaining About Shows You Don't Watch: Spoony has said that he has absolutely no interest in playing Final Fantasy IX, entirely because of the childish-looking character designs. He does admit that he's probably being massively unfair and might actually like the game if he tried it, but says that he just can't get past those designs.
  • Complete Monster: Black Lantern Spoony qualifies for this trope, as of the Final Fantasy X review. Not only does he murder Spencer in cold blood, but he attempts to kill Insano and Clone!Spoony at last.
  • Continuity Porn: The new animated version of the show's opening contains a hurricane of references to almost everything Spoony has ever reviewed.
  • Crazy Awesome: After being reminded that Ultima 3 features grass as an enemy, he announced a contest for videos of fans' epic battles with grass.
    • His persona in the Alone in the Dark review with the Critic and Linkara, combined with a bit of Adult Child. Not only does he announce that he's broken into Walker's house, but...

Spoony: Hey, look what I can make the Critic say!

NC's Computer: I like to wear women's clothing. I like to wear women's clothing-

NC: *shoos Spoony away from computer*

  • Creator's Pet: It Came From Beyond Midnight. Although he could be seen as having other motivations for hosting the show.
  • Crosses the Line Twice: Many times. Some more notable occurrences:
  • Crowning Music of Awesome: His opening theme(s).
    • Spoony's vocal cover of A Whole New World even manages to make Dr. Insano just turn around and walk right out of the room.
    • Syncing the first Anima summon to one of the many epic music bits from Kickassia in part 2 of his Final Fantasy X review.
    • Long Live the Spoony One.
    • Wendy's Training Videos - no really.
  • Dude, Not Funny:
    • This happened for real during the second part of his review of Final Fantasy X, his character encouraged his fans to track down and murder fans of the game before finally announcing he would do it himself with a box cutter. More than a few people have been disturbed that he would even joke about that, feeling that it goes one step too many beyond mere fan hating.
    • Some fans were apparently unhappy with the jokes he cracked about Lou Ferrigno's character in Cage, a brain-damaged Vietnam vet who gets tricked into an underground cagefight; Spoony remarked that if anything, he was complaining about the idea.
  • Ear Worm: The theme song.
    • Hot Drinks from the Wendy's Training Videos riff. Even Spoony admits that it's probably the catchiest song he's heard in a while.
  • Ensemble Darkhorse: Dr. Insano, of course! Don't you know anything about science?
    • Giant Dizzy Gillespie, too. Spoony had to explain to his fans that he had had to stop using him because the figure was fragile and had been slightly damaged from the action figures scenes.
    • Within her short time on the site, Oreo is already becoming ridiculously popular for the V-logs.
    • Simcoe the Magician from the Skullduggery review became pretty popular with just one appearance, due to how hilariously bizarre and unsettling he is. Pulling Oreo out of a hat didn't hurt either.
  • Everyone Is Satan in Hell: Spends a good chunk of the Mazes and Monsters review decrying this, eventually leading to this question:

"How joyless and paranoid is your life if you're afraid of children and adults armed with funny-shaped dice who still play with dolls?"

  • Fan Dumb: To put it simply, Spoony's fanbase is effectively split between honest, decent fans and Trolls who do everything in their power to be as annoying and disruptive as possible. This has included:
    • Calling his then-girlfriend Scarlett a "fat cow", prompting him to take down the thank-you video he made after winning the Mashable award (which was the first time Scarlett ever appeared on the site) and ensuring that she never appeared in any other videos, except in the background of a Magfest video.
    • Complaining about Kickassia, especially saying that he needed more focus time (which blatantly ignores that Spoony was second only to The Nostalgia Critic in terms of screentime and importance). Noah responded by blocking negative discussions of the film and telling the complainers that their rabid criticisms were causing real damage to his working relationship with the rest of TGWTG.
    • Claiming that "Wrestle! Wrestle!" was taking focus away from his main site, ignoring the fact that it's made irregularly and during downtime, and the videos are made while he renders his other videos while he has little else to do. Of course, since he's ended "Wrestle! Wrestle!", this is pretty well a moot point.
      • All of his V Logs, Counter Monkey segments, and similar material get this treatment. Despite only taking about an hour to film, next to no time to plan, and no time to edit, some people believe that they're responsible for lowering the amount of full reviews.
    • Any time he does a Crossover review, you can expect countless responses complaining about it and saying that he shouldn't waste his time working with guys like Linkara or Bennett the Sage and should stay solo. Never mind that these guys are his real-life friends...
    • Any time Spoony expresses an opinion, you get this in spades. Whether it's negative (like Final Fantasy VIII and Metroid: Other M) or positive (his actually enjoying the live-action Tekken movie and Mass Effect 3's ending), SOMEONE is going to pitch a fit, which usually involves calling him gay and trying to get under his skin by bringing up Scarlett or the infamous "BETRAYAL!" moment.
  • Growing the Beard: Most fans point to the review of The Thing video game as the point where Spoony started hitting his stride and established his trademark humor and running gags. He himself agrees, mostly since that review marked the point where he started writing actual scripts rather than just talking off-the-cuff about the games he was reviewing.
  • Harsher in Hindsight: Learning about his heart-condition and that he has been forced to quit drinking caffeine because it, as Spoony so eloquently put it, "Can make his heart explode". It makes it rather cringe-worthy when you go into a archive-binge and realize just how often he drinks from a can of soda during his reviews.
    • At the end of his "Lords Of Magick" review, Spoony bursts into his room dressed as "Macho Man" Randy Savage, who was promptly blown up by landmines that Spoony had planted just inside the door. Less than a week later, Randy Savage died after suffering a heart attack while driving and crashed his car.
    • Any of the (surprisingly numerous) Suicide as Comedy moments counts, as one of Spoony's fans sent him a "goodbye" email before committing suicide, which has inspired Noah not to make this kind of joke anymore.
  • Hate Dumb: To go along with the Fan Dumb above: Anytime Spoony criticises anything, especially if the thing is or was mega popular, he is just being a Fan Hater and obviously trolling. There is no way that he could ever possibly have a legitimate point about anything.
    • Inverted when he praised Mass Effect 3's controversial ending and called out all the fans who complained, calling them whiny brats with an entitlement complex and saying they should have seen it coming from the first game. After a good bit of Twitter-jousting, Spoony actually started up his livestream just to continue the debate.
    • Every time he does a Crossover with TGWTG people, expect many "fans" to loudly complain that they want only Spoony and that Spoony should stop doing things with TGWTG, despite the fact that Spoony himself has explicitly forbidden such whining and bans people who do it.
  • He Panned It, Now He Sucks:
    • His Final Fantasy VIII review is his most well known for triggering this.
    • He also has his vlogs, where he will openly criticize games and movies that he didn't like. Of particular note is a one-off Threatdown he did where he quite savagely attacked The Legend of Zelda series as unchanging games that are given too much hype. He openly admitted that the games are well made, but there was still backlash to behold.
    • Spoony's Anime reviewer, Dean the Adequate, also got his share of hate when he released negative reviews of Lucky Star and bashed the sacred Transformers cow that is Beast Wars in a franchise retrospective.
    • Spoony suffered another wave of backlash for completely savaging the Deadliest Warrior video game of all things. Spike responded with a Dear Negative Reader letter, which prompted a follow-up where Noah responded to the complaints against his review. It's apparently gotten bad enough that he started having to mass-ban trolls from the message board.
    • His negative review of The Expendables has gotten plenty of detractors, not just from his fans at the comments section, but from his fellow TGWTG contributors as well.
    • His bashing (to say the least) of Metroid: Other M on Twitter is likely to attract even more negative attention to himself.
    • Now, he has to deal with negative feedback for his Tron: Legacy review.
    • Spoony gets quite a bit of this from his consistent bashing of Nintendo and its products. His recent coverage of E3 2011 comes to mind.
    • Happened again when he posted his dislike of Cabin In The Woods on Twitter, and the backlash got rapidly out of hand.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: In the Clones Of Bruce Lee" review, Dr. Insano mocks Dr. Nye for trying to take over the world with what basically amounted to a weedkiller. Then in the second honorable mention for the grass wars, Dr. Insano declares war on the US - with killer grass.
    • Spoony annoying the Critic by making him say/type "I like to wear women's clothing" is made even funnier when he says in the Captain America review that he made him dress up like a dirty ballerina in Spooning With Spoony 2.
    • In the Pumpkinhead crossover video with Lord Kat, they equate the "dancing Pumpkinhead" ending of the game with the developers giving you the finger. Some time later we learn of an alternate ending...where Pumpkinhead LITERALLY gives the player the finger.
    • He starts episode 6 of his SWAT 4 review gushing about how cool an auto shotgun is. This comes back to bite him later in the same review.
    • Remember when Spoony called Uwe Boll a "cinematic Hitler" in his Alone in the Dark review with The Nostalgia Critic and Linkara? Guess who Uwe Boll is playing in Blubberella.
    • During his Q&A session at the 2010 ScrewAttack Gaming Convention, the subject of cosplay comes up. "No, I don't dress as Yuna."
  • Ho Yay: Lampshaded between an alternate Insano and Linkara (parodying The Room). "You are giving the slash fic-ers material!"
  • Internet Backdraft: Spoony did not enjoy The Expendables, and was not shy in stating this.
    • He spent several days after posting his review arguing with Angry Joe over the film on Twitter.
    • And again when he said he actually liked Mass Effect 3's ending and called out the complainers, first on Twitter then on his livestream. His main points were "it was obvious from the start what would happen", "it fits the story and mood perfectly", and "you guys are just mad that you didn't get your Fem!Shep lesbian harem ending". But then, it seems that he subscribes to the Indoctrination Theory.
    • And again with his dislike of Cabin In The Woods, which again led to a Twitter war and a livestream session.
  • Love to Hate: He sums up on the things that he likes about the Cage films is the despicably evil main villain Mr. Tagaki.
  • Memetic Badass: Reb Brown.
  • Memetic Molester: "Spooning With Spoony".
  • Memetic Mutation:
  • Memetic Sex God: Again, "Spooning With Spoony", along with any one of his cameos from Benzaie's videos.
  • Misaimed Fandom: Though the Ferris Buellers Day Off review came out on April Fool's and was hosted by Dr. Insano (meaning it was mostly likely not to be taken seriously), many people came out of the woodwork agreeing with Insano's Alternate Character Interpretation of Ferris as an irresponsible and manipulative jerk.[1]
    • A straighter form of this comes from reactions to his text articles 'Why I Should Never Write Screenplays', in which he proposes ideas for franchises such as Terminator and E.R. that would be spectacularly awful if ever actually filmed. Some fans said they liked the ideas and thought they'd be cool. Spoony had to remind them that they're BAD ideas in the start of his Terminator idea. And in his outlining a final season of E.R. where the Zombie Apocalypse occurs, he starts off by saying this idea would be a Jump the Shark moment for the series to stave off further misunderstandings.
    • Also, the whole point of the 'Dr. Insano becoming President' sketch was to show that people who vote for supervillains such as Lex Luthor or Final Fantasy's Edea for public office are stupid for voting for those villains, and that the world would be screwed if said villains actually made it into office. Doesn't stop a few fans from saying 'Insano for President'.

"Because he's honest."

Spoony: "I have to object to how silly and nerdy the whole thing makes us look. As if we were sad and dorky enough to make a pilgrimage all the way to Chicago just to seek out the Urkel House. We were there to film an imaginary battle between Super Mecha Death Christ and Donkey Kong Jesus on a Puff of Smoke. The Urkel House was purely incidental!"

  • Moral Event Horizon: Despite numerous attempts at killing Linkara, murdering Spoony and plotting to take over the world, for many viewers Doctor Insano only passed this after writing the Secret of Nimh 2.
  • Most Annoying Sound: Spoony's Ultima IX review started up a "Betrayal Counter" that yelled out "BETRAYAL!", "BETRAYED ME!" or "THIS GAME SUCKS" every time it went up. This got annoying really fast (but fortunately stopped after a while once the game started providing scenes to cut away to instead.)
  • MST3K Mantra: Doctor Insano is Spoony's alter ego, yet the two exist separately and simultaneously. In fact, Insano KILLED Spoony. Just...don't think too hard about it.
    • CR devoted an episode of his show Familiar Faces to explaining how there are now three Dr. Insanos running around: Spoony's alter ego, the one currently living with him, and the one in a lab somewhere else.
  • Network Decay: There was a period of time where Spoony was doing more vlog's and wrestling rants and less reviews.
  • Never Live It Down: His reference to Masato Tanaka as "one of the great lucha guys".
    • People (especially Trolls) love bringing up the X-Com "BETRAYAL!" moment.
    • Some still won't let go of that time Spoony said he wanted to kill people that liked Final Fantasy X.
  • Nightmare Fuel:
    • The singing hamburgers from the Wendy's training video.
    • His reaction to a segment from TNA Impact:

"The only reason I didn't change the channel was because I honestly thought I was having a nightmare."

    • Quite literally, TNA Impact itself. In the 11/1 Wrestle Wrestle, Spoony describes how he passed out on the couch while watching Impact and had all sorts of strange dreams, but the only one he remembered was one about a crappy Ghostbusters sequel with an animated rabbit sidekick.
    • What about Chuckles the Fucking Jester?
    • The end of the Game Over review.
    • The Madness of Roland. Quite a few people commented that while the video itself wasn't too scary, Spoony's face at the end did disturb them. He even refers to it as Nightmare Fuel at the beginning of the commentary.
    • The Nostalgia Critic in the second Pumpkinhead's Revenge review is really unsettling. Or is he?
    • According to his review of Akalabeth, the former offices of California Pacific Computer are home to the skeletal remains of their staff, who Richard Garriot forgot about after he started Origin and left to die sitting by the phone waiting for someone to call and report that they'd won the game.
    • I'm not the only one who finds Black Lantern Spoony deeply unsettling...am I?
      • Most definitely after Part 3 of the Final Fantasy X review, where he actually manages to enter the Uncanny Valley by appearing in black and white and speaking in a deep electronic voice. Oh, and he's surrounded by damned souls.
    • Chuckles the Fucking Jester. Does anything else REALLY need to be said? I mean, it really says something when The Gate Keeper gives a fucking Yellow Ring of FEAR!
    • Black Lantern Spoony does what Black Lanterns do best and rips Spencer D. Bum's heart out of his chest. Onscreen.
    • Insano's line at the end of the Highlander video game review, after Spoony freaks and runs off-screen. The perfect delivery and glasses really sold it.

"He'll be back. They always come back."

    • January 18, 2012 during the SOPA & PIPA protests, Spoony changed the homepage to all black with an evil red-eyed Burton and the words "The Experiment is Over" in red. If you didn't know about SOPA now, this will wake you up.
  • One of Us:
    • Aside from being a complete geek and pop culture junky, Spoony has shown signs of awareness of TV Tropes, including name-dropping "Foe Yay" in his Deadly Premonition review.
    • He's also a bit of a closeted Otaku, as he's gotten pissed over people calling Alucard Arucard and even thinks he looks like Dr. Tenma.
    • He made another Tweet remarking that so long as movies kept throwing people out of windows, he'd keep referencing Cowboy Bebop.
    • Dr. Insano mentions Handwaving in the review of "The Dungeonmaster."
    • Though they were for his Final Fantasy playthroughs, he did cosplay as Squall & Tidus (and even went so far as to get a wig similar to the latter).
  • Paranoia Fuel: The "I heard that, Curtis" running gag is this Played for Laughs.
  • The Scrappy: There was a considerable fan backlash against the Spencer D. Bum character in his Dirty Harry review. Spoony has acknowledged and Lampshaded this in subsequent reviews, and even joked about killing him off. He finally went through with it in the preview video for the Final Fantasy X finale, where Black Lantern Spoony tears out Spencer's heart.
    • Sean Fausz has become surprisingly hated doing Spoony's Wrestle Wrestle videos.
  • Strangled by the Red String: During his Eclipse v-log, he almost seems to be going insane trying to figure out why Bella and Edward are in love.

Spoony: Give me one thing that they...mutually like. Give me one thing they do together. Okay, I'll make it simpler: give me one thing that Bella Swan likes at all.

  • Straw Man Has a Point: His April Fools review of Ferris Bueller's Day Off as Doctor Insano. He stated in the commentary for that video that this was intentional.
  • Title Confusion: Spoony almost always refers to Phantasmagoria: A Puzzle of Flesh as "Phantasmagoria 2: A Puzzle of the Flesh". This may be deliberate, as it means the title flows more naturally when he's yelling it as a Running Gag.
  • The Problem with Licensed Games: Frequently encounters this.
  • Too Good to Last: The Deadliest Character series probably won't go beyond the first episode, for various reasons Noah mentions in his commentary.[2]
  • Unfortunate Implications: This Twitter post.
    • Itself a reference to RedLetterMedia, whose work Noah has mentioned he greatly enjoys.
    • In part 10 of his SWAT 4 Let's Play he makes anti-semitic jokes, while a song that has German lyrics plays.
  • Viewer Gender Confusion: Kiros of Final Fantasy VIII.
  • Villain Decay: In his early appearances, Dr. Insano was a legitimate threat to the multiverse between becoming president of the United States on a ticket with Fu Manchu, seizing control of Neutro, and unleashing Mechakara into Earth-Prime. Ever since his attempt at creating a cyboplasm monster resulted in the creation of his "son" though, he's turned considerably Lighter and Softer.
  • The Woobie:
    • Insano stumbled into this territory at the end of the Street Fighter 2010 review. "NOBODY LOVES ME!"
    • Spoony himself becomes a pretty huge woobie for the duration of his Atari 2600 E.T. review. Not only is he playing one of the worst games ever made, but he's doped up on painkillers and spitting blood while doing it. (The video was made shortly after multiple surgeries to remove his wisdom teeth.)
    • In his review of Breaking Dawn, this is his opinion on Charlie Swan for having a conniving sociopath like Bella for a daughter and for being utterly powerless throughout the films.
  • What an Idiot!:
    • Spoony repeatedly complains about his teammates' Artificial Stupidity in Swat IV.
    • One of his major gripes with the Final Fantasy VIII plot, where Squall repeatedly hands over the girl to random people who ask nicely and then immediately sets off on a quest to get her back.
    • Does it literally on several occasions, but none with as much anger as the ones in his Final Fantasy X review.
  1. ↑ But this interpretation predates the review.
  2. ↑ It took a year and a half to make, the animator said he probably couldn't do another one, Screw Attack has a similar series, and the Deadliest Warrior format is somewhat restrictive.
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