Updates on 2020: The Year YOU Control Nathan Rabin
I am nothing if not a man of ideas. That’s kind of my thing. I’m an idea man. Some of my ideas are great. Like coming up with the phrase Manic Pixie Dream Girl. That was a pretty great idea. I’m proud of that one.
My World of Flops was a great idea. The Weird Accordion to Al? Also a great idea.
In this economy, and this business, you pretty much have to continually come up with great ideas just to stay in business. In this bleak Darwinian environment, you need to innovate, adapt and evolve or die.
So, as part of the never-ending struggle to stay in business I launched a project called 2020: The Year YOU Control Nathan Rabin.
It’s an extension of Control Nathan Rabin 4.0, the column where I write about a movie of a reader’s choice in exchange for a one time, one hundred dollar pledge, the price going down to seventy five dollars for each subsequent entry.
Also a great idea, if I say so myself, and I am, now, in this sentence.
Only in 2020: The Year YOU Control Nathan Rabin, readers/patrons won’t just angrily demand that I write about a film of their choosing; for a one-time 99 dollar pledge they’ll be able to nominate a theme month for Nathan Rabin’s Happy Place and if their nomination is voted on by enough patrons to make the top 12, I will devote an entire month to writing about a subject of their choice, and throw in a movie of their selection as a bonus.
I thought it was a good idea to both make money and connect with my readers in a new and more direct way, to give you what you want, what you really, really want, instead of relying exclusively on my admittedly sometimes dodgy judgment. .
I figured I would have one master post and then as patrons contributed nomination pledges I would add them to the poll. Then I discovered, to my dismay if not outright horror, that Patreon does not possess the technology to add entries to an existing poll. Once it’s live there’s no adding anything to a poll so I am being forced to improvise.
I still think this is a really good idea that will lead to an awesome 2020 here at the Happy Place where I’m writing more specifically for y’all than ever before so what I am going to do is change the parameters of the feature somewhat so that for the next month or so I will continue to collect 2020: The Year YOU Control Nathan Rabin 99 dollar pledges and then on November 15th, 2019, roughly one month from now, everything will be locked down on one master list that patrons, and only patrons, will be able to vote on. The 12 nominations that get the most vote all become theme months for 2020.
Will fate, circumstances, and your votes lead to me seeing this movie? Possibly!
To make this even more appealing, if you suggest a nomination for a theme month and it is not chosen, your pledge transforms into a Control Nathan Rabin 4.0 pledge and you can still pick a movie I must watch and then write about.
So even if your choice doesn’t get enough votes still get something with a 100 dollar value! It’s a win-win-win proposition (that’s even better than a win-win proposition!), and not just because I desperately need the money.
As for theme months, I vow not to half-ass anything. For each theme month there will be 5 to 7 pieces of solid content devoted to the theme. There will be no half-stepping on my watch.
Here are the nominations that have been made so far. First up, my choices, then patrons:
My choices:
Phil Hartman Month
Direct to Video Sequels month
Mismatched buddy cop month
Hip Hop Movie month
Podcast Month
Jeff Goldblum month
Nominations from Patrons:
Marvel Month!
Nora Ephron Month
Unexpected Tearjerker Month–Movies like Ratatouille that have you weeping in spite of yourself
Danny DeVito Month
Martin Lawrence Month
John Candy Month
So if you have an idea, please do make a pledge. Even if you do not have an idea, go ahead and become a patron anyway so that you can vote on this all-important poll and play a firsthand role in determining what the Happy Place looks like next year.
Even more importantly, you can help ensure that we stay in business, which is the point of all this furious exertion in the first place.
So please do participate in 2020: The Year YOU Control Nathan Rabin. I’m having to improvise a bit in its execution and structure but it remains a terrific idea I’m excited to make a glorious reality.
Make the magic happen by pledging over at https://www.patreon.com/nathanrabinshappyplace
and, of course, you can still participate in the Weird Accordion to Al book pre-order campaign as well over at https://make-the-weird-accordion-to-al-book-a-ridiculous-r.backerkit.com/hosted_preorders