One student filmmaker, with the help of a few friends, has set out to give viewers a peek inside the world of his own “bromance” with his best friend.
The result is True Bromance, a popular YouTube series created by Mike Collins, a 22-year-old senior in physics.
Collins, or “Loki” as his friends call him, is a member of Theta Chi Fraternity and a part of what he has dubbed a “bromance.” He shares this bond with John Stancil, 23, a musician and DJ.
The whole True Bromance idea was not at all preconceived. Collins and Stancil realized that together they are easily able to make others laugh, so one day, late last summer, the duo filmed a short skit that they expected would get a couple views on YouTube and never go any farther. They were wrong.
Their first episode caught the attention of friend and filmmaker Tim Szczesniak, who offered his talents to the True Bromance team. Since then, every episode been filmed, directed and edited by Szczesniak. Each video takes roughly eight hours to film and then, depending on episode length, a sizable amount of time for editing and proofing.
Currently, there are ten episodes of True Bromance, two of which are behind the scenes, or as they call them, “Behind the Bro” episodes. The episode content ranges from anything like an afternoon watching television to going a week without the pair’s favorite beverage, Pabst Blue Ribbon.
In an ongoing theme of overly representing their personal habits, Collins and Stancil seem to drink only PBR during each episode.
“PBR certainly is a recurring theme,” Collins said. ”We do enjoy PBR, but we greatly amplify that in the series.”
Collins fondly remembers the filming of his favorite episode of True Bromance, “Regularly Scheduled Brogramming”. He said that the entire video was completely improvised, and that he and Stancil came up with every skit on the spot. Collins believes that their fans enjoy their improv episodes much more than those that are scripted because it is more natural and genuinely funny.
When asked how to define a “bromance”, Collins had to think for a moment.
“Bromance is about buying a video game just because it has a co-op campaign,” Collins said. “It’s about breaking some guy’s nose because he had the nerve to say something about your friend’s Mohawk.”
Sadly, the next episode of True Bromance isn’t likely to be filmed any time soon. Collins is nearing completion of his Physics degree and is spending all of his free time either studying or tutoring.
Stancil, meanwhile, has been doing a lot of work with his band, Cool Kid Collective, an “acoustic-rock, hip-hop band” for which he plays bass guitar, and Szczesniak has been working non-stop on his upcoming full-length film, Remnants.
True Bromance has a total of 11,560 total views and 90 subscribers on their YouTube channel which is a respectable number, but nowhere near the views garnered by YouTube stars such as sxephil or juliansmith.
These YouTube stars do shows featuring sketch comedy similar to True Bromance, but they have higher production costs and maybe more importantly, a lot more time to make each video.
Collins and Stancil are unable to produce daily or weekly videos due to their other obligations. They believe that “blowing up” on YouTube would require a more regular and consistent release schedule.
Current fans of True Bromance agree that Collins and Stancil do have what it takes and make an excellent comedy pairing.
Tiffany Deans, a psychology and social work double major, is one such fan who appreciates the extreme nature of the series.
”True Bromance represents the epitome of male relationships,” Deans said.
Billy O’Donnnell, a business administration major, said the series is like “The Office on crack.”
“It’s something I can relate to,”O’Donnell said, “something I can see actually happening around campus.”
You can check out True Bromance at www.YouTube.com/TrueBromance.
