Dawson from Nerdy in Many Ways!

Dawson Interview

[00:00:00]Melissa:  this is spoiler country and I’m Melissa surcharge today on the show. I’m excited to welcome artists and YouTube. YouTube sensation does. And we drag welcome to the show.

Dawson: Well, thank you so much. A YouTube sensation is very generous, but I appreciate that.

Melissa: No problem. No problem. How are you today?

Dawson: I’m doing pretty good.

My wife and I just got back home like yesterday, or I guess today, really from a Thanksgiving vacation. We’re in Vegas for about a week, but it’s going to be back home. Say what we’re going to be back.

Melissa: Awesome. How is Vegas? I mean, with, you know, with everything going on, were you able to like, do the same things you did before?

Or how was that like?

Dawson: Well, we, it was an interesting situation because it was my wife’s grandparents 50th anniversary, and they rented out this like big old house, like kind of on the outskirts of Vegas. So we didn’t, we didn’t do like the Vegas Vegas experience. So, I mean, we just kind of stayed at this nice house that had a pool and a hot tub and like a tennis courts.

Like we didn’t really have a reason to leave. So we just. We just got to stay at the house the [00:01:00] whole time, which is really nice having a lot of food getting really fat of course. But it was a good time. It’s a good time.

Melissa: Yeah. It sounds like a good holiday, you know, there’s a worst places to spend it.

Dawson: That’s definitely true. Very true.

Melissa: Yeah. Yeah. So, so you’re be the host creator of nerdy in many ways on YouTube. So when did you start that and, and what like inspired you to, to start that channel? So I’ve

Dawson: been doing this for about, I’d say a year and a half now. I started out because I have a little brother named Brigham who has his own channel called Briggs comics.

And he started his channel about two years ago. And it was just kind of away from like talk about things he’s interested in like nerdy stuff and caught books. Of course. And at the time I was doing sports commentating for my university cause I’m really into sports. And that, that was the field that I was in at the time.

And I was just like, you know what, I want to talk about more things than just sports. And so I started YouTube and like, like anybody who starts YouTube and starts a very ghetto at first, like no [00:02:00] microphone set, it’s recording with your phone or whatever. But I started that out in like, By eight months after I started YouTube, my first YouTube channels account got hacked and it was okay.

Cause I started over and then ended up being bigger than the original one was. So like, I, it’s not really a huge deal, but now I just started because I just wanted to. I don’t know, talk about things I was interested in because a lot of places that I’ve lived, I’ve lived in very like small town communities.

And when you’re like small town country areas, there’s not a lot of people were into comic book stuff. So I, I braced out just trying to see if I can connect with other people who are interested in same things that I have. And it turns out there’s a lot of people, so successful.

Melissa: Nice. So we’re still, where are you from?

What’s your small town.

Dawson: Well, I mean, right now we’re in small town, Virginia, like outside of Lexington, Virginia. But I’m actually from everywhere. Honestly, my dad was in the oil business, most of my childhood, and we moved around from like Texas to [00:03:00] Colorado, to South Dakota, to Iowa back down to Texas.

Now it’s Virginia. So I’ve, I pretty much just claim the United States as my home. I don’t really have a hometown. My hometown, the United States is a good one to call it. So there you go.

Melissa: So tell us about the channel. Like what types of content, you know, can we find on there?

Dawson: Yeah. So one of the things I have on my banner for the channels that we talk about, like movie stuff, video game things caught books music, cause I I’m also a musician.

I play guitar and drums and a vocalist. So I do some music stuff on there from time to time, whenever I get the time and a lot of live streams, it’s just it’s just simply a place to get together with other people who are interested in nerdy stuff, you know, just kind of talk about it and just have a good time.

It’s just kind of a. I try to establish like a nerdy community where we can just talk openly about things we love and kind of have it be a positive environment,

Melissa: which

Dawson: nowadays on social media, it can be kind of a hard place to find, especially on YouTube and Twitter. [00:04:00] Sometimes we, we tried to, at least I tried to have this positive environment where you just talk about these things and just, if we disagree on something, then it’s like, cool, you like that?

You’re free to do that. And it’s just that kind of nerdy, positive atmosphere that at least we’re trying to have.

Melissa: Yeah. Yeah. Because there are a lot of like, yeah. Toxic fandoms and things on social media right now. So that’s that, there’s a place that people can go and just, here’s some positive stuff. So what’s like new on like what’s up and coming right now.

What are the things that you’re excited about that you’re doing shows about, you know, as far as comics and movies go.

Dawson: Yeah. I mean, of course, one of the big things right now is the Snyder cut of justice league. I’m a huge DC fan. As you tell me all my many DC books back here. So of course that’s something that’s a big interest to me.

And of course I love Zack Snyder’s DC films. And so we talk a lot about those, that the news about that, which right now, like, Moving news is like the only news that’s really talked about. Cause there’s not really much else to go down unless you follow politics, which when you’re trying to have a positive atmosphere, you [00:05:00] don’t really talk about politics.

So that’s not necessarily we cover, but yeah, the Snyder cause stuff, they, one of them of course the Mandalorian as that’s kind of pinging back some steam with the second season, of course, star Wars. Big time. Favorite of mine? I love star Wars. And just a lot of there’s a lot of theory, vetoes, actually, I’m starting a new thing about channel where I talk about like, what if situations like I’ll take something from like a DC film.

Like for example, the first one we’re going to do is what if Batman killed Superman and Batman V Superman, Donald Justice, and like kind of talking about the alternate story that would evolve from that. And just things of that nature where we just try to. Expound upon things and try to see like what would happen in this situation and try to allow fans to think for themselves and kind of visualize how they think the character would react in certain situations, which is always a fun discussion.

Melissa: Yeah, absolutely. So like, if you were in charge, like what kind of ending you would, you would see coming kind of

Dawson: extent and also just like. Based on [00:06:00] the versions of the characters that people love. Like, for example, like, he’ll look at the character Batman, right? There’s like a hundreds of different iterations of that character, hundreds of different versions that people love.

Like you have the, can’t be versions like Adam West and George Clooney. And then you have the serious ones, like Christian bale, Ben Affleck, Michael Keaton. And then you have like everwhere far and few between. And so there’s so many different interpretations of what the characters like. Right. And so a lot of people would like, see, like, how was your version of Batman act to this situation is always very interesting to me.

Melissa: Yeah. What do you think about the Robert patents than one that’s coming up?

Dawson: Oh, I’m so stoked. Honestly. When I first heard the news, I’m not gonna lie. I hadn’t followed Rob Pattinson’s acting career past Twilight. So I was, I was very much hesitant on, in fact I scared of my phone for a while and I was like, what?

Because I’m a huge baffling fan. And so before that announcement was made, I was just like, Holding my breath like Ben Affleck was like still there, which he technically is, but like at the time it was very much up in the air. And then we’ll wrap Pattinson was cast. I was just like, I don’t know about this, [00:07:00] but then I’ve watched some more of his work.

Like for example, the lighthouse Willem Defoe and in tenant, of course. And now I’m just super stoked. Cause everything I’ve seen from it so far, I’m liking it. It’s different from what I normally would prefer a Batman habit. The suit for example, is very different from what I would prefer. But I’m just very anxious to see what Matt Reeves has in store for us with that.

Melissa: Yeah. Yeah. I wasn’t really that excited about it until actually that I heard that they were casting Colin Farrell as the penguin. I’ve thought that would be such an incredible role for him. I mean, I guess you wouldn’t think of it right off the bat, but like, Oh, no, just looking at his you know, if you will look at some of his independent work that he’s done with like, you know, his Irish films, he, he gets pretty crazy.

So I thought, well, actually he would make a really good penguin villain.

Dawson: Yeah. And it was interesting because at first, when they cast them out, they’re going to do like there’s this alternate. Not necessarily a penguin character, but a guy named emperor penguin where he’s like a younger, like more why are you version of the big of character, but he’s not [00:08:00] Oswell couple pot.

And so I thought they were going in that direction. Then when I saw the trailer, I was like, Holy crap. He’s off wall, cobble pot with like the gray makeup. Like honestly, get that makeup team for the Batman award right now. The movie’s not even out. Because of how good he looks like. Honestly, I’m excited to see him too.

Melissa: Yeah. You have a still shot. So just been like, Whoa, okay. This is what we’re getting into. I’m excited.

Dawson: Oh yeah. So stoked. And then of course he had Paul Danno who like the first one that popped in my head, but when they first announced him as the Riddler, I’m just like, okay. Yeah, that just works. Cause he’s just kooky and awkward.

And like you just see him pull off very psychotic character, like. The Riddler contend to be. I was like,

Melissa: yeah. When I’m just also happy that they’re going into a darker version again, you know? Because I, I’m not, I like the campy stuff, but I do prefer Batman and darker.

Dawson: Yeah, me too. I mean, can’t be fun at all, but like, I, I always go back to like the [00:09:00] origins of Batman and also Batman’s most successful stories, which all tends to be darker and more psychological and, and more, quite honestly more brutal.

Like for example, you have the courthouse storyline, you have the dark hair return storyline. Pretty much. Let me see if I even see it. Let’s see Batman, hush. A lot of these were Batman is just a darker character, which mean when you dress up like a bat and like black and gray dog, and your parents are killed in front of you.

Like, of course it’s gotta be dark. That’s how you stay true to the character, at least in my opinion. But

Melissa: that’s just me. I totally agree. Yeah, for sure. So yeah, that’ll work. Do you know now when that’s coming out? I haven’t even heard. I think it’s like halted production or something because of COVID or.

Dawson: I think they they’re just about to wrap a filming.

Actually, they had a couple of stops in production due to COVID, but I think they’re starting to wrap up filming at least with the main cast as far as I understand. And so I think as far as I know, I think there’s still going for like the 20, 22 release date, which I’m just like, so. Bugged about cause we were [00:10:00] working the Snyder cut in 2021.

And if we got the Batman 20, 21 in the like a Batman stream comes through, get justice league and a Batman film, different versions all the same year. I mean just like sign me up, but it doesn’t, it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen, but either way. That is stuff still happening. I mean, I’m all down for it.

Melissa: Yeah. Well, speaking of the Snyder cut, that seems to be all, anyone can talk about, you know, right now what are you like planning and preparing to do? Because I’m, I’m sure that you’re going to do some shows based on, you know,

Dawson: Oh, yeah, I’m sure I’m going to get roped into some, like stream marathons discussing it.

I’m probably displaying me like a full two day straight where I’m gonna be asked like, Hey, be on the street, be on the stream and like talk about it. And then that’s that’s to me the most exhausting two days of my life. But I mean, I’m, I’m planning on doing a full fledged review of that. Of course.

I mean, I I’m so excited to watch that thing. Cause I mean, four hours of Zach standard material. I mean, yeah. A movie lovers should want that. So that’s, that’s gonna be a [00:11:00] fun. So I’m going to binge watch that thing. I’m going to review as fast as possible cause you know, there’s gonna be competition for getting reviews out there.

You just know there’s gotta be like thousands of reviews, of course, both positive and negative, but that’s going to be the main point of conversation on YouTube verb. Months. I mean, it already is right now, the movie hasn’t even come out yet. We only see like two trailers for it and it’s the center of conversation.

So

Melissa: yeah, no, I literally have this like image of him, like sitting in his apartment, you know, like with a fake mustache, like twirling it and like laughing and like an evil maniacal laugh, you know, making everyone run around like crazy.

Dawson: Oh my gosh. Yeah. Is that a, I’m assuming you’re referring to his accident or?

Yeah, he he’s, he’s such an interesting character when it comes to promoting this movie, like, he’s honestly this, the way promoted this thing is very much unprecedented. Cause like no other movie has had something like this. Like nothing like this has ever happened where like, you can just like put out pictures, like the [00:12:00] studio doesn’t stop you.

And then like you get this full fledged force of people online. Hashtag. And yet at the same time, like having these different fan events, like I actually had a, a stream recently with Richard Citroen, who was the stunt double for Batman in Batman, V Superman and justice league, as well as the voice of Darkside reporter where we talk to them.

And they both said like, yeah, we haven’t seen anything like this. As far as fan reception of a director’s vision. Like nothing they’ve ever seen, like this they’ve been in Hollywood for years. So again, it’s definitely something that’s very unprecedented.

Melissa: Yeah. Yeah, no, that was my thought too. I thought, how is no one stopping, you know, the studios and stuff?

Like, no, one’s blocking him no stopping him. No

Dawson: surprise too. He was surprised too. Like he totally thought one of us is going to kick out his door and said like, Hey, stop posting that stuff. But they did. And he’s like, all right, here you go. I was sitting in my living room

Melissa: full steam ahead.

Dawson: Oh yeah. Pretty much.

And he’s appearing on streams left and right. And chorus all make sure they go to a good cause they have SP and everything, which is absolutely phenomenal. That’s. That’s always one thing I can turn to, no [00:13:00] matter like how maybe some fans get with as far as toxicity is concerned, which a lot, majority of a pretty good, but there’s some that definitely need to get toxic.

Yeah. That’s one thing I can always point to whenever that happens is look at the good, the majority is doing donating to suicide prevention and helping to save lives in that way. As, at least as much as they can given the circumstances.

Melissa: Yeah. No, absolutely. So like when you approach your reviews, cause like you said, there’s a lot of competition.

What do you try to do to like set your, your reviews apart?

Dawson: I think, well, one thing I try to do is like a lot of people will give a movie, like the grade, for example, like, they’ll say like it either has a, B, C, or D or whatnot, or regulate out of like a number out of five or something. I try to be different by saying whether or not a movie is rewatch Hubble.

Because to me, the big, the most important thing about a movie is can you rewatch it multiple times and still be entertained and still be invested in the story? And if that’s true, then to me, the movie is successful. [00:14:00] Then again, there are a lot of movies where like one time as enough and it’s impactful and that those are kind of rarities, but overall movie can attract me and make me want to watch it again.

And again, to me, that’s a very, very well done film because again, it, I feel like films are supposed to. Spark imagination. And if we can do that again and again, that’s like, you’ve done your job. It’s like a piece of art they have hanging on your wall, like of growth, how long you have it. If you love a type of art, you still look at it again and again, because it was very well done artistically.

So I try to approach it in that way, which I feel like it’s pretty different. But at the same time, I also try to approach everything with a more. Positive outlook, because you see a lot of channels nowadays that really look to bash any little thing in a movie, which can be fun to watch. Like for example, there’s, there’s cinema sins.

They’re entertaining to watch because they kind of take it to the extreme and you can tell it’s it’s satire. Right? You can tell it’s satirical, but it’s, there’s a lot of the channels that are very serious about it. Whereas me, I try to find everything that I can like about a film. Now and [00:15:00] I’ll point out negatives.

Like there’s, there’s no reason to only say positive things about every film, because that’s what becomes pretty rote and pretty, you know, but I feel like every move to a certain extent has something good to offer. Whether it’s at least a good visuals, maybe some parts of the soundtrack that are good, or maybe some actors somewhere in the movie that, that did a good job.

And let’s talk about where the wild things are. That’s the only exception to that rule. But most movies, I feel like have something positive to

Melissa: offer. Yeah, no, I think you’re right on that one. I mean, even, you know, the worst movies that I’ve seen you know, like where you’ve literally either turned it off or fast, it, because you’re just like, I need to get to the end, you know, just to see what happens.

I watched during Halloween, I was trying to watch like, you know, as many horror movies as I could. And I think it was called the gosh, I think it was called the pale. DOR or the pale horse. There’s I’m going to get confused. There’s one that’s like really well acclaimed. But yeah, it was, so it started off really good.

It was like a Western kind of feel to it. And I was like, Oh, this is [00:16:00] cool. And then like, literally like 20 minutes into the movie, it was just like downhill, like, you know, garbage fire to the point where I thought, okay. But like you said, you can find something good about it. I’m like, okay, well, the first 20 minutes was gutted.

I promise. And this cinematography was cool. But yeah, it’s. It’s important to, I think not always talk about negative stuff, you know, and try to find that positivity.

Dawson: Let’s talk about Batman and Robin. I rewatched that a couple months ago because I was doing a series of like Batman solo film reviews.

And I hadn’t seen a movie in years and I put it in and like within the first 10 minutes, I’m just sitting there like, this is somehow worse than I remember.

Melissa: No. It’s yeah, it’s so bad. Actually, a funny story. I, I live in an area where there’s this famous golf tournament and a lot of celebrities play in it.

And I, my sister and I went one year, cause we got some free tickets and Chris O’Donnell was there playing as you know, like one of the. Celebrity people to help the golfer. [00:17:00] And so we were like, my sister was like, Oh, I can’t wait to see Chris Rosano. And we’re, you know, we’re arguing about it. And I’m like, who cares about him?

He was the worst Robin ever turned around and he’s standing directly behind me. Gives me the dirtiest look. Yeah. Oops.

Dawson: Sorry. Oh, that’s so sad. So sad. It’s so unfortunate. Cause like, you know, he was so excited to play. Like anybody who would play Robin would be super excited for that. I mean he even still has his Robin suit at that is like you said on different shutoff Axios, but yeah.

I mean, it’s so unfortunate. What happened to him? Like honestly he’s him and him and the actor for Alfred. I mean, Michael golf, I think was his name. Him and the active Alfred were somewhat the only like glimmers of hope in that movie to a certain extent.

 

But that’s really stretching it because, gosh, I remember that’s the, one of the only movie reviews that I posted on my channel, where I just went full on ham on a movie, like at the start out the thing, like, I don’t want to [00:18:00] do this.

I don’t want to film this review. I don’t want to get mad, but I will. Because it’s necessary.

Melissa: I think that all the Alfred’s have been good. I think that’s the one consistent thing they’ve done. Well,

Dawson: yeah, I could agree with that. Of course Michael golf is just iconic and again, he was the main good thing at all through, I mean, of course Michael Keaton was great. Yeah. And then you have Michael Kane.

Who I think did as good as he could with his Romy Christian Allen writes pretty well, but I think some parts about his Alford were kind of iffy at times. She just kind of a exposition machine for the most part, but he did really good with grade and the Jeremy irons. I’m so excited to see Jeremy Aaron’s back as Alford and Zach’s.

I was just asleep. I love Jeremy irons, Alfred. Oh, he’s so good. So fantastic. I mean, he reminds me of the Alfred from dark Knight returns, which of course is very intentional and Alfred’s from many different other storylines, just how sarcastic he is and how like cynical. He is a Batman, like, for example, [00:19:00] when he says, like, not that there’s likely to be a next generation of wanes.

Yes. Thank you. That’s it.

Melissa: You know exactly. Now, are you excited about the new wonder woman movie that’s coming out like directly to HBO max? I am.

Dawson: I like yoga dotes. I think she’s awesome. I think she. It’s it’s really cool to see how she’s become the character despite the initial blow back at first, which of course happens with any like conflict character.

Let’s be honest. Everybody receives backlash. Ben Affleck received the Henry capital received a gal, but don’t receive them. I mean, heck even some of the MCU actors received backlash for their castings which is St. Salute. Cause everybody, because everybody loves the MCU. But w w we’ll ignore that. But not excited.

I think the only thing is that there has been fatigue from it being pushed back so many times, you know, cause it really should have gotten this movie like a year ago, but it’s been pushed back so much, but I’m still excited. Cause I support, I wanna support Gallia dote. I wanna support Patty Jenkins. I’m just, there’s just some parts of the story that [00:20:00] kind of have me like what’s going on, especially with Steve, Trevor, like that’s still one thing I can’t quite figure out as to how he, it makes sense for him to be there.

And stay there throughout the entire story without being some, like crux of like the bad guy. Gosh, what’s his name? I can’t remember his name. Pedro Pascal’s character. Yeah, or like part his plan. So like there’s some parts where I’m just not really sure what’s going to happen there, but again, I’m still excited to DC film.

And DC, it’s, it’s a great time to be DC fan right now. So, I mean, I’m definitely gonna watch it for sure. In fact, if it’s in my theater down here, down the road and techie, I’m gonna go see it, both in the theater and on HBO max.

Melissa: Yeah. Now I think it’s cool that they’re doing it, you know, in HBO, max as well, just because

Dawson: a lot of

Melissa: theaters are closed.

So that’s really cool that everyone’s going to like get an opportunity to watch it, you know?

Dawson: Oh, yeah. Yeah, because there was big worries about that for a while. Like, cause they they’ve been wanting to putting it in theaters and they’ve been saying like, Oh, this belongs in theaters for months now. And so I was just thinking like, well, they’re going to bite the bullet and just continue to go [00:21:00] to theaters and like have it postponed indefinitely because who knows when all these restrictions are going to go down.

At, at that point you’d lose half of its money, which we don’t want that to be. I think this is the smartest route, considering the options that they have.

Melissa: Yeah, no, absolutely. Well, let’s let’s make us switch over to video games. Cause I know you, you handle those as well. Yeah, I’m a big gamer. So what are you, what are you playing?

What do you like when you don’t like right now?

Dawson: Well, I’m very much kind of a more two thousands, 2008 retro gamer. Cause like my family was never like well off enough to the point where we could buy the newest console, as soon as that came out, like we, we got the Xbox three 60 when there was talks to the Xbox one, like, okay, we’re very much like behind in that way.

So I play a lot of like, X-Box three 60 games, PlayStation two games, I think. One if I have it, but let me see if I have one, one second. Yeah, here it is one of my favorite games of all time is this classic PlayStation two game cube, an X-Box game [00:22:00] called Sphinx in the curse, mummy, like those kind of like platform, adventure games, like, and I love, I actually just got the remastered version for the Nintendo switch.

Which I still love it. It’s still fantastic. It’s not perfect, but it doesn’t have to be perfect for me to love it, but definitely we’ll retro stuff. And of course the Arkham games cause. Batman because why not? And I’m finally getting a PS4. As soon as PS five goes out for half a thousand dollars, I’m getting a PS4, I’m going to get the spider man game.

And of course we don’t play that like nobody’s business. Cause Fireman’s another favorite character of mine. So like, yeah, so definitely like more. Older gaming compared to like what a lot of streamers do. That’s why I don’t like stream games that much. And just talk about them because like, let’s be honest if someone’s playing like, like say Overwatch, right?

No, one’s going to like decide to go watch somebody play mat in 2013. So

Melissa: it’s true. Yeah. Do you do that the via, have you ever done the X-Box like the game pass?

[00:23:00] Dawson: Yeah. Not as much as I would like to just cause like, I don’t know. There’s a lot of kids where wife likes to watch me play. She’s not much of a gamer, but she loves watching video games.

Like maybe playing like an adventure game. She’ll be like, go over there. All right. Get that thing. It’s like, okay, I’m on it. I saw it too.

Melissa: Yeah, no, that sounds like my boyfriend. I said, I’m the gamer in the house errands, but he likes to watch the intros like, cause he loves like, you know, the opening credits and when they’re talking about like the story in the class, so he’ll sometimes be like, wait, don’t start it until, you know, I can watch it with you.

And then, and then I’m like, okay, go away now.

Dawson: See, I used to be the watcher, my. My older brother, I have an older brother. He’s like two years older than me when we were a little  and he had all these adventure games and I would always just watch him play. And I would always be the person who knew where to go.

Like I could tell like where the game was hitting you to go. And he could never tell us like, go that way, go that way. Okay. You gotta be as possible this way. Hit it at that spot. It’s like, how do you notice, like, it’s obvious, it’s telling you right there.

Melissa: Right?

[00:24:00] Dawson: I’ve transitioned to the gamer, which is much more fun.

Melissa: Oh, it’s yeah. It’s much more fun. Yeah. I think, well, games have changed so much, you know, like when I was a kid, you know, I had super Mario brothers and legend of Zelda and, you know, I went through my PlayStation phased on like, pretty much all of that Xbox just cause it’s, I’m used to it. But I just recently started playing well, not too recently, but.

Yeah, the fallout 76. Are you familiar with any of the fallout games?

Dawson: Oh yeah. Yeah. I played fallout new Vegas quite a bit.

Melissa: Sorry. It was, that was like, honestly, one of the best ones other than fallout three, I think.

Dawson: Oh yeah, that was fantastic. I love that. What, even though, like, that was one of the ones that I watched my siblings play because at times it can be like fricking hard when you’re starting out.

Like also like, Oh, this is a massive freaking bug and you’re dead. And like, Oh, what the heck was that?

Melissa: Yeah, no, those were a lot more complicated. I think, you know, it takes a while to kind of get the hang of it. There’s so many different mechanics into it, but you know, it’s interesting with a lot of these games now [00:25:00] I’m actually kind of anti like multiplayer or at least like not having an option to do solo.

Cause I think that, like, I dunno, what do you think about that? Like, there’s like so many people that want to play with other people, but I’m kind of a loner, I guess it’s like.

Dawson: I’m down for multiplayer. If I’m playing with people that I’m in the same room as people that I know like in high school, I would play call of duty modern warfare at my friends till three in the morning, and have like pyramids of mountain Dew cans.

You know, that that’s what we did on weekends. And so that’s fun. Cause like you can trash talk each other in person, you know, each other and it’s fun. You can just Jospin each other. Whereas online I’ve never gotten into the whole multiplayer online scene. I just never got into it just cause like I saw so many friends that did it and like, especially the early days when like just people would trashed out into like crazy, like pass each other out.

And I was like, I don’t feel like having that happen to me today. So I’m just going to play a single story mode. And it ends up being just fine for me. [00:26:00] Like, yeah, sure. I’ll get frustrated at the game, but at least they don’t have some 13 year old cussing me out.

Melissa: Yeah, no, exactly. Yeah. That’s totally happened to me back back in the day when I had like a headset and everything.

Yeah. And they were just talking so much crap and I’m like, okay I’m just gonna turn this off and mute. You

Dawson: got to step away. The I’m a lot more about those. Like. First for one person, one player, a adventure games, like I’m super excited for. The, the up to legend is all the breadth of wild. Cause my wife introduced me to Zelda because we didn’t grow up with Nintendo systems very much so we didn’t get to play those.

But then wife got us square. I guess we got a breadth of while for Christmas two or three years ago, I think. And. Man that that game is a blast. Like I I’ve been converted. I’ve been converted to Zelda games. Cause that was fantastic. So sign me up for the sequel.

Melissa: Nice. Have you have you ever played any like fable or final fantasy?

Dawson: That’s that’s one conversation that can never get into because I never had those games and like all my friends. Oh, my friends talk about final fantasy and they’re just like, yeah, do that one [00:27:00] iconic moment. I’m just like, I don’t know this. I’m sorry.

Melissa: I can’t join it.

Dawson: It’s every nerd plays those. It feels like, and I’m just sitting there.

Like, I feel like I should have my nerd card revoked now.

Melissa: Well, I mean, they were great for. At least, you know, the time when they first came out were really big, you know, because the whole, the turn-based system, you know, which is so different now. And I think that like, once you have played the newer games, it’s hard to go back and play final fantasy and games like that because it gets kind of boring, like the whole, you know, waiting for your turn to like, do a magical spell or something like that.

So I like it real time.

Dawson: Yeah, I can agree with that. It’s like a lot of app games that happen, like there’s this one app game called it was at star Wars, legends or something where it’s turn-based and like, you can only attack when it’s your turn and I’m just sitting there, like, yeah, I’d rather just walk around and like attack things whenever I want.

And because that’s more, it’s more free, like an open world game. That’s what I prefer. Cause like you can just do whatever you [00:28:00] won. That’s why I love a legend of Zelda breath of the wild so much just because. It’s so OpenWorld and you literally dress how you want use whatever weapons you want. And literally just make your own story in your head if you really want to, because you don’t have to do the actual story mode.

I mean, yeah, sure. It’s fun to do that story. See where that leads, but you can literally like climb a mountain and think like, Oh, my character is like some snow warrior in the mountains and he’s sliding down on a shield. Like just think of whatever the heck you want. Which I think is so amazing with modern day gaming is that you can do that all the time.

And so many of these games because the world is so massive.

Melissa: Yeah, absolutely. And I came, just gotten really good reviews. I haven’t played it, but yeah, I’ve been reading the reviews and it’s like, people are obsessed with it.

Dawson: Oh my gosh. Like even when you finish the story, it’s still very playable. Just cause you can just go around the world and I’m still finding new things.

I’ve been playing it for like. Two years now, I’m still finding new things on the map and just find a new objects to get. And at one kind of game, though, they’re having a hard time [00:29:00] getting into, and I’m kind of curious to hear what you think about this is. Like these story games that are basically movies.

Like, for example, the last of us, like I watched a play along the last of us, which it was great. It was like watching a zombie movie basically, but they’re very linear and you have to go a certain direction in a certain place. And it’s essentially a movie where you press a couple of buttons and I’m not necessarily fond of that.

I’d rather be all in one direction or all in on the other, if it’s going to be a movie. Lisa has an animated movie, but it’s gonna be a game. Maybe give me a little bit more freedom. That’s just me anyway.

Melissa: Totally agree with that. I haven’t played that game, but I, I felt that way about red dead redemption two, because red dead redemption two.

I loved the first one. And

Dawson: so actually the game of the year edition does

Melissa: offer, Oh my God. Yes. It was amazing. And so I got the second one and maybe I just haven’t played far enough along yet, but [00:30:00] so far, you know, the first hour of the game was just all cinematics where you could like use that to push a couple buttons here and there, you know, get on the horse ride for a little bit, chase the bandit.

And then it was like back to, you know, 15 to 20 minutes. Movie stuff. And it’s like, well, this would be a really cool movie if I wanted to watch it, but I want to play a game,

Dawson: right?

Melissa: Yeah. I

Dawson: know my little brother has played in late. Apparently he says, once you get through the first little bit, like it comes very much more open.

Cause like I’ve, I’ve watched a lot of videos about it and watch my brother play it where like, you can, you can meet a big foot. You can see like alien, spaceships, like so much random stuff that you can do and see in this open world, like you can even eat a dead robot. It’s just like, what the heck, but, but I’d probably just have to get through that first little bit.

In order to get to that more open world, at least that’s I haven’t played it either because I haven’t played it myself, but apparently that’s, that’s how it is. At least how I’ve heard.

[00:31:00] Melissa: I’ll keep playing it, then just see if it gets any better. Yeah. But also getting back to what you were saying about the whole movie aspect of a video game.

Have you, have you played any of those ones where they’re actually. Hmm. They’re actually movies like films. They have them on, on Xbox. I don’t know if they’re, I’m, I’m guessing around the PlayStation network to where it’s actually actors and you like choose their dialogue options. And so it’s like these live action ones.

It’s I try to play one. It was super bizarre.

Dawson: Yeah. I’ve heard about those, but like kind of like what you said, it just sounded so weird to me. Like, I don’t know. I just don’t. I just don’t like the idea of like, cause when you have a movie there’s a certain timing to dialogue that makes the scene what it is.

So if you’re like hesitate for even a couple seconds and like a choose the dialogue thing, it feel, it feels disjointed. Yeah, it takes you out of the experience because it’s no longer off conversation [00:32:00] rather about what you chose and how fast you chose it. And I’m not necessarily down for that. Like again, you got, in my opinion, gotta be full out, full in on one thing or another, like being in between like, For example, when you talk about like more cinematic video games, like red dead two were last of us.

There’s some parts where all of a sudden pressing a button just comes as a surprise. Like, Oh crap, I gotta do something now just watching and then you die and then you have to go back and start over again. And that’s, that’s, what’s frustrating me. Cause like they lull you into a sense of just watching and they’re like surprise button.

Like, no, no, just let me know. And then I’ll play.

Melissa: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Well, I think that’s why like games like fallout and sky rooms so much because there’s really no cinematic at all. You’re just literally on your own and it makes it more real, I guess you can kind of put yourself in the game more.

Dawson: Yeah.

Yeah, I totally agree. Like you just make it however you want it to be like, especially like Skyrim and then fall out. Just be wherever the heck you want to be in the story. Like [00:33:00] just dress however you want, like battle. However you want. Like again Skyrim, you can either be with magic. You can be a brute warrior.

It could be an armature, like do whatever the heck you want, whatever fits your personality. And it’s just more fun that way. Yeah,

Melissa: totally. A hundred, a hundred percent agree. So you’re also, you’re an artist, correct?

Dawson: I try to be

Melissa: awesome. So what kind of like, what are you, what lane are you in with with art?

And are you, are you trying to get into comics or, you know, what, what’s your goal with that?

Dawson: I do. And now it is due primarily digital illustration. I’m using a program called procreate which is what a lot of different digital artists, poster designers even professors I have in my university that I’m about to graduate from.

He worked in matte painting and background design for a long time in Hollywood and procreate program that he’s used for a long time. And so I’ve. Guns. We’ll learn that program a lot. And I’m doing, doing comics, my own comics [00:34:00] that my family and I write and I illustrate, and actually these three frames complex behind me are ones that I’ve illustrated.

And so we’re working away in that. We’re actually working on a fourth one right now, which is a follow-up to this one. But it definitely a very con hook S a lot of like inking hash marks very graphic style. Like in fact, I could probably pull up something to kind of show you an example of what I’ve been working on.

I’ll probably pull up my latest I try to imitate Jim Lee in some like fan art sometimes not just because Jim is the master and if I can even get analysis as good as he is, then I’ve done my job. But this is, this is an example of what I like try to do nowadays. Oh, that did not go well, those touch screens.

Melissa: There you go.

Dawson: So that’s an example of something that Oh

Melissa: yeah, that’s awesome. Wow. That’s really clear. And yeah. That’s well done.

Dawson: Okay. Well thank you. I definitely try, but now I’ve been doing more of that [00:35:00] lately. And I actually have, in fact, I could probably show this real quick. This is a page from the comic book that I’m working on right now.

And so this is more of like my normal style when I’m not trying to imitate Jim Lee.

Melissa: Wow.

Dawson: That’s before all the dialogue boxes and everything. And so that’s, that’s Savage volume, two that’s coming out probably, I guess, whenever I get done with it, but hopefully within a matter of three months.

Melissa: So that’s really good that it’s put together.

Yeah. So where can people buy our comics or do you have a Kickstarter or are you on an Amazon self publishing?

Dawson: Amazon self publishing. Yeah, we have a three months. If they go with my channel nerdy in many ways, the links to those books are all on the descriptions of my streams and videos. You, you can even search up Dawson Friedrich on Amazon and they’ll probably come up.

I mean, hopefully because my name’s attached to it. But yeah, that’s, that’s like a finals on Amazon. We’re trying to maybe venture out, maybe find some other ways to do it as well. Like for example, there’s [00:36:00] this place called galaxy con in Richmond, Virginia. That’s. Hopefully happening in March, depending on everything that happens.

But we’re hoping to have a booth there and go to more conventions like that, where you just bring a bunch of copies of our comics and showing people because the more exposure you can get the better.

Melissa: Cause we just,

Dawson: we just on Amazon and you like put a couple posts that are now and the like, Hey, buy my comic.

There’s like couple that get bought. So we’re trying to venture on that

Melissa: way. Yeah, no, it is hard. When you’re just using social media to promote definitely. I have to get out to the cons, you know, if we can have, of course. So how has, like, you know, the pandemic affected you as far as like your creativity and your career?

Dawson: It’s actually, as far as my creativity is concerned, it actually sounds kind of morbid, but texts kind of helped me. Because actually when this whole COVID lockdown stuff started, I got a, a job like designing visuals for a game app called 24. So I was using digital [00:37:00] painting all the time. And I was working about 25 hours a week, just drawing and honing in my craft, which was very helpful for me.

Just getting more practice cause like anything else, the more practice you get, the better you get at it. And also helps of course that you’d love to do it, which I do. And so it helped me a lot in of course, lockdown also definitely helps YouTube to a certain extent because I mean, when people are in lockdown, they look for forms of entertainment and when they exhaust all their Netflix movie lists, They go to YouTube.

Right. And so hopefully if they’re like nerdy stuff, they have it upon my channel. And so in a way it’s helped find me at the same time. Like, you know, COVID still sucks, but you know, that’s how it is.

Melissa: You’re making it. Yeah. Are you on other social media platforms at all? Besides YouTube and Facebook?

Dawson: Yeah.

I’ve, I mean, I’m on Twitter. That’s where I do a lot of my promotion, my stuff. And I’m also in Bureau because they just had the update Bureau 2.0. And of course I gotta be on there to see what Zach posts

Melissa: you don’t stay on top of that. Of course.

Dawson: Yeah. Just got to keep up with the news. [00:38:00] I want Instagram to Instagram, not as active, but like I try to be, but Twitter is definitely the most hopping place for me.

And I am w three, two is where I’m at on Twitter.

Melissa: Okay, cool. Yeah. I just joined Tech-Talk for the first time and I am so confused.

Dawson: I, I had that for a couple of months. Cause when I was going on, my channel, people were telling me like, yeah, I got to talk to promote your channel. I just didn’t know what to do.

Cause I’m not, I’m not the kind of personality, the leg. Puts out skits on Tik TOK. Like I’ll talk about nerdy stuff as long, as much as the day is long. Right. As far as like doing Tik TOK dances, I’m sorry. That’s just not me. I’m too long and lanky and white to do that. So

Melissa: yeah, it’s fun, you know? My sister’s on it and a bunch of my friends and I thought I would go on it just like you to promote, you know, my brand and everything.

But yeah, I’m trying to figure it out. It’s, you know, it’s confusing. It’s a new technology.

Dawson: I mean, there there’s some uses out there that do a really good job. Like I, I think Oh gosh, there’s one guy [00:39:00] who, my friend  from the point extra lounge, his interview today he does the parody songs of like stupid situations and even talks about like old pop culture references.

Like he made a song about the. The E T sequel book that was written that barely anybody knows about AI. I have

Melissa: no idea about that.

Dawson: Yeah. It’s so weird. Like it’s, it’s not even close to what the movie is, but anyway, like there’s some fun people like that that are, they’re fun to see, but they’re kind of far and few between at least my own perspective.

So like I am plus whatever, some of my family noticed that I talk to, like, you have a tick talk, I’m just doing it for my brand. And so, yeah. It’s interesting.

Melissa: Do you ever watch Trey Kennedy?

Dawson: Trey. Oh, man, that sounds familiar. I feel like I shouldn’t own that.

Melissa: He’s so funny. I think he started on YouTube actually.

And just, you know, blew up and I think he’s got like billions of followers now, but he does all of these. Sketches. The one I [00:40:00] saw that like I, when I found out about it was like girls, he imitates like girls in the fall, like with our pumpkin spice jazz.

Dawson: Yes. He Oh gosh. Yes. I know him. He’s great. I, I subscribe to on YouTube.

That’s why I know him from and they ended the skit where he has all people of this family represent a social media platform and the YouTube when it comes to like, Oh my gosh, dude, what’s up guys? And then say like family road, trip, board forever. Like it’s so hilarious. Love that guy.

Melissa: Yeah. He’s so funny.

He’s like, I saw him and I was like, Oh my God, this guy’s genius. And he plays him, like he plays all the parts, like in. The skit, you know, like he’ll like splice it all together. And the funny thing is when he starts going out in public, like, he’ll go into an Ikea store or like a home Depot or whatever.

And like, without permission, like he’s just filming his thing there. And like normal, random people are walking by staring at him, like, what are you doing? [00:41:00] And it’s so funny.

Dawson: He’s so good. Like, he’s one of those guys. Like he, he makes one of literally everything. It’s fantastic. Like some of my favorite ones are when you like.

Pretends to be a middle schooler, like middle school during COVID he like has the fake braces on and it’s just like, Oh my gosh, it’s so, so dead on.

Melissa: No, he’s great. When he does the Karens, you know, he does like the caring part one part two, or like or the, the shoppers, like the hipster that shops, you know, at target as opposed to wait, but, you know, person that goes to Walmart and.

Dawson: No one is safe with Trey Kennedy and it’s great.

Melissa: I love that. Yeah, I know it’s off by the hook. So.

Dawson: So how do you family guy?

Melissa: Oh my God. Yeah. I know that guy is just, I mean, he keeps getting bigger and bigger. Like I can’t wait for him to he’ll have his own show at some point, like a television show. Yeah.

Dawson: Easily.

Melissa: Yeah. So do you have any advice that you’d love to give anyone? You know, cause they’re, you [00:42:00] know, while into your YouTube career, I know you’re going to continue to grow it. For, for people that like, you know, want to start their own YouTube channel, like what advice would you give.

Dawson: Oh, that’s, that’s a great question.

I’d say if someone’s looking at looking out there to start their own YouTube channel and just focus on things that you love. And don’t just simply try to do what’s trending because like doing what’s trending, you know, helps you bill for sure. But if you do something that you love in the process, then it becomes fun.

It becomes a project rather than something that stresses you out. Right. Like. For me, the reason I do this whole nerdy stuff is not, not because like the Snyder has trending or because one, one 84 is trending or Batman 20, 22, I guess it is now is trending. But because I love this stuff and it’s very, very fun.

And I’d say the classic advice, just be yourself when it comes to your content creation. Because when you try to put on a facade, like, you know, a lot of people will tend to do because you know, just what they need to do. It it’s tiring. It’s [00:43:00] exhausting. Cause I know I, I try to do that at first. Just kind of like.

Put on a face because that’s what everybody does and it’s just tiring, exhausting. I just didn’t like doing it. So when you become candid with people and you become genuine and just show them who you are that people relate to, that people connect to that because of this. See the, the genuineness artists, the.

How are you caught? Yeah, the genuine is, I guess I’ll say it’s not proper, but of, of what you’re doing. They see that you love what you’re talking about. They see you’re passionate about it and they see your true self and that is much more trapped to people. And so we’re just going through the motions and just really doing it because it’s Papa thing to talk about.

Right. And so that’s my big thing is just do or talk about what you love or do you love for content creation if that’s what you want to do and be here.

Melissa: Yeah. That’s great advice. Really good advice. Yeah. Be authentic. And, and then, yeah. That’s the

Dawson: word? Authentic. Yeah. Yeah. A genuineness just did not sit right with me.

So authentic.

[00:44:00] Melissa: Genuine was good too, about like sincere, genuine there’s lots of there’s lots of adjectives.

Dawson: Great.

Melissa: Well, now, before we go, tell me again the name of your comic book so that people can look it up on, on Amazon.

Dawson: So three different conflicts that we have. We have Savage the, Oh gosh, a bunch of the blue Raven.

I forgot the ton of my own comic Savage legend of blue Raven written by a DJ. We drink my father. And illustrated by yours truly. Then you have a tale of three illustrated by me and written by my older brother, Asher, we drink. And then you have the vine Lord right here written by my brother, Brigham weeds, Rick illustrated by yours.

Truly those three are available on Amazon. Again, if you go to my channel nerdy in many ways underneath each video in each stream, you can see the link to all three of those books on Amazon and that’s, we can find those.

Melissa: That’s awesome. And I love that it’s a family affair. That’s really cool, but you guys are doing that together.

Dawson: And it’s, it’s so interesting. Cause like I I’m a very visually creative person, but at the same time when it comes to story creation, I have a hard time coming up with original things. [00:45:00] So the fact that I have three writers around me, my family to like fuel my visual creativity and I can just present them.

Like, this is what you’re writing in visual forum is like you said, it, it kind of completes it. And it’s just very much a joint effort. It’s. It’s just fun. It’s it’s perfect. It’s like almost like we’re family or something.

Melissa: Right. That’s cool. And then when you guys get to go promote it, you had to do that together too.

So it’s like an excuse in cation and, you know, kill two birds down, go do business and then go hang out and have family time as well.

Dawson: Exactly. Now it’s again, killing three birds, three stones.

Melissa: Yeah, I know that it’s very rare to, because you know, most, most families like, you know, most writers, like they’re like only writer in their family or whatever.

So it is nice to have that common commonality and I bet it makes a dinner conversations. Interesting too.

Dawson: Oh, yeah, very much so. Especially with just like the other things my other family members are doing. Like my older brother just came out with a book called no prey, no pay which has all been on [00:46:00] Amazon.

So like, there’s always been stories happening that either just novels or like comic books, like I even have one of my brothers just regular novels right here that you wrote three years ago. So like he has these, then we have like chronic books. So there’s a lot of creativity going on, which I’m always down for.

Cause you know, that’s, that’s just who I am.

Melissa: Yeah, no, me too. Yeah. I’m a writer as well. So I’m always down to find new books and you know, new comic books and new novels. So I’ll definitely have to you know, look you up and get all of your, your family stuff. I think I would

Dawson: definitely pick it.

Definitely feel free to pick it apart and let us know where we messed up.

Melissa: Oh, never. No, I will. I mean, no, I don’t like to review. I mean, honestly, like I like to read I like to interview and talk to people, but I’m, I’m not, I do review occasionally, you know, when, when people ask, but I don’t know. I just don’t have the heart to review.

I guess

Dawson: it’s hard. It’s hard to keep up. This is because a lot of times there’s so much content being put out there. Like there’s so [00:47:00] many different movies that come out and just like, there’s some you just miss for, for years and you don’t see them. Like I finally, a couple months ago finally saw.

Fantastic four from 2015. Oh, wow. And did a review of that. And I was like, okay, that was a couple of years. I didn’t do that. Which I mean, a little bit of. I’m okay with having missed it. Yeah. After watching it, but yeah, like there’s things that come and go, and then before, you know, it’s too late and a week has gone by and the hype for that movie or that book has died down or like, well, no point making the video now because, well, it’s not going to get any interaction.

Melissa: So

Dawson: it’s tough thing to keep up with. So you just got to definitely got to choose your battles when it comes to reviews.

Melissa: Yeah, well, yeah, you’re an interesting business because you’re, you’re dealing with algorithms and you’re dealing with, you know, all kinds of trending things that are trending and not trending.

And so you, that must be kind of exhausting to always be on like the up and up on what to, to film and what not to Oh yeah.

Dawson: Oh yeah. I mean, [00:48:00] freaking algorithms. I swear the death of me. I mean, I understand the reasoning for it at the same time. I’m just like, Like there’s some videos like I’ll make and they get a bunch of views and there’s somebody else I think are much better than those videos.

And those don’t get a lot of views and I’m just like, come on, YouTube, help me out here. Throw me a fricking bowl.

Melissa: I feel your pain. I feel your pain. What’s your Twitter handle so I can make sure we follow you.

Dawson: Yeah, it’s a

that’s what Twitter handle. And you’ll find this same logo as the. The what’s it called the profile picture, so,

Melissa: yeah. Awesome. Great. Well, thank you so much for coming on tonight and chatting with me. This has been really fun. I can’t wait to watch your show. I’m gonna subscribe to you. I’m on YouTube as well.

So I will definitely subscribe and yeah, everybody listening, you got to get on there and find Dawson on a. Facebook you’re on Facebook or on Twitter. But nerdy in many ways, that’s the YouTube channel and that’s where you’ll find the link to all of his books that are [00:49:00] available on Amazon. Yeah.

Thank you so much. We’d love to have you back on in the future too.

Dawson: Oh, absolutely. This has been great. I really appreciate this conversation out. I would be more than happy to be back on here. Again. This has been fun.

Melissa: Awesome. Thanks. Thank you so much.