If you’re even a passing fan of anything Joss Whedon has done (Buffy, Firefly, the upcoming Dollhouse series, etc.), you’ve probably already heard of his latest project.
It’s a little ditty called Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. And it looks like it’s going to be a tremendous amount of fun.
Of course, it’s a musical. Even better, though, it’s a musical with Nathan Fillion and Neil Patrick Harris as hero and wannabe villain (respectively). The whole thing was mostly put together on favors and friendship, coming together during the writers’ strike.
Matt Roush, over at TVGuide.com, has an exclusive review of this sure-to-be cult phenomena. Between that and the teaser that’s currently up on the main site, I know I’ll be eagerly watching the online-released version on July 15, 17 and 19. I’ll be even more eagerly awaiting it’s release on DVD at some undisclosed future date.
Again, this is one of those potentially ground breaking experiments in the realm of Web and Television entertainment. It’s not starting out as a full series, like Quarterlife, there’s not a whole lot of pressure to be picked up by a network or an ongoing cost. Dr. Horrible is, for now, a one-shot deal to see if the model works. We can only guess that, with Whedon’s built-in fan base, there will be at least some moderate amount of success when looking at site hits and video views. The real question is: Will he make enough to be able to pay the people who volunteered to help make the thing in the first place.
If that economic hurdle can be overcome, if a lean production schedule (six days of shooting) and talented team can turn in a professional level entertainment and get it out to people, we may finally see one of the shifts advocates of Web-based shows have been hoping for for a long time. (Anyone who’s ever seen or participated in a 48 Hour Film Challenge knows that high quality can be achieved in a time crunch and on a low budget–but that doesn’t always scale from those 7 minute films to 40+ minutes of show.)
The world will know for sure in just about two weeks when Dr. Horrible tries to take over the world–one computer at a time.
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