After 21 years, Warner Bros. is shutting down Rooster Teeth, the production company behind Red vs. Blue and RWBY, amongst different titles. The method is anticipated to take a number of months, in accordance with a discover from Rooster Teeth common supervisor Jordan Levin, published Wednesday on the Rooster Teeth website. The Roost Podcast Community, which boasts podcasts like Kinda Humorous and RT Podcast, will stick with Warner Bros. because the company appears to promote the community.
Warner Bros. will nonetheless launch a accomplished, unspecified Rooster Teeth-produced film and different in-the-works tasks, and is “exploring options” for Rooster Teeth’s content material, according to Deadline. Variety reported Wednesday that round 150 full-time staff shall be laid off, with “dozens of contractors and content creators” all of a sudden impacted, too.
Levin attributed the closure to “challenges facing digital media resulting from fundamental shifts in consumer behavior and monetization across platforms, advertising, and patronage.”
The company was based in 2003, and with it got here Red vs. Blue, a machinima-styled present that used Halo to inform a narrative about two teams of remoted, opposing troopers dropped right into a barren canyon. The present rapidly grew to become a success; it took a sport individuals beloved — the unique Halo — and created a parody of each wartime narratives and navy video video games. Most significantly, it was simply humorous — not less than, it was to me as an adolescent. Twenty-one years later, I nonetheless typically mumble a line from the primary episode to myself: You ever wonder why we’re here? Red vs. Blue’s last season is slated for this yr.
“Though not intentional, It’s only appropriate that our last season of ‘Red vs. Blue’ coincides with us navigating this closure together,” Levin wrote. “Our legacy is not just a collection of content but a history of pixels burned into our screens, minds, and hearts. Rooster Teeth has made an indelible mark on the media industry, and we should be so proud of the countless ways we pioneered a business connecting creators and content with a dedicated community.”
Rooster Teeth ultimately branched out from there, with exhibits like Achievement Unlocked and Let’s Play. It’s subsequent main hit, an anime-style internet collection known as RWBY, debuted in 2013. The subsequent yr, Fullscreen acquired Rooster Teeth earlier than the production company debuted its first film, Lazer Team. That acquisition kicked off a string of mergers and restructurings that led to Rooster Teeth’s consolidation below AT&T. AT&T tried to promote Rooster Teeth in 2021, saying its income dropped by $20 million in 2019. Rooster Teeth didn’t get offered, so it was included within the AT&T deal that merged WarnerMedia with Discovery to create Warner Bros. Discovery.
Rooster Teeth, whereas nonetheless common, struggled to take care of the janky attraction and simple humor of its earliest days. The company additionally confronted a number of severe controversies, together with RWBY actor Vic Mignogna’s removing from the present after allegations of sexual harassment, as properly as several instances of alleged workplace misconduct.
On social media, Rooster Teeth followers seemed to assist the company’s laid-off employees, and known as the approaching shutdown “an end of an era.” Although Rooster Teeth has modified a ton through the years — and never at all times for the higher — lots of people look again fondly on the works it created.
