The Story of The Stolen Series

In 2015, I started watching a YouTuber called McJuggerNuggets. You've probably heard of (and forgotten) about him. He is most well-known for his YouTube series titled The Psycho Series.

The Psycho Series was an original series by McJuggerNuggets about a gamer dealing with his "old world" father. The series was beyond successful and I personally loved it a lot. It ended in June of 2016 and went on for years! The brilliant aspect of the Psycho Series was that it wasn't real but was portrayed as real. Every episode was from a first-person view and was made out to be a normal vlog. And McJuggerNuggets didn't admit that it was staged until the finale! The entire time, McJuggerNuggets' fanbase believed that the events of this series were actually real! But everything was staged the entire time. And I was genuinely amazed by it. It wasn't real but it was made out to be. And I wondered if I could make something similar.

Sometime in early 2017, I started to brainstorm ideas for an original series that could be believable to be real. The major difference between myself and a very famous YouTuber was that I had pretty much nothing to work with. I could not afford to buy anything new for videos and I didn't have much to use. So, my story had to be very simplistic.

My idea for my series ended up being a story of how my phone was stolen. Yeah, that's it. Basically, the first episode would be me at a schoolyard, and I'd get robbed of my phone. Then I would have to try to figure out who did it while dealing with the anxiety afterwards. I would obviously play the main character and I had my cousin to play the robber.

I ended up making it! The Stolen Series was made! The series was about eight parts and it starred myself, my cousin and 4 friends if you include the finale and a phone call from one episode. The first episode went really well, there were a few decent parts and the finale was incredible. At this point, I wasn't a great actor nor was my cousin. But this was a really fun experience. It was actually good practise because this wouldn't be the last time that I act, direct, write, edit, etc.

But remember, the initial reasoning I had to create this series, was to convince people it was real. And did it work? Abso-fucking-lutely.

After I released the first episode of The Stolen Series, I went to school to see a few deeply concerned friends. 2 or 3 of my friends from school literally thought that I had my phone stolen. And I cannot stress how much I laughed about that. Also, just a few days after the episode went live, I went to see some family-friends. My mother and I approached the door and knocked. As soon as the door opened, I heard, "DID YOU LOSE A PHONE?!"

The Stolen Series actually did a lot for me. It was really my first major project and it led to many more. I met multiple fans through the engagement of the series. My channel, confidence and motivation all grew from this project. The brand that covers every aspect of what I do is called STOLEN Studios. Where do you think that name came from?