Happy 2023 and Goodbye 2022!

Hello, friends of the internet. It’s been a while since I’ve sat down and written a post like this, but it’s time to reflect on my successes from the previous year and what I hope to see in the current year. As of the publication date, it’s been two years and two days, to be precise. You can read the article from 2021 here.

Last year, I did a lot. I started the year with a refresh of my social media graphics, held my first-ever Reel Awards ceremony, announced “Phase 3” initiatives such as audio commentaries and Behind the Curtain, revised Patreon tiers and goals as I celebrated the second year of Austin B Media (some of which I had to walk back), enabled annual Patreon subscriptions, scaled back my Twitter presence, and launched merch!

This is only a broad-strokes look at my 2022, though, as that only covers the announcements I made during the year. Throughout 2022, I covered a litany of awards like DiscussingFilm’s Critic Awards, the Critics Association of Central Florida, the 79th Golden Globes, the National Society of Film Critics Awards, the Music City Film Critics Association, the BAFTAs, the Online Film & Television Film Awards of which I am a voting member, the 94th Oscars, the 2022 Film Independent Spirit Awards of which I am a voting member, among many others.

This year, I’m happy to report I’ll be covering the aforementioned critics’ groups and a few new ones. For example, since I am now a voting member of The International Film Society Critics, I’ll be covering that much in the same way I cover the Spirit Awards and OFTA Film Awards.

On the note of critics groups, I aim this year to join yet another group like the Online Film Critics Society, the Critics Choice Association, the DiscussingFilm Critics Association, the Hollywood Critics Association, or even Rotten Tomatoes.

Besides awards coverage, I was also able to cover video games a little more than usual with articles about Grand Theft Auto V and Cyberpunk 2077’s current generation versions getting a release date, the announcement of an “all-new PlayStation Plus,” E3 2022 being canceled, Halo Infinite’s questionable winter update, the reveal of Need for Speed Unbound, among a few others. In 2023, I hope to include more reviews and news articles, but we’ll have to see how that shakes out.

Speaking of news articles, I also covered quite a few trailers. Whether it was the Super Bowl trailer for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Hulu limited series The Girl from Plainville, Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One, either trailer for Thor: Love and Thunder, and a few others I can’t recall.

I hope to make coverage of trailers a tenet of the site this year, especially when big-name films like Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, and John Wick 4 get new trailers.

Television shows became a large part of my coverage in 2022. Whether it was my reviews of the first season of Halo: The Series, Moon Knight, Candy, the third season of The Boys, the first two episodes of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, the third season of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series alongside my news coverage of TV.

In the coming months, my TV coverage will consist of season reviews and major awards shows like the Emmys. Some of the shows I’m looking to cover are the second season of Star Wars: The Bad Batch, Copenhagen Cowboy, How I Caught My Killer, That 90’s Show, The 1619 Project, Boys in Blue, Poker Face, Shrinking, to name a few.

Alongside TV, movies were a ton of my coverage in 2022. Whether it was festival coverage such as Long Line of Ladies out of SXSW, interviews such as my talk with the editor of The Integrity of Joseph Chambers, or reviews like Good Luck to You, Leo Grande out of Tribeca 2022, comedies such as The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent or The Valet, dramas such as Emily the Criminal or The Banshees of Inisherin, release date announcements for Blu-rays like Thor: Love and Thunder. Due to the massive growth I’ve enjoyed this year, I also attended press screenings for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Avatar: The Way of Water, and Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.

One of the areas of growth was featuring my first two contributors to the site: Beta-Critic (who also reviewed the first season of Abbott Elementary), with his review of the hit Indian action movie RRR, and Christian Salazar’s review of the period war biopic Devotion. I can’t tease what they’re working on, but I look forward to seeing what reviews they publish this year.

When I look ahead, I’m hoping to diversify what kinds of movies I cover and how often. One of my big goals with Austin B Media that separates it from other entertainment websites is that I like to cover things that other websites don’t have time to cover in detail. I’m weary of covering big-budget releases that are already receiving plenty of coverage and require a lot of time to review in a manner that I feel encompasses the entirety of the film. The considerable time commitment leads me to say no to many things I would love to do but can’t do.

So, this year, I will begin to cover more independent films like Wildcat, Mars One, Alcarràs, She Said, The Drop, and so on. Also, new this year will be reviews of 2023 Film Independent Spirit Award nominees.

This approach will extend to festivals like Slamdance, True/False, Panic Fest, SFFilm, Hot Docs, and others I haven’t decided on yet. I want to focus on indie films that aren’t getting as much media attention as others, and I hope that a distributor reads one of my reviews from these upcoming festivals and chooses to pick it up.

Something I’ll be experimenting with is trying to cover the music I listen to every week. Since I know nothing about music, these won’t be reviews, but what music I loved, liked, and what wasn’t for me.

Outside of content, according to my Patreon data, I did reasonably well for myself. Through the nine new Patrons I received throughout 2022, I was able to buy tons of writing resources, including a yearly subscription to Grammarly, almost every video streaming subscription service, upgrade my Squarespace plan to include features to sell stuff online, and other things needed to keep the business thriving.

One of the ways I plan to keep the business thriving is by modifying the Patreon benefits. Unfortunately, I cannot continue providing a monthly hangout, a Patron-only newsletter, and Behind the Curtain, so starting on February 1st, these benefits will be removed from my Patreon page. These benefits might return in the future, but for now, they’re being retired.

What I’ll add in their stead will be all the movie & TV commentaries I’ve released thus far, as well as the first edition of List of Shame, which will be covering The Wolf of Wall Street. It’s not reasonable for me to keep offering a product to customers who aren’t purchasing them, so it makes more sense to me to offer it as a Patron exclusive. I haven’t figured out what tier will get the commentaries, but the List of Shame articles will be for all Patrons.

While this may seem like less is being offered, let me assure you that this isn’t the full scope of benefits I plan to offer in 2023. I don’t have concrete details on new benefits, as I’m still brainstorming those, but I can reveal that weekly schedules will return on Monday, January 9th. Additionally, I’ll be opening up the “Request a Review” benefit to all Patrons and including music, video games, and TV shows in the poll.

I am also changing the tier system to make things more affordable for everyone. The Kim Pine and Other Scott tiers, valued at $200/month and $250/month, respectively, are being retired for the time being. These tiers will be back in the future at more affordable prices. Right now, I’m toying with the idea of this structure of pricing:

1. Matthew Patel - $1/month

2. Lucas Lee - $3/month

3. Todd Ingram - $5/month

4. Roxie Richter - $10/month

5. The Katayanagi Twins - $20/month

6. Gideon “G-Man” Graves - $50/month

7. Scott Pilgrim - $100/month

The above pricing isn’t final, but I think it might be more flexible than how I have it priced currently.

I hope you’ll consider becoming a Patron if you aren’t already. Even if you can give me $1/month, every Patreon subscription helps me pay for renting movies I didn’t get in advance, buying new equipment, website costs, and more! As a bonus, I’ll send you a personal thank you video if you join during the next month.

Until next time!

Thanks to Thomas Stoneham-Judge from Movies For Reel, Shane Conto, Joseph Davis, David Walters, Ambula Bula, Matthew Simpson, Thom Blackburn, and Beatrice AKA Shakesqueer, for supporting Austin B Media on Patreon!