(motorcycle engine revving)
(gentle music)
- Hey.
Can I sit here?
- No.
Sorry.
(clothes rack squeaks)
(gentle music)
(upbeat music)
- [Announcer] Ladies and gentlemen,
formless blobs,
and content-detecting algorithms,
please welcome your host, Daniel Howell.
(audience cheering)
- Hello, internet.
I'm Dan, and welcome to the pilot of my new show,
"Dystopia Daily with Daniel Howell",
where the show may not be daily,
but every day on this planet
is an endless, goddamn nightmare.
(upbeat music)
(upbeat '80s music)
That's right, I am back.
And this time, for the first time in my life,
I am finally gonna do it.
Not it, have sex, I am gonna do YouTube properly.
I am finally just gonna give the people and the algorithm
what they ask for collaboration,
reaction, interaction, self-flagellation.
I am here to create some fucking content,
and I am doing it my way.
Welcome to the world of "Dystopia Daily".
(intense music)
Not filming in my bedroom,
crossing some weird, personal boundary,
in this space that perfectly represents my spirit,
just, no don't film too close to the materials.
I can be free to express myself and create the content
I've always dreamed of in the committed confines
of a limited series with the defined structure.
So get ready,
which I guess you are
'cause you have already started watching
and we've started.
Okay.
Give it up for the house band, everyone.
(audience cheering)
(upbeat music)
(knuckles cracking)
(discordant piano tones resonating)
(audience cheers)
(Daniel gasping)
On with tonight's show!
I would like to open each episode of "Dystopia Daily"
with a monologue about the times that we live in.
Something topical, personal, controversial,
sexual maybe, I dunno, whatever.
There are simply too many things happening out in the world,
and also deep inside me that make me wanna scream,
maybe do a little cry.
And this is the platform for my agenda.
So where do we start?
Well, society is crumbling.
The Earth is dying,
and I'm having a complete existential crisis.
What's new?
Yeah, after over a decade of being one of the most
there people on the internet,
I am completely broken on a personal level
that no one fuckin' asked about.
I dunno what I wanna do with my life
because I don't know what I want.
More attention?
God, please no.
Money?
Yeah, I've been ruined by stupid leftist YouTubers
and Twitter accounts.
And now I'm some bloody, low-key socialist
that can't live without the guilt.
Is it just sex?
Is that what this whole relentless quest
to entertain and build my name is for?
Just an insidious plot to get in some hot celebrity's pants?
Then what?
What's after the nut?
Okay, TMI.
Let's pivot.
(Dan clears throat)
Career.
So previously on this neurotic bitch,
after having my dreams disintegrated
by an non-caring corporate cog in the machine,
and thusly relearning how to be cripplingly depressed
for a while after I literally wrote the book
about looking after your mental health.
Look, I am allowed to knowingly self-destruct,
and not take my own advice.
Guess I just can't also ask for sympathy
if I should know better.
Well, I'm now picking myself up,
and trying to turn my life around again.
I'm a full adult now, supposedly.
I tried not to shave for a bit to see
if it's possible for me to not just look like a very tall
and sad child so heterosexual men
don't just immediately stop watching me after judging me.
And who knows?
Turns out, apparently I've still got another 10 years
before I have the kind of sexy, full coverage,
I'm a man now stubble that members of One Direction
had when they were 20.
Am I still getting taller?
Am I just gonna be what, like 17 foot six?
Dunno what I'm hoping for.
I actually tried an Insta filter
that gives you a beard to try and visualize this.
(startling music) And yeah,
I didn't look rugged.
I look like a stock photo of a serial killer.
What was I talking about?
What I'm doing, right.
The problem with everything I aspire to do with my life
off social media is it has to be on someone else's terms,
and their timeline, which is fine.
But I can't just wait like a moldy turkey dinosaur
cryogenically trapped in the bottom of a bloody drawer
because of you, okay?
Some of you sorry shits have been following me
for a concerning amount of time,
since I was bright-eyed and wearing color.
Come begin to think
about how I've insidiously influenced you
and ruined your productivity over the years.
And some of you have now grown up to be me
where I was back then.
And I'm looking back at my attempt at young adult life
like you do not know what you're in for.
It is gonna be a train wreck.
Sorry not.
Roller coaster that has ups.
Every day, I am tempted to just go live in the woods,
but you keep asking me to come back,
trapping me in this liminal hell
where I can neither fully follow my dreams
or just frolic in the forest and finally be free.
So fine.
I will log into my accounts and I will give you content.
Thank you for your continued support.
You hear about so many YouTubers, musicians,
actors burning out.
And honestly, who bloody cares?
What I wanna know is what happens after that?
Do you just wake up one day in a pile of ash
and decide to rise- (angelic harp music)
From the embers like a phoenix?
If someone makes a Dan is on fire joke,
I swear to God, I'm gonna crawl through this camera
like the girl from "The Ring",
and I'm gonna choke you the fuck out, right?
Except some of you weird fuckers will probably enjoy that.
And I don't know who you are, where you've been,
or what you've been touching.
So I'm just gonna keep my hands to myself.
A more appropriate metaphor is like a shit Jesus
coming outta the cave after dying,
except he doesn't have the super God powers
to roll the boulder,
and it's just quite physically weak and sweating heavily
as he nudges the rock an inch every 12 hours.
The small problem that I have to overcome going forward
is I have developed a total phobia of social media,
which as someone who is reliant on two apps to live
is a bit of a fuckin' problem.
(crow caws) On bird app,
where everyone is angry, but thinks they're very smart
and funny and have important opinions,
I feel like I cannot tweet without it being a refined joke
or some hot take
that I've spent literally hours workshopping.
And when it takes me hours of iteration
to end up posting something like this,
you know I've got a problem.
Honestly, Twitter is just a place to lure
and trap the world's narcissists
that think the rest of humanity needs to hear them
so they can just argue with each other in an echo chamber,
thinking that it's
where all the most important conversations happen.
If you're watching this and you don't tweet, you are normal.
(fog horn bellows)
I'm obviously not.
(camera shutter clicks) On Instagram,
my problem is my lifestyle is voluntarily already isolating
and locked down
'cause I'm a fuckin' nerd.
For real though, what is Instagram for?
I feel like you're either a style icon serving looks,
or someone sharing snippets
into their exciting everyday life
so that their followers just get to know them better.
I don't get dressed or go anywhere.
So I'm not serving looks and I don't do anything.
I sit inside eating pizza and playing "Mario Kart".
So what the am I posting on my Stories?
I debated this once, had a little meltdown,
and posted this.
(person gasps) (horrifying music)
And I really dunno where to go from here.
I might just go full cheeks out for the lads,
just to feel something.
Whenever I post a video there or anywhere else,
people keep asking me to make a fuckin' TikTok,
as it's oh, where they prefer to doom scroll
their content now.
And I think as we've established
in my unethically long, self-indulgent story time
"Why I quit YouTube",
I have a weird relationship with this place.
Firstly, it turns out YouTube didn't delete my channel
after posting that, which is nice.
In fact, it got spotlighted number one worldwide,
which was interesting.
An unusual power move from someone inside YouTube,
more of a power bottom move, really.
YouTube has a sub-kink, apparently.
Hey, YouTube,
do you want me to drain your bank account?
I feel like that would be fair at this point.
At the very least, get on all fours
and you are not allowed to touch until I say so,
or I get on Trending.
Anyway, thanks to the nice people
that work at YouTube, apparently.
I appreciate your kindness,
considering the position of absolute power
that you have over my life.
But as a creator,
I am so desperate to have the respect of my peers
and the snootiest of some subscribers
that do make it clear they are here for a good time,
not a fun time, that I am afraid to upload anything
unless it's a fuckin' feature film.
I did a live gig for charity in London, after Pride,
where in a dank cabaret bar,
I stood in front of a bunch of drunk lesbians heckling me.
- [Drunk Lesbian] Penis!
- P.
(audience laughing)
Through a heartfelt
and probably inappropriately humorous set
about hating rainbows and corporate pride,
and posted it on my side channel, danisnotinteresting.
Which has since made things weird
between myself and Anthony and Wilbur.
Did I make it weird?
Yeah.
That is an hour of unhinged and horny,
high quality content that I recommend.
I will link below and at the end of your viewing pleasure,
but I was afraid to post any of that on this main channel
in case, I don't know,
it somehow wasn't something even bigger and better
than "Basically I'm Gay".
And you all said, "Dan, what the hell are you doing?
Why you like this?"
I have somehow pushed myself into a corner
where I can't create a clip
unless I got some kind of bomb to drop
or trauma to mine for content.
And much like our planet,
I have got no natural resources left.
I am old, uncomfortably warm,
and some weird pale thing just keeps orbiting me.
This is the burnout.
I'm tired.
I'm terrified.
I care way too much about what people think
and what it all means.
Have I just done too much?
Have I seen too much?
Have I lived 1,000 lifetimes of extreme existence online,
and my fragile human psyche
just simply cannot comprehend anymore?
Or have I just let various paranoia mutate unchecked
and trap me in a prison of my own toxic thoughts?
(children cheering)
I am in terminally online rehabilitation,
just trying to learn to shit post again
and find some serotonin somewhere.
So this show here is a immersion therapy.
They say the best way to face your fears is head on.
So I am here and I'm queer and I am just gonna force myself
through the tears.
So brace yourself for dangerously uncensored ranting here.
I have DMed at least 25 people
to get some really special guests on
that we can have some amazing,
insightful conversations with.
Really connect and have a good time.
I'm gonna experiment with the idea
of making the types of videos that normal YouTubers do
to see if I can just get over this.
And I want to interact with you, the viewers
that scare and inspire me so much.
This is it for me, hail Mary.
I've got big plans and high hopes for this show.
So either this goes perfectly first time,
or I will just live on a remote island,
writing erotic fiction under a pseudonym
and self-publish on Amazon.
Which let's be honest, I'd probably be better at.
"So many D's so little time:
A One Direction reunion
self-insert fic by Haniel Dowell".
Tags: POV, group, shame, tentacles,
anthro, fire, humiliation, broken hands.
Watch out, Liam.
Right, yes, now a word from our first sponsor.
(cash register chimes)
(upbeat music)
So I couldn't get a proper sponsor in time.
So today, I am the sponsor.
Hi, #ad.
Do I have to say that if I am the person?
I'm doing a whole world's tour until 2023.
It's a show called "We're All Doomed",
about all the worst things in the world
and how humanity's on the brink of collapse,
but trying to laugh at all so we can cope with the pain.
I'll also probably overshare.
Maybe have an emotional breakdown
and interact with you live in like a comedy way.
Interact. Obviously.
If you are watching this in 2024,
there's a reasonable chance the world
will have already ended 'cause of,
does it really matter?
But I'm sure you can watch the recorded special on Roblox,
or some kind of metaverse trapped in
as an NFT embedded in your nipple.
I don't fuckin' know.
Seriously, I've been working on this show for months.
It came from a deep, urgent place inside me.
It's a show I made to just give me
something to head towards to save my own life.
It's probably the most not self-deprecating,
destructive, possibly offensively funny,
and biblically epic thing I've made so far.
And I can't wait to do it with you in real life.
No, they're not gonna realize it.
Unlike this dystopian digital shit,
nothing makes me feel alive and real and meaningful
like being in a room full of physical people, just laughing,
forgetting the stress and having a good time together.
So if you come see me,
we are gonna party like it's the end of the world
'cause it probably is.
I'm traveling all across the UK, America, Canada, Australia,
New Zealand, Europe places.
You can go to DanielHowell.com to see if I'm in your town
and get tickets now, unless you are in the Netherlands
or Finland and a few of the places
that have sold out already when this recorded.
So I guess I shouldn't have mentioned those specifically.
Just go.
I'm probably outside your fuckin' house in a bus right now.
Get a ticket, whatever.
Thank you.
I just wanna show the world and show you
that even when every part of you is screaming
not to do something,
sometimes, you should just go for it
in a really extra way
because what's the worst that could happen, huh?
No one turns up to your thing after inviting them?
You try something and decide that your instincts
were definitely right and you do hate it,
or that the people in your life are weird
and you don't wanna interact with them.
That will not happen.
Do not go down without a fight.
I am here and I am gonna fight to the death.
If this show inspires you to pick yourself back up
and do that thing for you, hell yeah.
Unless that thing is a bad crime.
In which case, I wanna be clear to law enforcement
that I do not know these fuckin' people.
(bell rings) So press all those buttons
that make the algorithm happy.
Subscribe to see this show succeed,
and I will see you next time,
unless society collapses on "Dystopia Daily"
with me, Daniel Howell.
(upbeat music)
We are going to put something on the table.
- Oh.
- That is a truth we have never dared admit to the internet.
(upbeat music)