- (children) Kids React to retro stores!
This episode: Blockbuster Video!
- (Finebros) So today, there's no laptop. - Oh no.
- (Finebros) Because today, you're reacting to this.
- What's this?
- What is this? This is, like, 1800s.
- "Buster"-- "Blockbusters Video."
- "One-day rental. Blockbuster Video."
- I think I've heard of this once.
But I never knew what it was.
- I thought this was a book.
- It's a old-school movie.
- It's a Blockbuster video.
- I remember these.
- I saw the Blockbuster Video store, and it was closing down.
And now it's a paint store.
- (children) Question time!
- (Finebros) This is a rental from a video store
called Blockbuster Video. Do you know what a video store is?
- No.
-No.
- I don't know.
- It's kinda like Redbox but an actual store.
- I used to get movies there all the time.
- Just a store where you go get videos or movies--
or rent them, I guess-- and then bring them back?
- It's not that popular. Is it even still alive?
- It closed down most of the locations,
'cause now there's stuff like Netflix and Hulu
and all these things where you can just do it online.
- (Finebros) Well, a video store
is where you would go to rent movies.
So I'm gonna walk you through
what it would be like to go to a video store.
First you have to get in your car
and drive all the way to the store.
Then you'd look around for a movie you like
and pay money to rent it and bring it home.
But you only could keep the movie for a certain amount of time.
- It's a back-then Redbox.
- One-day rental.
- Sometimes you don't have time to watch the movie
until the day you can, you have to return it.
- That's crazy. What if you don't finish it?
- (Finebros) Do we have anything like this today?
- We-- you can go to On Demand if you have that.
- Amazon Prime you could rent movies.
- Well, nowadays, there's stuff like Netflix,
which I watch a lot of, and YouTube.
Though that doesn't really have too much to do with movies,
but still.
- (Finebros) Sometimes you'd go to the store
because you wanted a specific movie.
But then someone already rented it and it wasn't there,
so you had to pick something else or just go home with nothing.
- And that's why people make YouTube today.
- That's like the library,
except with film and weird-looking boxes.
- Now, with things like Netflix and stuff
that you can just watch on demand, it's not as bad.
- That's when people were very patient. (chuckles)
And now we are not.
- (Finebros) So once you picked your movie,
you'd go up to the front counter
and present them with your membership card.
- You have to have a membership card?!
- You get a card too? It's so fancy.
- I think I remember it.
- Here you go. Oh, thanks. Bye.
- Video stores used membership cards
to keep a person's information
so that if a video was never returned
or somehow got lost, they would charge the person.
- Ohhh. That makes sense.
So that somebody doesn't just keep it forever
and then just have and sell it.
- (Finebros) Which brings us to late fees.
If you didn't return the movie on time,
you'd get charged more money than you already paid to rent it.
What do you think about that?
- I think-- think it's kind of mean.
- It's inhumane that we need to pay more
just 'cause we are late on a movie.
- This place is old. You can get stuff for way cheaper.
You can download Netflix.
All you need to do is pay for your account.
- I'm all used to you can just go on the internet.
And now you can watch movies.
- What if there's a video store 20 miles away from your house?
Then you just spend more money
and then more money because you can't get it back on time.
- If you don't return the movie on time, they can't do business.
They can't get their movie back,
so they can't give it to someone else.
So I mean, it's fair.
- (Finebros) Remember that this was a pretty normal thing
not too long ago.
In the past, there really wasn't a way to watch movies
except in theaters or on TV when it was randomly on.
So you'd go to video stores to watch movies,
because there was almost no online video watching.
What do you think about that?
- I am so glad I didn't live back then.
- I wonder how people lived.
- It's weird to think that that was so not too long ago.
- I think that's really sad.
Can't go on a device and watch Netflix, Hulu, On Demand.
- (Finebros) To give you a bit of a better idea
of what Blockbuster was,
we're gonna show you a couple of commercials about the store.
- Commercial.
- I think I've only seen, like, one commercial for them,
and that was right before they went out of business.
- (announcer) Imagine the perfect video store.
It would have a great selection, right? Right!
- Oh, this is so cheesy.
- (announcer) Over 10,000 videos, three-evening rentals.
- That looks so old-timey.
- (announcer) So no rush, no hassle.
- The clothes, the hairstyle,
and how everything looks is so different.
- Look at that! Look at that man!
He's flying down with the blue thing!
- (announcer) Well, the perfect video store...
- (clerk) Welcome to Blockbuster Video!
- "Welcome to Blockbuster Video!"
- (announcer) There's one near you.
- ♪ Blockbuster Video! ♪ - Oh, they have a theme song too.
(snickers)
- ♪ Blockbuster Video! Wow! What a difference ♪
- That was one of the worst commercials ever.
- (crowd chanting) No more late fees!
- No more late fees!
- (crowd) No more late fees!
- Pretty sure that's how most people would be for late fees.
- (crowd) No more... late fees? - Protest for nothing.
- They stopped late fees?
(crowd cheering)
♪ (Roy Orbison, "It's Over") ♪ - Oh. (laughs)
- Ew!
- ♪ It's over ♪
- (announcer) Someday, you'll remember where you were
when you first heard
that there are no more late fees at Blockbuster.
- That's probably a really good thing to do as a business.
- Just because there's no late fees, they're like,
(swooning) "Yay, this is the time of my life!"
- (announcer) The new Blockbuster. - "The new Blockbuster."
(sarcastically) Well, that is a major improvement.
I would like to applaud Blockbuster a few years ago.
Good job.
- (Finebros) So at its peak, Blockbuster had over 9,000 stores
and 60,000 employees. - 60,000?
- Really? That's a lot.
- (Finebros) But have you ever been to one?
- I don't think so.
- No.
- No. But I've seen a lot of these.
- I think my dad has when he was a kid.
- Yeah, like a LONG time ago.
- They don't exist anymore.
- I'm pretty sure they all closed down. I'm not sure. Right?
- (Finebros) Well, in part because of things
like Netflix and Redbox, Blockbuster has ended up
having to close almost every store.
What do you think about that? - Aw, that's sad.
I feel bad for them, and then they're like,
(jubilant) "We're so successful!"
(downhearted) "We're not successful."
- When I heard about the one that they were closing down
near my house, I was like,
"Aw, but loved getting all of my favorite movies there."
And now with Netflix, it's like, "Oh, Blockbuster who?"
- I mean, it's gonna happen,
'cause everything gets better and better.
So I think it's obvious that they were gonna go out of business,
'cause there's always something that's gonna be better
than something else.
- The world is getting older and more advanced.
Things come and go, and it's the circle of life.
- (Finebros) Now that you've learned
a little bit more about video stores,
what would you say to your parents or other people
who had to rent movies this way? - You guys were really patient.
- It's not their fault.
They didn't have all this new stuff that came out now.
- I feel bad, because you had to drive to a video store.
And what happens if there was not a video?
- Life must've been so hard.
I mean, first you had to go out into the car.
And you're tired, but you want to watch a movie.
- You had to go all the way there, no matter how far it was,
and get it. That's-- that's hard.
It's not like really hard. But it wouldn't be the most
fun trip to do every time you want to watch a movie.
- Thanks for watching this episode of Kids React.
- Like what you saw? Then hit that Subscribe button.
- Goodbye. Make it a Blockbuster night.
♪ (end music) ♪