Chris Chan: A Comprehensive History
| “ | What made him this way? What is the attraction? What keeps us fascinated?
This is the story of Chris Chan. |
” |
| The opening narration for the series. After Chris's transition, feminine pronouns are used instead. | ||
Chris Chan: A Comprehensive History is a documentary webseries created by Geno Samuel, which began in February 2018. It is, as the name suggests, an extensive, in-depth documentary about Chris's life, similar to Sachumo's. However, while Sachumo's film is an abridged summary of Chris's life for newcomers, Geno's videos go into greater detail, with most videos being between 35 to 45 minutes in length, with a decent portion of this being tied to the playback of Chris's own audio and video.
The documentary series began on 14 June 2018 and covers select events ranging from how Chris's parents met in the 1980s to Chris's arrest on 1 August 2021. Currently running at 85 episodes, the series has far surpassed Geno's expectations of how in-depth it would be when he first began developing it. As of Part LXXXV, the runtime for the documentary series is quite extensive at over two and a half days.[note 1] The series is currently on an indefinite hiatus of a year or longer, with the last episode coming out on 17 March 2024, on the anniversary of the creation of the Sonichu character.
The series is composed of material Geno personally believes to be relevant and/or interesting, and it leaves out the remainder.[1] In an April 2023 comment, Geno stated that he was "evermore trying to make [the episodes] move faster by cutting out irrelevant stuff", adding that he wanted to be finished sooner so he can focus on other projects, like making documentaries on other subjects and producing music.[2] Even still, Geno has claimed he intends to continue the series until either he or Chris dies.[3]
Overview
The series is in chronological order, taking several videos just to cover Chris's life before his internet fame, with a significant portion of the series (28 episodes) dedicated to the troll-influenced events of 2009 and 2010 – trolls had prodded Chris into producing many calls and videos at the time, which the series utilizes for playback. It presents the events of Chris's life in a mostly objective light, allowing watchers to pass their own judgment on Chris and the people around him, although Geno selectively chooses what material to cover.[1] Nonetheless, Geno occasionally slips in dry, blunt observations over Chris's shortcomings, along with summaries of how Chris's problems manifest themselves and worsen over time. Furthermore, he also manages to maintain a completely neutral, deadpan tone of voice when discussing the absolute absurdities present in Chris's life, and he reads spelling errors precisely as they are written, which leads to some of the documentary's most humorous moments despite being an overview of Chris's life.
Geno's narration also reflects Chris's changes in identity throughout the series, initially referring to him as "Christopher" before changing it to "Christian" in the first episode and using masculine pronouns for the bulk of the show's run, eventually shifting over to calling Chris "Christine" and using feminine pronouns by the time that the series reaches the events of late 2014, when Chris began to transition. However, Geno has used masculine pronouns in the context of referring to Chris's past antics, and also during Chris's extended period of being "possessed" by Sonichu in most of 2020 and part of 2021. Beginning with Episode 61, Geno began altering the theme music to represent the Idea Guys saga. Since the saga in question ended in Episode 62, Geno has said that it would be reverted back in Episode 63, although a distorted, reversed version of the theme has consistently played over the credits since then.[4] Beginning with Episode 70, glitches have been introduced to the intro, with the severity of the distortion steadily increasing with every video. Episode 85 has no intro, instead featuring a black screen featuring the name of the episode. It also ends with "End of Season 1", instead of the usual "End of Episode X".
Geno initially predicted the series would take around 50 episodes to reach the present day, but the fiftieth episode only reached the events of mid-2016. Geno has revised his initial prediction to eighty-nine episodes[5], implying a laid-out plan for the documentary, but he did finish it in slightly lesser amount of these. Once he's "caught up" with Christian Weston Chandler's Adult Chronicles, Geno plans to continue the series incrementally up to its logical conclusion. To give Christory more time to develop, he took a break following the release of the final episode of the first season.
The documentary series has inspired a considerable amount of new discussion related to Chris, which has predictably produced more weens who mistakenly think that "modern" Chris acts like he once did during the so-called "Classic Era" – much of the context behind trolling was never publicly released by Chris's trolls, making it appear as if many of Chris's actions during troll sagas were his own ideas. The documentary itself eventually ended up being a part of Christory in a more direct fashion, as several people who would go on to interact with Chris either found out about him, or were influenced by, the series. Furthermore, Chris is aware of the series, and has commented on it several times over Twitter and YouTube, usually expressing approval of Geno's attention to detail, but critiquing him on parts he found too graphic or fake.
In light of the incest reveal, Geno, like everyone else, was utterly flabbergasted by the extremely dark turn that Christory took.[6] Geno then announced, via his Patreon, that the series would be taking an extended hiatus following the release of Episode 59. He explained that he felt that it would be potentially tasteless and exploitative to continue the series immediately after Chris's appalling actions came to light, so he informed his patrons that he would not be completing and releasing new episodes of the series until early 2022.[7] During that time, Geno redirected his attention to work on his other documentaries and music projects. The series officially resumed on 24 February 2022, Chris's 40th birthday.
History
Geno attempted to monetize his GenoSamuel2 channel. On 13 June of that year, when it was his turn to be reviewed by YouTube staff for the monetization program, they instead issued community guideline strikes due to the clips of bullying featured in the videos, and as a result his channel was terminated.[8] Geno confirmed that he did send an appeal form, but YouTube never gave him his channel back. Fans reuploaded all of the episodes made prior to the strike and Geno created a new backup channel on YouTube where the series would be uploaded from then on.
A week later, Geno revealed on the backup channel he would be taking a long break from the videos, stating that he was getting tired of always having to have Chris in his mind when making the documentary. He said that he will continue working on them sometime near the end of the year.
On 3 January 2019, he announced on his Twitter in the form of a teaser poster that the series would be coming back on 24 February 2019, which also happens to be Chris's birthday. The new series contains updated audio, additional and corrected information and some modifications to prevent another takedown. He also mentioned that he would not be monetizing the videos out of respect.
Geno said that Chris knew of the original run of the series and approved of it.[9]
In July 2020, Geno announced the series would go on hiatus again until August; however, the series resumed slightly earlier than expected, as Part 41 premiered on 31 July.
On 14 September, Geno posted a message explaining why he decided to use feminine pronouns to refer to Chris beginning from Part 43:[10]
| CHRIS CHAN’S PRONOUNS ARE NOT SHE/HER, AND THEY SERIOUSLY CAUSE SENSORY OVERLOADS IN ME!!! GENO NEEDS TO RECALL EVERYTHING REFERRING TO HIM AS A WOMAN AND CHANGE CHRIS’ GENDER BACK IMMEDIATELY!!! FOLLOW ME IN BOYCOTTING CHRIS CHAN: A COMPREHENSIVE HISTORY, UNTIL GENO WISES UP, RECALLS EVERYTHING AND CHANGES HIS PRONOUNS BACK, NOW!!! But seriously, yes, the transition happened, and has already caused an uproar which I doubt will subside. This would have happened anyway if I didn’t change it; I would have a different vocal minority yelling about it. The change does not reflect my personal opinions, and even if they did, the star of the series’ name now would still be “Christine.” I must deal with the reality at hand. I started calling Christopher “Christian” when he wanted to be called that, and now I just started referring to her as a woman with the name of “Christine.” The video series should not be seen as a voice of reason, or as a preacher with a message. It is an opportunity to give Chris a voice, and to offer a better understanding of her thoughts through the very many experiences meticulously documented in her life. It is up to you to make whatever you want with the information given. As the ancient Indian proverb goes, “It is what it is.” |
On 31 July 2021, Geno decided to put the series on hiatus following the release of Episode 59, in light of the incest situation. He had originally planned to do so after Episode 60, but opted to take a break from the series for multiple reasons.
On 1 October 2021, Geno was featured on TrashTaste, a podcast featuring a group of anime YouTubers, thereby exposing Chris to millions of weebs everywhere. In the podcast Geno expressed his desire to also follow his other passions, not wanting to be known as "The Chris Chan guy". When asked how many episodes were possibly left, he replied maybe another 10 episodes
. He also said if the opportunity arises… if I can get something done with Netflix, this could be a stepping stone.
[11]
On 24 February 2022, Part LX (60) was released, ending the series' 208-day hiatus.[12]
April Fool's jokes
Occasionally, Geno will play a prank involving the series on 1 April.
On 1 April 2021, Geno commemorated April Fool's Day by changing the title of the series to Donald Trump: A Comprehensive History, and altered the thumbnails of every video in the series to include images of him.[13] The content of the videos themselves, however, remained unchanged. Chris did not take kindly to this, privately messaging Geno over Twitter to complain about the alteration.
On 1 April 2022, Geno did another April Fool's Day joke by changing his username to Tekken Time Bomb and swapping all of the titles and thumbnails of the videos with clickbait on subjects unrelated to Chris, renaming the playlist "Freshest Videos".[14] Nonetheless, the titles and thumbnails all cleverly alluded to details discussed in the videos themselves.
On 1 April 2023, Geno uploaded what appeared to be Part LXXIV (74), which began as one would expect it to begin, however it took a sharp turn, revealing it to be an April Fools joke and showing a plotline imagining Chris realising that the Dimensional Merge was a delusion and Dimension 197 didn't exist, selling all his toys and video games and getting a job at a local Target, followed by him leaving the Internet and eventually marrying. It ended with a major-key version of the Comprehensive History theme song and a "THE END" card. Photoshops and AI-generated audio of Chris and Ben Saint were used to create the illusion. The video was unlisted the following day, but is available to those who have the link. The real Part 74 was later uploaded on the 17th.
Omissions
Geno has at times made omissions to the series. In response to a question on the matter, Geno gave episode 66 as an example and stated:[15]
| “ | Just for Part 66, I didn't include a whole period of time when Chris was obsessing over Bowsette, and created a backstory for her which stated she was the child that resulted from Bowser raping Princess Peach. I didn't address it because it was a secluded period and was never addressed in the future. I tend to leave in things that I know will be featured later on, such as the development of the Dimensional Merge rhetoric, which is important enough to go over in more detail at least once. Once an event or idea is mentioned in the doc, I would go over it in lesser detail later on so as not to repeat myself too much. | ” |
Mentions by Chris
In August 2019, Chris, while in his phase of role-playing as Magi-Chan, began "binge-listening" to the series[16] (suggesting that, like with the Sachumo documentary, Chris couldn't bear to actually watch the videos). Chris would make comments on the videos as Magi-Chan via Twitter, and as himself in YouTube's comment section.
Chris's interest in the series continued after his phrase of role-playing as Magi-Chan ended, eventually watching the series as opposed to just listening.
- "quite curious, when you think about it, from the Animal Crossing Video, Christine calls for Sonic Heroes being GameCube exclusive; she gave premonition to the Nintendo-Exclusive Sonic titles."[17]
- He noted exactly which cartoons and games Megan Schroeder had introduced him to over a decade prior "just for the record and Megan's reference", those being Soul Calibur and Tekken OC Yoshimitsu, also saying he'd been a fan of My Little Pony and Sailor Moon before meeting Megan.[18]
- "You made me laugh when you stiltedly read, 'You don't have to tell me twice. But back in the Stone Age...' Just simply how you said it cracked me up.
Reminder, the end of that joke is,
'...you Really needed to tell them twice'; you couldn't get it through their heads at all."[19]
- Chris viewed his past homophobia with regret.[20]
- Chris commented on Part 24 in YouTube's comment section, claiming that he had known Alec Benson Leary was a troll, among other dubious remarks:
| I remember those times, and it was cringing to hear myself drone ON and ON just in thinking he was going to clear those ads from my old website. Subconsciously, I had always Known he and his crew were Trolling me the whole time, and it showed in how I reacted later on. And, yet, while partly oblivious, I Was Trolling Alec At the time. And I take no shame in it, because he was Trolling Me. I saw through his charade and showed it in how he treated everyone in my few pages, as he had already done, and worse, in his pages. It only added fuel to the nobility of pulling the plug on the Cwcipedia to save myself, my arts, and my peoples and family, he from the shit I was having to deal with from those bastards. Psychic Powers were strong within me in the later part of this video. And they have only gotten stronger over the years into now, despite my having the many more trials to endure and learn from.[21] |
|
This Part, starting from 16:30, I forgot I made this video. It was soo Stupid, it is genuinely hilarious. Rolling on the floor laughing I guess it was in the high-energetic, loud voice I used that day to imitate Liquid Chris. ALOL! “yamosexual”? Get ready for a meme of that word. |
In summer 2020, during Chris's phase of role-playing as Sonichu, Chris continued watching the series.
About Part 38, Chris tweeted about the goofy facial expressions he had made in Message for John Kyle[23].
| I found hilarious Mama’s expression when she said “Whoop-de-doo for him” in that one video of hers that was featured.
And that includes this one; yep, that’s a Derp face. Go ahead and Meme this out of context. “Well, Whoop-de-Derp ta-dum!”
|
About Part 39, an angry Chris complained about Geno reading an e-mail from the LoveYouLongTime E-mails, 2013-2014 collection in which Chris had privately talked about shoving his own penis into his buttcrack. He also whined about Geno's coverage of the house fire.
| Hey! Firstly, that door to the bathroom downstairs was unable to close at all back in 2013 and early ‘14. Second, Why the Hell would you read that personal shit about Mama with the penis thing? Oh, My Chris Chan! Why did Kim have to be such a literal Troll to totally expose these things when they were shared with her in strictest confidence? “Kim Wilson”, if that is even your real name at this point, Mama may forgive you to an extent, but I, Sonichu, am truly insulted by this shit stunt you’ve pulled with her trust in betrayal over the years.[24] |
About part 42, Chris commented on the Brushfire Video:
| For the record, when Mama recorded that putting out the fire video, she and Barb were literally still recovering from the house fire earlier that year. Sight of fire gave Mama a whole bunch of PTSD for the number of years.[25] |
About part 44, Chris thanked Geno for referring to him with his preferred pronouns, as the series had entered the point of Chris's transgenderism.
| Finally, you got the pronoun right with Mama Chris Chan; thanks, Geno. Better late than never. 😊⚡️[26] |
After the Sonichu spirit possession ended, Chris still commented on videos- albeit as Chris himself, once more.
About Part 52, Chris commented on his distaste of Donald Trump and the predictions he made.
| I predicted how horribly Trump was going to do. Who was right all along? Me. ⚡️💙⚡️
Trump was a Mean King, and he did not get our votes then or again.[27] |
About Part 54, Chris made a joke regarding the episode's Roman numbering (LIV).
| Part LIVe! On the Internet![28] |
About Part 56, Chris promoted the as-of-yet unreleased next episode of the series, claiming it would cover the events of the Idea Guys saga.
| Tune in next video for Idea Guy, Johnson Wiles, and Stephen Boyd, or that, among which, is chronicled in “Awakening of a CPU”.[29] |
Part 57 did not, in fact, bring up the Idea Guys. They eventually made their first appearance only by Part 59.
In his 100k subscriber Q&A special uploaded in December of 2020, Geno answered a question Chris had posted from the CwcvilleGuardian account. Roleplaying as Sonichu, Chris asked what Geno believed to be the draw of himself and life story.[30]
| Hey, Geno. I, Sonichu, offer a sentiment of support and kind thoughts in response to this. Congratulations, Dude. But I do have a question, as well (feel free to get really Metaphysical about it; break your own fourth walls). Given every single possibility between this and all other dimensions in this Omega timeline set we live in, including that Mama Chris Chan, herself, being the OC of OCs, could also have been a creator of all Original Creators, including yourself, if not that one major influential aspect, What do you feel is the most significant factor that attracts everyone's attention, including yourself, to her?
In short, What do You feel and think is the attraction; what makes you fascinated about Chris Chan? |
Geno answered Chris's inquiry at 1:10:28 as the final question of the video, stating that he found it fascinating due to how it cannot be replicated today and how Chris and various trolls created an entire fantasy world which Chris lived – and continues to live – in:
| The attraction is that the story of Chris Chan came about during a very interesting time on the internet: of course, because this could not technically really happen in real life as much as it did here. It was a difficult time on the internet where it was kinda like a Wild West situation, where there was a lot more focused on trolling and bullying and saying whatever the hell you want without any consequences. And people were getting in touch with the internet and posting videos and showing themselves off online a lot, without maybe understanding the consequences of what bad things might happen to them. You know, all the bullying that Chris took from the trolls, it's like a wonderful mix of belief in self mixed in with trolls' ambitions to work against or for that belief – to create this sort of fictional universe for Chris. Which Chris ended up believing wholeheartedly, recently. It's a product of its time, really. You can't really replicate it these days – because I think the internet has now a lot more safeguards against this sort of carry-on. And Chris is a very unique individual. I think you might know that very well. He's very unique, a product of his own upbringing and of his own autism. And that's what keeps me fascinated. It's almost like a fictional universe created artificially in a real life universe, you might say. Um, and I can understand how this can get really metaphysical because I kinda feel like the trolls and Chris kinda helped each other to create this fictional universe for each other. Though some people believed in it a lot more than others. And that's – I think – a big reason why Sonichu/Christine might think the same way about being the, uh, "creator" of real creations, because they are alive in a sense. If you believe in it, they are alive – the characters. You might treat them as alive to an extent. I think it's a bit too much to say that they do exist in an alternate dimension – I don't believe in that at all – but they do exist as much as you want them to exist. It's all up to you. It's all up to the human mind – each individual brain – what you think. It's all up to you – whether you want to improve yourself, or whether you want to go down this path or that path, whether you want to listen to your superiors or not. It really is all up to you – and your world is whatever you want to make of it. Be it intentionally want to make of it or unintentionally want to make of it, consciously or subconsciously. And that's the story of why I find it fascinating. |
In July 2021, The WCT and Chris discussed the series and potential upcoming episodes. Chris believed that "the ten and a half months when Sonichu Prime and I were body-swapped" would be one of the last sagas people would find entertaining.[31]
According to Don Lashomb, Chris planned to collaborate with Geno and make audio commentary for every episode of the series.
Influence
| “ | I first fell in love with Christian Weston Chandler and thought I had a big brother when I watched the original run of Geno Samuel's documentaries. | ” |
| Jacob Sockness[32] | ||
Geno's documentary is often noted for either introducing many people to Christory or having an influence on it.
- Jacob Sockness[32]: An enabler who wanted to have sex with Chris.
- The WCT[33]: A member of the Watchmen white knight/enabler group. While it's unknown whether WCT knew of Chris prior to the Comprehensive History, WCT was "fascinated" by the series itself. WCT was also in GenoSamuel's Discord server where he met the Watchman member Naught.
- Fiona[34]: A young woman and enabler who became infatuated with Chris. While she claimed to have been introduced to Chris through Deadwing Dork, she would also watch the series on end, and become an active member in the CWCSphere soon after.
- KwaiiSandbag: An enabler who role-played as a psychic and influenced Chris to end his phase of role-playing as Sonichu.
Episodes (both original and revised)
Remastered cut plans
Geno stated a plan to produce a remaster of the series, saying in a r/ChrisChanSonichu thread on August 2023 that plans "includes fixing mistakes, putting stuff in that I missed before, and even cutting some stuff out if it's really unnecessary" and that it "would be released in the same multipart format on Rumble".[35]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Kiwi Farms posts (SamuellyGenie)#Extent of Coverage
- ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/ChrisChanSonichu/comments/12ppz6g/has_anyone_made_a_list_of_genos_doc_parts_that/jgv9rt9/?context=3 (archive)
- ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/ChrisChanSonichu/comments/15un9rc/comment/jwyqxpr/ (archive)
- ↑ https://youtu.be/W3K30u0T5gI?t=1091/
- ↑ https://twitter.com/genosamuelgeno/status/1517274668004118528/
- ↑ https://twitter.com/genosamuelgeno/status/1421139988138188804
- ↑ https://www.patreon.com/posts/stopping-now-54330974
- ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/ChrisChanSonichu/comments/bpe1lz/its_coming_cant_wait_for_the_new_material/enu9fug/
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KyrkBzO-WY8&t
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/post/UgyQY_S-ex_qB7nUns94AaABCQ (archive)
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FciJamr2z1Q
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBN4_57TuMY
- ↑ WayBack Machine: 1 April 2021
- ↑ WayBack Machine: 1 April 2022
- ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/ChrisChanSonichu/comments/wun7mu/about_the_doc/ilb5j3f/?context=3 (archive)
- ↑ https://twitter.com/MagiChan111448/status/1165401077619073024
- ↑ https://twitter.com/MagiChan111448/status/1165329837071962117
- ↑ https://twitter.com/MagiChan111448/status/1165401077619073024
- ↑ https://twitter.com/MagiChan111448/status/1165401077619073024
- ↑ https://twitter.com/MagiChan111448/status/1166479203585466368
- ↑ Link to video, and archive.org's screenshot of the comments section.
- ↑ https://twitter.com/CPU_CWCSonichu/status/1236699315302797312
- ↑ May 2020 social media posts#Chris talks about Genosamuel's Documentary
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zSpn0ZNwqQ&lc=UgzdoujDjuYP-1upCml4AaABAg
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=karTjT_4Gbc&lc=UgwK8W6anDfgeWo3YGR4AaABAg
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5MdSQG0B_c&lc=Ugzapm793HOq50Jjq7p4AaABAg
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=os51Bmrr0Kw&lc=UgwYOZd_fR_CdoQ_K-l4AaABAg&ab_channel=GenoSamuel2.1
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUHnLlqY6SI&lc=UgzA39cP4b-MEVr78AN4AaABAg&ab_channel=GenoSamuel2.1
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hydR9nksHSg&lc=Ugx3w3o9-QZT0EL3Tb54AaABAg&ab_channel=GenoSamuel2.1
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcGzQrkKHo0
- ↑ WCT DMs#Bismuth and Geno
- ↑ 32.0 32.1 https://www.reddit.com/r/ChrisChanSonichu/comments/drxzg7/am_i_responsible_for_the_sockness_saga/
- ↑ "The WCT" - EGS Reupload Wiki (archive)
- ↑ I have a full-blown crush on CWC and I feel absolutely insane
- ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/ChrisChanSonichu/comments/15un9rc/what_are_some_things_geno_samuel_has_either/jwz2gaq/?context=3 (archive)
Notes
- ↑ More accurately: 2 days, 12 hours, 19 minutes, and 4 seconds.
External links
- Playlist of old version
- Playlist of current version
- Playlist of a mixture of old and current
- Geno's backup channel
- Geno's main channel
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