Remarkist Slates 2021-2022
So our inaugural series was a blast. What started as a simple idea to watch a favorite show together has grown into a vibrant community and app platform celebrating fandom and the stories we love. But where do we go from here? We’ve been chatting and sharing ideas for subsequent series and films. Some of us have even set sail on a few. Well, it’s time to introduce Remarkist’s official plan for rolling out new Worlds and watches on the platform.
This is an epic post, so prepare yourself for a lot of information. If you don’t want to wade through all of it right now, you can also jump to the end of the post for a link to our upcoming calendar in spreadsheet form. But if you do have a few minutes to get through it, I promise, you’ll be glad you did.
Our scheduled journey is broken into parts, similar to the way TV networks break their ongoing programming into Seasons. We call these periods of programming at Remarkist Slates.
What is a Slate
Slates are exactly 9 weeks of programming. Each Slate consists of 3-4 series or franchise watches (and accompanying chats, games, talks, and firesides).
Slates are always set up so that there are 1 to 3 days a week completely free to include surprise events or for the community to build out other watches in tandem with the Slate.
There are 5 Remarkist Slates per year, which leaves a little over 7 weeks for official Remarkist Hiatuses—like our 2-3 weeks of Holiday Hiatus in December, as well as a Summer and Spring Hiatus.
So without further ado…
Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life
Two weeks before the start of our first official Slate, we will begin the Gilmore Girls revival series, A Year in the Life.
AYITL: Winter - Saturday, October 2nd @ 9am PT/12pm ET
AYITL: Spring - Sunday, October 3rd @ 9am PT/12pm ET
We’ll take a weekend off before continuing the next two episodes of the revival to allow our Canadian family to celebrate their Thanksgiving weekend.
We’ll continue the second half of AYITL on the first weekend of our first official Slate.
AYITL: Summer - Saturday, October 16th @ 9am PT/12pm ET
AYITL: Fall - Sunday, October 17th @ 9am PT/12pm ET
Join us as we revisit our favorite townies a decade later to see where they’ve all landed. Or where they haven’t.
1st Slate - Oct 11th through Dec 8th
Ru Paul’s Drag Race - Season 6
Season 6 has strong consensus as the top season of this series or at least in the top 3. With 24 seasons and counting, that’s a pretty impressive distinction. If you know anything about why it’s considered such a crowning season of television, please remember, Remarkist is a Spoiler-Free Zone.
We’ll begin this watch with the documentary Paris is Burning on Tuesday, October 12th, at 6pm PT/9pm ET. After that, the schedule will be Wednesdays and Fridays at 6pm PT/9pm ET (with the exceptions of Friday, October 22nd when I’ll be in Kent for the Fan Fest & Wednesday November 24th when many of us Americans will be traveling for Thanksgiving).
Firefly - Season 1 & Serenity
This watch will take us 500 years into the future to follow a rag-tag crew of space pirates. With only one season and a sequel film, we’ll be up to speed on this World before the holidays. That should prepare us for a deeper dive into the full Whedon-verse.
We’ll begin with the pilot on Thursday, October 28th at 6pm PT/9pm ET. Henceforth, episodes will be Mondays and Thursdays at the same time, with a double feature of episodes 13 & 14 on Friday, December 10th—also starting at 6pm PT/9pm ET. We’ll watch the sequel film Serenity on Saturday, December 11th at 5:30pm PT/8:30pm ET.
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel - Season 1
And finally, we’ll build out more of the Amy Sherman-Palladino universe with her and Dan’s newest series-World. We’ll see a few familiar faces as we transport ourselves to the late 1950s NYC to follow the life and career of stand-up comedian Midge Maisel.
We start with the series pilot on Tuesday, November 9th at 6pm PT/9pm ET and continue with episode 2 on Saturday at 9am PT/12pm ET. Henceforth, we’ll watch on Tuesdays evenings and Saturdays mornings/afternoons at the same time.
This series will also have an alternate watch time for audiences on the other side of the Atlantic. Starting with Episode 3, Tuesday watches will be rewatched the following day (Wednesday) at 10am PT/1pm ET, which is evening for our family across the pond.
Holiday One-Offs
This Slate also has 4 special Holiday events baked in, each with 2 events per day. Those are:
October 11th - Canadian Thanksgiving
The Wonder Years @ 6pm PT/9pm ET
Bob’s Burgers @ 7pm PT/10pm ET
Halloween Weekend
October 30th
Ghostbusters @ 10am PT/1pm ET
Texas Chainsaw Massacre @ 7pm PT/10pm ET
October 31st
Practical Magic @ 10am PT/1pm ET
Rocky Horror Picture Show @ 7pm PT/10pm ET
November 25th - US Thanksgiving
Master of None @ 7am PT/10am ET
Gilmore Girls - Deep-Fried Korean Thanksgiving @ 8am PT/11am ET (Oh yeah, we’re going back!)
Holiday Hiatus
We’ll be taking a 3-week hiatus between our 1st and 2nd Slate to celebrate the holidays with a set of special community-led holiday watches and Secret Santa events for community members. We’ll have a post coming soon with that schedule along with details for how the Secret Santa will work.
2nd Slate
Buffy the Vampire Slayer - Season 1
From galactic space pirates to inter-dimensional vampires. Our 2nd Slate begins with more of the Whedon-verse. We’ll be dipping our toes into the Hellmouth, starting with the pilot on Monday, January 3rd at 6pm PT/9pm ET and episode 2 on Thursday, January 6th at 6pm PT/9pm ET. The rest of the season will be Mondays and Thursdays at the same time. So get your stakes ready for some serious slaying.
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel - Seasons 2 & 3
Starting January 4th, we continue with the adventures of Miriam “Midge” Maisel. Like our first Slate, episodes will be Tuesdays at 6pm PT/9pm ET and Saturdays at 9am PT/12pm ET
And like our first Slate, there will be an alternate watch-time for our Tuesday episodes the following day (Wednesday) at 10am PT/1pm ET, which is a better time for members of our international community.
Schitt’s Creek - Season 1
And finally some “har har” laughs. I’ve been noticing a lot of Schitt’s Creek memes from the community, so I took it as a sign (something you all may want to keep in mind for future Slates). These episodes are short, so we’ll be doing two per night every Wednesday and Friday at 6pm PT/9pm ET, starting Friday, February 11th.
3rd, 4th, & 5th Slates
Our 3rd through 5th Slates will take us up to next October around this time—a full year of programming. Wow. That will be crazy! But do you doubt we can get there? I don’t!
Here are 17 series and franchises (Remarkist Worlds) that I have identified as strong contenders to get us through this next year. We will fit 9 to 12 of these into our 3rd through 5th Slates. We may replace one or two of these with better ones we choose along the way. Where these fall will be based on the best way to release them and maximize excitement around the watch. That could mean coordinating schedules with special guests, or simply the preparation needed to market and promote to the appropriate fandom.
Worlds denoted by a * are Marquee Worlds that have particularly immense fandoms. If a World extends into various forms of media and experiential products like theme parks, video games, etc. it can probably be classified as a Marque World. We’ll likely only launch 1-2 per year since they take a lot of preparation and marketing to get right.
These are in no particular order:
Suspense
Veronica Mars S1
Lost S1
Drama
Sex in The City S1
Dawson’s Creek S1
One Tree Hill S1
Bunheads
Fantasy
* The Wizarding World (Harry Potter/Fantastic Beasts)
Comedy
One Day at a Time S1
Friends S1
Reality
Bachelor Nation 1-2 select seasons
Sci-fi
Orphan Black S1
Black Mirror
Superhero
* Marvel (all MCU, Sony & Fox Mutants)
Horror
The Walking Dead S1&2
Musical
Glee S1&2
Animated
Archer S1
* Disney’s Animated Multiverse (incl. Pixar)
Subsequent Seasons of Official Watches
Some of you may be asking, “What happened to Ru Paul after our 1st Slate?”, “I don’t see Schitt’s Creek or Buffy in our 3rd through 5th.”
This is where the community comes in. In most cases, our Official Slates will only cover 1-2 seasons of TV shows, especially long ones. The community will be responsible for building out subsequent watches to keep those Worlds alive and complete the watches we started. Our 1-3 free days per week in a Slate are designed for just that.
This is how the seeds we plant in an Official Remarkist Slate can grow into a lovely and vast community-tended garden.
World Stewardship
I should also mention an important aspect of our Official Slates: I won’t be technically hosting any official watches or events. None of us will.
Some of us will be co-hosts (a small rotating team chosen just before the start of a watch), and I will certainly be there for all of these Slate watches, but the host listed in the app will be the Official Remarkist Account.
This is really just an attribution thing, so don’t expect an actual Remarkist Host in our audio chats. Think of the audio room itself as the Remarkist Host. Yes, I’ll be shouldering a lot of the technical aspects of the account, but this will get us closer to John Cabrera being an equal member of the community.
Having our official Remarkist Account host events will also allow us to drop our first official Remarkist Mementos. Mementos are digital collectibles that commemorate our time together, but they are also licenses that give their holders certain privileges set by the host. Since the host here is Remarkist itself, the Mementos dropped during the Slate will be quite special. They will give the holder special privileges set by the platform—in this case, privileges tied to the Worlds where they are dropped.
Every World on Remarkist will have a set of 20 Stewardship Mementos.
When a new World is introduced in a Remarkist Slate, the Remarkist account will drop one or more of its official Stewardship Mementos during the watch. As the World grows over time, other Mementos from the set will be dropped. Rather than challenging the attendees to crack the password, these Mementos will be placed in a reverse Dutch auction starting at a certain amount of KRNLs (determined just before the drop). Every second that passes, the auction price will drop until someone decides to purchase the Memento with the KRNLs they’ve collected.
These World Stewardship Mementos will come with various moderation rights within a particular world, and holders of the Mementos will work with Remarkist to build their Worlds into thriving fandom spaces, with incredible guests and events. In return for their dedication and work building up a World, the holders of these Mementos will receive ongoing KRNL royalties on most KRNL spending within a World—such as all couch reservations, event ticketing, or paying to listen to archived audio.
Hosting non-official events
So how do we treat Worlds that haven’t been introduced on a Slate or that we won’t get to for months, maybe even years? Are they off-limits? What about Worlds we’ve already ventured into like American Horror Story or Marvel? Who has the right to start a World or host a watch? And if I want to introduce a new World or watch, does that prevent someone else from getting to it before I do?
The short answer to all of these questions is this:
No World is off-limits to anyone at any time.
You can start a watch and launch a new World whenever you want. You can even host watches of the same shows that are on our Official Slate at the same time that the Slate is running. That’s to say, no one, not even the Official Remarkist Account, is entitled to a World over anyone else. If someone decides to host a watch of a show you are already doing or planning to do, while I do understand how this can feel like someone is stealing your thunder or treading on your plans, please resist planting a flag at Remarkist. We don’t plant flags on Worlds, shows, films, genres, era, or days of the week. These stories have all been loved before us. They will continue to be rewatched and loved by others… often simultaneously.
Also, keep in mind that these Stewardship Mementos should not be confused with hosting within a World. Holding one comes with no obligation to host events within a World. And if you don’t hold one it doesn’t exclude you from hosting events either.
Likewise, hosting events within a World doesn’t entitle you to one of these Mementos. They will go to whoever has the KRNLs and desire to claim them. Someone might put a lot of effort into hosting events in a World that haven’t been introduced on an official Slate, and by doing so they may bring premature awareness and excitement to that World that could make its World Stewardship Memento very appealing. That could also make it unaffordable to that host when it finally does come to an Official Slate.
On the other hand, by hosting events in a World before it arrives in an official Slate, you could be building valuable content—like archived recordings of your events or coveted Mementos and clubs. You could develop influence over a World before its official introduction brings in new audiences. Those new audiences would likely lean on established hosts of those Worlds or seek out earlier content and Mementos created by them. And that could be even more rewarding than the Stewardship Mementos themselves.
The birds-eye view
And finally, since most of us are visual absorbers of information, here is the above schedule in a spreadsheet calendar form:
Remarkist’s 1st & 2nd Slates (all times are in PT)
So save the dates, and get ready for a 2022 roller coaster of watches, chats, games, talks, and panels. Looking forward to exciting days ahead!