Fire Lisa Schwarzbaum MANIFESTO

Hey guys! I'm sure you're wondering, just what is Fire Lisa Schwarzbaum? Unless it isn't 2008 and you've been reading us for years, which I'm assuming you have. But due to the fact that we haven't written any entries yet, I'll write a manifesto for the uninitiated.

Just what is Fire Lisa Schwarzbaum?
Fire Lisa Schwarzbaum is a rip-off of Fire Joe Morgan, a popular blog that commented on and made fun of bad baseball-related journalism. It was probably the greatest blog on the internet, until they quit a few months ago. We're here to pick up the pieces and ultimately embarrass ourselves for eliciting comparison.

Fire Lisa Schwarzbaum comments on and makes fun of bad movie criticism. We are so named after one-half of Entertainment Weekly's abominable critic duo of Lisa Schwarzbaum and Owen Gleiberman. "Fire Owen Gleiberman" just didn't work.

If we actually gain an legitimate readership at some point, we'll probably move to a different server and try to spend a few minutes coming up with a remotely original name, only to settle with "SchwarzbaumThirtyEight.com" or "The Huffington Schwarzbaum."

Just who does Fire Lisa Schwarzbaum make fun of, exactly? Surely not the bloggers, the innocent bloggers!
DON'T CALL ME SURELY A JOKE FROM AEROPLANE, 1981

We don't cover news stories or special opinion pieces or film blog updates: only movie reviews. Maybe, once in a while, something else will be too irresistible and we'll cave, but for the most part… there are just way too many movie reviews to spend time on anything else.

We will cover any critic who has a voice on Rotten Tomatoes. These critics' reviews, if only by minuscule amounts, help shape the public's perceptions and subsequent opinions of the films they cover, the box office, the awards, everything. We won't cover anyone who isn't a part of that.

Just why are you being so mean?
Because we all know people who would do a much better job, for much less pay. I can probably think of fifteen people I know personally, most of whom don't even like movies or are alive, who are more deserving of a spot on RT than RT's fifteen worst critics.

And with a tool like Rotten Tomatoes (as well as Metacritic) equalizing the crazy Victoria Alexanders with the professional Roger Eberts and summing up movies with a single number, every critic included suddenly has an uncomfortably massive effect on the film industry. We believe that they should be held accountable.

We also like to make fun of things.

Just when are you gonna update?
When we get to it!

Will you cover reviews of movies you haven't seen?
Most often not. Between the three of us, we see a whole lot of movies. There are some we definitely will never see, though, as we don't have the kind of money that allows us the luxury of "Space Chimps." That doesn't mean we won't enter those critical worlds, but we'll mostly stick to the movies that we have some frame of reference for.

Just what makes a review "bad" to you jerks?
Well, we're just starting out, so we don't quite know yet. We'll take it one review at a time before we can arrive at any conclusions/methods of profiling.

Are you really going to take Victoria Alexander seriously?
We're gonna take Victoria Alexander VERY seriously.

Hey, there's no way you guys read every review on Rotten Tomatoes!
Nope! There are, literally, dozens, maybe hundreds of reviews we have yet to read. Honestly, we'll never get around to most of them, cause that's a lot of reading and we have (figurative) wives and kids. And we already have plenty of known offenders that we keep up with furiously, but for the most part, Rotten Tomatoes is a jungle. That's why we need your help! If you spot an offender, send an email to us and let us know about it. We'll give you credit and a place to stay if you're ever in town.

So who are you guys, really?
That's to remain a secret for three or four years, until we reveal that we're all Emmy-award winning television writers.

I'm Zach, and my co-posters are John! and Max. You can contact us via email at zlyon@umd.edu, and then whatever emails blah blah blah