Million Dollar Extreme is a comedy troupe that is either hated or loved half of the time, with the hate seemingly just due to the groups politics. However,
there is a lot more to MDE than political satire/jokes that are edgy for the sake of being edgy. They have a very unique comedy and art style and if not
for their politics would probably be seen as great comedians by most people without hesitation.
In this article I am going to talk about their history, their show World Peace, their overarching messages and themes, Sam Hyde, and the MDE fanbase.
Part 2: The rise of MDE on Youtube
On December 30th of 2007, Sam Hyde created the Youtube channel Million Dollar Extreme at the age of 23. On there he would upload comedic videos, typically
monolouges he would film in his bathroom. Later in May 12, 2008 Charls Carrol (a close friend of Sam Hyde) and Nick Rochefort created their own comedy
troupe called blackcountryenjoy. Blackcountryenjoy was much more of a standard Youtube comedy group while MillionDollarExtreme was... weird.
Blackcountryenjoy would only upload for a few months before it's members decided to unite under MDE in 2009. There was a
noticable spike in quality in their videos following this. The merger also heavily influenced Million Dollar Extreme's comedy and art, and is the point
where MDE started to become 'avante-garde' in a way. MDE videos beforehand were much more focused on post-ironic meta humor (Sam walked so Jreg could
run lol) and satire, whereas MDE following the merger incorporated much more absurdist and political themes.
MDE would hold meetings frequently to think of ideas for videos at this time, and Sam posted his videos onto 4chan frequently. Charls Carrol also became
involved with Occupy Wall Street at the time. Eventually one of their videos, Ideas Man, became
viral, and 4chan and Reddit would begin to take interest in MDE's work. This would culminate in the creation of the subreddit r/milliondollarextreme, as
well as the website mde.tv which hosted the MDE forums, which would be the main hubs of the MDE fanbase.
In 2012 MDE also released a comedic album titled TWAT with 30 tracks.
Something to take notice of is the fact that around this time, MDE's videos would feature much more socio-political commentary in them then they did
previously. While obscured under layers of irony, there are still hard-to-miss points that are made, although MDE of course never set out on trying to
spread some sort of message. This would further pivot MDE into it's own unique blend meta-irony, shock value and political satire that has defined it.
In 2013, Erick Hayden, who is a legitimate actor associated with actual Hollywood movies became involved with MDE (first appearing in the video Doctor
Manslave), and would go on to be a member of MDE.
Part 3: Trolling
In 2014, Sam Hyde created a Kickstarter fundraiser for a brony dating sim game titled Dark Skies, which was intentionally very cringey. Bronies began
donating money to it in hopes of it getting produced. Idubbz would cover it on his Kickstarter crap series, but Sam Hyde would copyright strike it, and
told Idubbz that if he wanted him to uncopyright strike it he must squat 200 pounds below parralel. This caused Idubbz to develop a grudge against Sam
that would culminate in a major event which I will go over later.
The bronies eventually came to the conclusion that Sam Hyde was an alt-right troll and was just stealing their money, and as a result the fundraiser
couldn't get enough funds and the project was cancelled. Sam would state later on that he did plan on actually making the game had they gotten enough
money.
2014 was also a notable and pivotal year in MDE's history due to three events:
Million Dollar Extremes standup routine at a organized Twitter comedy event, released under a video titled "Privileged White Male Triggers
Oppressed Victims, Ban This Video Now and Block Him". If you haven't seen it yet, please go watch it. In it Sam Hyde reads a bunch
of statistics to a mainly Liberal audience that contradict Liberal views on homosexuality.
Sam Hyde did a TedX talk titled "2070 paradigm shift", which was a mockery of Ted talks. Again, I have to ask you to watch it if you haven't.
Sam Hyde did a recorded presentation at an anime convention meant to satirize weaboos
You can notice that this was the year where they focused on trolling more than anything else. However in 2015 something bigger that wasn't even the work
of MDE themselves would happen that you have probably heard of. It is something still referenced often to this day, to the point that the joke has been
dead for nearly a decade now. I am of course talking about the shooter incident.
When the Texas church shooting happened, a congressman calling into CNN stated that the shooters name was Sam Hyde due to shitposts made on Twitter that
he saw. People of course found this very funny and would continue reporting whenever a mass shooting happened that the perpetrator was Sam Hyde. Even in
2023 Adam Kinzinger retweeted a post saying that the "Ghost of Kyiv" was named Samuyil Hyde and attached an obviously photoshopped image of Sam Hydes face
cropped onto a figher jet pilot, causing Tucker Carlson to correct him on FOX news.
However, these are of course not the only times that Sam Hyde has appeared on national television.
Part 4: World Peace
In 2016, following the media attention and massive fanbase of Million Dollar Extreme, especially due to how fitting MDE was with adult swim style humor
and editing, Adult Swim premiered the television show "Million Dollar Extreme presents: World Peace". Somehow, MDE had memed themselves to being a TV show.
The show is the magnum opus of the group. Whereas
other times when MDE had been given a platform they would immediantly troll them and then be gone, Million Dollar Extreme used their new oppertunity to
create something amazing. I know I keep saying this but please watch it. If you are going to watch anything I mention in this video, let it be this.
There may or may not be a copy of it on the Internet Archive ;), not that I am suggesting you do anything illegal ;) ;) ;).
This show couldn't have come at a more perfect time. 2016 of course being the year of the american presidential election where Trump would win,
it was also a very great year for the alt right movement in general. So being given a TV show would give them access to about a million more people then
they had before.
Anyways, I rewatched the episodes so that I can give you a brief highlight and analysis of them:
Episode 1: Your Vibe Attracts Your Tribe
A focus mostly on absurdism as well as art. One skit however was about Mark Zuckerberg being killed for his numerous privacy breaches and scandals, so
it also incorporated satire and shock value.
Episode 2: Illegal Broadcast: John Hell Emergency
The second episode is much more political than the first one. It starts with a skit about a dating contestant show and women having high expectations of
men while women don't want to have to do anything, then a skit where people are just singing the words "Jews rock!" and "I love jews!" while adult swim
executives film it, the implication being that they are doing it as sort of a apology to jews because of World Peace. It then goes back to the dating
contestant show. And the last skit is about a angry CEO and the boredom of modern life and office jobs. This was probably one of the riskiest episodes
they made, and one of the reasons they received so much controversy.
Episode 3: 3 Down 47 to Go Countdown to Mass Funeral
The third episode is also heavily political, though it goes alongside absurdism. There are many in-between sequences with advice about women and rants
about annoying leftists. The first skit has Sam Hyde in blackface being broken up with by a white women, the second one is a particularly absurdist one
about making tap water with hair spray, gun powder, toilet water, ashes, etc while talking about how no one in Flint Michigan would ever actually do
anything about their government besides complain, rather than killing politicians who are responsible. The last one is about a teacher suffering a mental
breakdown while his students are in class. The teacher thinks about being dumb and having to teach about the holocaust and black history. Then when the
musical performance starts he hangs himself. I think this skit is also about monotmous work life and being a cog in the machine.
Episode 4: Mad at Dad? GOMAD for Chad MGTOW
The fourth episode focuses more on just comedy with absurdist and satiracle undertones rather than the other way around. The main skit is about
a disabled lonely man who seeks the help of someone who is good at making someone attractive to women.
Episode 5: Not Everyone Thinks You're a Hero
This episode also focuses more on simply the comedic aspects while maintaing some absurdism and satire. The sequences in between skits are heavily
politically opinionated however. Perhaps during episodes 4 and 5 Million Dollar Extreme wanted to not just be appealing to other right wingers but many
others as well.
Episode 6: You Hate This Show Because You Hate Yourself
This is the last episode, and it seems they wanted to go out in a bang, because there is a strong return to edgy political satire. The first skit is a
fake ad for something called the toss it project, where you film yourself writing a slur someone called you on a styrofoam cup, and then throwing it.
The fourth skit is about a abusive wife and a submissive beta husband trying to get someones sperm to impregnate the wife, because the wife doesn't
want to use her husbands sperm. When they take her to get tested to see if her DNA is compatible, they cook her alive.
The fifth skit is about kids playing baseball, who have a gay pedophilic coach. The last skit is about liberal, over medicated children. The episode
ended with very weird graphics before ending, forever.
The show was essentially about many different aspects of modern American society. Each episode had its own unique spin and direction, and especially with
the cast and crew, particularly Andrew Ruse, they were able to make very artsy stuff as well that we have never seen them do since World Peace.
Despite the success of WP, of course there would be problems. For one, Adult Swim started censoring the show. Often by heavily editing the opening
sequences and cutting out parts of skits, to the point that they might not even make as much sense. Though what would eventually cause their downfall was
a Buzzfeed journalist named Joseph Bernstein. He interviewed Sam Hyde over the phone, and Sam Hyde took it as an oppertunity to troll him.
Joseph then wrote a hit piece titled "The Alt-Right Has Its Very Own TV Show On Adult Swim" in response. Eric Andre and Tim Heidecker, who didn't
want competition against their own shows, tried to get Adult Swim to cancel World Peace. Eventually Adult Swim caved in, thus ending the show.
While Tim Heidecker was a guest on H3H3, Sam Hyde called in confronting Tim on air. Tim would of course deny that he purposefully tried to get World Peace
shut down.
Part 5: Downfall and resserection
As if getting their show cancelled by Adult Swim, and likely never getting another show on television ever wasn't enough, the community would eventually
be cracked down on too. In 2018 Reddit banned r/milliondollarextreme and eventually the mde.tv forums would shut down. The community to this day, while
the fanbase is present, has yet to find a particular home. Charls would stop being friends with Sam Hyde due to how he handled the interview, which in his
opinion caused the end of World Peace. Especially considering the fact that Charls was homeless following the end of World Peace since he didn't have any
other sources of income and spent a long time couch surfing, it is at least understandable why he chose to do that. Charls started his own Youtube channel
Bombstrap where he would work on his own independent projects.
Million Dollar extreme, now with just Sam and nick, would eventually begin to focus almost exclusively on podcasting. In 2019 MDE did release "Theatre of
the Aire", which had several episodes with sketch comedy. But besides that, this was the downfall of MDE. However, they would recover, as Idubbz would
be plotting his last act of relevance. In 2022 Idubbz released a video titled "Getting away with it", which was intended to be about Sam Hyde. Idubbz
would film an entire 1 hour documentary about Sam Hyde, with multiple interviews. Near the end of the documentary, Idubbz confronted Sam Hyde about
the copyright strike Sam had given him, to which Sam would turn it around on him and reveal that all of the information Idubbz had recorded over the
last several days was all a fabrication. Sam had even rented out a used dentists office and claimed that it was his studio. Idubbz held off on releasing
the video for multiple years until 2022 due to that fact. But when it was released, Sam Hyde was pushed back into the mainstream once again. Though this
would only make Idubbz more pissed off at him.
There would be some more beef with them, mainly Idubbz not allowing Sam Hyde to attend Creator Clash, a event for youtubers to box eachother where
all the proceeds went to charity. Sam Hyde then trained another Youtuber instead, and created the character "The candyman", who was an Irish boxer.
This would only make him and MDE more popular, of course, while Idubbz would have his own downfall which he has yet to recover from.
From what I have seen it doesn't seem like Idubbz actually dislikes Sam. Sam called Idubbz at one point on camera and Idubbz seemed happy to receive a
phone call from him, causing some to speculate that Idubbz's wife is forcing Idubbz to not like him, but thats just speculation.
Sam Hyde, as the candyman also called out Hasan Piker, saying that he is going to fight Hasan. Hasan of course over dramaticized it and just left it at
that.
In febuary of 2023 Charls would reunite with MDE to work on World Peace 2, a show which has yet to be released.
In 2023, fishtank.live would be created by the remaining MDE members. It is a website with a 24/7 live stream where viewers can interact with the members
of fishtank.live, and there is also a online series of it. From what I can tell, it involves the members in some house doing challenges.
In January of 2025 Sam Hyde would release a video titled "Dear Elon", which called out Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy for their belief and practice of
H1B visas, particularly for Indian immigrants. The video would become very popular, and Vivek Ramaswamy would even alledgedly communicate with Sam Hyde
following it. Dear Elon would also be the most popular thing MDE ever made, with 11 million views (World Peace only had 1 million).
And of course just yesterday, MDE announced that they would soon be premiering Extreme Peace, intended to be the sequel to World Peace, which they intend
to release on their own as an indie project.
Outro
Although there is so much lore from Million Dollar Extreme, and serious viewpoints, one must not get too caught up in the meaning and sentiment of
Million Dollar Extreme. Million Dollar Extreme is a comedy group after all. This article is meant to untangle a very entangled web, which nowadays is
so hard to untangle. What you need to understand about Sam Hyde and Million Dollar Extreme as a whole is that Sam Hyde rarely makes it seem like he
takes anything seriously. From the very beginning despite the messaging, it was always a goof, and this sense of being buried under layers of irony is a
large part of what makes MDE MDE. It is so integral that even despite the constant everyday filming and podcasting that Sam Hyde has been in for the past
few years, it is very rare that Sam Hyde has ever expressed emotions besides enjoying something or being pissed of at something. No offense, btw. But you
can notice that fans cherish the few moments that Sam Hyde does express genuine emotion because it shows the underlying character, personality and
struggles of Sam Hyde, which we all experience (though perhaps MDE fans struggle more in life than normies).
The creation of the internet has pushed pop culture to extreme lengths never seen before. Pop culture is a relatively recent creation, being about
80 years old, but in the past 20 years we have been able to see tens of thousands of nieche celebrities be given a platform and community, and be
able to interact with fans all around the world in real time, creating a era where you can know everything about a person without even knowing the person.
And this is bad for the human brain. Humans evolved to live in small, localized communities. The people you knew were people around you, the people they
knew, and the people in charge of your community. Now we see a place and time where we are caught up in other communities on the internet full of people
who might not even exist. All while our own local, real communities are dying. We have seen a loneliness epidemic all around the world because of this,
which causes much more dependence on these supposed communities online.
This article is an examination of one of these online communities. But it is also much more than that, it is a look at a rebellion against the mainstream
pop culture and the interactions of these online communities, as well as art and humor.
Anyways I hope you liked this. This was originally a script for a video I wanted to make back when I used to make Youtube videos, but I never finished
that so I decided to just take this and edit it a bit.
