Getting Nostalgic About “Nostalgia Critic”
A look back on the “Nostalgia Critic” series and how it changed over time
Reading Time: 4 minutes
Doug Walker debuted his persona, the “Nostalgia Critic,” a man-child with a handgun, a traumatic past, and a terrible temper, in 2007. His job was to review bad movies and television from the ‘80s and ‘90s, such as “Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue,” a mass crossover from the ‘80s about the dangers of marijuana. His reviews were mostly limited to clips of the source material and him joking around in front of a wall, with some occasional low-quality sketches.
Walker uploaded a half-hour video of that same persona riffing on the new “Ghostbusters” movie in 2016. This review did not have any clips of the film, since he could not legally obtain any. Instead, he reacted to satirical reenactments of the film’s main plot points by a professional cast. The review also had a legitimate storyline incorporating a “Church of the Heavenly Proton Pack,” a feminist corporation, meninists, a black Willy Wonka, the Hi-C Ecto-Cooler fruit juice, and a cameo by Satan’s pony-loving daughter.
How did we get here?
The “Nostalgia Critic” became a landmark of Internet culture in the mid-2000s—his videos hit millions of views and his face became a popular source for reaction images. Walker developed the website ThatGuyWithTheGlasses.com (now