Web Video / Unabridged

So unplugged, you'll wonder if it's even real.

Unabridged is a live-action series produced by Team Four Star. It is a faux behind-the-scenes look at the production cycle in TFS Studios through the eyes of new employee Stephan Krosecz (who is the director of the series). The pilot episode premiered exclusively to TFS's patrons on July 22, 2019, and went public on YouTube on March 21, 2020.

After the first season was put on hiatus due to the COVID-19 Pandemic effectively shutting down production, Team Four Star confirmed in late 2021 that they were working on completing the remainder of the season, which started filming in June 2022. It wasn't until December 15, 2023 that the fifth episode was released, with the series finale airing a week later on December 22, 2023.

The playlist is available here.

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Unabridged contains examples of:

• 555: The child Nick kidnaps in episode 2 gives his mother’s phone number, and this is the only part of it not censored.
• Actor Allusion: The fifth Episode has a few references that are reflective of TFS at the Table and the Natural Oneders campaign.
  • Chris Zito is once again plays the GM of the Gauntlets & Goblins campaign, just like the times he was the team's DM'd for Natural Oneders and Foolproof.
  • Nick plays a physical attacking character whose family was killed by the Big Bad of the campaign, Fuk'Ra, similar to Lani's character from the Natural Oneders, Wake Scalebound. Unlike Wake however, Fuk'Ra is a Gobarian (read: Barbarian) instead of a Monk class, and has no interest in taking on the Shadowmancer after his entire family was killed by him.
• Adam Westing: All the members of TFS play exaggerated versions of themselves, not unlike the versions of themselves seen in the April Fool's DBZ Kai II.9 episode.
• The Alcoholic: The rest of the team's antics have pretty much driven Kaiser to this. Though he mentions at the start of episode 5 he's gone dry.
• Alliterative Name: After Nick kidnaps a child in episode 2, Grant and Kirran try to make a child star out of him for the gaming content, and they come up with the name Davey Download.
• Alone with the Psycho: Double Subverted in Episode 1. Scott throws Stephan into an office room with Zito and is worried for the former when he leaves the room 22 minutes later, though Stephan insists he’s fine and him and Zito just talked for a bit. The moment Kaiser leaves, Stephan breaks down and reveals that the experience was just as traumatic as Scott expected.
• Atomic F-Bomb: Nick's response to Zito stabbing him in the leg in episode 4.
• Attention Whore: Nick is so eager for attention that he gets excited when he’s the prime suspect of the “murder case” Grant and Kirran are investigating.
• Authority in Name Only: Nick views himself as the leader of the company (or at times, "Vice CEO") but both Kaiser and Stephan point out that he has no actual authority over anyone.
• Ax-Crazy: Zito’s life inside and out of the office is shown to be quite violent, seemingly of his own making.
• Black Comedy: Oh fuck yes. The plot of the second episode is about Nick kidnapping a child and terrifying his mother, ending up getting the cops involved.
• Brick Joke: The Squirrel that was mentioned to be living in the walls of the offices in Episode 1 finally appears, reuniting with Grant and Kirran in time for the finale.
• The Cameo:
  • Gaijin Goombah, a friend and close affiliate of the group, makes an appearance in episode 3 in a photo of possible suspects for who smashed the Mr. Coffee maker.
  • Chris Rager appears in the picture on the newspaper article in Lani’s flashback and heard on the phone during hostage negotiations as Officer Lionel Garfield.
  • Jacob Quinn, the team's lawyer and manager, plays the referee for the boxing match between Lani and Mr. Fork.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Grant and Kirran's collective minds hardly ever go to the most logical places.
• Continuity Nod: The name of the tech company Kirran & Grant start in the "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue is Karxi, which is one of the Unusual Euphemisms they discussed in episode 4 when trying to get around The Swear Jar.
• Cure Your Gays: Kaiser was subjected to Muppets-style videos as a child that were intended to do this. He's pretty sure all they did was make him a furry and a King Richard fanboy.
• Da Chief: In episode 3, Grant and Kirran take turns playing this role to themselves in their investigation.
• Digging Yourself Deeper: The entire plot of the second episode. First, Nick unintentionally kidnaps a lost kid on the street and "adopts" him. Then, when Kaiser finally persuades him to call his mom and return him, Nick says that she needs to bring a $100,000 because most people don't even have a thousand squared away for emergencies, then hangs up on her. Unsurprisingly this gets the police involved, but during the call with them he ends up hanging up on them.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Lani being a loud kid at the start of vacation reportedly led to a cop tackling him.
• The Dividual: Grant and Kirran, who are frequently paired up together and rarely appear one without the other, with their jokes stemming from the two bouncing off each other.
• Establishing Character Moment: Every member of the team has an introduction that encapsulates their personality and working style:
  • Scott greets Stephan and tells him not to bother with names because he's not sober and just gives Stephan an awkward, sleepy-looking smile before taking him on a tour of the office.
  • Nick is introduced sleeping in the gaming room while porn plays very loudly on the TV. His subsequent introduction interview then involves him making up several titles for himself while Kaiser yells at him from off-screen that those titles don't actually exist.
    Kaiser: Nobody calls you that!
    Lani: They might! One day, they might...
  • Chris Zito’s first scene has him walking into the office kitchen with blood pouring out of a bullet wound on his arm, followed by him pouring a bottle of alcohol on it and stapling some paper towels over it, all while he swears that what he does on his off-hours is his own motherf*cking business. Nick and Kaiser’s reactions indicate that this is not an uncommon occurrence.
  • Grant and Kirran's introduction interview features them talking about how they come up with all of the best ideas, while defensively recounting an instance where they were berated for bringing a live squirrel into the gaming room.
• Failed Attempt at Drama: When Grant and Kirran interrogate Stephan about the “murder” of the coffee machine, Kirran slams his hand down on the table as an intimidation tactic, only to hurt it and go “OW!” Grant does the same with his fist shortly after.
• Formula-Breaking Episode: Episode 5, where instead of a typical day in the office, the employees are partaking in a game of Gauntlets and Goblins, complete with a set-up and presentation similar to other actual play shows, though with the same interview cuts at the main show.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: Some of the jokes are funny tidbits only onscreen for a short while.
  • The asterisk next to the “real” in the “A completely real docuseries” part of the opening has a different footnote Couch Gag.
  • When Nick flashes back to why he’s afraid of cops in episode 2, there are additional newspaper articles besides the one about him as a child being so loud that a cop tackled him. One of them is a piece reporting on the death of Princess Diana written by someone clearly upset with the editor.
    • The details of Nick’s own article show that the cop who tackled him in his childhood happens to have the same name as the one calling them for the hostage situation, likely being the same person.
• Grand Finale: Episode 6, where after a long hiatus, the members of TFS all need to create their own videos for the channel.
• Heel–Face Turn: T.J. Pryde the gay conversion doll shows up in an ad for Skillshare, clearly unhappy about his previous views and trying to grow as a person.
• Hidden Depths: While Grant us trying to come up with a con for Kirran in episode 3, Kirrain gets quiet and starts muttering suggestions that he's an idiot.
• Honorary Uncle: Nick considers Scott a terrible one to his “son” in episode 2 when Scott insists on returning the child to his actual mother.
• Hurricane of Puns: Grant and Kirran make several coffee puns while circling the “crime scene” in episode 3.
• Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: The titles of Episodes 1-4 have a word beginning with the letters “Un“ somewhere in them. Episode 5 and Episode 6 break this a little bit, but both Episodes still have an "un" in the title as "Gauntlets & Goblins" and "SEO Speedwagun" respectively.
• Inherently Funny Words: In Episode 5, Kirran and Grant get a kick out of saying "Goblin," which they repeat several times before Zito tells them both to shut up.
• I Need a Freaking Drink: KaiserNeko. Happens in the second episode when Lani’s antics cause him to just pull out a flask and drain it.
• I Have Your Wife: Most of the Black Comedy in episode 2 plays for laughs the fears of a mother whose son has been kidnapped and is seemingly held for ransom.
• I Take Offense to That Last One: Zito's response to hearing that Scott takes his coffee "Four times a day, Irish as Zito."
  Zito: "Mother[bleep]er said WHAT?!"
• In Memoriam: A played for laughs in-universe example. The series finale is dedicated to Nick, where the epilogue specifically notes that he had died two years after the events of the show from sniffing markers, with a "In Memoriam" message appearing afterwards. The real Nick is still alive when the Episode was filmed.
• It's All About Me: Nick is a self-absorbed dumbass who never thinks about the consequences of his actions and often does stuff without thinking, along with claiming that "Vice CEO" isn't good enough of a title for him and that he thinks "Emperor" sounds better.
• Karma Houdini:
  • Lani's only comeuppance for his actions in Episode 2 is getting unsuccessfully chewed out by Kaiser and reluctantly dropping the kid off at the mall after he turns out to have a dog allergy.
  • Despite the Police Brutality mentioned below, it's implied that the officer who tackled Nick in his childhood kept his job and is in fact the same cop that calls TFS to negotiate the safe return of Nick's "adopted son".
  • At the end of Episode 3, it's explicitly stated that Grant and Kirran were never caught for the coffee machine case.
• Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: In the first episode, a very bad and generic animation stands in for Dragon Ball Z Abridged.
• Mockumentary: The series is styled as if it’s a documentary.
• Must Have Caffeine: Pretty much the only one who isn't horrified by the broken Mr. Coffee in episode 3 is Stephan. And Kirran and Grant, who randomly broke it the night before just for a laugh while blackout high.
• Mythology Gag: Kaiser inexplicably wears an eyepatch throughout episode 3, with the only acknowledgement of it being a “Where did the eyepatch come from?” caption below his name. It's a nod to DBZA's infamous “Where did that scouter come from?” joke, which has been a source of embarrassment for Scott for close to a decade.
• Noodle Incident: In Episode 1, Zito walks into the kitchen with blood pouring out of a bullet wound on his arm. Little explanation is given for this other than an implication that his life is generally this violent.
• Not So Above It All: Kaiser is the beleaguered and constantly ignored voice of reason in the office. Except when it comes to the subject of coffee, where he's just as insane as his coworkers. Both he and Stephan also fall into the same tabletop shenanigans that the others are subjecting Zito to and proceed to take his campaign off the rails.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Zito stabs Nick in the leg after getting fed up with the swear jar debacle in episode 4.
• Obliviously Evil: Nick’s kidnapping a child has primarily self-aggrandizing motives, but it comes from a place of having some idea of good intentions and he clearly doesn’t realize how bad his actions look to the worried mother. He also fails to recognize how irresponsible a father he would make and how dangerous he comes off as when demanding to see money with the kid’s return.
• Off the Rails: All Zito wants wants the guys to do when he is GM-ing a game of Dungeons & Drag- uh -Gauntlets & Goblins is for them to fight the Shadowmancer... but the party want to do anything but that instead starting a fight with/seducing the royal guards and attempting to flee.
• Once an Episode: The events of each pre-hiatus episode start “on a Monday” and kick off with a special meeting occurring in place of their usual Monday huddle. We never actually get to see what a Monday huddle is normally like.
• Only Sane Man: Stephan, and to a lesser extent, Scott. Surprisingly, Zito of all people then takes up this role during Episode 5, after his game of Gauntlets & Goblins goes completely sideways after everyone does a bunch of things that got them in trouble in-game.
• Police Brutality: The newspaper report in episode 2 describes a policeman tackling Nick as a child just for being obnoxiously loud after getting out of school, causing his fear of cops in the present day. The article also mentions that the officer’s claims to have only given a verbal warning contradict eyewitness testimony.
• Political Overcorrectness: Lani and Kaiser invoke this in episode 4 when they introduce a company-wide policy that bans any kind of behavior YouTube may deem demonitization-worthy. This includes swearing, lewd gestures, discussing drugs in any context, being openly gay, and owning an anime body pillow.
• Poor Communication Kills: When talking to the mother and the cop on the phone in episode 2, Nick demands to see an exorbitant amount of money when the return happens but neglects to explain further (he wants the people he leaves the kid with to be monetarily well-prepared), understandably leading to them thinking he’s holding the child for a ransom. Scott's infuriated exasperation just sells it.
  • In Episode 4, the failure of the crew to sit Nick down and tell him to quit with the whole 'forking over cash for swear words' results in him getting stabbed in the leg.
• Railroading: When, during a Tabletop Role-Playing Game, the guys ignore Zito’s plot hook he's created as Game Master of fighting the Shadowmancer who killed Lani’s character's family he tries to force them into the scenario in various ways.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Scott (rational, collected, and serious) is the blue, next to Nick's (narcissistic, impulsive, and loud) red.
• Rewatch Bonus: In episode 3, knowing that Grant and Kirran broke the coffee machine adds to the Irony of them investigating their own crime. Notably, there is a moment that Kirran that says he doesn't think he did it, which turns about to be the best way to word it since he and Grant were blackout high when they smashed the thing. There's also the fact that he says that they don't remember their Ding-Dong Bing-Bong the night prior.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: In episode 2, Stephan leaves the office (and the rest of the episode) the moment it’s confirmed that Nick's “son” is kidnapped and not legally adopted.
• Self-Deprecation:
  • In the series finale, when the TFS crew is putting out ideas to help get their channel back on track. Stephan suggests making a live-action scripted comedy series (like Unabridged), which Kaiser shoots down by saying "that sounds like a lot of time and effort that I don't wanna do."
  • In the series finale, Kaiser's Abridged segment is a brief Abridged version of Unabridged, with jokes about how the series ostensibly takes a bunch of established tropes in past sitcoms but applies it to the Team Four Star crew and Unabridged instead.
• Serious Business: As Stephan learns the hard way, one does not casually dismiss the destruction of a Mr. Coffee around Scott, and gets throttled by him to illustrate that point.
• Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: In Episode 6, a Ninja-like Twitch streamer/influencer named Mr. Fork becomes Lani's arch enemy, where Lani does everything he can to inconvenience him games like Fortnite. While Lani thinks he's getting to Mr. Fork, the latter is completely unaffected by his threats and doesn't think much of Lani, often forgetting who he is. This one-sided "rivalry" eventually escalates into Lani challenging Mr. Fork to a boxing match, which Mr. Fork takes as an opportunity to plug their brands.
• Special Guest:
  • LittleKuriboh as “Notgeta” in the first episode.
  • Chris Rager (the voice of Mr. Satan) in episode 2 as Officer Lionel Garfield, seen in the picture on the newspaper article in Lani’s flashback and heard on the phone during hostage negotiations.
  • Matthew Mercer of Critical Role fame plays the narrator of episode 5, who details how the guys are playing a Tabletop Role-Playing Game, Gauntlets & Goblins.
  • Jesse Nowack plays Mr. Fork, Lani's Sitcom Archnemesis during his segment in Episode 6.
• Squash Match: Played for Laughs. Lani and Mr. Fork are set up for a celebrity boxing match, with Lani having trained for the match while Mr. Fork having streamed all day before the match. Much to his detriment however, Lani had trained for several days straight, his body barely being able to move or fight after training. By the time Lani throws his first punch, he collapses onto the ground, with the referee managing to count him out since he can't get up. All without Mr. Fork even throwing a punch himself.
• The Stoner: Mr. Fork, who has a drawn out manner of speaking, while also having short-term memory loss and mannerisms associated with the character type. He's also got a sponsored energy drink called High Score, which is a THC-infused energy drink.
• Suspiciously Specific Denial: While Stephan’s denial of having broken the office’s coffee machine is sound, he later mentions having hated his former job as a barista and suspiciously denies having broken any coffee machine at this location. He didn't do it after all, as while Grant and Kirran were blackout high the previous night they'd gone to the office and smashed the machine for kicks. He may have broken a machine at his old barista job though.
• Take That!: Episode 4 is one long one directed at YouTube and its over-the-top demonetization practices, pointing out how what is (and isn't) at risk of getting flagged is rife with Unfortunate Implications.invoked
• Unknown Rival: In Episode 6, Lani does everything he can to interact and get on Mr. Fork's nerves, while Mr. Fork takes everything in stride and is not sure who Lani is, making the rivalry incredibly one-sided. When things escalate to the point that Lani challenges him to a celebrity boxing match, Mr. Fork agrees only to promote his brand, and ends up forgetting that he has a match with Lani multiple times. Mr. Fork ends up winning against Lani, though mainly due to Lani overtraining himself to the point he can barely move, and Mr. Fork didn't even throw a single punch.
• Very Loosely Based on a True Story: The vehicle for the narrative is new employee Stephan.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: In Episode 5, after Lani introduces his character, Fuk'Ra, he inexplicably takes off his shirt and stays shirtless the rest of the Episode.
• "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The final episode features this after everyone managed to create videos for the channel, with a brief synopsis of what the characters did after they were finished, complete with freeze frames and a melancholic song playing:
  • Kirran and Grant opened a tech company named "Karxi" valued at $5 billion. They then however got bored and started up a new YouTube channel, Good Times Zone.
  • Scott would go on to found a charity for underprivileged furries that also served as a way to have him avoid paying taxes.
  • Zito was last seen caught in a shootout with the local police and gunmen. An explosion was seen, but his body was never found... but he can be found streaming on Twitch.
  • Stephan was attacked by the office's squirrel (twice) and was driven to the hospital.
  • Lani became addicted to sniffing permanent markers and died 2 years later.
• You Do NOT Want To Know: In Episode 2, after Zito arrives to give Lani what looks like a burner phone, Scott asks how Zito knows about the kid situation.
  KaiserNeko: Wait, hold on a second. You weren't at the Monday huddle this morning. How do you know about this?
  Zito: Scott. Don't ask questions that you don't want the answer to.
  Kaiser: ...Yeah, that's fair.
• You Wanna Get Sued?: In Episode 5, when Stephan brings up how the very legally distinct Gauntlets & Goblins is just a stand-in for Dungeons & Dragons, Zito cuts him off before he can complete his sentence.
• YouTuber Apology Parody: Parodied to hell and back with Stephan's segment in Episode 6, where he plays a Ukulele singing about how "sorry" he is and that he saw these videos saw a lot of views and as a result gives him a lot of revenue.

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