I’m a little late to this party, but my life was just transformed by the amazing, “Guy on a Buffalo,” YouTube meme.
Here’s the second of four videos:
Michael Humphrey from Forbes published an interview with the author of these videos, and began his article with some background:
The story of this series of viral videos may start in middle 19th Century America. A man named Buffalo Jones roamed the range hunting, and eventually trying to preserve, North American bison.
Jones became legendary and one manifestation was a 1978 movie very loosely based on his life called “Buffalo Rider.” Here’s a link to the trailer. What the movie lacks in cleanly executed shots and plausibility, it gains in a guy riding a freaking buffalo.
Jomo Edwards, leader of the Austin-based band The Possum Posse, came across the movie on a website for public domain films. As he explains, inspiration took over. Last month, Edwards started posting videos aptly titled, “Guy on a Buffalo” with songs Edwards wrote and recorded to accompany clips from the movie.
The whole thing is interesting even not not an entirely wise use of one’s time.
But there is an almost profound observation at the close of the interview, when Michael asks Jomo how a video like this could go viral.
Another meme this year is the honey badger and I wonder if you have any thoughts on why certain animals make for such good comedy.
I think it comes down to machismo. It’s sort of like the whole Chuck Norris craze. . . . I don’t know exactly why, but for some reason, people like to watch people and animals that are “badass” (to quote the honey badger video), to root for them, and to spout off over-the-top claims about their invulnerability.
I noticed comments on the Buffalo videos almost instantly. One person posted “I am serious. I am not writing hastily. The Guy on the Buffalo is all that is left in this world that is good and pure and true.” There must be something cathartic about siding with the top dog… or badger… or buffalo. Maybe we want to believe that there are animals and people in the world who are powerful, trustworthy and just. Or maybe we don’t get to experience enough manliness in real life. Whatever has made is such a success, I’m certain that it was dumb luck on my part.
. . . I have seen the Buffalo Rider scenes where the buffalo drags the Guy under trees, over stumps, etc., and I imagine that the deleted scenes were even worse. I don’t think man was intended to ride buffalo.
Here are the rest of the videos:
