On Cinema

On Cinema (also called On Cinema at the Cinema) is an American comedy web series and podcast starring Tim Heidecker and Gregg Turkington as amateur film critics. The duo appear as fictionalized versions of themselves. The show started as an independently released podcast from 2011 to 2013, before being picked up as a professionally produced web video series by Thing X in 2012, continuing after the site merged with Adult Swim's website in 2013. The show moved to HEI Network, an independent service, in 2021, with funding given by user subscriptions and special event ticket purchases.
On Cinema at the Cinema is the hub of a metafictional 'fictional universe', including the original podcast, 15 seasons of the web video series, yearly live Oscar specials, a spin-off limited series entitled "The Trial", the spin-off series Decker, a movie review app, an On Cinema Live! tour, and a film entitled Mister America.
On Cinema also features guest actors, some of whom play fictionalized versions of themselves, most notably actors Joe Estevez and Mark Proksch. The show and fictional universe have a dedicated cult following of fans who play along with the storylines via social media, often taking sides as "Timheads" or "Greggheads", or "Unityheads" for those that do not take a side. Heidecker and Turkington also started Decker-Con, where they appear in character and interact with fans.
Early podcast episodes of On Cinema were usually no longer than one or two minutes. Heidecker and Turkington would "review" films without actually providing any meaningful information or critical insight. With the video series, Heidecker and Turkington start using a rating scale of "bags of popcorn" ranging from 0–5. While Turkington respects the limit of five, Heidecker often goes overboard giving "6 bags" or dozens more, creating tension with Gregg. Almost every film gets a score of "5 bags"—known as a 'five-bagger'—or higher from both reviewers.
Played by Tim Heidecker as a fictionalized version of himself, Heidecker is the creator and host of On Cinema. Despite being host, he appears to know very little about the films he is discussing, although he is a fan of Tom Cruise and Jack Reacher. Heidecker often uses his show to discuss his conservative views and personal problems, or to promote his other projects, like his action series Decker, his band Dekkar or his company HEI Inc. Heidecker is an aggressive and egomaniacal alcoholic, constantly drinking and berating his costars during the Oscar specials.
Heidecker has faced multiple family problems throughout the show. Heidecker has an estranged teenage son from his first marriage, which ended after he underwent brain surgery against the wishes of his wife. He then met Ayaka while she was staying with his family as a foreign exchange student. The two eventually marry and have a child called Tom Cruise Jr. Heidecker. Tom Cruise Jr. died shortly after birth after Heidecker refused to have him vaccinated, and his death led to their marriage rapidly spiraling apart. After they divorced, Heidecker married Juliana, the sister of fellow Dekkar band member Axiom, which was short-lived. Heidecker then began a relationship with Toni Newman, the sole juror who refused to find Heidecker guilty and Heidecker's aide for his political campaign. They married twice, but following an affair and a trip to rehab, a newly sober Toni divorced Heidecker. Later, after Toni’s son Matt is shot and killed, they reconcile, with Heidecker taking the name of "Newman Heidecker" owing to a misunderstanding while getting his marriage license certified.
Played by Gregg Turkington as a fictionalized version of himself, Turkington is a frequent guest of On Cinema, sometimes acting as host when Heidecker is away. Turkington is a film buff and self-described movie expert, with a large amount of unimportant, uninteresting and often incorrect trivia to share about films discussed on the show. Despite his obvious lack of critical insight Turkington believes that On Cinema should be devoted exclusively to "the movies" rather than Heidecker's personal life and views. Turkington has an extensive collection of VHS cassettes located in Victorville, California, which he refers to as the Victorville Film Archives, boasting that it's one of the largest film archives in North America, though its exact size is unknown and has been destroyed on multiple occasions by Turkington. Turkington's favorite film is The Hobbit and he describes himself as a "Hobbithead", campaigning every year for the Academy Awards to recognize Peter Jackson and give the Best Picture award to The Hobbit trilogy, believing that the academy has "a write-in section". Turkington produces many of the show's recurring segments, including "Popcorn Classics" and "On Cinema On Location", and plays Special Agent Jonathan Kington on Decker. Despite his clear antipathy towards Tim, as well as the constant abuse he suffers under him, Turkington repeatedly returns to On Cinema in the hopes that he will be made co-host.
The On Cinema podcast was produced independently by Heidecker and Gregg. The podcast consists of Heidecker, along with Gregg as a "special guest" for almost every episode, covering movies poorly and with little insight, and often engaging in arguments. Gregg later developed a more pretentious "film buff" persona, and Tim took a turn to being obnoxiously political, sometimes devoting entire episodes to conspiracy theories, much to the chagrin of Gregg.
Heidecker has stated that On Cinema was started out of a desire to mock the podcasting community. The first episode was recorded on the set of The Comedy, where Heidecker and Turkington were working together, after Heidecker proposed the idea between takes. In April 2017, On Cinema initiated a Patreon page for funding, most of it going to the Oscar specials, with some of the higher options including receiving producer credits, walk-on roles for the Oscar specials, or live custom Skype reviews from Gregg Turkington.
In 2013, the On Cinema Film Guide app was released, featuring the voices of Turkington and Heidecker reviewing over 17,000 films.
The series moved premieres to Adult Swim's online live streams in 2017, with the series continuing to be posted on YouTube on a delay. The Adult Swim streams later picked up a fan-show series, Big Unhappy Family, in 2019, as a companion to season 11 and Mister America. However, in late 2020, following the COVID-19 pandemic and layoffs that shuttered the Adult Swim streams, it was announced that the show would move from Adult Swim's platforms to HEI Network, an independent streaming service created for the series.
The show has a dedicated cult following of fans who interact with the storylines via social media, often taking sides as "GreggHeads" or "TimHeads" in the frequent personal conflicts between the hosts which are often only tangentially, if at all, related to films or cinema. During the annual live Oscar special, Tim and Gregg both frequently provide interactive elements via online polls for fans to vote on. This cult following is especially found on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, the latter through Gregg and Tim's respective profiles, of which Gregg has completely devoted to the persona of his alter-ego. Heidecker and Turkington have also appeared in character on the podcasts Kreative Kontrol with Vish Khanna and The Best Show in 2015 and 2017.
Heidecker and Turkington also started Decker-Con, where new episodes of Decker are shown to fans and the cast appears as their On Cinema characters to field questions.
For "The Trial", Heidecker and Turkington upended the traditional review aspect of the series, and staged a mock event where Tim's character was on trial for murder, which lasted over a week. It received acclaim from observers, some of whom called it "brilliant" and "ambitious."
In 2018 and 2019, Heidecker and Turkington initiated a nationwide On Cinema Live! tour with special guests from the On Cinema/Decker universe such as Joe Estevez and John C. Reilly, the band Dekkar and special content created only for the tour, such as live reviewing various major release films, including Superfly, Mission: Impossible – Fallout, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, Sicario: Day of the Soldado, Ant Man & The Wasp.