Jack Marione

**Jack Marione** (born January 20, 1996), better known as **Fantasticast**, is an Australian YouTube personality, credited with piorneering a genre of YouTube videos on expensive stunts, film, and gaming. His channel has 153 million subscribers as of February 15, 2023, making him the most subscribed Australian YouTuber on the platform. By 2019, Marione would focus on releasing content into his application.

He is also known for creating his own application for his content known as the *Fantasticast Application* or the *Fantasticast App*, for short, which was released on March 10, 2015, following the flood of success from his Challenge Games, which failed prior to the launch of the application. Marione released the app anyways so that the viewers can find his content easier. However, users couldn't watch the Challenge Games series

Marione on March 10, 2019 had signed up to TikTok and created an account under the alias "Fantastitok", however soon reverted his username to *Fantasticast*. Following this, Marione released an update to the app and added an entirely new area titled "TikTok Arena", where he soon confirmed he'd release content from his TikTok account would be added to the Fantasticast App. He also added a "Store" page, where users can purchase access to the *Hunger Games: The War* film, that was released to members of his YouTube channel in 2018, unlike YouTube, users could purchase the film once to watch.

On March 16, 2019, Marione confirmed that more "premium content" would release in the future and only will be viewable to Fantasticast Gold users on the App. Marione confirmed content released as "Gold" would be more premium. He revealed that the Gold plan costs $14.99/monthly. On June 20, 2019, Marione announced the end of his YouTube channel and plans to focus entirely on TikTok and his app.

## Early life and education

Jack Marione was born on June 20, 1996 in South Australia, where he was also raised.

## Content creator career

### YouTube Era

#### 2007–2009: Early years

Marione created his YouTube account on March 10, 2007 and originally named his account "Life with Jack", until he renamed it on March 27 that year into "Fantasticast", which would turn out to be his name for the rest of his YouTube career. He stated at the time in a video he uploaded "I never wanted to create videos for a living. I just found myself on the platform and wanted to just upload for fun, that was until I found out how much success I was getting." All his original videos from 2007 through to the end of that year were getting an average view count of 196,500 which is highly successful. Marione then at the end of all future videos requested that those who enjoy his content should subscribe to his channel.

Marione originally played *Call of Duty* and uploaded twice a week for fun, until 2009 where he'd move on from gaming. In February 2008, Marione moved from *Call of Duty* to other games such as Far Cry 2 and GTA V. While uploading these games, Marione went from uploading twice a week to a daily uploading schedule. He reached the 100,000 subscriber milestone in March 2008. This alongside the two additional games made his channel blow up and at around this time, the channel was at 225,000 subscribers.

In January 2009, Marione made a video announcing that throughout 2009, he would aim to release a monthly vlog that would be titled "Month Review – January (through to December)." These videos recieved over a few million views each month, and raised his subscriber count to 565,000 from the 225,000 the month prior. In June 2009, he made a video that reached 20 million views, marking the first time a video from his channel reached that much views.

#### 2010–2012: The beginning of the Challenge Games series

By January 2010, Marione made a full on career out of YouTube and had confirmed to the public he was on the road to becoming way more famous. He planned many new genres to join such as vlogs and entertainment, as they were the most interesting to him at the time. He uploaded his first vlog on June 29, 2010 and at the very end, he announced a TV Series he had produced that is set to air at the end of 2010 in December. Fans of the channel response were mainly positive, but some didn't like that at the time, he didn't upload any gaming videos for two weeks. Marione responded to all the comments, stating that his gaming videos don't do as well as his other type of videos and only wished to grow bigger, but he also stated he had plans to return to gaming in some form at some point 2011.

On 18 December 2010, Marione released his first episode of his new series titled *Challenge Games*, which would reach 10 million views in the first week. He also announced that he wasn't going to upload until April 2011 and his first video back would be the second episode of Challenge Games. Fans commented that many would love some gaming videos, however Marione didn't respond to those requests.

On 6 April 2011, Marione released the second Challenge Games episode and officially confirmed a second season of the series would be releasing in September that year. On April 17, 2011, he released a video playing *Call of Duty: Black Ops*, but the video didn't even recieve anything near a million views. Some fans thanked Marione for giving gaming content but a day later, he made an announcement that he would not be releasing any gaming videos until August 2011 as he wants to focus on his vlog videos and Challenge Games content. This caused him to lose over 10,000 subscribers the following day. This caused Marione to announce early, that he wasn't going to stop gaming videos but again made it certain that he won't be uploading gaming content until August 2011.

In August 2011, Marione confirmed he wouldn't continue making gaming content. A few weeks afterwards, he released the trailer for the second season of the Challenge Games series, which recieved over 60 million views. However, some commented stating it was bad timing to discontinue gaming content and many made many comments on how Marione focused too heavly on the series instead of his own content. Marione didn't respond to any of the comments, but made a post on his website stating he is making his own content and he won't be bossed around by people who are just viewers in the channel.

The season one finale of Challenge Games was released on September 10, 2011. On September 24, the first episode of the second season was released and recieved 76 million views in the first day. After a week, the episode reached a grand total of 346 million views. At this point, Marione reached the 1,000,000 subscriber milestone.

In October 2011, he revealed a new website he owns, and announced future projects will be revealed through the sites blog. While, most of the community loved the idea of having a website for his YouTube channel, many were against it, stating Marione shouldn't really make YouTube anything else other than just a channel for videos.

In January 2012, Marione announced that his Monthly Review series would be ending in December 2012, due to the time requirement to make those type of videos. He announced he'd replace those videos with a yearly review starting 2012, he stated "Since it's a year away still, you can expect some plans to change. They always do. Yearly Reviews are just the beginning of the concept." He also again, that he'll do a 2012 Yearly Review video if people requested it, but later confirmed he won't.

Marione confirmed that the season two finale would release in mid-2012 in June, however, Marione confirmed that the season would be delayed due to behind-the-scene issues. The finale would later release on October 14, 2012.

On December 17, 2012, the final Monthly Review video was released, which at the end, Marione confirmed he would continue the trend with a yearly varient instead.

#### 2013–2015: Reaching 10,000,000 subscribers and the downfall of the Challenge Games

Marione on January 17, 2013 confirmed that all the profit he made from 2012's season would go directly into a new series coming in early 2014. Marione also confirmed that he had recieved a grand total of $1.202 billion dollars from the entirety of 2012, thanks to the Challenge Games seasons, which at the time, hadn't been renewed for a third season.

Marione on January 24, renewed the Challenge Games for a third and fourth season, both planned for a 2014 and 2015 release. Marione added that "Thanks to the longer production time, we can invest more into the series, and I've always wanted to ensure the series is the very best it could be." Marione also confirmed that the series may not see past six–eight seasons, stating it is only a "matter of time before a series falls off." Marione also announced that fans can expect the third season to release much earlier than any other season before.

By February 14, Marione's channel had reached 10,000,000 subscribers. Marione confirmed that the third and fourth season of the Challenge Games would be filmed back to back. On November 18, that year, Marione announced that filming had finished for both seasons and announced the third season will begin on January 28, 2014.

During an interview, Marione confirmed that Season 3 would focus more on action than what they'd originally did with the first two seasons. He added that the season would consist of eight episodes instead of the normal six and would have the same outline; however will be completely different. Regarding many concerns from fans stating that action would ruin the third season, Marione confirmed that the fourth season would be a "back to the roots" type of season.

On January 28, 2014, Challenge Games Season 3 began and the first episode was generally recieved well with over 126 million views. Marione thanked the fans for sticking around. He announced at the same time that after episode 304 airs, the series would have no releases until May 20 that year. This caused backlash from the community, who commented things saying how it is a bad idea to post-pone content that doesn't need delaying. However, Marione confirmed after the season returns in May that year, no more breaks would happen and it was only done so that there isn't a long break between Season 3 and Season 4.

On May 20, 2014, Challenge Games Season 3 returned but didn't go well in views. Compared to the first four episodes, which all gained over 100 million views, the fifth episode only gained 45 million views. Marione blamed this on the lack of a Trailer during the break, but backlash from the community would tell Marione that he was at fault. Marione soon later, confirmed the fourth season would be the last. This caused the community to go wild against Marione, who'd given up on such as strong series over a single episode. By June 10, Marione apologised to the public and revealed he wasn't planning the fourth season to be the last, he also added that it may only get a fifth season.

Season 3 of the Challenge Games concluded on November 17 that year and the finale gained 66 million views. Marione thanked those who stuck around with the series and announced that the series had been renewed for a fifth and final season. Marione added that he was going to end the series with the fourth season, but didn't write the season to end the series, prompting him to do a fifth season to conclude the story. He announced that he will be making a new plan up for the remaining time he has left with story telling.

On June 25, 2015 Season 4 of the Challenge Games began and recieved 166 million views, marking a new record in views for the series. Marione originally had the plan to have a mid-season break in Season 4, just like Season 3, but Marione changed plans to ensure the same events doesn't happen again. The season ended that December and all episodes averaged 102 million views. Marione confirmed a few days later that Season 5 has been cancelled, making the fourth season the final.

#### 2016–2018: New Era, Vlogs, and Change in Plans

Marione knew he had to make some changes in order to grow bigger and knew doing a fifth season of the Challenge Games wouldn't be the way to do it. He continued on and said that in order to move into a new "era" as he called it, he had to do things differently from previously. He also made a public apology about how he was and promised that he'd make multiple improvements to his videos, his attitude, and most of all, the Merch he sells. Marione stated he wants to ensure that the future of his channel will cost more money and be more about quality.

Marione soon after announced a new series called *The Hunger Games: The Series*. He confirmed it would be out at some point and the series is in very early stages of production. He confirmed that the series would be turned into a fully made film, and be untitled. He confirmed the movie won't release until at-least mid-2018 or 2019 at latest. He later confirmed the release to be in 2019.

In January 2016, Marione had just over 42 million subscribers on his channel and had big plans to continue some old fashioned vlogs. He began releasing daily YouTube Shorts, which began blowing up and becoming viral. Each of his shorts got over 12.5 million views.

In March 2016, Marione's channel was reported by heaps of users causing his channel to be removed causing Marione to contact YouTube. Soon after, Marione announced on Facebook that production on his movie hasn't stopped and was hopeful that his channel would be unhidden. By early 2017, his channel was returned and nothing was removed. YouTube confirmed the removal was a mistake due to a massive bug with their systems.

Marione confirmed on June 10, 2017, that his new movie was finished production and was titled "The Hunger Games: The War"; and would release in 2018. Marione also revealed in a video a week later, on June 17, that he would not be doing YouTube from 2023; he soon made a blog article that had over 7,500 words, explaining his decision and in a interview told everyone he "wanted to ensure he could do more, and YouTube wasn't helping him." He also explained that he revealed the plan many years early so that he could plan ahead of time and make sure the months leading to 2019 would be nothing other than "fan-service".

He went on and announced that he had already began scripting and making more content for 2018 and had also confirmed the final video would be a two and a half hour long video of his "best moments" and would also show a few snippets of some future TikTok content.

On May 12, 2018 The Hunger Games: The War was released for "Members" only, causing backlash from the entire audience. However, Marione would soon confirm that the movie wouldn't get released for everyone, unless they are a member.

 **Total Views** | 112 million

### TikTok Era

#### 2019–2022: New Beginning and the return to success

Following the reveal that he now has a TikTok channel and plans to expand his Challenge Games universe, Marione announced that they wanted to do more inside of the same universe. Marione later posted a roadmap on YouTube that showed his huge plan to return to his normal content from 2011.

Marione worked with many TikTok users to grow his own account so that he can release content for a wider range of audiences.

## The Fantasticast Application

### Concept

#### Creation

In 2013, Marione made a post on Twitter stating he began making early concepts of an application for his content. He made a second announcement that he plans to make a free-to-use application with optional premium offers with solo film purchases. Soon after the announcement, Marione released a video of himself navigating through the application, this sparked global interest in the app.

### Private Release

#### Australia Access

Marione confirmed he would release his application only for Australia for the first two months so that he can collect data and feedback to improve the experience before he launched it to the world. Soon afterwards, the app would become a famous concept by many other big content creators such as MrBeast. However, many fans of Marione would worry that he'd lose interest and stop uploading content for his channel.

## YouTube content

### Style

Marione aims to schedule his content in a way that will make him gain consistant high view count averages, for example, Marione released two videos in a row that both got 6.6 million views each. He also aims to make the most family friendly content on the platform. By 2013, Marione had reached a point in his content where it had become friendly for children to watch (PG). Marione stated later that year that he plans to make content that suits both children and adults.

### Backlash

Due to the lack of his normal content in 2013, Marione's content failed to meet his expectations. Due to this, Marione confirmed the series wouldn't see past the fourth season and announced a new plan for 2019 and 2020.

### Merch

Marione launched Merch in November 2011 after the launch of his website, and stated that all donations from Merch would all go back into making videos. The Merch caused lots of backlash from the community. The reason behind the backlash was the lack of single-item purchases, all items belong into a "Bundle" with each costing from $100 through to $250. Though, with the 2012 Season, Marione made over 123 million from the Merch alone. However, even with these numbers, fans continued to give hate towards the style of Merch. By June 2013, Marione made a seperate section to the Merch store where fans can buy items they want. In September 2013, Marione announced that he updated the contents of all bundles, stating they all include one free item of the customers choice. Fans appreciated the change to a normal Merch store style.

### Seasons and profits

During an interview with Marione in 2013, he called 2012 his "2012 Season." He also added that each season would be classed by the amount of money he'd gain from it. He announced that 2012 was crazy and earned him over a billion dollars. In December 2012, Marione confirmed he had big plans for 2013 following the massive success of 2012. But continued and stated the year would not have any new season of Challenge Games and instead would have a completely new acted series coming. Marione announced that the 2013 Season had gotten only $135 million dollars, which is lower than 2011's season.

## TikTok content

### Style

Marione planned to expand his world of story-telling through TikTok and return to the original content he created when he was at his peak of views, which was during the release of the first two seasons of Challenge Games.

### Return to Success

Marione, by 2021 made him return to a successful area of his career. Marione had released over a few hundred videos and most barely reached a few million views, but upon the release of the first episode of the *Challenge Games: The Sequel*, fans were happy to see a new varient of the classic series but was even more happy to have a modern-twist involved.

## References

1. ↑ Marione's view count
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 He reached 100,000 subscribers in March 2008, a year after he created his channel
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Marione reaching 1,000,000 subscribers
4. ↑ His name was confirmed in 2007
5. ↑ His channel has gaming, vlogs, and entertainment videos
6. ↑ Highest Subscribed Australian YouTuber account
7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Challenge Games failed prior to the launch of the app for the channel
8. ↑ Marione created a new username for his TikTok Account before it was reverted later on
9. ↑ Marione reverting his username to the original one
10. ↑ Marione revealing his plan to release all TikTok content into the Fantasticast App
11. ↑ Marione released his Hunger Games: The War movie onto his app
12. ↑ Marione revealing the Gold Plan in the Fantasticast Application
13. ↑ Marione revealing the price of the Gold Plan
14. ↑ Marione revealing his plan for his app.
15. ↑ Marione's birth and birthplace
16. ↑ His account was created in 2007 with the name "Life with Jack" until he renamed it to "Fantasticast".
17. ↑ Marione confirming not wanting to make a full time career out of YouTube.
18. ↑ Marione announcing his plan to do YouTube full time.
19. ↑ Marione played *Call of Duty* for the first few months of his channel
20. ↑ He moved to *GTA V* and *Far Cry 2*
21. ↑ He uploaded twice a week instead of once
22. ↑ He reached 200,000 Subscribers later that year
23. ↑ The announcement of his Monthly Review Series
24. ↑ He reached 500,000 Subscribers from the monthly reviews in 2009
25. ↑ His highest video reached 20,000,000 views
26. ↑ Marione announced he was going to have a full time YouTube career
27. ↑ Marione planning to add two new genres to his YouTube channel
28. ↑ Marione released his first vlog video on June 29, 2010 and announced his new series coming in December that year.
29. ↑ Marione didn't release any gaming videos for two weeks following his commitment to other genre videos
30. ↑ Marione confirming he is planning to continue gaming videos in 2011
31. ↑ The first *Challenge Games* episode got over 10 million views in a single week – marking a new success for the channel
32. ↑ He announced he won't be releasing any YouTube content until April 2011, he also confirmed it would be the second episode of the Challenge Games series
33. ↑ Fans disliked the lack of Gaming content
34. ↑ Marione released the second episode of the Challenge Games series and confirmed a second season is coming in September 2011
35. ↑ Marione released a Black Ops gaming video, however the video failed to reach view expectations
36. ↑ Marione announced he wanted to focus on the content that made him millions of views
37. ↑ The channel lost over 10,000 subscribers the following day
38. ↑ Marione confirmed he will be releasing gaming content in August 2011
39. ↑ Marione announcing the final decision on Gaming content.
40. ↑ Challenge Games Season Two Trailer got over 60 million views
41. ↑ Marione confronting the comments about "not making his own content."
42. ↑ Marione revealing the new website and the plan to use the Blog section
43. ↑ Fans disliking the idea of the website
44. ↑ Marione announcing that 2012 would be the final year he'd do monthly review videos
45. ↑ Marione announcing the new Yearly Review Format coming in 2013
46. ↑ Marione confirming he won't make a 2012 Review even though the fans wanted him to
47. ↑ The season finale was delayed from a June 2012 release to a October 2012 release.
48. ↑ Announcing the Yearly Review Style
49. ↑ Announcing a new series coming in 2014
50. ↑ Marione announcing the amount of money he recieved from the year 2012.
51. ↑ Marione announcing Seasons 3 and 4 of the Challenge Games
52. ↑ Marione announcing the plan for the next two seasons
53. ↑ Marione stating how long he foresees the series going on
54. ↑ Marione announcing Season 3 may begin super early in 2014
55. ↑ Marione's channel reaches 10,000,000 subscribers
56. ↑ Marione confirming he's filming the Challenge Games seasons three and four back to back
57. ↑ Marione announcing the release date of Season 3 of the Challenge Games
58. ↑ Marione confirmed a new format and genre would be done with the third season
59. ↑ Marione added to the idea of Season 3
60. ↑ Marione confirmed Season 4 would be like Season 1
61. ↑ Challenge Game's 3x01 got 126 million views
62. ↑ Marione thanked the community
63. ↑ Marione confirmed a huge 3 month break in the season.
64. ↑ Fans hating the delay of episodes
65. ↑ Marione explained the reason behind the break in between Episode 304 and Episode 305.
66. ↑ The downgrade of Season 3
67. ↑ Marione announcing that the Challenge Games Season 4 would be the final season
68. ↑ Marione apologises and confirms there will be at-least a fifth season of Challenge Games
69. ↑ The finale got 66 million views
70. ↑ Marione renewed the Challenge Games for a fifth and final season.
71. ↑ Marione confirmed why he's doing a fifth season
72. ↑ Marione's plan failed
73. ↑ Episode 401 becoming the most viewed Challenge Games episode ever
74. ↑ Marione revealed the original plan for Season 4
75. ↑ All episodes had averaged 100 million views
76. ↑ Marione announced the series end
77. ↑ A interview with Marione 1.12.2016
78. ↑ Marione confirmed he will be doing only new content
79. ↑ Marione promising the fans a new beginning
80. ↑ Marione revealing he is still putting money into his content
81. ↑ Marione announced his take on a Hunger Games series.
82. ↑ Marione confirming the development stage
83. ↑ Marione confirmed the series to be turned into a movie. He also removed the name of the project.
84. ↑ Marione confirming potential release dates.
85. ↑ Marione confirmed the movie release year
86. ↑ Marione wanting to continue vlogs
87. ↑ Marione's shorts all became pretty viral.
88. ↑ The view count of each Short video
89. ↑ Marione's channel being hidden by YouTube
90. ↑ Marione reveals that production for the movie hasn't stopped
91. ↑ YouTube confirming a bug that removed his channel
92. ↑ Marione revealing the movie release date.
93. ↑ Marione announced his conclusion to the YouTube video.
94. ↑ Marione explaining his reasoning behind leaving YouTube for TikTok
95. ↑ Marione revealed the titles of his final six videos coming in 2018, that have "started production".
96. ↑ Marione recieved backlash from setting The Hunger Games: The War only to members of the channel.
97. ↑ Marione making the movie member only
98. ↑ Marione revealed the long-term plan to return to the Challenge Games style of content.
99. ↑ Marione released a roadmap with his plan.
100. ↑ Marione working with other TikTok users to grow
101. ↑ Marione announced the app concepts are being made in 2013.
102. ↑ Marione confirming premium content.
103. ↑ Marione released early-access footage of the app.
104. ↑ Marione released the app to only Australia.
105. ↑ Other content creators loved the app idea. His fans worried for the future of Marione's YouTube channel.
106. ↑ Marione released two videos back to back knowing they'll get lots of views from his fans
107. ↑ Marione stating he aims to make the most PG content ever on YouTube
108. ↑ Him becoming PG only
109. ↑ Marione confirming he will make adult suited videos alongside child PG videos
110. ↑ Marione's expectations were not met for 2013
111. ↑ Marione's new plans for the years 2019 and 2020
112. ↑ Merch launch in November 2011 following the release of the website
113. ↑ The Fans giving hate towards the way Marione does Merch.
114. ↑ The prices of the "Bundles" were super high
115. ↑ He made over 100 million dollars from the merch alone.
116. ↑ Fans continued to hate Marione for his choice
117. ↑ Marione made a new area in the Merch Store
118. ↑ Marione made a change to bundles
119. ↑ Fans loved the change to the bundles
120. ↑ Marione calling 2012 the "2012 Season"
121. ↑ Him announcing his total from 2012 profit
122. ↑ Marione confirmed he had HUGE plans for 2013 following 2012's success
123. ↑ Marione announcing a new series
124. ↑ Marione confirmed the profit he got from 2013
125. ↑ Marione confirming the content style for his account on TikTok.
126. ↑ Marione released a sequel series to the classic Challenge Games