Stickdeath

2001

Date: 2001 · Place: stickdeath.com, hosted via Macromedia Flash · Figures: Sam Brown, founder · Newgrounds, parallel host · Tags: Flash, Violence 01. A Site About Killing Stick Figures Stickdeath.com launches as a Flash portal devoted entirely to short loops of stick figures dying. Crushed, exploded, bisected, run over. Pixel blood, no plot, no dialogue. The site adds a new clip every week or so through the early 2000s. It is the first portal organised around a single permitted emotion: cathartic stupid violence rendered abstract enough to laugh at. 02. The Permission Slip Stickdeath gives the 12-to-15-year-old boy demographic explicit permission to make and share violent Flash. Newgrounds follows. Pivot ships months later. By 2003 the stick-violence genre is so saturated that Xiao Xiao and Stickpage stand out by adding choreography. Stickdeath is the lowbrow root from which the entire Newgrounds animation pipeline grows. Every later Madness Combat, every JJBA stand-fight YouTuber, every Alan Becker Animator-vs-Animation owes the floor it stands on to Sam Brown. Sources • Wayback Machine, stickdeath.com captures 2001-2004 • KnowYourMeme, Stick Figure Animation • Newgrounds Wiki, Stickdeath