“Masters of Horror Taking on Comedy” betrays its embarrassing boardroom creativity. Here are three ways Microsoft could better serve their audience and build their service.

Roughly a month ago, around the time of Comic Con, Kotaku ran a press release from Microsoft promoting a panel called “Horror Meets Comedy Xbox Original Short Film Pilots“.

Aside from a title more jumbled than an eBay auction, the panel promised a look at another step in the 360’s expanding downloadable content lineup. Going only by the keyword-heavy name of the panel, this could have been a good idea. Horror and comedy are both fun to watch. We’ve seen them mixed successfully in things like Evil Dead II, Shaun of the Dead, even the remake of Dawn of the Dead, which wasn’t bad. Maybe this is a sensible, well-thought-out initiative from the Xbox clan. As long as the word ‘dead’ factors in somehow, it just might work. But as the full shape of their plan made itself clear, further reading only lead to laughter, then confusion, then disgust and disappointment.

Microsoft Corp. today announced that a set of original short film pilots will be coming to Xbox LIVE this fall, free to all members around the world. The unique concept of Masters of Horror Taking on Comedy, conceived by filmmaker James Gunn (“Slither,” “Dawn of the Dead”) and producer Peter Safran (“Scary Movie,” “Meet the Spartans,” “Disaster Movie”), will see some of the world’s greatest horror directors bring their comedic visions to life.

Where to even begin with the issues in this statement? For starters, applying the label “Masters of Horror” to the makers of films like Saw or the remake of The Amityville Horror is incredibly generous. Especially when their proposed ideas for this project are called Doggie Heaven (Woof!) and Meatdog: What’s Fer Dinner, respectively. Apparently dogs are the next big trend in horror, now that torture’s kinda been done. Or the best way to mix in some comedy with your horror is to include a dog, allowing for the inevitable (and hilarious!) scene where it humps someone’s leg.

It took another story to point out the most terrifying aspect of this concept, which might have gone unnoticed: the word pilot. Oh no, the visionary behind Meet the Spartans isn’t content with subjecting Xbox Live users to the tossed-off experiments of mediocre film-makers. Safran makes sure to point out that:

While created to stand on their own, the hope is that one or several clips prove successful enough to warrant expansion. “In their minds, these directors were thinking of them as franchise properties.”

Because everyone knows the world needs more cheaply-produced, half-hearted pablum on their Xbox hard drive. No, these are not “Masters”, and they are not mixing Horror and Comedy in ways that we need. That has already been done, it was called Grindhouse, and it was a fun little project for what it was. You don’t see real masters working on the level of Youtube videos for a game console audience.

……….

Before anyone cries foul at what may sound like close-mindedness, please take a moment to see these ideas in motion, and notice the obvious laziness all around:

XBox Masters of Horror Do Comedy Sizzle Reel

Which brings up the main problem with this whole initiative, outlined perfectly by a Microsoft exec in charge of original programming:

The clips have been conceived to appeal to Xbox’s Live’s core 18-34 year old male audience, which has embraced paid downloads of comedy series like South Park and movies like Saw since the platform’s launch.

Thus, when creating original programming, a blend of these genres made sense.

It’s a classic case of boardroom creativity. “People like X and Y, so if we combine them, we’ll have a sure-fire hit!”

That kind of thinking is condescending to the millions of users that would love to see new and interesting things provided for free, or even ad-supported, on a service they’re already paying a monthly fee to access. Xbox Live is not the internet, where the recent trend is to dump anything you can slap together with a camcorder and iMovie and see what sticks. It is, or should be, a premium service meant to differentiate them from their competition. Going by focus-tested formulas will only get them so far, and probably not in the direction they need.

If you take the premium cable channels as an example — ignoring the fact that they’re owned by the same company — they do illustrate two very different ways to operate. HBO uses their status for good: high-quality, sophisticated dramas that wouldn’t be possible on network television. They reap rewards for their originality with a flood of Emmy nominations and a healthy subscription base, which Showtime has been trying to catch up to for years. Take the other case of Cinemax, who uses their lack of restrictions to little effect: mostly showing soft-core b-movies. Granted, the latter can be useful to some in 10-minute increments. But the former is a legitimate brand of entertainment you can’t get anywhere else, and a solid return on your monthly investment. Hence a loyal base of fans who will gladly pay the extra fees for continued access.

……….

So in the spirit of contributing positive feedback instead of just ranting and raving about how lame ‘Humanzee’ looks — we’re in this together, after all — the following are some tips for the people at Microsoft on how to better serve their audience and better build their service. (If any MS operatives would like to further consult with the Under Culture staff, contact information is below).

It should be noted that these are content suggestions, but if there’s one over-riding suggestion that would immediately up their value, it would be a change to the fee structure. Either make the service free, or offer more to those of us who pay. A monthly download allowance for Gold level subscribers to be put toward video purchases would be a huge step. Or exclusive access to original content for free once the monthly dues are paid. Especially considering the competition doesn’t charge at all for the privilege of online play. All that subscription money has to get us something. As to what that could be, here are a few possibilities.

Three Ideas for Better Xbox Original Content:

1) Give the Fans More In-depth Gaming Coverage

If there’s one certainty about Xbox owners who pay for Live service, it’s that they’re pretty into gaming, so using the platform to deliver game news and videos has always been a no-brainer. They already have the ball rolling on this one, but there’s a lot more potential here; the current options are pretty much limited to the standard canned footage trailers. And getting to see new promos in HD on a big TV screen is definitely nice. But why, when it comes time for “Inside E3″ or “Inside Comic-Con”, are the clips mostly brief montages? Bring us whole panels, or longer-form interviews with the people who make our favorite games and shows and movies. Bring us inside the process instead of just advertising to us. Give the fans something more than the same trailer they already saw online that afternoon.

Even better, take it further. An honest discussion from within the industry, along the lines of Politically Incorrect for gaming, would be a lot more interesting than PR from ‘Major Nelson’. Gather some of the opinionated semi-celebrities in both development and journalism, people who are expressive and not afraid to disagree — similar to how Maher intentionally books both liberals and conservatives to have healthy debates — and let them talk about current games and industry happenings. A great roster could include a rotating cast of designers like David Jaffe (God of War), Cliff Bleszinski (Gears of War), Jonathan Blow (Braid), Ken Levine (Bioshock), possibly Denis Dyack (of Too Human infamy), or even Will Wright (Spore, Sims) if you can get him. Let them face off with serious critics like the Penny Arcade guys, Garnett Lee or Shawn Elliot from 1up, Michael Abbott of Brainy Gamer, as well as the professional appreciator types like Brian Crecente from Kotaku, or Gamespot pariah Jeff Gerstmann, currently of Giant Bomb . Maybe hosted by the always-thoughtful N’Gai Croal from Newsweek or the lively Geoff Keighley from GTTV. The round table format would give a broader perspective than a single review and a lot more insight than a Metacritic score or news feed.

Of course, this second idea would be too good to be true, because Microsoft would have to allow them the freedom to say unfavorable things about their games from time to time instead of quickly canceling at the slightest provocation. But then, that’s part of the burden of becoming a real network; taking a step back from editorial control and letting the programming live on its own.

2) Support Great Work with Nowhere Else to Go

As the world’s largest distributor of HD on demand, they’re signing a lot of deals with big studios and networks to rent or sell content that’s already popular, like the South Park’s and Saw’s mentioned above. But there’s also a wealth of things out there for entertainment buffs which are less obvious. Striking deals for more niche programming would make the service more indispensable, and be a boon to creators who don’t have an easy distribution channel.

One thing that comes to mind are short films, which are woefully under-represented in theatres or on cable, and would fit right in with their ‘bite-sized entertainment’ menu. Every year a dozen filmed or animated shorts get nominated for Oscars, and everyone sits at home wondering about them while an award goes to something no one’s ever heard of. Film fanatics with Xboxes would love to be able to download a six-pack of short films leading up to Oscar night, and see the best of a category they’d never get to see otherwise. This was part of the reason Don Hertzfeldt and Mike Judge started their annual tour, The Animation Show — to give a venue to an overlooked form. Try partnering with this sort of pre-existing organization for a weekly feature, all in high-quality downloads instead of pirated internet videos.

Not to mention another potential gold mine in anime, which American audiences have to wait to be translated and shown somewhere like Adult Swim. That is if they don’t go the other route, and download them from bittorrent, then either watch on a computer screen or stream to a TV (possibly through their Xboxes). Why not strike an international deal to save the otaku a few steps in the process, and up your traffic numbers at the same time? After years of playing games, they could hardly complain about the subtitles.

3) Don’t Just Sign Deals, Help Break New Talent

Lastly, take a page from your new friends at Netflix. As detailed in an excellent Wired article from 2006: once they’d built their base of viewers, they moved from just offering movies to helping get them distributed in the first place.

In the last seven years, the company has amassed 5 million subscribers and now mails 7 million DVD rentals each week… The company also has quietly become the exclusive distributor of more than 100 indie films, and it’s even starting to produce original movies.

Netflix’s move into distribution and production calls to mind early Miramax… Netflix is pursuing a similar model, and in just a few years it has distributed as many exclusives as Miramax did in its first 15 years of existence. “Last year we acquired four new titles from Sundance, and this year we’re working on about 12 deals,” says Ted Sarandos, chief content officer of Netflix. “Eventually we’ll be coming to Sundance and saying, ‘We can buy everything.’ There’s a deal for every film.”

Instead of just making sure they had the most content available, they started going out to find new hits of their own. Building a reputation is easy when you’re just signing every big name in the book, but real visionaries also help make big names.

And if the Netflix partnership has the the rising film stars covered, keeping it small could work just as well. Let them scoop up talent from the Sundance festival, while Microsoft goes out and offers deals to the best of the vast world of internet shorts. They could even rely on existing communities like Channel 101 to help vet for quality, then sign the best candidates on the cheap. There are thousands of creative people who’d gladly sign on for just enough money to keep them from going broke, so instead of trying to make shows on weekends and nights, paid for by their day jobs, they actually get a shot at exposure. And there are even more people who would have loved to see short-lived classics like Yacht Rock or House of Cosbys stick around longer than they did. Imagine what those shows could have done with a budget.

……….

On top of the stack of games to play on our Xboxes, there are already millions of hours of film in the world worth watching. Great new things are being made every day, some of which we might never even find out about. So why on earth should a giant, wealthy, powerful company, with presumably intelligent people at the helm, waste their time putting out a pilot about a deformed-looking human-chimp hybrid and his hilarious-but-also-horrifying adventures? They can do better, and we should expect better.

If by some miracle one of these happens to turn out well, they’ll deserve congratulations for trying something new. In the more likely scenario where these are terrible, or even so bad they get canned and never see the light of day, the real concern is whether this project is indicative of their plans moving forward. If that’s the case, and all their execs are looking to do is cash in instead of building something of real value, these pointers might go a long way toward improving their standing. And if they don’t follow them, perhaps their competitors will.