| “ | Hey there, Juggies. It’s your old pal, McJuggerNuggets, here. | ” |
―McJuggerNuggets' Intro | ||
Jesse Tyler Ridgway (born: September 29, 1992), better known online as McJuggerNuggets or RiDGiD STUDiOS, is an American YouTuber who grew up and lived in Elmer, New Jersey, He is currently living in Pennsylvania and is mostly known because of his scripted “Psycho Series,” in which two brothers fight each other while dealing with their psychotic father, who is better known as Psycho Dad. Jesse has another YouTube channel called RiDGiD Gaming, where he uploaded clips from his Twitch streams. The McJuggerNuggets YouTube account had a frequent upload schedule of 2 - 3 videos per day consisting mostly of vlogs and crazy family videos due to the volatile nature of his family, especially his father famously known as "Psycho Dad" as mentioned earlier. On June 6, 2016, Jesse uploaded the final episode of the Psycho Series titled "Psycho Kid Flees Country" in which it is revealed indirectly that the Psycho Series was staged. Since then, the YouTuber has created different series including a collaboration series with The Angry Grandpa and Boogie2988. In September 2019, he announced on Twitter that he would leave YouTube by January 1, 2020, instead of posting solely on his own platform, Storyfire, which was immediately backtracked.
Biography
Early Life
Jesse was born in New Jersey and had lived in the same house with his parents all his life. Jesse is the youngest of two siblings (his brother being Jeffrey Ridgway Jr of BigBrudda). After his birth, not much is known, but Jesse has confirmed that the most traumatizing year during his childhood was when he was 8 in 2000-2001, in which Jesse had his lower legs immobilized when he walked through hot asphalt. That same year, he was attacked by a savage Fred, one of his childhood dogs. He was rushed to medics on both occasions after suffering critical effects.
It is known that Jesse had befriended Georgie Stahlberger sometime before 2002, where he and Stahlberger were seen in images with Georgie's sister Emily. Jesse would then get his first exposure to videos when him and his brother would go visit Georgie and his sister Emily. In much of the old footage, Jesse is seen being the highlight or usually his brother's or Georgie's, punching bag, this was around 2002 and 2003.
Beginning YouTube Career
Jesse made his YouTube channel in December 2006, back then his videos had mostly 100+ views. He made some random videos and a lot of movies and short films, like Overachievers, and The G.A.M.E.
Education
In 2010, Jesse became a graduate of Arthur P. Schalick High School and by June 2014, he had graduated from Rowan University with a degree in Film, however struggled to pay a debt of $70,000. Footage of his graduation celebration was seen in the skit Jesse Reaches 100,000 Gamerscore.
Increased Popularity of The Psycho Series
In 2012, Jesse Ridgway created the infamous freak-out video series entitled, "The Psycho Series". The series is notable for getting Jesse to his goal of One Million Subscribers and giving him over 3 Million Views on YouTube. Originally, Jesse created the series as a joke parodying the infamous YouTube video genre of freak-out videos most noticeable of the genre is Wafflepwn's freak-out kid videos. As soon as Jesse uploaded his first "Psycho Dad" video he noticed an increase in popularity on his channel. Soon, only two years later, he would start daily vlogging and continue the story of his character and insane family.
Psycho Series Ending, Changes in Channel, Upload Schedule and Break From YouTube
With the series having over more than one hundred vlogs and forty-five psycho videos, the series ended on June 6th, 2016. His long time cameraman and best friend Corn quit being Jesse's cameraman while the series was on the verge of ending because of contract issues and since then had been replaced by another one of Jesse's friends, Parker Zippel, up until his departure as well after a one year contract was up on July 26th, 2017.
Since the end of The Psycho Series, Jesse has worked on numerous self-created series such as: "The Devil Inside Series", which chronicles Jesse's multiple personalities take control of him, most notable of them is Isaac, a depressing and angry individual. However, the Devil Inside series has ended as well as of November 6th, 2019.
Jesse recently went into an intermission between his new series that hasn't been given an explanation recently. On August 6th, 2017, Jesse Ridgway uploaded a video entitled "the hardest video i've ever had to film.", which explains his need for a break on YouTube. He explained that this is not the end of him uploading and that he just needs to work in his life before he makes a good video. He also explained that he's become depressed with the end of his three-year Psycho Series.
He returned on the 23rd of August with a video, in character (as the creator) to announce that he's actually working on a series as he speaks, which is what he's already in currently.
Less Video Traffic, Massive Decline, Storyfire and planned exit from YouTube
Since the Psycho Series has ended, Jesse Ridgway's channel has seen a massive and noticeable decline viewer and video-wise. He uploads videos now one day a week or takes breaks in between videos for about two weeks. His channel's comment section usually features people commenting on their opinion in which that the channel is "dead" or "over" in the likes of traffic-wise and has seen it' day. Also, Jesse and Brian Spitz, who helped create a documentary on the series and who played an antagonistic version of himself in a post-Psycho series of videos, founded the platform Storyfire, which allows a person to create stories with individuals or on their own. Jesse slowly began posting more content exclusively onto his platform, before announcing on Twitter in September 2019 that he would no longer be posting to YouTube by January 1, 2020, visibly growing intolerant of YouTube's practices from the last few years leading up to it[1]. On October 18, 2019, Ridgway announced on Twitter he was in the middle of editing a 'behemoth' video detailing his plans for his final output on the channel, which he released the following day.
Psycho Dad's Channel Ownership, Jesse's return to YouTube (January 26 - April 12, 2020)
In early 2020, Jeffrey Ridgway temporarily seized ownership of the channel after Jesse's departure from the platform. The banner and profile picture of the channel was changed, and Jeffrey was making weekly posts to the platform. His content varied from vlogging to his mowing business. On April 12th, 2020, a video was posted to the channel titled 'Begging Psycho Dad For My Channel Back!' Jesse came to his father's house on his knees asking for his channel back due to financial strains caused by the Coronavirus. He successfully gained channel access, with the exception that the revenue from the videos would be split between himself and his father equally. Another exception made by his father would be that all exclusive StoryFire content would be uploaded to the channel as a thank you/apology to his YouTube fanbase for abandoning them. Jesse is skeptical about doing this, as it defeats the purpose of StoryFire and its community. Since his return to the platform, his profile picture and banner has been changed to a picture of himself and of StoryFire.
StoryFire shutdown
On January 24, 2021, Jesse announced via Twitter that his platform, StoryFire would be shutting down on February 1, 2021. He released a video on his main YouTube channel with an explanation for the decision. He ultimately failed to secure financing and had several failed attempts from investors to allow the platform to continue in the future. Blaming larger platforms and competition, Jesse would no longer be able to support the app.
The Psycho Series
Psycho Series was a 50-episode, long-running series on the McJuggerNuggets channel that began on December 22, 2012 and ended on June 6, 2016. The premise of the series was originally to be a parody of Wafflepwn, another popular freakout YouTube channel. As Jesse says,
| “ | Obviously a lot has changed, so for me to just say "alright, we're doing a video", it's usually just like, okay. Instead back then their was going to be a lot of resistance... yeah I was inspired, I saw Wafflepwn, do in their videos and I saw people we're making money. So I was like "let's just give it a shot" and that's the true origin... | ” |
―The REAL Origin of the Psycho Series, McJuggerNuggets | ||
Then the series became something more than he ever expected. Originally a parody of what others were already starting to do, Jesse Ridgway decided to make his destruction series more than just about the destruction of the object itself and more on the characters development and interesting plots to create a beautiful life lesson. He worked with his father and brother on the series from the start to create a unique chemistry on his videos as well.
As the series continued he would soon have his whole entire family involved on the project, including another long time relationship family and his friends. One of his friends Zachary "Corn" Cornatzer would become his main cameraman during the duration of the series. Unfortunately, there was uncomfortable tension between the two longtime friends which distance their relationship.
Fan Mail Monday
This series, Fan Mail Monday, lasted about two years and was a way for McJuggerNuggets to communicate to his fans (via, P.O. Box) and what better way would it be for Jesse to have letters sent to him. He ended this series on the note of script wise (with the Psycho Series events) and because he was annoyed on getting expensive items from his viewers.
#MMM
McJuggerNuggets Movie Madness (nicknamed, #MMM, said Hashtag Triple M) was a competition series created by Jesse himself. Every week, he went on YouTube and gave his fans a filming genre. His viewers that participated would then create short films based on those topics to be featured on the series. The top 3 would get a shoutout from Jesse himself. The series began on July 8th, 2015 and ended on May 21st, 2016.
Negative Reception
"The Psycho Series" was and is the most popular series that McJuggerNuggets has created and for many reasons. The Psycho Series depicted mostly his father destroying expensive electronics and equipment, and making his son (McJuggerNuggets' character), very upset. While they are very entertaining videos, they have sparked controversy.
Ever since the series gained mass popularity, conspiracy videos were published by many different content creators pointing out and examining many scenes in the videos about how they were staged, far before it was revealed the series was staged. Primarily, publishers discussed the electronics in the videos being very cheap models, showing prices on websites such as Amazon and Walmart. Other videos discussed quick scene changes that hid swapped out props or pre-destroyed items. These videos sparked the controversy that the videos, and the entire series, were fake.
Positive Reception
McJuggerNuggets has received generally positive reception from the videos and content he has created.. His followers have enjoyed his vlog-style story telling videos, similarly to the content from the Angry Grandpa Show and Wafflepwn. His creative skills of cinematography and story telling have gained over 1 billion views on his channel and millions of subscribers. .
Other Channels
- Jesse Tyler Ridgway is Jesse's personal channel talking about stocks, finance and many other aspects about him. This channel has over 23,000 subscribers.
- The Psycho Series is a channel about The Psycho Series it has over 140,000 subscribers.
- RiDGiD GAMiNG is a channel about Jesse streaming video games it has over 300,000 subscribers.
Associated Channels
- Juliette Reilly is Juliette's channel she uploads music it has over 180,000 subscribers. She is the ex-girlfriend of McJuggerNuggets.
- Larry's Lounge is Uncle Larry's he uploads vlogs, basketball, cooking and skits it has over 600,000 subscribers. He is the uncle of McJuggerNuggets.
- Georgie Stahlberger is Georgie's channel he uploads skateboarding and trick shots it has over 200,000 subscribers. He is a childhood friend of McJuggerNuggets.
- ManNamedCorn is Corn's channel he uploads video game streams and skits it has over 200,000 subscribers. He is the best friend and former cameraman of McJuggerNuggets.
- CrocodileBuzz888 is Buzz's channel he uploads pranks and skits it has over 53,000 subscribers. He is the friend of McJuggerNuggets.
- BigBrudda is Jeffrey's channel he uploads pranks, updates and skits it has over 900,000 subscribers. He is the older brother of McJuggerNuggets.
- ParkerZip is Parker Zippel's channel. He is the friend and former cameraman of McJuggerNuggets.
Subscriber Milestones
- 1 million subscribers: April 26, 2015.
- 2 million subscribers: October 6, 2015.
- 3 million subscribers: June 5, 2016.
- 4 million subscribers: June 19, 2020
Quotes
- "Holy s-------t!"
- “I don't want any waffles!”
- “Why are you always filming?!”
- “I'm never gonna quit playing!”
- “F*CK these stupid clown shoes!”
- “I hate this family!”
- “I don't want this family!”
- “I hate you!”
- “Shut the f——k up!”
- “I love my mom, whoppee-frickin'-doo.”
- “I'm going to call… child services!”
- “I hate my dad! F——k him!!”
- “Come here!”
- “Guys, stop fighting!”
- “Keep it RiDGiD, Juggies.”
- “I'm going to tell my therapist!”
- “Do you have a drinking problem?” (to Uncle Larry)
- "WHAT ARE THE F--------ING NUMBERS!"
- “Garfunk, stay funky.”
- “Do you seriously want me to punch you in the face right now‽”
- "Dad, DAD!!!"
- “This isn't breaking bad! I know my name's Jesse…” (After Jeffery steals the RV)
- “Hey there, Juggies. It’s your old pal, McMonoNuggets, here!”
- “Guys, knock it off!”
- “I play Grand Theft Auto, I know how this works!”
- “Ow, f——k, my spleen!”
- “That’s a wrap.” (to his whole family together in Switzerland)
- "Keep it RiDGiD, Druggies." (First appearance of the Isaac character.)
- "THE DEVIL INSIDE!" (Shouting while his character, Isaac, held a gun up to his head.)
Gallery
I Met the Girl of My Dreams At Disney World
His is Have Girlfriend Ashley May
Trivia
- His subscribers constantly go up and down widely on a bases when hitting a milestone. This is usually due to what his character's in series like The Psycho Series, are doing.
- After the series finale 'Psycho Kid Kills Father', Elmer Police received over 1,000 calls in one day from concerned residents believing Jesse actually killed his father.
- He has collaborated with TheAngryGrandpaShow.