The creator duo have been best friends since middle school and have spent the last 20 years of their lives creating their variety show ‘Good Mythical Morning’ on YouTube
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NEED TO KNOW
- Rhett & Link’s YouTube show Good Mythical Morning is celebrating its 30th season and debuting on Netflix
- The duo started their channel in 2006, creating comedy content after making a childhood “blood oath” to do something big
- They credit their enduring success to their friendship and fans who connect with their authentic dynamic
Rhett McLaughlin and Charles Lincoln “Link” Neal have been friends since first grade.
At least, that’s how “the story goes,” Link jokes, exclusively with PEOPLE.
Between middle and high school, the pair (known online to their millions of social media followers as Rhett & Link) decided, as many preteens are bound to do, to make a “blood oath” with each other. As for the contents of said vow? To “do something big together,” explains Link.
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“That was literally the extent of the specificity of what it was. I guess we anticipated that it would be something in entertainment,” he adds.
Together, the content creation duo did just that — “something big.”
They created their joint YouTube channel nearly 20 years ago in 2006, uploading comedy sketches and music videos. Just six years later the pair created their flagship channel Good Mythical Morning, where they can still be seen conducting blind taste tests and trying out viral products, all while injecting their quirky sense of humor.
Twenty years later, the two best friends are about to celebrate a big milestone on that checklist of doing something big. Monday, Sept. 7, marks the 30th season of Good Mythical Morning, which also recently debuted on Netflix.
The show, previously a YouTube-exclusive variety show, will now air simultaneously on the streaming platform.
Despite the vast success that has come with their social media fame, the pair say that they “always assumed it was temporary” for two main reasons.
“Number one, we didn’t understand that it would become what it has become,” says Link of working in social media. “We thought it was just the minor leagues training ground to go and do a real job in entertainment.”
“And then the second thing was we were like, ‘Well, eventually our hair or at least one of our hairs is going to start turning gray, and then people are going to not care anymore.’ And the fact that enough people still do care about what we’re doing, I would just say we’re grateful,” he continues.
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“We started doing this when we were already older than all of the other people who were starting out on YouTube. So even 20 years ago, as 30-year-olds getting into YouTube, it was like, ‘Hold on, isn’t this what the teenagers or the 20-year-olds are doing?’ And we were like, ‘Yeah, but this is what we can do. This is where there’s no gatekeeper. This is where we can just make the thing that we want to make and then see who shows up.’ “
Throughout it all, the pair say that, at the core of their career endeavors, they always knew that whatever they wound up doing, they’d do together. Along the way, they found that this tenet—their friendship—had ultimately become a sticking point for their followers.
“What you find is that it’s the people who want to show up every day and just hang out with two of their friends who are best friends Is the thing that people are showing up for. We didn’t anticipate that,” they admit.
Reflecting on Good Mythical Morning’s 30th season, Rhett confidently says he feels like he’s living the dream. “When we first started Good Mythical Morning, we were trying to realize our dreams of making it in entertainment. But when the doors you’re knocking on don’t open, you go to the garage in the backyard, and you make your own show, and that’s what we did.”
As for how they’re planning to keep innovating in the ever-changing world of content creation, beyond the strides they’re making on Netflix and beyond, the pair call the streaming service’s confidence in them “validation.”
Says Rhett: “I do think that it is validation that the show that we’ve been making and evolving over the course of 15 years and 30 seasons has now been picked up on Netflix with no changes. They’re saying, ‘We think that Good Mythical Morning will be a great fit on our platform. We think that there’s an audience there.’ We’re excited to say we agree. The show that we’ve been making and that continues to evolve is something that I believe will find a Netflix audience.”
It’s one of the “perils” that individuals who come from a content creation background before transitioning into something “more traditional” often find themselves in, muses Link.
“They’re being expected to do a different thing, and suddenly they are maybe being asked to do something that doesn’t present them in the best light, doesn’t really tap into their skillset in the same way,” says Link. “And so their existing audience is like, ‘Well, I come to you for a certain thing, and so now you’re asking me to go to this place and you’re giving me something different. It’s not the reason that I kind of fell in love with your work.’ And then for the new audience, well, now they’re not seeing this person for the first time presented in a good light.”
Rhett adds, “We’re making Good Mythical Morning. We’re making it for the mythical beasts, the people who choose to watch Good Mythical Morning. And it was just, we’re making the thing that people have shown up for and will hopefully keep showing up for.”
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