Coinbase releases PART 1 from “The Degen Trilogy" featuring notorious Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC)
When the Bored Ape Yacht Club announced they’ll launch their own movie series, everyone was impatient and curious towards the outcome and now, the highly awaited Part 1 - Run the chain of The Degen Trilogy is finally here. While it received a lot of attention in the past few months, the release of Part 1 on the 26th of July created a wave of opinions circulating online. From Bitcoin maximalists to NFT strong supporters, the majority seems to have come to the agreement that the animation is phenomenal and deserved the wait, while the plot and dialogue are rather confusing and seem to lack essence, throwing effort and money out the window. This way, it is argued that Coinbase caused yet another disappointment with this project, after laying off employees and being under investigation with the Security and Exchange Commission.
But is it the case? Let’s rewind events for a bit of context.
What do we know about BAYC and the trilogy so far?
BAYC or Bored Ape Yacht Club is a well-known collection of NFTs built on Ethereum blockchain, which features cartoon apes procedurally depicted with different profile characteristics, having 10 thousand elements so far. These can be found on Ethereum as ERC 721 tokens and they seemed to have taken a step even further with Coinbase releasing Part 1 of "The Degen Trilogy” on the 26th of July 2022.
Coinbase and Yuga Labs, the acclaimed creators of BAYC, partnered up into producing a three-part movie series indeed, at the beginning of this year, with Part 1 out just a few days ago. The project was introduced to the world as being ambitiously interactive, as BAYC community members and even Non-ape users were given the chance to contribute to the project.
How?
For starters, in April 2022 it was announced that the BAYC community members could access the movie website and after connecting their Coinbase wallets, they could submit their Ape for consideration if they wanted it featured in the movies, alongside a written bio for an additional chance to become part of the film. The Non-ape users however, were promised to be able to choose Easter Eggs to be included in the upcoming films as well as voting for other creative elements. Everything was organised with the purpose of involving as many as possible in the creation of this trilogy.
Divided opinions
Over the course of the five minutes-film, the protagonist is presenting the story to the audience. After introducing the main characters and eventually competing against them with the aim of winning coin, he ends up entering a room full of “money zombies," at the top of a building, before the “to be continued” message enters the screen.
As such, some were left on the edge of their seats waiting for part 2 for answers, as others were utterly unimpressed. While the art direction, design and vfx are overwhelmingly impressive, many complained that the film moves too quickly from one frame to another and indicated that the dialogue is uncomfortable. More than that, there are others accusing the film of fetishizing NFT degeneracy and disrespecting values that Bitcoin stands for, among which fairness and awareness of its implications. More on that on gamblineers.com.
With the release of the film, Coinbase stock has indeed rebounded about 9,8%, but it most certainly hangs lower than 75% since the beginning of this year. However, BAYC have dug its path to limitless growth in the years to come, as one of the most influential NFTs collection, but the impact the three-movie series will have on its success is yet to be discovered in the near future, with the potential release of part 2 and 3 and decidedly based on the involvement of the Crypto Space community.