Ryan Dunn is Dead: My Eulogization of the Random Hero

Yesterday was a real challenge for me for a variety of reasons, but I always expected that would happen to me on the day when the inevitable occurred and one of the Jackass guys finally met their fate. I knew it would be really, really hard for me, and to add to that, I never expected Ryan Dunn would be the first to go. I will spare you who I suspected it would be, but I never predicted it would be Dunn, and it hurts considerably more.

Let me put it this way first. When I was a younger, 7th grade aged kid trying to find my identity and not succeeding, trying to do well in school and not succeeding, and trying to be included in groups and not succeeding, I turned to Jackass to cope with it. Or, more or less I was actually introduced to Jackass by no other than my momma, when on my 13th Birthday, absolutely unexpectedly, she gave me the Jackass box-set. I remember the very week when Jackass premiered. I was…well, I was 7. I watched some of it with my dad, and he really seemed to go for it with the same exuberance as when he watches AFV. Back then, I was too prude to even say the name, but I was familiar with the whole thing, specifically Johnny Knoxville, who even then I thought was an awesome fellow. Then, it went off of the air, and I sort of forgot about it until my Mom completely out of the blue sprung it on me that one year. To this day, I consider that one of the greatest gifts I have ever received. It just so happens that, in general, was one of the worst Birthdays of my life. I don’t care to recount what happened, but I ended up holed up in my room crying, and all I had to turn to was that box set. As soon as I began to watch it, I immediately grew a dedication and passion for that show like few things I have ever experienced. I’ll try not to overstate the importance it has had to me, but it changed my life. It absolutely changed my life, and it has gotten me through the darkest times of my life when Ben Folds couldn’t. It was one of my two antidepressants before I started taking antidepressants, and even if, now that I’ve aged and am sitting on the edge of adulthood and independence, I’ve have grown out of things like Jackass, I never have, I never will grow out of Jackass itself. It is too important to me, and I’ll always maintain my affinity to it. Really, I’m confident I love and appreciate Jackass more than anybody really realizes. I have every episode of Jackass, all the movies and their .5′s, Jackass: The Lost Tapes, every season of Wildboyz and Viva La Bam, and the original CKY DVD, and probably more I can’t remember.  I saw the midnight screening of Jackass 3D, and me and my good pal Dom won the gift basket of Jackass merchandise for being the “biggest fans” in a theater that was completely filled. I wore one of my 2 Jackass shirts the day before Ryan Dunn died. I OWN the actual pair of pants Johnny Knoxville wore in Men in Black 2. I was so active on JackassWorld.com when it still existed that I was told in an @reply from whoever runs their twitter now that said he remembered me, like a year after the fact. That still really surprises me, but, you know, flatters me even more.

Now to regress, growing up and trying to find myself as a kid for the past 10 years, as hopefully you can now tell, Jackass has been with me. Its been a real part of who I have become. And the following is something that is really important and something that really set in last night. The reason I ever started making YouTube videos in the first place was because of Jackass. Do you know how much that means? Maybe I’m not particularly proud of that chapter of my life which me and everybody I know calls the Jackass days, but it started me out on the road I’m on today. “Reubnick” as we know it probably wouldn’t be even remotely recognizable (or even ever existent) if it weren’t for Jackass. My videos have evolved, and I’ve even stopped making “videos,” my content has evolved and my sense of humor has evolved. I’m just about to finish my first film to be screened in at least one theater in July, for crap sake! I have really come a long way from those embarrassing skateboard/stunt videos I used to make, and I am very dead-set on doing everything I can to make a living in film. I’m going to go to film school. Film is what I do, and the reason I ever picked up the camera in the first place is because of Jackass. I am absolutely serious. That was my inspiration, and I know I’m not the only one.

Now, Ryan Dunn is the first to fall, and I am as devastated by his death as anybody who I never met could make me. And, the skater-punk rebel loner misfit kid I used to be in my years of most confusion, delusion and being lost while I try to find myself is just crushed and dealt a crippling blow. I idolized all of those guys back in the day, and on some level, I still do. And, I will say it time and time again, if any different group on the planet did the exact same things they do on Jackass now, I’d hate every minute. It is a stupid show. They do stupid, dangerous things nobody should do. They are the first to admit that. Nobody should do the things they do either, and they are once again the first to say it. But, that’s not nearly my favorite part of the show. It’s just the whole crew as a whole. There’s no way to replicate what that crew has. It is beyond special. It’s the friendship and the camaraderie. The loyalty and the care-free nature. The inclusiveness, and the feeling that aside from Bam, all of them are really decent, good-spirited people. Now, that group is forever missing a member, and there is no way for normality amongst that group to return.

I say this because I think more than just Ryan Dunn died yesterday. Much more died. I think has Jackass has officially died. We all sort of assumed it had clocked out for good as we watched the credits of Jackass 3D, but now I think it’s official. You can’t just use 8/9 Jackasses. It will never feel right. And although it has no real effect on me, I think that a certain part of me is gone too, now. The part of me who emulated Knoxville and Dunn because those two were my absolute vision of how to be cool. I was a weirdo who always wore corduroys, and I saw Ryan Dunn wearing jeans and thought he looked like such a cool guy, as well as his plain white tees. I saw how he was such a team player and never lost his cool, and I really admired that and tried to mimic it to get away from having a persona of being the guy with the fiery temper. It worked. And I saw what a good friend Dunn always seemed to be with his close-knit group, and then I wanted to be a really good friend to anybody close to me too. It was a major contributor to my disdain of shallowness. Listen, I know this guy wasn’t a saint, and he was reckless, short-sighted, unpredictable, surly, crass, and maybe had some bad judgement, which was proven in his last act alive. But that changes nothing for me. He’s still just as important. It’s possible to pick out traits you want to use as examples and make them your own while weeding out the negatives, and I did. I did that a lot with Johnny Knoxville more so, but Dunn almost just as much. When I started getting into all things Jackass, I initially pegged Bam as my favorite. That did not last however, and as I got older I got sick of his arrogance, disrespect and immaturity, so I thought about it and moved on to Knoxville and Dunn, and that never changed. Ryan Dunn is the Jackass that you like when you grow up. That’s just the one he is. In a way, him and Johnny seemed to oddly bring some sort of maturity and sanity and control to the whole deal. And, I would hope that all kids in that situation I found myself in moved on to Knoxville and Dunn as two of their favorites, because I really think Knoxville’s attitude is a healthy one to emulate, but even more with Ryan Dunn. I don’t mean the things he did obviously, but the way he always was and carried himself, the way he treated Ape and Phil and everybody else, and how he never really seemed to let anything get to him most of all. Most won’t agree, but I think that with that aspect alone, he makes actually a pretty good role-model. I can’t stress enough that Ryan Dunn was flawed…but so are the rest of them, and so am I, and I’d never want it any other way. Those with flaws are those who are interesting, and the ones with something to prove. Without them, we’d live in a perfectly boring world and everybody would go insane. We need flawed Ryan Dunns to inspire the flawed kids like I was. He’s a realistic role-model. He found a way to go from a drug-addled lost seeming cause to become a millionaire movie-star by messing around, drinking, and hanging out with the buddies, and THAT is inspiration that anybody could do anything they love. And he always kept a level head. I have so much respect and appreciation for him, and yesterday, I really felt like I lost a friend of mine. Once again, I never met him (I always really hoped to), but in the end, I spent more hours watching footage of Jackass and getting to know him without knowing him than I have spent with people I actually consider close acquaintances, and I felt like I lost my pal. It’s the same way I can grow close to people on the Internet I’ve never seen in person, have feelings for women I barely know and have never met, and feel just as bad when something happens to them as when something happens to somebody I see every day. This is why yesterday I was watching Jackass 3D as my private vigil and began to fight back tears and lost. I was hearing Weezer and watching the clip of Dunn looking at the stupid tattoos on his leg, and for the moment, he was like 20 again, and I was 13 again, like when I saw it for the first time. It took me back to the first hour of many years of many hours I would spend with Ryan Dunn, and I couldn’t handle knowing there would be no more years. It is silly, but I’ll never be ashamed to admit how influential, how much of an impact, and how important Jackass has been to me. Especially Knoxville and Dunn. Now, Dunn is gone, and I absolutely hope it is a long, long, long time before I have to say the same about Johnny, because as a crumpled heap on the floor, I don’t know if I’ll be able to manage it. They all get older, I get older, and one did have to eventually be lost to us. I just never wanted to see the day. I’m just feeling even luckier that we’ve still got Steve-O, Pontius, Preston, all of them. I wish them the best luck and health and I hope I still get a chance to meet them before it’ll ever be too late like it is with Dunn.

My thoughts are literally with them all, Ape and Phil, Eric Dunn, and especially with his love Angie, who I didn’t know of before yesterday. I can’t seem to get this off of my mind yet. It’ll happen eventually, but not yet. I don’t expect anybody who knew Ryan to read this, but if I’m wrong, I want whoever the reader is to know I’m taking this hard and that I am right with you.

I miss Ryan Dunn now, I will continue to miss him. I thank him for everything. He’s really been important to me.

I think I seriously am going to get “5+4=9″ tattooed on my foot to honor him someday. I’m hoping at least one person gets that reference.

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