Stick reviews: the internet's favourite deadpan genre

Somewhere along the way, the internet decided that sticks deserved reviews. Not jokes about sticks, but proper reviews: a photo, a score, and a few dry sentences treating a branch with the seriousness of a wine critic. It turns out to be one of the most good-natured formats online.

Where it comes from

The best-known example is Official Stick Reviews (@officialstickreviews), whose deadpan write-ups of sticks sent in by followers built a large, devoted audience. Its community goes by Stick Nation, and stick fans have their own vocabulary, like “natty” for a stick that is exactly as nature made it. The trend has even reached bookshelves, with a book called Sticks.

If you enjoy stick reviews, go and follow the originals. They did it first, and they do it with real care.

Why it works

• Everyone has an opinion on sticks. Every child has picked one up and known, instantly, that it was a good one.
• The deadpan does the work. Treating something trivial with total seriousness is a reliable kind of funny, and it is never mean.
• It gets people outside. You cannot submit a stick you did not find.
• The stakes are perfectly low. Nobody's stick is really bad. Some are just more natty than others.

Where Stick League fits

Stick League is an independent app inspired by the joy of a good stick. It is not affiliated with Official Stick Reviews, Stick Nation, Battlesticks or the book Sticks. Instead of sending a photo and waiting, you get a rating in seconds from an AI judge with a deliberately dry voice, and the stick becomes a collectible card you can keep, battle with and enter into a monthly vote.

We think the two can live side by side. A human reviewer brings taste and timing no app can copy. An app brings instant results and a game around them. If you want to know how our judge works, and where luck comes in, read how the rating works.

Write your own stick review

Want to try the format yourself? A few tips from the genre:

• Be specific. Mention the curve, the knot, the moss, what it looks like.
• Stay dry. Never gush. “Respectable” is high praise.
• Give it a name. Every great stick deserves one.
• Be kind. The stick did its best.