(SeaPRwire) –
By: Robert Kensington
I’ve spent 30 years betting on media franchises that stick. I would have never put a dime on Jackass back in 2001. Back then, every network exec I knew counted the days until it was pulled off air for good. Senator Joseph Lieberman was publicly calling for its cancellation after a 13-year-old boy recreated the Human Barbecue stunt and landed in critical care. It was written off as a cheap, dangerous fad that would burn out in 18 months max. No one predicted it would still be pulling in nine-figure box office numbers 25 years later, with a fanbase spanning three generations.
The official line around Jackass: Best and Last frames it as a casual, nostalgic send-off for a group of old friends. It leans into the goofy, middle-age gags about colonoscopies, and the cast’s public push for men over 50 to get routine colon screenings. It highlights their recent WeHo Pride parade appearance, where they marched on a custom float to show support for the LGBTQIA+ community. Most write-ups mention their old 1999 ban from West Hollywood for a prank involving a prison jumpsuit and a hardware store hacksaw. What the press materials don’t say is this entire marketing push was calculated to tap into a huge, underserved demographic of older millennial and Gen X viewers sick of toxic male media. The cast never had to rebrand to fit modern values, either. The queer undertones of their physical and anal humor have been the subject of academic papers for years. They’re just leaning into what was always there, instead of backtracking like so many other 2000s media properties.
The official release also touches lightly on the franchise’s messy internal history. It notes founding member Bam Margera only appears in archival footage, after years of well-documented substance abuse issues kept him off recent shoots. It mentions the cast invited Margera’s parents to the premiere, and Knoxville told Rolling Stone in 2025 he was glad to hear Margera was doing better. It frames the end of the franchise as a personal choice, tied to doctors warning Knoxville he can’t sustain any more head injuries. The unspoken context is that the cast’s willingness to own their flaws, instead of pretending they’re perfect, is the exact reason they’ve outlasted every other early 2000s reality TV property. Their jokes never target outsiders, only each other, which means they never aged into the bitter, bigoted edgelord personas that have turned so many other 2000s stars into pariahs today. Knoxville’s John Waters tee worn in key scenes is no accident. It’s a deliberate nod to the kind of countercultural, inclusive gross-out humor that ages well, instead of curdling into hate.
This franchise has pulled in over $750 million in global box office revenue to date, and Best and Last is on track to push that total over $1 billion. Media studios scrambling to capture male audiences that have abandoned traditional TV for manosphere garbage need to take notes. The Jackass model works, and it’s not built on stunts. It’s built on loyalty, vulnerability, and never punching down.
Jackass: Best and Last is in theaters now from Paramount Pictures.
Author bio: Robert Kensington, a 30-year veteran of media and entertainment industry investment and global franchise expansion strategy.