VicelandNirvanna the Band the Show the Movie made a splash in theaters earlier this year with a stunt-filled, heartbreaking time travel adventure that had everyone wondering how it was filmed. But, just as the title says, this movie was actually the spinoff of 2017 Viceland series Nirvanna the Band the Show, which itself was inspired by a webseries from the late 2000s. Before Matt Johnson directed BlackBerry and Jay McCarroll scored The Kid Detective, they starred as fictionalized versions of themselves in this hidden gem TV show that satirized everything from My Dinner With Andre to The Negotiator — and after years, Hulu has finally made it available to watch again. The episode “The Big Time” was filmed while Matt Johnson was premiering his real-life movie, Operation Avalanche, at Sundance Film Festival | VicelandEvery episode of Nirvanna the Band the Show starts with a simple premise: Matt and Jay, members of the band Nirvanna the Band, try to get a show at the Rivoli, a restaurant and music venue in downtown Toronto. Sometimes this plan is straightforward, like when they steal the Rivoli’s phone to announce their gig to a local newspaper. Other times, it’s more elaborate, like when they decide to 3D print a weapon to intimidate the booker and end up in the middle of a bank heist. Executive produced by Being John Malkovich director Spike Jonze, NTBTS is actually an incredibly smart series, even when the story is anything but. Filmed guerrilla-style — or at least, filmed to appear like guerrilla-style, the line gets blurry — candid and staged moments weave together to create adventures that shouldn’t be able to happen in real life, but it all feels so real, you don’t really care. Call it the Nathan Fielder Effect, another proud Canadian. But by far the best part of this series is its undying love of movies. If it wasn’t clear by the fact the boys’ living room is absolutely plastered with Criterion movie posters, cinematic parodies are everywhere. The first episode may be about Matt and Jay trying to censor genitalia off a building-tall poster while wearing papier-maché heads, but it’s also a pitch-perfect parody of Jurassic Park, even including John Williams’ actual score.“The Blindside” is simultaneously a parody of Star Wars and Daredevil. | VicelandTake, for example, Episode 4, “The Blindside.” It follows Matt after a Star Wars marathon leaves him completely blind right before the release of The Force Awakens in theaters. Jay, in an effort to look cool, goes to the premiere dressed as Han and leaves Matt dressed as a pirate. When Jay’s explanation of the movie gets too loud, and they’re kicked out of the theater, Matt appears dressed as Daredevil, effortlessly fighting off the fans who were antagonizing them. It’s honestly impressive to see how this series skirts copyright law — there are actual scenes filmed in movie screenings, at the actual Sundance Film Festival, and countless other places where it would feel illegal. They may not have had a show at the Rivoli, but they made a great show for TV — and we’re still talking about it almost a decade later. Nirvanna the Band the Show is now streaming on Hulu.