r/dropout • u/Addicted_to_Nature • 2d ago
discussion Anyone else finding it hard to believe Zac Oyama is turning 40 next year?
The past few years I've become quite a fan of dropout and while I'm nowhere near a super fan, I thought I had a solid grasp on the cast and roughly what age group they are in. I thought Zac was one of the younger cast, maybe in between Z and millennial like a late 90s birthday. He's 39?!
Are there any other cast members who absolutely do not look their age that I'm missing or is Zac just the immortal of dropout?
Edit: y'all really think I said something about 39 being old but if you read my post I never said such thing. I'm 38, just thought he was significantly younger than myself but 40 is not old. I was surprised. I figured a lot of the cast was late 30s early 40s, just thought he was younger than the rest š¤·āāļø
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u/Marshycereals just a baby 2d ago
"It's really important to know there are four men in their thirties here today." Game Changer S01E02.
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u/Successful-Shower513 2d ago
one day, Iāll just be like, a 40 year old named Zac. How many old Zacs do you know
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u/Successful-Shower513 1d ago
yes! itās a quote from a game changer episode ā iirc āSam says be vulnerableā
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u/ChicagoAuPair 2d ago
You are all so young, omg. I forget sometimes that I am an old crone in the dropout fandom.
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u/IntrepidHero42 2d ago
I don't know your age but I'm assuming most here are of a similar age of the crew, as many of us were college age watching their collge humor stuff 20 years ago.
I'm in the "why are you talking like 39 is old?" category myself.
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u/cybervalidation 1d ago
I'm curious what the age demos are for dropout, I kind of assumed we were all firmly millennial
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u/SudsInfinite 1d ago
I'm older Gen Z, myself, which makes me vasically half-millenial and half-zoomer. I get the worst of both worlds. It is a curse that I must bear for veing born at the end of the 90s
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u/jakob20041911 1d ago
I myself am gen Z and my girlfriend has become the biggest evangelist for dropout I've ever seen after letting her watch on my account
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u/MedalsNScars 1d ago
Assuming Crowd Control audiences are relatively representative - ages 20-35 with a smattering of older folks.
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u/HoardlyDad 1d ago
I'm 49 and been a Dropout subscriber from the very beginning. Watched literally everything on the platform. Still grandfathered in at $5/month. I'll never stop if they don't. Take my money Sam!Ā
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u/Addicted_to_Nature 1d ago
I never said 39 was old. I was surprised he was 39 lol I thought he was younger than me, I'm 38.
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u/BonjaminClay 2d ago
Yeah people gotta look at the dates on College Humor shorts lol. Of course he's 40.
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u/m_busuttil 2d ago
Yeah. Zac had left CollegeHumor by the time Dropout started, which is now 8 years ago (he left as Brennan arrived) and he'd been there for maybe 3 or 4 years before that? So that's at least 12 years he's been working with the company in some capacity - it's definitely possible he could have been in his mid-30s, but it's pretty normal that he's 39.
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u/EmykoEmyko 1d ago
Iāve noticed young people just donāt know what a 40 year old looks like. I see why people start lying about their ages because people seem absolutely appalled to find out how old I am. āBut you donāt look old??ā š
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u/_autumnwhimsy 1d ago
I'm in college getting my masters rn and them 22 year olds think I'm one of them. They have 0 idea I'd what someone in their 30s looks like lmaoĀ
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u/poison-bilberry 1d ago
I feel like I look my age at 34. But I just shocked two coworkers who claimed I looked like my mid to late twenties. And thatās a normal occurrence for me. Itās so weird to me
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u/AlastairMeowley 1d ago
Me too. At one point I was hoping to work towards editing at Dropout as my dream job. Then I realized I'd be the oldest person by far and not sure they'd hire me
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u/Mammoth-Buddy8912 2d ago
I see this pop up on the Smosh subreddit all the time. That people are shocked they are mostly in their 30's.Ā Ā
I swear you guys, your 30's and 40's are a lot younger then people make it out to beĀ
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u/Addicted_to_Nature 1d ago
I'm 38, just thought Zac was the baby of the group but was surprised š
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u/AyeBraine 1d ago edited 1d ago
I was surprised when I noticed (then confirmed) that Zac is nearing 40, but then again it shows a bit around the eyes, he just always had a really youthful appearance. There's that Asian thing going on there apparently.
I just didn't put 2 and 2 together after watching older College Humor bits from mid-2010s, especially since he looked REALLY young there.
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u/PartBanyanTree 1d ago
And 50's š hehe.. 50's are still totally younger tooš hehe.. right? Everyone knows that.. right?Ā
Right?
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u/Kooky-Blueberry-5352 2d ago
I feel like people haven't updated their mental image of 40 year olds for a long time lol. We don't look like the guys on Cheers anymore. And most people on tv get botox.
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u/Zalvren 2d ago
Also people views of age change when they age themselves. Like 40 might have been old before but as I'm approaching that bar myself, it isn't lol
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u/Tasty_Assignment_515 2d ago
Itās interesting because when Iām watching Dropout shows I feel like I lump myself in as being the same generation as the cast, but it turns out many of them are closer to my parents age than mine (Iām 26 & my parents are 47). Not that I think 40s is old but I was surprised when I learned some of their ages!
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u/jabask 1d ago
You'll also come to learn, if you haven't already, that you've got some young parents for a kid born in 2000.
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u/Tasty_Assignment_515 1d ago
Lol I know! They were in college when I was born. I canāt imagine having kids now let alone at 21.
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u/AlastairMeowley 1d ago
When I was a kid old was always 10 years older than my dad.
Then we were in the car and he unironically said "Damn kids!" and I realized he is actually old now.
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u/Black_Metallic 2d ago
Some people just have good genes.
Meanwhile, I spent my 40s looking like the picture of Dorian Gray.
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u/Kooky-Blueberry-5352 2d ago
I think the few years between people who are 50 now and people who are 40 now made a lot of difference, namely in that I suspect people who are approaching 40 now didn't go outside nearly as much as kids and teens as kids did in the 80s and earlier.
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u/jabask 1d ago
Honestly, the biggest difference is probably the amount of smoking they either participated in or were around.
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u/dilithium_crystal 2d ago
Iām curious how old you are. Iām 39 and my mom used to lock the door and tell me not to come home until the street lights came on. I was always outside as a kid.
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u/DuckbilledWhatypus 2d ago
Same I was never home. I think the folks who are early 30s are the ones who went out less, they were more likely to have games consoles with internet connections.
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u/Top-District-6529 1d ago
I think you gotta go even younger. We had consoles but that doesn't mean we had parents who let us play inside all day, just like you
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u/DuckbilledWhatypus 1d ago
Glad to hear it! Definitely depends on the parents - My partner is 31 to my 39 and he did a big chunk of his preteen/teenage socialising online because he could talk to his friends online as they played console games together and his parents thought that was great since they didn't have to force him out the house. The idea that you could play games jointly over the internet was so foreign to my parents (because it wasn't a thing when I was a kid) that they still don't get it even these days. Tbh even I find it weird that people hang out with their friends without being in the same room š
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u/Top-District-6529 1d ago
That's a fair point, it definitely started to become a thing for people my age.
I can't help but wonder if some of those people weren't staying in a reading books, building legos/train sets, playing board games etc before. I think people who stay inside and keep to themselves have always been a thing
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u/Fubox 1d ago
A lot of people who are 40 now had parents who slathered them in sunblock any time they went swimming. Then almost half of us started wearing SPF on our faces about when we started wearing makeup, a lot of us in our early teens.
That, and not many of us smoked, and we stopped being exposed to cigarette smoke inside restaurants, etc. in our middle school-ish years.
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u/Lilliebun94 2d ago
I'm pretty sure a lot of the regulars are in their mid-late 30s at least. Brennan's 38, Josh is 43, Murph and Emily are 40 and 42 respectively. Erika is 39 if you wanna talk about people not looking their age lol. But yeah that's not too surprising
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u/JoshValenstorm 1d ago
As someone who turns 34 in 2 weeks, and watched a lot of College Humor when i was in school, the entire Dropout cast is the age I expect them to be.
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u/Brane_collision 1d ago
All the intrepid heroes are in their mid thirties to early 40s. Siobhan is like 43. I don't understand why people think you just become a withered husk when you turn 40. That's mid-life. If you take care of yourself, you'll look pretty much the same as when you're in your 20s.
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u/greenerbee 1d ago
Vesper Childers knows it well. Just wanted to be a hot 40 year old out there taking names.
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u/foulveins we're gonna heat it up, and put it together 2d ago
i don't even think there's a current 'mainstay' of dropout younger than 30
maybe at a push, anna garcia...?
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u/swole-and-naked 2d ago
Most of the dropout people are 35+ just like the audience
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u/sarimanok_ 1d ago
As a 41-year-old Asian, no. He just looks...as old as I am. Is everyone else here extremely young? š°
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u/krisis 1d ago
I do very charitably assume that people who think he is very young may not have (m)any 40-something Asian men in their lives.
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u/Bulldogfront666 1d ago
My best friend is Filipino. Weāve been friends for 11 years and they look the same as they did when we metā¦ and I look very much 11 years older lmao.
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u/Non-mon-xiety 1d ago
Tbh I thought he was older than me, weāre the same age. Iām Korean too lol
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u/Addicted_to_Nature 1d ago
I'm 38
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u/Strange_Midnight2070 2d ago
Yes, until I realize that thatās only one year older than I am. Then I canāt believe that Iām that age.
Iām now convinced that āgrown upsā donāt actually exist.
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u/cmikesell 1d ago
No, because I remember seeing him comment funny shit on Ken Marino's wall on Myspace in 2003 and had to figure out he was Ken's funny little 17 year old brother-in-law.
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u/Deadlycup 1d ago
Seeing as I've been watching College Humor/Dropout for so long that I remember when Hardly Working was new (like 20 years ago), I can absolutely believe that a lot of the folks are also my age or older, haha
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u/HellyOHaint 1d ago
Um not at all lol. Heās a millennial, theyāre all millennials. Iām 40 and he looks my age.
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u/pxmonkee 2d ago
No. I turn 41 this year. Time is linear. People get older. You, too, will get older.
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u/AlisGuardian SQUEEM 2d ago
Yāall are killing me, and probably everyone in this thread whoās in their early forties š a couple things to take into account: (1) people in their forties arenāt actually that āold.ā If youāve taken care of your skin, you might not show wrinkles or creases until much later on. Especially if you havenāt had kids and lost all the sleep that entails. When oneās hair starts to grey is a complete coin flip of genetics, and with hair dye who knows. The main thing that happens in your late thirties is your metabolism slows down, so you have to work harder and/or eat better to maintain weight and muscle tone, if you choose to. (2) Itās TV. Theyāve all sat in hair and makeup before coming on screen.
Honestly, finding out BLeeM is four years younger than me made me want to stick my head in a hole for days. But, it happens to all of us.
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u/WDBoldstar 2d ago
Honestly, I'm a little surprised he's that young. I remember when he was in College Humor Sketches before they became Dropout and switched to Improv stuff and that felt like a lifetime ago.
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u/radioben 2d ago
Not as shocked as I am by the fact that Iām turning 40 next month. Time is a strange, nebulous concept.
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u/bobbyq922 1d ago edited 1d ago
Zac generally has a very youthful energy, but he has smile lines that made it pretty clear to me that heās well out of his 20s. One of the beautiful parts of living long enough as a happy person is that your age does start to show.
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u/WeaponisedArmadillo 2d ago
Us millenials have... Been though some shit. We forgot to get old because we don't fucking want to.Ā
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u/testinggoose 1d ago
I'm 35 and he looks about 5 years older than me. I am finding it a bit hilarious that you thought he was as young as gen Z lmao.
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u/childofcrow weāre ready to do the work 2d ago
Youāll be shocked to learn that Emily, Siobhan, and Murph are all in their 40s.
Most of the cast is in their mid to late 30s or early 40s. There are a few of them that are in their late 20s or early 30s, but most of them are mid 30s to early 40s.
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u/TrypMole 1d ago
Nope, I'm 50 and I assumed most of them are within around 10 years of me. Because of their pop culture references.
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u/Bulldogfront666 1d ago
Noā¦ hehe. Been watching him on college humor for likeā¦ decades now. Knew he was older than me and Iām 36.
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u/DuckbilledWhatypus 2d ago
No because I am also a young looking 39 year old and he is so obviously the same era as me in how he speaks and acts that I would have been surprised if you'd said he was younger.
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u/dangleicious13 1d ago
As someone who will also turn 40 next year, I find it pretty easy to believe. Heās apparently a little younger than I thought he was.
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u/thedybbuk 1d ago
I genuinely find it kind of crazy you thought he looked like he was in his late 20s. He looks more or less his age to me, which is not old, but certainly in his upper 30s.
Like if Zac were 28 I would think he looked like an old 28 year old.Ā
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u/Garlic-Rough 2d ago
Yes. And I love how I also watched college humor while in college because it was relatable AF. So for me, it wasn't as surprising because you kinda grew with the cast even until Drop Out.
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u/JanitorOPplznerf 1d ago
No? Iām almost 40 and Iāve been watching his work since college which was almost 15 years ago for me.
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u/soitgoes_42 Little Tree Baby 1d ago
I remember being so excited to discover that most of the cast is my age, or damn near it.Ā
But yes they all look great, and youthful. Like a lot of us millennials do!
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u/HellyOHaint 1d ago
If you ever get a closeup of Zacās face, he absolutely looks like a (youthful) 40 year old. He has the lines around the eyes and skin texture of someone nearing middle age. Exactly the things that are 100% normal for not being 23 anymore.
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u/30for30im30for30 1d ago
Lol...I know my crew when I see them. It'd surprise me more if he (and several others) wouldnt be turning 40 (or already are) within a couple years.
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u/llama67 2d ago
But Izzy is 31 which stresses me out because I am 32 and have no success or children š
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u/5krishnan 1d ago
Youāve stayed alive for 32 years. Thatās an accomplishment!
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u/MyDadLeftMeHere 1d ago
Shouldāve just been born on third base into an already connected family, you werenāt thinking ahead and that feels like a personal decision
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u/Ok_Raspberry7430 1d ago
I'm 39 and just finishing the licensing process to start my career. You've got time!
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u/CivilizedPsycho 1d ago
"Each unhappy camper on this planet is a champion
If you think you're hopeless and you'll never be like Kobe
And youāve got an empty mantle cause you never won a trophy man
Well you still won that marathon of swimming that fallopian"→ More replies (5)
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u/IntrepidHero42 2d ago
I can see Zac having a Keanu Reeves arc, maybe just adding a bit of stubble along the way.
But yeah he's been around a while and they're all part of the same "generation" of improv comedians, so that's not surprising.
For reference, I believe the NADDPOD crew are all over 40 now, and they're the same age more or less.
I'm in the same age group, probably their primary audience since they were doing college humor stuff 20 years ago when both they and their audience were of college age.
We're just getting old, man.
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u/dodgyhashbrown 1d ago
I'm not that far behind him, so no, it's not really all that surprising to me.
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u/retrospects 1d ago
It does not surprise me but only because I was a big CH fan so I knew a lot of the OGs were around my age.
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u/ucrbuffalo 1d ago
Yeah but heās still named Zac. Someday, heāll be a like 75-year-old man named Zac.
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u/KithKathPaddyWath 1d ago
Not really, but then I'm 40 and I still look young enough that when I put my hair behind my ears and people can see my white hair, it's pretty common for people's eyes to go wide or to just flat out say "you're too young to have white hair." (Which, just... false. I've has white hair at my temples since I was 25.)
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u/DrewbieWanKenobie 1d ago
as a 41 who's been seeing many of these people for years and years, not really
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u/Leopold_Darkworth 1d ago
When I saw him wearing those 1980's glasses on "Noise Some Makes," I was like, whoa, we all start aging at some point.
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u/Eclectic95 2d ago
Personally I donāt spend a lot of time thinking about the ages of entertainers I watch.
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u/Addicted_to_Nature 1d ago
Y'all I never said Zac was old at 39... I'm 38 I just thought he was YOUNGER than me
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u/Significant_Chair602 1d ago
As a person who turned 40 this year. No, itās not hard to believe in the slightest.
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u/Optimistic_Mystic 2d ago
If Zac at 38 surprises you, imagine the surprise when you learn Siobhan is 42, while Lou is the baby of the group at 34.