Michael Bay's Skibidi Toilet movie production company has apparently sent DMCA takedowns to Garry's Mod

Update: Garry Newman has confirmed that the DMCA notice was sent last year, and has since been "all resolved", in an email to IGN.

Original story:

Earlier this month it was reported that Skibidi Toilet, the YouTube phenomenon, may be heading to film and television via director Michael Bay. Now Invisible Narratives, a production company co-owned by Bay, has apparently sent a DMCA takedown notice to Garry Newman, citing the large number of Skibidi Toilet games and assets advertised within Garry's Mod.

Skibidi Toilet uses assets derived from Half-Life 2, however, and owes a lot to the Garry's Mod machinima scene. And the animation's original creator, best known as DaFuqBoom, is claiming innocence over the DMCA.

Newman shared a screenshot of the alleged DMCA notice on his S&box Discord channel.

"Significant revenue is being generated by unathorized Skibidi Toilet Garry's Mod games that are being advertised everywhere. There is absolutely no licensed Steam, Valve, Garry's Mod content related to Skibidi Toilet." The notice goes on to cite characters such as "Titan Cameraman, Titan Speakerman, Titan TV Man, and Skibidi Toilet" as property of the copyright holder Invisible Narratives. "Can you believe the cheek," as Newman noted on Discord.

If you don't have children or very young teenagers in your life, you might not be familiar with Skibidi Toilet, a series of 3D animations best known for early episodes in which a singing head which emerges from a toilet. If you have seen them, and you're a tired millenial like me, you probably spotted that the head sure looks like a City 17 resident, and the toilet like something you would have fired at a Combine soldier from the tip of your Gravity Gun.

YouTuber Alexey "DaFuq!?Boom!" Gerasimov, who currently has 43 million subscribers, makes no secret of these inspirations, often crediting Garry's Mod community assets in the video descriptions. Gerasimov also appeared on the S&box Discord after the DMCA began to circulate in the hope of getting in touch with Newman. "I did NOT strike Garry's Mod and I'm trying to understand what else is written in the letter!", he wrote.

It wouldn't be surprising if lawyers, on behalf of the production company Invisible Narratives, acted without Gerasimov's knowledge. It also wouldn't be a surprise if the entire thing was fake - the DMCA system is ripe for abuse and it wouldn't be the first time Garry's Mod has received takedown notices pretending to be from a company that wasn't at all involved. The typo in "unathorized" doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

I will make sure to keep on top of the situation and update this story should there be any breaking Skibidi news.