Zach Stone Is Gonna Be Famous

• Rory Scovel as Pat,[8] Zach's attention-seeking boss
• Robbie Amell as Nick,[8] Amy's friendly boyfriend and Zach's rival
• Shelley Hennig as Christy Ackerman,[8] the hottest girl in Zach's old high school
• Jason Rogel as Marcus,[8] member of Zach's camera crew
• Justin Dray as Phillip,[8] member of Zach's camera crew
• Arshad Aslam as Hasaad,[8] member of Zach's camera crew

Zach Stone Is Gonna Be Famous struggled in the ratings during its run. The series premiered to 650,000 viewers and saw its numbers decrease to half of that midway through its season. The show originally aired at 10:30 p.m. on Thursdays, but was moved to 11 p.m. in June 2013 to expand its dwindling audience.[16] MTV scheduled its eighth and ninth episodes to air back to back, and burned off the following three the next week. MTV officially cancelled the series on June 26, 2013.[16]

Zach Stone Is Gonna Be Famous has received mixed reviews from television critics. Brian Lowry of Variety wrote, "While the concept is hardly original ... the series still feels fresh and timely," adding, "this single-camera satire zeroes in on a burning, warped desire to be famous that MTV, as much as anyone, has stoked and exemplified. ... Indeed, even MTV appears oddly oblivious to the ironies of this dichotomy."[17] Entertainment Weekly called the pilot a "promising debut", positively reviewing Burnham's portrayal of the titular character: "Because there's an inherent empathy to the character, it's a delight watching him strive and fail to make the mundane ordinariness of his suburban reality sexy."[18] While noting the premise of parodying reality shows covered no new ground, The New York Times did commend the show's attempt to aim "straight for the dark underbelly of all these fantasies. It's one thing to put on a show; it's another to do so to mask huge holes within."[19]

Pilot Viruet of The A.V. Club noted that the character's "off-camera moments", such as his appeasement of girl-next-door Amy in the pilot, were more satisfying than watching "a completely abhorrent character do awful thing after awful thing. ... It's clear that the writers (and Zach) are so knowledgeable of this particular world that the end result is smarter than you'd expect the average reality show send-up to be."[20] Newsday called the show "almost too clever, funny and ironic for MTV", also praising the show's softer moments: "Zach is both commentary and send-up of the ephemera that MTV and the Internet at large celebrate – then instantly forget. ... But there's a core gentleness here, too, and while Zach's frenetic attention span is extremely splintered, he still manages to be relatable."[21]

In contrast, David Wiegand of the San Francisco Chronicle felt that the show "is more noisy than funny", comparing it to Burnham's beginnings posting videos to YouTube from his bedroom: "His bedroom videos were weird, too, but funny-weird, not I-need-an-Excedrin weird."[22] Hank Stuever of The Washington Post gave the series a scathing review, claiming that "this show is so bad, it's beneath even MTV". Describing the series as irritating, he continues, "One thing about MTV's so-called original programming is that it is often a safe refuge for the criminally unoriginal. I would like to point out that we can extradite Burnham back to reality and prosecute him as an adult."[23]