The imitation of jokes on Twitter is instantaneous. If you make a good joke your replies will be filled with people making the same joke back to you. It’s lame.
Comedy, like anything else, should be presented for public consumption only when done by people who are very, very good at it, and once you've marinated yourself in Lubitsch and Sturges most of the stuff that gets forced-sounding guffaws these days actually seems pretty weak. (Just like all the hours I've spent watching Astaire and Charisse forever ruined Dancing with the Stars for me.)
I like this piece - you've put your finger on something that's really hard to articulate. It brings to mind a lot of the The Ringer podcasts with a seemingly forced group laugh every 20 seconds as I sit there stone faced almost feeling like I should try to laugh to fit in. Contrast with Bill Simmons himself, who does seem to pull off the sarcastic banter in a genuine way that I enjoy.
This is interesting because I do see myself as a funny person, but I mostly don't try to carry that into my online life. My IRL humor is mostly just riffing on whatever mildly absurd thing is happening in the moment, and I never really thought about trying to port that over to a place like twitter, which is so constantly absurd there's nothing left to do but stand back and appreciate.
The recut Shining trailer reminded me of a similar trend from 2005, when a bunch of people took clips from existing movies to create fake trailers in the style of Brokeback Mountain, highlighting moments which, taken out of context, might read as subtly homoerotic. "Brokeback to the Future", that sort of thing.
Not a particularly funny meme. One example really stuck out to me, however. Someone made a fake Brokeback Mountain trailer using clips from - Fight Club.
I wonder if the person who created this trailer thought to themselves "wow, it's REALLY easy to find clips from Fight Club which seem subtly - even OVERTLY - homoerotic!"
I like this one, too. My 14-year-old son is really funny (truly—not just a mom thing); he's been an old muppet in the balcony since he was about four. He absolutely overshoots the mark with commentary and hot takes sometimes (often), though, and we tell him so: to be truly funny requires a huge helping of judiciousness. We listen to a lot of comedy in the car (not to make him a better comic, just b/c it's fun), and lightly talk about what is behind all of that greatness. But mainly we call it like it is: tone it down, not everything needs a take, etc. It's a balancing act to support creativity/humor/cleverness but also not just let it run like wildfire; you need checks and balances, people who love you to tell you that that one was great and this one was a dud. I think the difference here is that the only people telling you online that something sucked are doing so in such a mean-spirited and ultimately self-aggrandizing way; there's a huge absence of unconditionally loving criticism in people's lives, I think.
A key problem is that with professional forms of most creative activities constantly available on demand, we've lost sight of what amateurism can and can't do. I have a few friends I can make laugh pretty consistently and they in turn make me laugh. We aren't objectively funny out of our specific social context but that's fine. Similarly a friend's art work or music can be pretty good even if it's not going to meet a gate keeper standard and can be live and in person, a fun niche, or tuned to your specific context in ways that professional art almost never will be.
That can be awesome, but really relies on boundaries between the amateur and the professional that social media tears down. I think hobbies in general can similar suffer.
You've hit the nail on the head that so many people are so desperately trying to force humor everywhere all the time, but I wonder where it all comes from. Could it be that so many of us are deeply insecure, and the internet has made that insecurity worse rather than better?
The Apatow style comedy and Joss Whedon really taught most of the country very bad lessons about humor. They've made quips extremely annoying in general, but they also make me long for comedy that was well scripted and didn't spend 2 minutes of every 15 allowing actors to riff badly at one another.
I think this goes beyond comedy... everyone thinks they’re funny... everyone thinks they’re a food critic, infectious disease expert, social justice expert (whatever that would be), criminal justice expert, etc, etc.
Giving everyone the ability to livestream their lives appears to have convinced them that they always have something worth live-streaming... ;)
Bizarrely, I’m (as described by others) way funnier now than I was in my teen and college years--mostly because I’m now confident enough to be self-deprecating and pull it off.
But that’s not West Wing comedy, and I’m by and large not a funny writer. Go figure.
At any rate, I feel this kind of “being funny” is tainted by trying to _produce_ humor. That rarely works. But lots of people are reasonably funny in person, once they’re comfortable--not that it’s a cavalcade of zingers, but rather a ton of interesting observations and amusing moments.
Tangentially related - I’m 25 and a lot of people my age remember Vine very fondly. I feel the need to remind them that the vast majority of Vines were fucking terrible. There were a few genuinely funny people and some everyday hilarity that people were lucky enough to record, but 80-90% of it was the kind of unwatchable sketch comedy you describe here.
The imitation of jokes on Twitter is instantaneous. If you make a good joke your replies will be filled with people making the same joke back to you. It’s lame.
Comedy, like anything else, should be presented for public consumption only when done by people who are very, very good at it, and once you've marinated yourself in Lubitsch and Sturges most of the stuff that gets forced-sounding guffaws these days actually seems pretty weak. (Just like all the hours I've spent watching Astaire and Charisse forever ruined Dancing with the Stars for me.)
This morning's grumpy old fossil take.
I like this piece - you've put your finger on something that's really hard to articulate. It brings to mind a lot of the The Ringer podcasts with a seemingly forced group laugh every 20 seconds as I sit there stone faced almost feeling like I should try to laugh to fit in. Contrast with Bill Simmons himself, who does seem to pull off the sarcastic banter in a genuine way that I enjoy.
This is interesting because I do see myself as a funny person, but I mostly don't try to carry that into my online life. My IRL humor is mostly just riffing on whatever mildly absurd thing is happening in the moment, and I never really thought about trying to port that over to a place like twitter, which is so constantly absurd there's nothing left to do but stand back and appreciate.
The recut Shining trailer reminded me of a similar trend from 2005, when a bunch of people took clips from existing movies to create fake trailers in the style of Brokeback Mountain, highlighting moments which, taken out of context, might read as subtly homoerotic. "Brokeback to the Future", that sort of thing.
Not a particularly funny meme. One example really stuck out to me, however. Someone made a fake Brokeback Mountain trailer using clips from - Fight Club.
I wonder if the person who created this trailer thought to themselves "wow, it's REALLY easy to find clips from Fight Club which seem subtly - even OVERTLY - homoerotic!"
No kidding.
I like this one, too. My 14-year-old son is really funny (truly—not just a mom thing); he's been an old muppet in the balcony since he was about four. He absolutely overshoots the mark with commentary and hot takes sometimes (often), though, and we tell him so: to be truly funny requires a huge helping of judiciousness. We listen to a lot of comedy in the car (not to make him a better comic, just b/c it's fun), and lightly talk about what is behind all of that greatness. But mainly we call it like it is: tone it down, not everything needs a take, etc. It's a balancing act to support creativity/humor/cleverness but also not just let it run like wildfire; you need checks and balances, people who love you to tell you that that one was great and this one was a dud. I think the difference here is that the only people telling you online that something sucked are doing so in such a mean-spirited and ultimately self-aggrandizing way; there's a huge absence of unconditionally loving criticism in people's lives, I think.
A key problem is that with professional forms of most creative activities constantly available on demand, we've lost sight of what amateurism can and can't do. I have a few friends I can make laugh pretty consistently and they in turn make me laugh. We aren't objectively funny out of our specific social context but that's fine. Similarly a friend's art work or music can be pretty good even if it's not going to meet a gate keeper standard and can be live and in person, a fun niche, or tuned to your specific context in ways that professional art almost never will be.
That can be awesome, but really relies on boundaries between the amateur and the professional that social media tears down. I think hobbies in general can similar suffer.
You've hit the nail on the head that so many people are so desperately trying to force humor everywhere all the time, but I wonder where it all comes from. Could it be that so many of us are deeply insecure, and the internet has made that insecurity worse rather than better?
The Apatow style comedy and Joss Whedon really taught most of the country very bad lessons about humor. They've made quips extremely annoying in general, but they also make me long for comedy that was well scripted and didn't spend 2 minutes of every 15 allowing actors to riff badly at one another.
I think this goes beyond comedy... everyone thinks they’re funny... everyone thinks they’re a food critic, infectious disease expert, social justice expert (whatever that would be), criminal justice expert, etc, etc.
Giving everyone the ability to livestream their lives appears to have convinced them that they always have something worth live-streaming... ;)
Bizarrely, I’m (as described by others) way funnier now than I was in my teen and college years--mostly because I’m now confident enough to be self-deprecating and pull it off.
But that’s not West Wing comedy, and I’m by and large not a funny writer. Go figure.
At any rate, I feel this kind of “being funny” is tainted by trying to _produce_ humor. That rarely works. But lots of people are reasonably funny in person, once they’re comfortable--not that it’s a cavalcade of zingers, but rather a ton of interesting observations and amusing moments.
Some people are just that quick, but they are the exception that proves the rule. How many Conan O'Briens are there? And even he fails sometimes.
I blame everyone taking improv classes for this phenomenon.
Tangentially related - I’m 25 and a lot of people my age remember Vine very fondly. I feel the need to remind them that the vast majority of Vines were fucking terrible. There were a few genuinely funny people and some everyday hilarity that people were lucky enough to record, but 80-90% of it was the kind of unwatchable sketch comedy you describe here.
Really struggling to not come up with a witty zinger in response. There's a sort of impishness about comedy that is hard to deny.
Actually I am not struggling.
Good enough?