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alethianightsong · 5 months

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Each GTA game is a satire of American culture so GTA 6...

might be a satire of the mid-2010s and influencer culture. Lucia might've been in jail for 5-8 years, long enough to come outta jail and asks, "Who are all these skanks with the phones?" and Jason goes "Oh yeah, you haven't seen many influencers in prison. These people get so popular that they're paid to peddle crap to their fans." "Sounds dumb as shit." "Well, they make millions. The sexy ones can scam 1000s of dollars from their fanboys & get away with it" which naturally leads into some side-missions consisting of Lucia faking being an influencer or maybe she and Jason help an influencer take out the competition.

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blackswaneuroparedux · 10 months

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Anonymous asked: What do you think about John Oliver? (The British American comedian and talk show host.)

I honestly have no strong opinions about John Oliver only because I haven’t avidly watched all he’s done. What I have seen of his HBO show ‘Last Week Tonight’ left me lukewarm if not indifferent.

In England Oliver followed a well trodden path of most British comedian-satirists. He went through the Cambridge Footlights comedy club as a student at Cambridge - the seed bed of talent that included half of Monty Python, Douglas Adams, Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Richard Ayoade, and other notable writers and actors. But after that he reached what I say the second tier of British comedy fame by doing comedy gigs at Edinburgh every year, appearing on lots of BBC light hearted satirical news panel shows, and then briefly a podcast for the Times. So not a stand out success story.

But I don’t really blame John Oliver for that. It’s just how the comedy culture is in the UK. There just isn't that much room in Britain for non-standup comedians. It’s a very small ecosystem. If you're a stand-up (and I suspect, if you're represented by Avalon, the big UK comedy agents), you can get on the panel shows, do one man comedy tours, and probably get a sitcom gig - and thus make a decent living. If you're not quite that sort of comedian, or more of a writer/character comedian, you either scrape a living from Radio 4 for writing gigs, or you look elsewhere.

America came to Oliver’s rescue. He only really got visibility when his run of the mill stand up routines caught the attention of the producers at John Stewart’s Daily Show where he started as a writer. And the rest is history as they say with his own weekly satirical news show on HBO ‘Last Week Tonight’.

I don’t think it’s controversial to say he’s still not really known back in the UK. He’s an American citizen now from what I gather and so I’m sure he’s not too bothered given his own glittering achievement in the US.

But how may I explain why I feel underwhelmed towards the comedy of John Oliver?

I was comparing notes about the differences between American and Brit humour with an American work colleague who was at Harvard and almost did stand up comedy as alternative career in NYC but bombed. He really liked Oliver and really liked his humour. I couldn’t understand it until it dawned on me that Oliver’s brand of humour isn’t really British per se but very Americanised. I find a lot of his humour revolves around shouting things in a state of exasperated disbelief. In effect Oliver has that British sarcasm which, in the British accent, comes across as authoritative to the American ear and therefore more humorous. But he also has that classic American shouting and gawping aspect which typifies American comedy styles.

I think that type of humour isn’t really British and doesn’t go down too well as I think Brits prefer humour that is either more surreal or dry but delivered with more restraint, at least when it comes to political humour. I suspect a lot of Americans see him as the token ‘funny British guy’. That plays very well to American audiences. But I doubt being British in-and-of-itself isn't as easy to add to your comic persona if you're performing to a Brit audience.

Not to get meta but I think Oliver wants to have his cake and eat it. I get the suspicion that his performance is a performative in the sense that he plays what he thinks Americans like about British humour but it’s utterly watered down to the American market - in other words as dull as dish water and not very risqué or edgy that Brits are used to - or were until the cancer of woke infecting British comedy, case in point the canceling of foul mouthed but funny Scottish black comedian Jerry Sadowitz from the Edinburgh Fringe festival).

Worse, Oliver comes across as too polished for a Brit audience - “All tits and no teeth” as one comedian writer friend of mine at the BBC told me once.

I think if you see enough of his own show ‘Last Week Tonight’ you can lift the Wizard’s curtain and see the simple formula played on repeat each week.

Leaving aside the low hanging fruit easy gags (e.g. against Trump and Republicans in general). I have no issue going after politicians - I loathe them all - but it’s just not funny. Going after corporates is also fine. But I don’t think it’s particularly informative most of the time and especially where he is liable to misunderstand or twist facts. Not surprisingly his views on gender affirming care for children (ie mutilation and sterilisation of pre-pubescent children) is predictable hot mess of sheer ignorance and virtue signalling.

It’s not so much a criticism but as much older friends have pointed out that in many ways he’s mimicing an iconic satirical news show from the 1960s, David Frost’s ‘That Was The Week That Was’ that first broadcasting in 1962 and was a satire hit charting and subverting the changing nature of British society and cultural life in the 1960s. It didn’t last long but what it did was explode a satire bomb under British society for decades to come. In many ways it paved the way for Monty Python and Private Eye (a satirical magazine that still is the bane of the British political, media, and arts establishment).

Oliver’s show doesn’t have the comic wit and charisma to pull off great satire.

For me the irksome problem with Oliver is that he’s consciously manufactured being a British guy playing at being an American version of a British guy doing comedy. So the way he acts just doesn’t seem quite right to Brits looking in. Something smells off even as he looks and sounds so sanitised.

His brand of satirical comedy of speaking truth to power schtick doesn’t work in the UK if only because it’s already been done very well (Stewart Lee) or done really bad (Nish Kumar).

Moreover BBC shows like the long running ‘Have I Got News For You’ would be our equivalent of the Daily Show but as a panel show. Over its twenty odd years it been really good or just averaging, but it ticks that box of British self-deprecating style of humour while also dishing out cutting barbs. But whatever Oliver does still doesn’t come close to what British satire does (or used to do).

Thanks for your question.

#question #ask #john oliver #satire #daily show #british comedy #comedy #british satire #american satire #culture #american comedy #HBO

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k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9 · 1 year

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#jason voorhees #satire #flowers #friday the 13th #random #Antagonist #fictional character #cosplay #american slasher film #american slasher movies #80s slasher movies

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tygerland · 3 months

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American Psycho (2000)

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fey-family-reunion · 5 months

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"ace attorney's representation of the law/lawyers is dumb because it's inaccurate" becomes less interesting of a take every time i hear it. oh yeah this series where ghosts and parrots go on the stand is totally trying to be the most well-researched 100% accurate legal drama ever, instead of simplifying or glazing over things for the sake of pacing and fun

#which doesn't even get into the whole 'it's a purposefully exaggerated satire' angle #or how every time i see this take it's always from someone comparing it to the american justice system #as if the way we do things is universal lmao

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war-in · 2 months

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Inside back cover of Dec 1955 Playboy Magazine

#american culture #playboy magazine #french #napoleon #napoleon bonaparte #illustration #illustrative art #satire #year: 1955

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haveyoureadthisbook-poll · 15 days

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#american psycho #bret easton ellis #horror #satire #book poll #have you read this book poll #polls

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american-boyboss · 1 year

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#sigma male #sigma grindset #patrick bateman #american psycho #christian bale #whisper #relationship #affection #attachment #mood #male satire

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9ofspades · 1 year

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Opinion: I'm an Anti-Specsser and Everyone Else Should Be Too

Why are you wearing glasses?

No, seriously. Why the fuck are you still wearing glasses?

The epidemic is over. I don't know anyone who worries about nearsightedness anymore. Do you hear anyone talking about it? Do you see nearsightedness germs flying around? No, because it's OVER.

Look, I don't know how to break it to you, but a thin piece of glass in front of your eyes isn't going to help protect you from macular degeneration. It's a false sense of security, an illusion; like if you just keep looking through them you can pretend that the world has crisp sharp edges. Well, guess what? The world is blurry. You don't know where empty space ends and your body begins. In fact, it doesn't. Your body is mostly empty space.

Everything happens for a reason, anyway; so if you get into an accident because you can't drive without your glasses? Tough cajones; take your punishment like God intended. It's your fault for having bad genes, which you got because of... original sin, or something. I don't know, I didn't actually read the Bible. I just believe vehemently in every word of it, except the words you use to disagree with me. Because that's wrong.

I don't think I'm doing anything wrong by yelling at glasses-wearers on the street. It just fills me with such visceral, incandescent rage when I see a pair of pince-nez balancing on someone's nose. It's like they're sending a direct fuck-you to people like me, who choose not to wear glasses. So of course I have to yell at them; it's just simple self-preservation - if I don't, pretty soon everyone will be wearing glasses, and ganging up on those of us that don't, because we're "jeopardizing public safety" or "a danger to the common good." I don't need to listen to that.

When you declare you're on the opposite side from me with that flag you wear right on your face, you shouldn't be surprised when I treat you like an enemy. "What sides?" you ask? "There's no 'sides' here; everyone is just choosing-" oh, shut up. You're so naive. Of course there are sides. There's sides to everything. What about a circle? you say. Inside and outside. There. Now don't you feel stupid.

And those circles you wear on your face mark you as being on the inside. I don't like that. Nobody likes being left on the outside. So stop wearing them. That way I can find something else to be angry about, like freckles. I think I'll take on freckles next. If you have them, stop having them. You're being too different from me and I don't like it.

#swearing #satire #parody #covid allegory #anti-maskers #glasses #unreality #bastardized christianity #evangelical philosophy #public health #public safety #ocular health mention #eyes #aggressive language #current events #american politics #I literally could not make anti-masker sentiments sound more illogical if I tried #original

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deadpanwalking · 2 months

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What did you think of the first episode of The Regime? I'm not sure what to make of it yet.

Neither am I—I really hope that it comes into its own and doesn't rely as much on the Veep and Succession house blend. Kinda digging Elena and Herbert's Kronk and Yzma thing, though.

#girl in cookie monster pajamas and her simp familiar is a dynamic of all time #one thing i loved about the death of stalin is that iannucci didn't just copy paste a satire of american or british politics into 1953 #he demonstrated an understanding of a distinct flavor of soviet-era satire—a chimera of literal and figurative gallows humor #i hope we get to see some of that here #that is to say—i hope it employs central europe as more than a set dressing and plays with cultural and historical context #anonymous #assbox #the regime

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johnconn · 2 years

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No that scene where butcher walks through a metal detector and it beeps so butcher just shows the cop the gun he's casually carrying in his pocket and the cop just says 'nice piece' and lets him go got to me😭

#the boys #best satire ive seen on American gun violence #billy butcher #eric kripke

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ravewing · 13 days

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guys what do i do if i accidentally ordered an extra copy of the declaration of independence

#declaration of independence #amrev #american revolution #history #not satire. help what do i do with it

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funfeminism · 10 months

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I think men should have to take some sort of test before reading or watching satire. Cause they can’t keep consuming American Psycho and Fight Club and earnestly adopting the ideas and getting away with it

#don’t cancel me this is only half sincere #satire #American psycho #fight club #books #movies #mine #test #text #text post #men #feminism #women #satire movie #satire book #book #movie #men reading #critical thinking skills

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acrossthewavesoftime · 3 months

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Oh, the subtlety of 18th century satirical plays. Almost lends itself to a tag game.

The dedication even has a more violent interpretation of what we today might call an 18th century second cousin of the booty shorts meme!

And I think I will steal this closing line for my own correspondence. ;) The play is The Fall of British tyranny: or, American Liberty Triumphant, a Tragi-Comedy, by John Leacock (1776), a relation of Benjamin Franklin's.

#18th century #satire #john leacock #american revolutionary war #american war of independence #amrev #1776 #the fall of british tyranny #or ameriican liberty triumphant a tragi-comedy

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2-gay-2-furious · 2 months

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#male satire #sigma male #whispers #gay #sigma male grindset #gaycel #ryan gosling #patrick bateman #male manipulator #american psycho #barbie #kenough #yukio mishima #guy hocquenghem

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saisbesitos · 3 months

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Obligatory Catboy, since Valentines Day is coming up. (=˃ᆺ˂=)

#american psycho #patrick bateman #catboy #nekoboy #valentines day #wall street #80s movies #christian bale #artist on tumblr #fanart #Am I being satirical?#That's on you to decide.

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