I Saw This!! realiTyVgames

I Saw This (double exclamation point) is our feature wherein Kent(me) or Toasty attempt to write about a bunch of stuff they watched some time ago and meant to write about but just never got around to doing so. But we can't not write cuz that would be bad, very bad.  Florida governor bad.

One thing we haven't written much about on this blog is realityTV, specifically competition shows.  I know I'm not a huge fan, and I suspect Toasty is similarly averse to the genre.  I think in recent years I've started watching more competition shows than ever, by which I mean, a couple, versus none.  I recall dabbling in early seasons of Survivor and Trading Spaces and American Idol and Project:Runway but at a certain point I realized that these competition shows were just empty calories, and not even all that delicious calories...like eating veggie straws when you could just have had potato chips, or caramel corn, or a fruit salad. I'm feeling peckish and losing the thread here.  In recent years, we've watched all of Nailed It! on Netflix, easily the most entertaining baking competition show out there, because the whole point is bad bakers trying their best, and having fun while doing it.  We've also watched Lego Masters which, given that we're obscenely ridiculous toy people in this household (I'm watching a youtube video about action figure news as I write this), is not that suprising, but I was surprised to find how engaged I was with the show, which is not very much about the personality politics and all about building cool Lego diaramas.

So, we partook in a few other reality competitions in the past couple months... more in such a short time than ever...let's just talk about it....

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LOL Canada - AmazonPrime

I started in on Last One Laughing Canada out of sheer curiosity.  Given that I'm a comedy lover, I wanted to know who from the Canadian comedy scene would wind up on this reality competition show (and would it be funny, or just sad?).  Well, a completely godawful introduction let me know, and, I was quite surprised that I knew everyone involved, save one ( Brandon Ash-Mohammed) and liked pretty much everyone. The crux of the show is putting 10 comedians in a room for 6 hours (edited down to about 3 hours over six episodes) and telling them they can't laugh, or even smile.  The last one left wins a pile of money for charity.  There are rules, but the basics basically is no laughing, no smiling, one warning, then you're out.

The "LOL" formulae was developed from a Japanese game show but now seems to be an Amazon brand which has, currently, 9 different international versions on the streamer, including Australia, German, France, Spain, and India, with a Quebec version forthcoming (surprised there's no US or UK version yet).

With host Jay Baruchel the competing comedians were Drew Barrymore's ex-husband Tom Green, Kim's Convenience co-star Andrew Phung, Whose Line is it Anyways legend Colin Mochrie, Kids in the Hall's Dave Foley, comedian (and ex-pat living in the UK) Mae Martin, "America's Sweetheart" Caroline Rhea, one of my favourite live stand-ups Debra DiGiovanni, The League's Jon Lajoie (whom our dog Taco was named after) and Letterkenny's K. Trevor Wilson joining Ash-Mohammad.

The thing about comedians is a lot of them don't laugh at comedy, they analyze it, they deconstruct it as they see it, like a magician trying understand how another magician's trick works.  A lot of them have a severe poker face.  But the flip side is there's some of those comedians that just love to laugh, so those ones are out almost immediately.

What I wasn't expecting was Tom Green. It's been so long since I have engaged in Green's absurdist shenanigans that I forgot how good he was at that sort of thing.  He got a lot of miles out "delicious cheese sandwiches" (maybe too much mileage). And here he's kind of in his element, just able to be his weird self. Lajoie was easily my favourite competitor, as he had tactics for not laughing, which were tremendously funny on their own.  Mmm. Mmmhmm.  Ash-Mohammad's seductive sunscreen application was something absolutely special to behold, and Mochrie is such a seasoned improv pro that almost everything he does is so good.  Foley seemed to be completely disinterested in the whole thing, even after he was ejected, while Rhea came prepared to laugh, which was kind of the antithesis of the show (rolling out in her teen daughter's wardrobe was a pretty good bit though).

I laughed a lot, and enjoyed spending time with pretty much everyone, and I found the format worked quite well as a competition, really drawing the viewer through from episode to episode, but the unstructured room with hack comedy props is little too malformed for high quality comedy.  The good thing is at 6 sub-1/2 hour episodes it didn't overstay its welcome.

LOL Australia - AmazonPrime 

As I started this post writing about the Canadian version, put the Australian version of Last One Lauging - hosted by Rebel Wilson - on in the background, kind of as an experiment to see if the show would still work even if I didn't know the personalities involved.  I only know a couple of the comedians, mainly host Wilson and absurdist Sam Simmons (who I wrote about here during 2013's JFL42 festival, the one year I deigned to write about stand-up comedy on the blog) but the format proved itself to be just as attractive and entertaining, even if the personalities involved were a bit more alien. 

It's still a fairly funny show, but there's definitely some cultural differences that bubbled up to the fore.  For starters, the Aussies are much more brutal and cutting, like they were treating the room as a place to roast each other, really dig into their careers and, in some ways, let their petty jealousies bubble up to the surface in unflattering ways, that, I guess were meant to be comedy (the thing about roasting is it's only funny if everyone's laughing together, otherwise it just feels mean, and the whole point here is to not laugh, so nobody's laughing).  The Canadians all seemed genuinely respectful of one another, even if they didn't quite know each other.  The elder statesmen, the ones who had gone off to temporarily bigger careers in the States, they were still generally kind to the younger set.  Australia is roughly the same population density as Canada, but where they're situated in the world they're the big English-speaking market (with New Zealand being their Canada), so there's no where to go as an elevation unless you're willing to make the huge leap to the States or UK.  As such it's a tinier, more insular market, everyone knows each other on this show, but there's much more of a competitive spirit between them all.  And throw in $100,000 prize (not for charity, but for the winner) it's certainly a bit more cutthroat.

Another standout in comparison was the Australians' reliance upon dick and bum jokes.  So many bum jokes. I think half the gags here were about bums.  There's got to be some sort of cultural obsession with the ol' hiney Down Under (well, I guess "down under" is basically a butt euphamism as is, so perhaps it makes some sense).  There was quite a bit more lewdness in the Aussie LOL, and maybe an overreliance on cheap theatrics.

It was funny to see that there's a few archetypes that bubble up.  There's the seasoned improv vet, (Mochrie in Canada, Frank Woodley in Australia), the almost-as-seasoned absurdist (Green vs Simmons), the one who distances themselves from it all (Foley vs the almost entirely unengaged Ed Kavalee, making Foley look positively enthusiastic by comparison), the young buck going deep against the vets (Ash-Mohammad vs Nazeem Hussain) and the anti-laugh tactician (LaJoie vs  Dilruk Jayasinha).

Even comparing the hosts, Wilson was much more passive than Baruchel, who seemed to want to insert himself into the happenings as much as possible. The Canadian version also had some games and special guests inserted into the proceedings which made for a bit more entertainment and sense of structure, where there was little else but chaos in Australia.  

But then Sam Simmons was on the attack from moment one in the show, and didn't let up for anything.  My recollection of him as a live performer was that he would do anything, shamelessly, and his sense of comedy crossed the entire spectrum, but here he was mostly focussed on shock-and-awe.  By the end of the show the room looked like a bodega had exploded, like a rock star's hotel room after a coke-fuelled bender, and most of that chaos could be attributed to Simmons.  His go-for-broke, no shame comedy started minutes into the show as he stepped out from behind the change room curtain, music blaring, to perform a wild dance wearing a leather jacked with over a dozen stretchy rubber dick-and-balls stitched on it, which he then proceeded to tug and stretch and fillate in a manic fit along with the hyper music.  And that's where he started his onslaught.

Just past the halfway point, there fell a spastic sense of desperation among the remaining competitors which only seemed to heighten as more were eliminated.  It was less funny and more interesting from a sociological standpoint, as these people who feed off laughs started going absolutely mental, seemingly for hours going "is this funny?" over and over.  That sort of desperation was only flirted with in the Canadian one, but the same sense of "this is a form of torture" seemed to overcome them as well.

I didn't come out of it with a healthier appreciation for the Aussie comedy scene...there was a lot of weaksauce efforts in that room of unfamiliar personalities, but the few standouts really stood out.  Woodley, Simmons, Becky Lucas, and Dilruk Jayasinha I think were tops for me. 

I don't think I'll give any of the other foreign language versions a try.  Comedy is so much in the delivery and the delivery is shot when you're trying to do it through subtitles.

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Best In Miniature - CBC Gem

Another Canadian competition show, though a lot less calmer and gentler than LOL Canada, and much more in the vein of Lego Masters (and I'm sure all those damn baking shows that other people seem to love), where the production cares much less about personalities and backstories, and instead is much more focused on skills.  In this case it's people who create miniatures, dollhouses and accessories.

There is an amazing amount of skill, experience and creativity involved in miniaturing, and the competitors, ranging from only a couple years to decades of experience, each show their own personality in their art.  The competitors hail from the US, Canada, and the U.K., and they seemed to have some form of on-line presence and be largely familiar with one another through social media, some having even bought pieces off the others.

The first episode's challenge is building a dollhouse and it immediately shows the strengths and styles of each of the artists, but also very, very quickly exposes their weaknesses.  Subsequent episodes feature a mini-challenge, where they have to create a small piece in less than an hour, which they are then judged on by the show's experts (one a miniatures expert, the other a design expert), and then they have a specific challenge working in one of their rooms for up to 10 hours.  Each room has to meet some specific design challenges that are foisted upon them, as well as feel a part of the overall aesthetic of the house.

I was impressed, constantly, every episode by everyone, some more than others, but just agog with how cool and amazing and talented these people are at making such a broad spectrum of items.  While some had specialties, most were still able to adapt and create what was needed even if they weren't intimately familiar with the how to.  Plus as the competitors were winnowed down, the more fine and precise the work got, the more impressive it all was.

I enjoyed this show tremendously, very little of which had to do with personalities, except in how they came out in their art.  It was such a low-stakes, low-drama, competition that it was a soothing, relaxing and utterly transfixing watch.  I would like more, but I may also just watch again.

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Is it Cake? - Netflix

Shows based of memes are maybe not the best idea, and Is It Cake? is a fudging mess of a game show.  The format of the show is so bizarre and kind of so antithetical to the way almost any other competition show is done that I have to wonder if it's just ahead of its time, or if it's really just a train wreck.

Hosted by Saturday Night Live's Mikey Day, the premise of the show is three bakers compete in creating a cake that looks like something else, then each cake is put up on a podium against 5 other non-cakes of the same item, and a panel of three "celebrity" (some are minorly famous, some are like specific famous, and some are just internet famous) guests have to come to consensus in 20 seconds on which one is cake.  

But that's just the high level structure...it gets really, really weird the more you dig into it.

The show starts with 9 competitors.  After a round of "Is it cake?", where a variety of random items on podiums - one of them cake - is displayed, and eveyone gets a chance to choose.  If there's a tie, the fastest answer wins.  Kind of a weird system there.  But then, the winner gets to choose two others from the stable.  They each then choose one of the non-cake items for them to replicate in cake form.  The other 6 competitors just go to a bench on the side and...sit there, for 8 hours, while the three competitors bake and make their fake cake.  So bizarre.

AFTER the judging, if the judges were fooled by more than one cake, the judges then have to pick the winner based on how real the cake looks up close and how good the cake tastes.  Then the winner gets a chance to win some prize money by playing "Cake or Cash" where two items looking almost exactly the same are presented, only one is cake, the other is cash.  If they guess which is cake, they win cash.

The following episode, the winner of the previous episode picks two more contestants (from the pool who haven't already been chosen), they play a round of "Is it cake?" with the random items, pick their item to cake fake replicate and go through it all over again.  It's clunky as clunky can be as far as a competition show goes, and yet, it's kinda stupidly entertaining.  It's absurd they have people sitting around for 8 hours while people bake cakes, but that's what happens.  

The contestants, however, are all rather supportive of each other, and all very into discussing techniques, and approaches, and flavours and whatnot.  It's always nice these competition shows where the competitors really are just happy to trade knowledge and appreciate each others' skills.

Likewise, it's fun watching Day's hacking into things that are - and are not - cake.  And the brief moments of deciding whether something is or isn't cake is still a challenge even though you've just watched 20 minutes of the cake being made, the show edits it enough that when it comes time to guess it's still fun for the audience (but it comes at the expense of getting into finer detail on how the cake was made).

Every episode I couldn't believe I was still watching it, and yet, I wanted to watch more after each episode was over.  It's incredibly stupid (and a HUGE waste of food...where does all that cake Day mangles wind up?) and it's such a silly premise, but I enjoyed it despite myself.

KsMIRT: all groaned up

 KsMIRT=Kent's month in reviewing television. I haven't reviewed television in a while. Truth be told, I find reviewing television frustrating, as I don't have the capacity to review episode by episode, nor do I have the capacity to really, really dive into a full season. So why bother with these half-assed reviews? I mean, how can I not? Can I not? 

This Month:
The Rise and Fall of Reggie Dinkins Season 1 (2026, NBC - 10/10 episodes)
Deadloch Season 2 (2026, AmazonPrime - 6/6 episodes)
Last One Laughing UK Season 2 (2026, AmazonPrime - 6/6 episodes)
Star Wars: Maul: Shadow Lord (2026, Disney+ - 10/10 episodes)

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One of the things I hate the most about my brain is how deplorably poor it is at remembering clever one-liners or turns of phrases from the media I watch. I'm so direly envious of those who can, like, the next day after watching a new show or movie, perfectly use a quote or reference in correct situational context. I mean, I would rather be funny on my own, but part of being funny is remembering one's own bits and I have a real hard time remembering to commit to a bit. (Toasty has a running gag on this blog of citing an obscure or absurd reference point when bringing up an actor in his entries, and when I try to do it, I can commit about 12% to the bit, often forgetting mid-post about the bit.... We could really do with an editor ... if we were striving for any sense of professionalism... which I gave up on long ago).

I say this because shows from the Tina Fey and Robert Carlock school of situational comedianity (30 Rock, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Girls 5Eva) are so, so amazing at one liners and ridiculous turns of phrase that I want desperately to remember so, so many of them, but it's a futile want...my brain just ain't wired that way.  The Rise and Fall of Reggie Dinkins is another Carlock production, co-created with Sam Means (who wrote on all three of the aforementioned Fey/Carlock specials) and serves as a spotlight piece for Tracey Morgan (Cop Out).

Morgan plays the titular Reggie Dinkins, an ex-NFL pro who was the hottest draft pick one year and an instant icon, until a gambling scandal drove him out of the sport and into a reclusive lifestyle for two decades. Daniel Radcliffe (Swiss Army Man) plays Arthur Tobin, a certain-award-winning documentary filmmaker who has convinced Reggie to let him film him as he prepares to mount a comeback into the public spotlight. Tobin himself is trying to mount a comeback after an epic (and viral) meltdown on the set of a Marvel movie he was hired for, and then fired from. 

Reggie's ex-wife Monica (Erica Alexander, Wu-Tang: An American Saga) is still his manager and they have a very friendly and familiar relationship, but whatever was between them romantically is long since dead. Monica is likewise venturing out into new terrain as she explores taking on other clients, but is constantly interfered with by a rival organization run by Barry Hu (Ronnie Chang, The Devil Wears Prada 2).

Reggie and Monica's son Carmelo (Jalyn Hall, Space Jam: A New Legacy) is kid of privilege but seems to really love and admire his dad, but harbours secrets that he fears would shame his father...really, geeky secrets. Reggie's much younger fiancee, Brina (Precious Way), is much more than a gold digger, for her social media influencer empire is on the rise and she's making her own serious money. She actually loves Reggie, and somehow the show makes it work.  And then there's Reggie's best friend and former teammate Rusty (Bobby Moynahan,Hoppers), who lives in the basement but is utterly committed and loyal to Reggie.

The gags are, as should be expected, a rapid fire, just an incredible barrage of ridiculous things often said ridiculous ways. There's some fantastic physical comedy (the peak, for me, was Rusty chasing a hard boiled egg he left in a pocket of his laundry and dives into the top-loader washing machine only to get stuck in the machine, vertically upright...and then it starts agitating) and a strong roster of recurring characters such as Reggie's sports rival (Craig Robinson) and Arthur Tobin's hook-up with a postal worker played by Megan Thee Stallion (just seeing the two of them in the same frame is wild...and kinda hot, the size difference and sexual tension is palpable).

Of course the show lives only at the whims of Tracey Morgan who is quite in the pocket on this one. While it may be hard to imagine Morgan as a genuine physical threat on the football field, his physicality is one of the greatest gifts to comedy especially when they "age down" Morgan for flashback sequences that barely try at all. But Morgan also delivers his one-liners with his trademark inflection and gusto, and the writers sharply swivel back and forth between making Reggie surprisingly astute, educated and pop-culture savvy and ridiculously lacking self-awareness and being a goof. The treat is how these two sides of the character don't really contradict one another.

Even among all the riches of gags there's still a heart to this show, a desire to see these down-but-not-out characters actually succeed (although there's a definite Lucy Van Pelt to the whole thing where just as success seems to come, the football is pulled away). Excited to hear Season 2 is coming.

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I quite loved Deadloch's first season, so I was super bummed when Season 2 came out and I no longer had a subscription to AmazonPrime to watch it, and there were no viewing alternatives.  Eventually I would have to feed the Bezos machine my daily quarters to get access, but I wasn't going to like it. Would it sour my experience of watching things on the Amazon platform? Turns out, no, not so much.

Season 1 ended with a nice pat ending for the mystery/ies at hand but did as so many series do and attaches a coda to the end that teases where a second season might be heading. In this case it was having detectives Eddie Radcliffe (Madeline Sami) and her/their partner Dulcie Collins (Kate Box) investigate the death of Eddie's former partner, Bushy, with Dulcie's exhuberant wife Cath in tow.

It's kind of amusing then that within minutes of the first episode of season 2 we find Eddie's quest for justice being pretty decisively slammed down by the copious evidence that all but confirms Bushy's death was a suicide...a dated suicide note in his handwriting perhaps the most damning piece in a trove of them.

So if Bushy's death isn't going to be the thrust of this season, what is? Well, Eddie's gone completely mental about the verdict on Bushy's case that she's/they're reluctant to go along with Dulcie on the new case in which a dead crocodile near Barra Creek on the north shore of the continent was found with a severed arm in its mouth. Whose arm is it? Does it connect with the mystery of two missing Swedish backpackers? And what's with all the dead and missing crocs? 

It turns out Barra Creek is Eddie's hometown, and most of the people there know her/them, and with few positive associations. Eddie's father was recently released from prison and it turns out Eddie was the one that put him there, convicted of killing crocs, which are a protected species.

But there's so many other mysteries afoot that it's hard to connect them all, or to see if they're even all connected. Eddie is too close to the situation to see anything clearly and is even more unhinged than she/they were last season, while Dulcie is getting lost in process and procedure, being swallowed by the job, which starts interfering in her relationships with Eddie and Cath.

This season of Deadloch builds an insane community around Barra Creek that is only a pile of mysteries heavier than an Australian riff on Letterkenny. There's the animosity towards city folk, and all the cultural conflict between the indigenous population and the redneck hicks in town, as well as the competing croc tourism business which finds the small-potatoes Darrell family (whose patriarch may or may not be the owner of the dismembered arm) competing with the aggressively bro-polished attractions of Jason Wade's (Luke Hemsworth) croc park. It's a rich, and very specific world that's a bit of a romp to visit but, woof, would be so much rougher to experience for reals.

This season is densely packed with both mysteries to unravel (concurrently) and hilarious line readings, many of which I would never have caught without the subtitles on. So often characters are talking/yelling over each other or muttering under their breath that it's pretty astounding how absolutely razor sharp the dialogue and the portrayals are here.

Dulce and Eddie get a new assistant in Leo (Jean Tong), a low-level journalist who is so low-key people barely register that they're even in the room with them. Of course when perky, ultra-polite forensics expert Abby (Nina Oyama) happens on the scene - ecstatic to be reunited with her work moms - she's uncontrollably jealous of Leo, and acts out in hilariously rude (for her, yet still quite tame) ways.

As with last season, I found it amusing how much the showrunners/creators (Kate McCartney and Kate McLennan...no Kate McHarrison or Kate McStarr?) love to reveal that so many of the female characters in this show are lesbians (or queer-coded) and the jokes about lesbians (by lesbians for lesbians) as well as feminism (by feminists for feminists) are a salve for an entertainment reality that's starved for this kind of representation.

That Deadloch had two less episodes this season was a sure sign that the first season was strong enough for Amazon to give the series a second shot but that they didn't have much confidence in it growing its numbers the second time around. McCartney and McClennan close out the series in its final episode, and we find both Dulce and Eddie in quite different places by the end of this season from where they started, and the ending is a happy one, though sad if this is the last we'll ever see of these genuinely fantastic characters.

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If I write about a reality TV show or a competition show or a panel show, I will usually do one season but not usually any more than that. I feel they're the type of show that if I'm not talking about the format then I really only have what happens to discuss, and usually there's too much to remember and write through (or too much of nothing, so nothing much to write about). Plus, quality can warble dramatically, and it can all be too much.

 That said, I feel particularly inspired to write about the second series of Last One Laughing UK, the show that got me to subscribe to AmazonPrime again (dammit).  

I discussed LOL Canada and LOL Australia back when LOL first cropped up and Amazon proliferated the format across the globe. It's interesting that the only (English language) one to have a second season is LOL UK, and I think that has to do with the fact that the UK is sooooo panel show/game/reality show intensive in a way I don't think any other country is. There's something fundamentally British about comedians faffing about in a loosely structured format that hasn't really transferred to other countries in quite the same way. The UK is a densely populated island, but it's also pretty small, which results in the comedy scene being relatively close knit in a way we don't see in Canada (due to its vastness) or in the US (due to its size and capitalistic competitiveness).  

The format of the show hasn't really changed... 10 comedians get in a room and they can't laugh or even smile broadly... if they do they get a yellow card, and if they do it again they get a red card. Monitoring them are Jimmy Carr and Roisin Conaty, which Jimmy acting as the sort of ringleader/emcee/Jigsaw of the piece. Though the pretense is that Carr and Conaty are eagle-eyed watching and then triggering the alarm if there's a laugh or a smile, the facade is less strict this season and there's an awareness the producers are feeding them the possibilities.  I wish there was even more transparency actually.  We are only seeing about 3 hours of what is probably an 8-10 hour shoot (the clock is set at 6 hours for them to be in the room, but I suspect with stopping and starting and various set-ups that it last a lot longer) and even then it's only what we're seeing of the edit (and it's clear there's at least one camera for every couple of performers tracking their movements and face). At times we the audience are seeing things that it seems Jimmy and Roisin are not... but it's always hard to know in what order things actually happened as opposed to the edit.

This second series of contestants is a great bunch and the reason I wanted to write up this series is because I had thoughts on their performance and the way the show may or may not have favoured them:

[SPOILERS WITHIN]

The majority of the contestants this season I know from watching Taskmaster, with a few exceptions. It just goes to show how great a show Taskmaster is at exposing the world to the UK comedy talents. Each contestant had to prepare a "joker", or a one-person performance of approximately 5 minutes in length.

• Romesh Ranganathan - an exceptionally prominent competitor, like, probably the most involved in everything throughout the show. His standup persona is very snarly, so he seemed like he would be a tough act, but he was always on the verge of breaking. Ramesh's joker was hammering on his lazy eye and then having prepared bits for the crowd to read which, honestly, needed to be more discomforting in most cases...but he did get one person to break.
• Diane Morgan - I haven't spent much time with Morgan's Philomina Cunk character, but Morgan seemed like an early frontronner because she should be used to being funny with a straight face as she often does this with the public as Cunk. Her joker was reading Dylan Thomas with fart breaks. Incredible. While not the most vicious player, she was definitely in the mix in the room.
• Gbemisola Ikumelo - a 2 time BAFTA award winning comedy actor/writer/showrunner, but never been on Taskmaster, so I have no idea who she is. She will go down in infamy on this show for her attempt to not react to Morgan's farts. Ikumelo was holding in the laughs to the point of pain and tears, until finally letting out a gutteral wail of a sob laugh at the end of Morgan's performance. Once eliminated she didn't hang around the green room long, having fallen ill. If I had to guess, a migraine, because surely that would happen to me too.  She was a great presence but didn't go on the offensive much. We didn't get to see her joker.
• Maisie Adam - a delight on Taskmaster season 20 doesn't seem to get much room to stretch here, at least until she goes face to face with Ramesh and the two of them start to basically roast one another. We don't get to see Maisie's joker, which is a shame. She's pretty involved in the room, but not heavy on offense.
• Amy Gledhill - a contestant on the current season of Taskmaster, where she's a very lively, vibrant presence. She was pretty recessed in the room. I have to suspect being a younger comic in the mix and the other contestants not being as familiar with her, that she wasn't as comfortable inserting herself into the more seasoned group engagements and perhaps wasn't as included or targeted in them. I think she was taken out on a cheap call though (maybe as likely because she wasn't as active a participant)
• Bob Mortimer - a legend, apparently, in the UK comedy scene, and the winner of season 1 of LOL (meh, I think Richard Ayoade gave him the win out of some sort of reverential deference), as well as a former Taskmaster contestant. I don't find his schtick very funny, I don't vibe with it, but clearly a whole generation of comedians find his shit uncontrollably hysterical. I was ready to riot if he were to be crowned winner again. His songs are dumb and his jokes seem to amuse himself more than anyone (though for some reason they are very amused). He was very involved in the whole thing and seemed comfortable in the environment being the reigning champ. His joker was abysmal, but again, the crowd seemed to love it. I dunno.
• Alan Carr - another comedy legend whom I've maybe heard of... but don't remember. He was all over the place in this one, and generally pretty funny throughout, although his joker was a bit... vintage... being a somewhat hastily constructed game show. He was giggling throughout the introduction so I thought he was an easy goner, but he stuck through well into the second half of the show.
• Mel Giedroyc - the host of the Great British Bake Off and a former Taskmaster contestant. She seemed to be an easy get, a real laugher before the show started, but she figured out her "game face" early on (sticking her lower jaw out any time she was about to laugh) and she went deeeep in this one. She was probably the most aggressive player and the one who was looking for opportunity. Her joker was a really bold physical performance which... was... very... interesting (according to David Mitchell).
• David Mitchell - a big time sketch and comedy series performer and actor who I'm quite familiar with. He was as in the mix as Mel, Ramesh, Alan, and Bob, and was seemingly perplexed the whole time.  Did he want to be there, or was that the persona he was playing, of someone who didn't want to be there, to distract him from laughing? He seemed to be acting the whole time. His joker was a terrific really bad first-time stand-up comic routine which was very droll. The only problem is the show clearly shows him smiling a number of times (at least two) and doesn't call him on it.
• Sam Campbell - the odds on favourite for the win because Sam is unflappable. Whenever someone seems to have a comedic edge on him he can completely undercut their bit in surprising and hilarious ways that seem like absolutely no big deal to him ("that's a serious issue" he says to Mitchell during a particularly funny "edgy" run in his bad-stand-up bit). Sam's joker was patentedly absurd, but he let the comedic glory be not himself, but the Tim and Eric-quality community theatre performers he had tag along in his ridiculous set piece. Sam didn't attack enough, though whenever he did chime in it was usually quite sharp. I vibe with Sam Campbell in a way I don't Bob Mortimer.

The winner of the Series was David Mitchell, and almost well earned, except for the fact of the show letting him off the hook for his various smiles. Neither he nor Sam got a yellow card, and so the final tiebreaker came down to who made the most other people laugh, and David won 2-to-one.  I think one of those smiles/yellow cards would have been the tiebreaker otherwise.  

It was a fun series, but the one thing I noticed was how weak the attacking was. On other series we would see competitors smell blood, seeing a comedian on the verge and they would just hammer on them until they broke, and nobody did that here. Mel was the closest, as was Diane Morgan at times. I also noticed that, unlike other LOL series the prize here was just a trophy, and no big charitable donation or prize money.  Also, this series didn't have much in the way of guest interjections. A notable British TV interviewer stepped in with a pretty funny series of interviews with the contestants, and Natasha Demetriou (of What We Do In The Shadows) and Ellie White came out of a cubby as "intimacy coordinators" and made everyone hilariously uncomfortable. Put them both in the next series.

Fun show. 

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In the wake of The Mandalorian and Grogu's middling box office and middling critical reception, there's a lot of angsty blogging, youtubing, tiktokking and podcasting around the state of Star Wars today (present company not excluded), and what the future might bring under Dave Filoni's guiding hand as co-president of Lucasfilm. 

Filoni was brought aboard the Star Wars train by George Lucas himself, to assist Lucas in overseeing The Clone Wars, animation being Filoni's forte. The Clone Wars got off to a rocky start, with a middling theatrical release of the first four episodes as a film (that The Mandalorian and Grogu feels like four episodes of The Mandalorian is not lost on me), but by the second season of the series the kinks had sort of been ironed out, and the series wound up being the glue that holds the Prequel Trilogy together, rather than vice versa.

Filoni went on to create the animated series Star Wars: Rebels, definitely in my top 5 Star Wars projects ever, but that too was a series that took time to build, being enjoyable enough the first season but making itself epic and its characters involving in its second season, increasing in scope for its subsequent two seasons. 

Filoni's works since then have been more in the live action space but not ignoring animation. A revival seventh season of The Clone Wars was an epic capper to the series as well as dovetailing into Revenge of the Sith, while The Bad Batch explored the fallout of the Clone Wars through a new cast of characters and featured the trademark Filoni touch of being a bit rough around the edges the first season, but gelling quite firmly and endearingly the second. What Filoni brought to these projects were incredible character-building, expansive galaxy-building, and a commitment to not forgetting what came before.

While The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett and particularly Asoka had Filoni-esque highlights, there's a large contingent of the Star Wars fan base that want live action to be treated differently than the animation, as more accessible, less addled by Star Wars lore.  They're probably right. And the worry is that under his hand the future of Star Wars is going to be an ouroboros.

So when you get a nothingburger like The Mandalorian and Grogu, that worry is justified, but then you also get Maul: Shadow Lord, which expels the issues with previous Filoni-created series and manages to get up and running in a matter of a couple short episodes, rather than an entire season. 

Sure, Maul is a legacy character who has been seemingly killed on screen at least twice already, and it may be a little confusing for any casual fan to understand in what time the series takes place, but it's a show that doesn't get bogged down with the past, and it's also not overly concerned (at least with this first season) with extensively tying itself to everything else Star Wars.

Maul, here (played once again impeccably by Sam Witwer), is our anti-hero, a man who has been wronged by his former master, Darth Sidious, now the Emperor Palpatine, and also full of loathing towards the Jedi, who have gotten in his way more than once. He had, previously, attempted to create a criminal empire to take on his former dark lord, and was not just squashed like a bug, but his brother was killed in the process. He is a traumatized figure whose powers and abilities are both fueled and crippled by that trauma.

His goal, then, is to re-establish a criminal empire, as well as find himself an apprentice to help him take on his former master. The two aren't necessarily mutually exclusive goals, but also focusing on both detracts from focus on the other.

On a remote planet, Janix, Maul operates in the shadows, but not deeply enough. His criminal doings have raised the attention of Brander Lawson, an inspector of the local police force played brilliantly by Wagner Maura. Lawson begins investigating Maul's operation and eventually confronts the villain, but is given a proposition, one which a good cop like him cannot accept.

Also entering the picture are Jedi master Eeko-Dio Daki (voiced by Dennis Haysbert) and his padewan Devon Izara (Gideon Adlon). They too are living in the shadows of Janix, scrounging for whatever they can get on the streets, when they confront the former Sith. 

But soon, enemies must be allies on all fronts, as the Empire becomes alerted to Maul's presence and a pair of Inquisitors begin hunting the Jedi and Sith down. As well there's a Star Destroyer full of Imperial troops and bureaucrats locking the planet down, and while it's not quite as invested in highlighting the grip of totalitarianism as Andor was, it's still unsettling and effective in showing how these types of agencies operate in tearing down existing structures of order and imposing their own.

Maul: Shadow Lord surprises at building a cast of characters worth caring about, investing us as equally in Lawson, his son, and his robot partner Two-Boots (Richard Ayoade) as we are with Master Daki and Devon as we are with Maul and his coterie.  We just know that at some point Maul has to turn on Daki and get Devon on his side. That could be a horribly clunky moment if done wrong, and at a certain point we wonder if it's going to happen at all, the show lulling us into a false sense of allyship between the parties. It's honestly surprisingly brilliant in how its story unfolds.

And then there's an epic clash that we thought would be reserved for a second season, but this show is wasting no time. It's not Filoni-pfaffing-about in its first season. It's kinetic and propulsive and easily consumable...too consumable. It is the Pringles of Star Wars, just salt, starch and grease making you crave more, and once it's over, the craving doesn't go away, only becoming stronger in its absence.

If the future isn't so bright for Star Wars live action, at least we know animation is going to be more than okay.

T&K's XMas (2020) Advent Calendar: Day 7 - The Princess Switch 2: Switched Again

A Toast to Hallmarkent: The Princess Switch 2: Switched Again
 2020, d. Mike Rohl

The Story:

When last we left the Princess Switch, Stacy (the baker from Chicago) was married to Prince Edward making her Princess of Belgravia.  Lady Margaret Delacourt, duchess of Montenero, (Edward's ex-fiancee and somehow identical twin to Stacy) meanwhile had fallen in love with Stacy's business partner Kevin, was adored by his young daughter Olivia, and there was insinuation that he was going to propose.

Well, it's two years on and Stacy has been keeping busy in her princessly duties, too busy in fact, such that Edward is feeling ignored.  Stacy's just so worried about her twin not-sibling Margaret who has, as a result of the death of her uncle, and abdication of her cousin, become Montenero's Queen-in-Waiting.  Because of her new royal responsibility, she and Kevin broke up, and it's causing Stacy to fret.  With the coronation a few days away (on Christmas, naturally), Stacy thinks there's one last opportunity to get Kevin and Margaret back together.

Back in Chicago, at Kevin's bustling, pre-COVID bakery (where Stacy is a silent partner), the goodies are in total demand, and Olivia is child labor working the register.  Kevin (who sports a real beard throughout the whole movie appears to have a fake beard in this scene for some reason) looks like hot garbage, wearing sweatpants and a dumpy sweater to bake in.  He looks unhygenic, quite frankly.  They should have CGIed in flies and stink lines.  Stacy mocks his post-breakup misery and implores him to come to Margaret's coronation.  Just close up your busy shop that is probably the only way you make money and fuck off to royal gaga land (but if you can land a Queen then you don't need to worry about money, so maybe it's a gamble worth taking).  Also, Olivia didn't mail the RSVP declining as her dad had asked her to.

In Montenero, the gang all arrives together, and Margaret's palace is looking pretty drab for almost-Christmas.  The dust covers are still on virtually everything.  So, the gang (and the ample staff of the palace) decorate the shit out of the place.  It's completely overblown and excessive and it looks festive as fuck in there (two "fucks" already, what's up with me today).  Seriously, Margaret's bedroom is more festive than a Santa Claus parade.  Then Margaret and Kevin are left to go make hot chocolate for everyone (and by everyone I mean only the main cast, surely the legion of staff who did the majority of the work get no hot chocolate...hot lemon water at best).  Kevin cracks a joke about how Margaret has probably never even been in this kitchen, and she gets him back by looking in the oven and saying "oh, all the food is gone".  Actor Nick Sagar has to do so much fake laughing and fake enjoyment of trite things in this film...you can see a little bit of his soul die with every smile and half-laugh.  Things escalate when Margaret drops a bag of flour on Kevin's face and it devolves into a "we have servants to clean this shit up" flour fight (where Vanessa Hudgens keeps throwing the flower in Nick Sagar's face but he's obviously been instructed to avoid her makeup and hair because he throws it only at her chest).  

They get a little closer but are interrupted when  Margaret must go see her chief of staff, Count Antonio Rossi, who, you can tell from the first second on screen is a real jag. And most definitely not Italian.  Margaret has known him forever, and now he's making eyes at her, professing his interest in ruling by her side.  Ugh, he's slimy and gross.  But he's an effective approximation of a Disney princess cartoon villain in real life.

At an evening event, Kevin and Margaret start to dance (Kevin: "lets show them how it's done".  End result: nothing at all spectacular), and they have a moment, but they're once again interrupted, this time by Margaret's cousin ("cuzzy"), the posh and flamboyant Lady Fiona Pembroke (Hudgens again).  It was all trite, cliched b.s. trying to get lapsed lovers back together until Fiona shows up, and suddenly the movie (20 minutes in) is laid bare... three Vanessa Hudgens?!?  There's going to be some triple switching happening.

Well yes.  First Stacy wants to switch with Margaret to give her some quality alone time with Kevin, hopefully rekindling the romance.  Margaret is reluctant but Olivia, Frank (Edward's chief aide) and Mrs. Donatelli (Margaret's chief aide) are all on board for the Princess Switch again.  But there's triple trouble, since Lady Fiona is pretty much broke, so she and her two dimwit lackeys (Reggie and Mindy) scheme to switch places with Margaret just long enough for the coronation and to take a respectable half of her fortune before going off to some tropical paradise where there's no extradition treaty.

To fast forward through all of the shenanigans, Edward has a heart-to-heart with Stacy-as-Margaret,  Olivia distracts Edward from the switch with Christmas Eve shopping, Margaret and Kevin build snowmen which is all it takes to profess love for each other again, Fiona switches places with Stacy who she thinks is Margaret, but when Margaret returns to switch back with Stacy, Fiona keeps up the Margaret act and calls her the imposter.  She totally can't believe that worked (nor can anyone watching), as Margaret backs off.  Then Fiona-as-Margaret tells Kevin off and send him packing on a late evening run to the Montenero airport on Christmas Eve, although the weird magical old man from the last movie turns up as the cab driver.  Why? I dunno.  

Anyway, Margaret regroups with Edward, Frank and Mrs. Donatelli (who Fiona fired...on Christmas Eve... after two decades of service... seriously...and there was nothing suspicious about that unprompeted, out-of-character action?  C'mon!) and they plot to rescue Stacy, who kind of escapes on her own, leading to Edward punching out Reggie (with Frank assisting with a well-timed judo chop).  Fiona-as-Margaret encounters Antonio (sigh) and he's onto her right away (she has a damn tattoo on her finger ffs!).  Turns out Antonio, despite being a count, is broke too, so they hatch a scheme to step up the coronation to late Christmas Eve, rob the kingdom blind and he takes a cut.

But they're busted. Antonio gets arrested and Margaret and co rush off to the airport to stop Kevin from leaving. She's the almost-damn-queen of Montenero...no security is going to hold her up from chasing after her man who is getting ready to board a plane.  They get married by a priest who's about to miss his flight to London, because Kevin was actually going to ask her last summer and still carries the ring everywhere he goes. Fiona, meanwhile, was kind of left unattended at the church, so she makes a run for it, with a couple of crown jewels to show for it.

The coronation happens, the Aldovian Christmas Prince and princess and royal baby from that other Netflix movie series are there, and Margaret looks amazingly queenly (not quite the same budget as The Crown happening here, but inspiration taken for sure).  Ah, but looks like Fiona got caught and was escorted to the coronation by the police.  And Boss Nass holds up the glowing orb and shouts "peace"! Now all the Moteneroids and Gungans live happily ever after.

PS. There's no discussion, at all, about what's happening with Kevin's bakery in Chicago.  Don't worry Kevin, it's going to get shut down for COVID concerns in 4 months anyway.  Go live in your wife's estate and be happy.

The Draw:
I watched the first one and enjoyed it for its differences from the usual Hallmark/Lifetime fare, so I watched this one...remembering early on that it's not *that* different from the usual Hallmark/Lifetime fare.

The Formulae:
Stupid misundertandings because people don't frickin' talk to one another.  Playfully romantic(?) food fight.  Grownups, without any children around, building snowmen (and women...snowpeople).  The race to the airport. The gross, manipulative third party trying to snake his way between the romantic couple.

Unformulae:
All that, cheap boring action, and role switching.

True Calling?
It's true, the princess did switch again.

The Rewind:
They actually do a very shrewd job with the body doubles that you think you see multiple Hudgens in the same scene more often than you ever do.

The Regulars:
Almost the entire cast is the same from the last one.  Van Hudg is actually really great, crafting three distinct characters and making them play very well in disguise as the other ones.  It's kinda fun.

How does it Hallmark?
More engaging the the usual Hallmark fare, but that's not saying to much.  Much, much, much better production values.  Crowd scenes look crowded, the palace and decorations are gorgeous, the costuming is more than just H&M wear, and looks really really good.  Wigs and makeup are great (don't see to many wigs in Hallmark, do ya?) particularly in helping Van Hudg define her three personas.

How does it movie?
It's tough.  Van Hudg is so damn charming she makes almost anything worth watching...and yet this one's a bit of a mess.  It doesn't spend enough time with any of its plots to really make them stand out...the switch and double switch seem forced and really doesn't last all that long... the story relies upon people being oblivious when they should be more astute... and the contrivances are often too, too much.  I don't like that the stakes of the big evil switching plan was really just Kevin and Margaret's relationship.... there should have been grander stakes involving the well-being of the country...but then the typical audience for these things just wants the lightest and fluffiest escapist fare.

T&K's X-Mas Advent Calendar: Day 3 - Holidate

A Toast To Hallmarkent
Holidate (2020, d. John Whitesell - Netflix)

The Story:

Sloane recently went through a break-up that devastated her, and she's refusing to call the guys her family keeps trying to set her up with.  She has one of those families that seems to only care whether she's dating someone or not. At Christmas she gets harassed by all family members about both her love life and her appearance, receives sad oversized pajamas from her sister, sits at the kids table (which she calls "the singles table") with her nieces and nephews, and her brother gets engaged to the girl he's been dating for three months.  Oh, and she accidentally witnesses her aunt receiving cunnilingus from a mall Santa she brought as her "holidate" (a no-strings-attached date just for a holiday to get family off your back).

On the other side of Chicago, Jackson is going on a third date to his not girlfriend's parent's house for Christmas because he's Australian and is unable to return home.  Has nowhere else to go.  Alarm bells start ringing immediately when the parents, decked out in matching ugly Christmas sweaters welcome him like he's practically family.  The mom takes him through VOLUMES of photographs and shows him the daughter's pageant trophies in a horrifyingly pink bedroom, and then advises him that they're cool if he nails their daughter there.  He says he's not planning on staying over.  The third-date meanwhile is so excited about how much her parents love him she orally pleases him in her bedroom.  He receives from her not just the BJ but the gift of khakis, and she expects something in return...even though she said they weren't going to do the whole "gift thing".  It erupts and he storms out of that family that may or may not be part of a cult.

Sloane and Jackson meet at the returns desk where the pajamas and khakis are holding up the line due to no receipt.  The two sort of bond over their horrible holiday experiences and Sloane's aunt's idea of a "holidate" spurs Jackson to suggest the idea that they be each other's de-facto holidate for any occasion necessary.  She's reluctant but invariably she finds herself with Jackson on New Years Eve, Valentines Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, Cinquo de Maya, Mother's Day, and the 4th of July.  A Labor Day wedding they attend with separate dates but wind up hanging out together anyway.  Hallowe'en comes and Sloan finds herself in trouble with Jackson coming to her rescue.  The next morning, they totally do it, but the sudden complication of their Holidate arrangement creates weird tension that obviously doesn't get resolved until Christmas, in grand rom-com fasion.


The Draw:
Honestly, I put it on for something to watch, and very quickly found myself chuckling, then laughing out loud.  I thought this was just going to be another of Netflix's Hallmark-esque Christmas romance in the vein of A Princess Switch or A Christmas Prince but no, this is a legit actual romcom movie...like one that should have been in theatres.  

The Formulae:
Even though it's not a Hallmark or Lifetime or of it's ilk, it's still laden with tropes.  The whole "family harrassing the single woman for being single" is terribly cliche (but most movies don't have Frances Fisher as the mom doing the harassing).  Likewise, the plot where characters use each other as a no-strings-attached plus one only to find actual love with each other is one of the most common plots of the genre.  The girl just having been through a devastating breakup and not really trusting men anymore...yep...but that's just kind of like real life too, eh?

Unformulae:
This whole template Toast and I use is built around Hallmark-type movies and pointing out where these incredibly rote, generic, milquetoast movies differentiate from one another is part of the fun.
With Holidate, well, it's a real movie, with swearing and sexuality, and fleshed out characters (I liked the B-plot with the sister who has to go to all the holiday events by herself because her husband is too paranoid to leave the kids with anyone).
And dammit, it's funny.  I laughed out loud regularly.  The performances are great, there's wonderful chemistry among all the actors.  I believe Sloane's family is a family (they all pick on her the same way) and that connection really sells the humour.
Plus, my wife and I came out of it with the catchphrase "Your tits look great in that outfit".  Not a very useful catchphrase, but we're sure to use it inappropriately with each other and laugh and laugh.

True Calling?
Well, yeah.  It's all about the "Holidate".

The Rewind:
Shall we say the first half hour?  Or Easter. See below.

The Regulars:
Dan Lauria, the dad from The Wonder Years has a small part here.  He's been in a couple different Hallmark/Holiday romance films.  Hell, he played Santa in "I'm Not Ready For Christmas" which was the first entry in last year's T&K X-Mas Advent Calendar ... the title song of which I just heard playing in the grocery store last night!
Everyone else is great.  Emma Roberts has been acting forever and she's delightful...a little cranky but very fun, all the charm and powers of a young Rosanna Arquette.  Luke Bracey I don't know at all, but as I always say: handsome Aussie...yes please... and he's damn charming like a Hemsworth cousin or something. (Also, I loved the joke he made about Sloane's ex... Luc..."Luc? Sounds like a wanker").  Jessica Capshaw as Sloane's sister Abby is an amazing and amusing supporting player, and Kristin Chenoweth as the hyper-sexual Aunt Susan is always a delight (she wears a Playboy bunny outfit to the kid's Easter party.  There's one moment at the end of a scene where she's bunny hopping towards off screen in the background that made me chuckle so hard.  Loved it. Rewind moment! (oh, and I note that Chenoweth also starred in her first Hallmark in last year's A Chrismas Love Story which I reviewed and Toasty did too, with differing results (a year later I think Toasty was more correct than I was lol.))
 

How does it Hallmark?
1000% better than even the best Hallmark movie (which for the record, in my opinion, is The Christmas Club)

How does it movie?
It's great.
Here's how great.
I started watching it on my own, as I tend to do with the holiday romance fare.  My wife tends to join me a few minutes in and only half pay attention to the terrible movie I'm forcing her to watch.  She doesn't really like romcoms in general nor the Hallmarkie holiday romances.  So she comes in to Holidate about a half hour in and about 10 minutes pass before she says "I'm kind of really enjoying this".  So I gladly offer to start it over (the setup is really funny) and we watch the whole movie through having a wonderful time.  We do so love a handsome Australian.

Go-Go-Godzilla: #6 Ghidora: The Three-Headed Monster

Japanese Name: San Daikaiju: Chikyu Saidai no Kessen ["Three Giant Monsters: Earth's Greatest Battle"]
Director: Ishiro Honda
Studio: Toho
Year: 1964
Runtime: 92:58 (Japanese version, 84:46 English version)

The Story:
I've just realized that my process for recording the story of these Godzilla films is very much like my usual Hallmarkies breakdowns, where I'm basically writing and editing the summary as I watch the film. The reason I've realized I'm doing it this way is because, like Hallmarkies (especially pre-2020 Hallmarkies when they became more self-aware), they were batshit insane.

But, these have twice the challenge of Hallmarkies since I'm watching them subtitled and so I can only really look away when the action is happening, and isn't that *really* the point of watching Godzilla movies? 

Except, in this case, no, because the wild first 2/3 of the film are monster-fight free, and the fight is mostly dogshit.  This one is all about the build-up. 

Ghidora: The Three-Headed Monster opens with a meteor shower. Reporter Naoko Shindo is embedded with ufo nuts and is trying to take their reports of contact with aliens seriously. Meanwhile, her brother Detective Shindo is assigned the case of protecting Princess Salno of the small republic of Selgina, which is undergoing some internal strife, and her life might be in danger. Except they've already planted a bomb on her plane. But the Princess receives contact from a glowing orb of light who urges her to get out of the plane urgently, which she does, shocking her trusted aides... who promptly die in the explosion moments later.

Professor Miura (who we just saw in Mothra vs. Godzilla) is investigating one of the meteors that landed in the mountains, and is shocked to discover it's both a grower and glow-er. Naoko is sent on assignment to report on a prophetess holding court in public claiming to be from Venus, warning of imminent danger to humanity...Rodan is coming.

 Meanwhile, the siblings Shindo watch TV, an entertainment program spotlighting "where are they now" news stories, and have landed the Shobijin twins, Mothra's dimunitive fairy from Infant Island who are received by the crowd like huge celebrities. They tell the sad news that one of the twin Mothra larvae died, and, seemingly, the other one is depressed.

It seems like 20 minutes of extreme scattershot randomness, until Detective Shindo pieces together that the Venusian woman from the news is actually Princess Salno with amnesia and delusions, but so too does Salno's evil uncle with aspirations of the throne, and sends hitmen after her. Naoko meets with Professor Murai, and her brother joins them for lunch, when Salno's warning of Rodan's coming comes to pass.  Naoko decides to take Salno into her care and the Shobijin join them, as Salno warns of Godzilla's attack on an ocean liner. Surprisingly, this film passes the Bechdel test.

Detective Shindo wards off an assassination attempt on Salno and takes her to a doctor.  Meanwhile, Godzilla and Rodan "fight" and Ghidorah's egg hatches.  The doctor's only conclusion for Salno's condition is there's nothing wrong. Even after hearing the Venusian's story, warning of Ghidorah's destruction of the Venusian civilization 5000 years ago, his only conclusion is electroshock therapy which for some reason Detective Shindo is right on board with. Ghidorah goes on a rampage. The government is freaking out with three different monsters rampaging about. The only useful suggestion on how to tackle the problem, outside of atomic weapons, is to ask for Mothra's help.  The Shobijin doubt Mothra ability to defeat Ghidorah alone... Mothra says the only hope is to try to convince Godzilla and Rodan to team up with her to fight the space creature.

Which is exactly what happens. 

But first, at the clinic, Detective Shindo agrees to electroshock therapy for Salno, but her cruel and inhumane "treatment" is stopped by the monster fight knocking out the power. Then Shindo foils another assassination attempt, with the help of his sister and Prof. Murai. They flee with the rest of the villagers. Ghidorah's rampage is swift, violent, and at least three times more destructive than a Godzilla and Rodan rampage combined.

Yes, Mothra goes to Godzilla and Rodan and asks them for a team up. It goes a little something like this:

"Squeeal."
"Roar."
"Cluck."

The Shobijin interpret the "conversation",

"Don't fight," Mothra says, "let's work together to protect the Earth from King Ghidorah's violence."
Naoko asks if they agree.
"No," the twins reply. "Both Godzilla and Rodan are saying they don't care."
"Damn it. Bastards!" Shindo exclaims.
"Godzilla is saying he has no reason to save humans. 'They are always bullying me.' Rodan agrees with him. 
"Mothra is saying 'Let's forget the past.' Godzilla and Rodan are saying to each other that the other one should apologize. Mothra is still trying to convince them.
"'This Earth is not just for mankind but for everyone.' Mothra is saying 'It is our duty to protect it.' They are getting close to agreeing.
"No! it didn't work," the twins say, crestfallen. "Mothra will have to fight alone."
[it's so stupid]

In another eyerolling twist, the assassins' car is destroyed by Ghidora, but one assassin survives. He takes off into the woods, but also so has Salna. Shindo chases after her. Salno falls off a cliff and bumps her head. A gunfight ensues. Shindo is shot, but the assassin is crushed by falling rocks.

Mothra is no match for Ghidorah alone, but when Godzilla and Rodan have a change of heart, they tag team up and send Ghidorah packing.

Salna's knock on the head cures her insomnia, Fred Flintstone-style, and she makes some goo-goo eyes at Detective Shindo.  The Princess returns home on a plane with the cast seeing her off. The Shobijin return home with Mothra with new BFFs Godzilla and Rodan seeing them off? The End.

The Creatures:
Godzilla, of course. Looks the same as in Mothra vs. Godzilla, except the puppet Godzilla. It has a different head and mouth sculpt, I think. Godzilla behaves like a shitty teenager, quite frankly.  Godzilla's atomic breath is not really animated here at all (must have run out of budget) so only ever looks like mist. The performance of Godzilla has all the energy of a sporting mascot. It's pretty corny.

Rodan looks really really bad. Like a plucked turkey with fingers on the end of its wings. I know it's supposed to be a pterodon-adjacent creature, but it's really ugly. I can't figure out what all the dangly things on its belly are...? Teats?  Rodan's chief weapon is wind, like Mothra last film.

Mothra, still in larval form, is mostly seen in miniature skulking around. Seems to be a new miniature sculpt than in the previous movie as its body is overly segmented, as in each little lump on her body seems to be a different jointed piece. The full size suit form seems the same as the previous film.

Ghidora is a gigantic, golden, three-headed, three-tailed monster sort of Godzilla shaped but wider, with no arms and massive wings that seem broader than either Rodan's or Mothra's. Rather than having lizard skin, Ghidora has scales with each seeming to be intricately pieced on, rather than just sculped into the suit. He fires crooked yellow laser beams from his mouths and they are even more destructive than Godzilla's atomic breath.  He's an impressive looking beast costume, but man does it ever look awful when flying, kicking its legs around, not streamlined at all.

The Shobijin twins return, and are ever so cute. They get multiple costume changes, like they were set up for a whole doll line or something.

The Battles:
(1) The first Godzilla vs. Rodan battle is so stupid, done almost entirely in miniature. Godzilla mists Rodan in the face as it hover's mere inches away from his mouth. His back fins light up once but his breath is only ever mist.  Rodan then pecks Godzilla in the head a half dozen times, and Godzilla's eyes dart back and forth afterwards. I think it's supposed to convey that it made him dizzy, but it's almost more like an eyeroll... as if to say "what am I even doing here?"  And that's the first battle. It's less than a minute at nearly the hour mark.

8 minutes later, the battle continues, as Rodan knocks Godzilla over and we see him struggle to roll himself over like a beetle on its back. Then Rodan picks him up by the back and flies off with him then drops him on some power lines.  

When the fight picks up a few minutes later, Rodan pecks 'zilla on the head a few more times before Godzilla smacks him down out of the air then suplexes him.  He then twerks on Rodan with his tail before Rodan bites it.  He mist Rodan in the face again before Rodan summuns up another winds storm. Godzilla starts kicking rocks at Rodan.  

As Mothra approaches, Godzillas rock kicking turns into a bout of hackey sac as they bounce a boulder back and forth between each other. Mothra sprays silk in Godzilla's face, Rodan squelches, laughing. Then Rodan gets the same treatment and Godzilla slaps his belly in delight. It's so stupid.  I really hate the anthropomorphism of the Kaiju. I worry it's only going to get worse as the Showa era trucks on.

When Mothra fights Ghidorah, she just gets wreck. Ghidora blasts her over and over again, sending her flopping like a fish out of water. Godzilla enters the fight, gets blasted, and tries to grab Ghidorah by the necks, but they're too much, sending him flying into a bridge. Rodan attacks from the air, and Ghidorah chases him. They play aerial chicken and both lose, crashing into one another and careening into the ground. Godzilla starts chucking boulders at Ghidorahs heads (the first time we've seen Godzilla throw things. 

Ghidorah blasts 'zilla in the guts making his tummy feel all funny. Rodan attacks from behind, Godzilla up front, Monthra by the tail, but even altogether they get sent flying. Godzilla gets blasted in the butt. Mothra crawls onto Rodan's back while Godzilla keeps Ghidora busy, and then Mothra starts with the silk spray, binding Ghidora's three heads together much like it bound Godzilla last film.  I don't get how it's such an effective deterrent but it sends Ghidorah packing, flying off into space. Winner: Godzilla, Rodan and Mothra...and friendship!

The Humans:
The humans story dominates the film and it's a rather incredible weaving of a multitude of narratives into something close to a cohesive plot. A very bizzare plot, but these are bizarre movies.

I'm sad our reporter friends from Mothra vs. Godzilla didn't return but it was nice seeing Murai again. I loved the funny little subplot of Naoko's mom and brother thinking Murai was her secret boyfriend, and when her brother tells him, Murai seems neither surprised, nor intrigued, nor amused. He's all business. No time for love.

Friend or Foe:
Godzilla certainly starts out as a foe, in that he emerges from the water only to destroy a boat, but somehow, by the end of the story, he's maybe not the people's champion but his threat level has palpably diminished.

The Sounds:
Godzilla gets some new short roars for when its talking or laughing (ugh). Mothra sounds the same as last time. Rodan makes the same sound as Space Ghost's ship when it travels in the air. Rodan also sort of has a cluck it make which sounds like a mix of clanging two cans together and talking through the Snake Mountain microphone.  Rodan also has a sort of cluck-roar which starts as a squelch of a bird and ends like a lion.

Ghidorah sounds like a trilling raygun effect being pitched one octave higher and lower

Akira Ifukube's score this time seems to be playing on big, brassy 60's superspy soundtracks, only going even bigger and with more menace.  

The Message:
Aliens are real and you should believe in them and also be scared? I dunno.

Rating (out of 5 Zs):
ZZZ - honestly, the first two thirds are pretty great, but the monster fighting is flaming garbage and drags the whole last act down.

JFL42 Comedy Festival 2013

Last year's JFL42 festival of comedy started off on a wrong note with a horrendous delay in getting the festival passes after ordering.  Coupled with the confusion about how the festival works and not having a usable smart phone to effectively check in and reserve shows, there was a lot it had to overcome to make it worthwhile.  What it has was some damn incredible comedeians and the more shows you take in the more value you get out of the festival pass.

It was an easy decision to do it again this year, particularly when discovering the early announced line-up included four of my favourite acts (Mulaney, Kinane, Maron and Burress) with two of the headliners (Silverman and Ansari) vying for my headliner selection.  The ticket ordering process this year went incredibly smoothly, with my festival pass arriving within hours and buying a pass for my wife at the same time required only a couple clicks on a simple "Transfer My Pass" process.  Months before the festival, it had already started things off right.

What wasn't so great this year, however, was the scheduling, partly my fault but also a problem with the organization of the acts.  There was a bit of bunching of the bigger names towards the end of the festival, overlapping at the same time, which was problematic and caused me to miss out on two favourites, Hannibal Buress and Maria Bamford (there were midnight show options for each on Thursday and Friday nights, but not much of an option with work and kids.  As well, there didn't seem to be as many name acts this year as there were last year, and it was very close to the starting date when the last half of the 42 were revealed.  There were a lot more hosted events, which I guess is fine, but I didn't think to investigate them until deep into the festival.

So committed to the festival this year were we that I called in my mother to fly in to watch after the kids.  We only had four nights booked when we asked initially but we took advantage of the in-house babysitting and jumped on a couple of extra shows.  I matched my show attendance from last year (8 shows) but packed even more extracurriculars with my wife into the week.  Where she only saw three shows plus the headliner last year (Louis CK), she caught all the shows with me this year and it made for a far better festival experience.

Here's a few brief recaps of the shows:

Mark Little and Kyle Dooley (opener Todd Graham) - September 20, @The Comedy Bar, 7PM
I didn't know what to expect.  I love Picnicface, the sketch ensemble of which both are members, and Little is a great stand-up in his own right (saw him last year), so I had hopes they could deliver something entertaining.  And it was something, all right.

Todd Graham was an inspired choice for opening act.  He has a quiet, reserved delivery, with dry punchlines and methodical pacing led to a slow laugh build-up (often to the point of uncomfortably awkward), but ultimately quite funny.  Little and Dooley follow Graham on stage with a stark counterpoint, kicking over the mics, crunking to some hardcore hip-hop and screaming like they're wrestlers from the 1980's WWF.  The aggressiveness was disarming, like shocking your skin by jumping in the snow out of a sauna, bracing but it wakes you up.  They don't let up from there.

Little and Dooley construct a loose, free-flowing narrative about attending their high-school prom that takes dozens of diversions that seem improvised (and to a degree are) but are still an important part of the overall structure.  There's a third member to their team in the booth playing music queues and interfering with the proceedings causing Little and Dooley much hilarious consternation (as the unseen third man, he's brilliant and every gaffe or interruption led to comedy gold).

Little and Dooley's irreverent production was jam packed with so many clever elements and funny bits that my mind overloaded.  A section of the show found Little becoming so irate with the errors from the sound tech that he starts ranting, his rants at first repeated by Dooley, then Little starts speaking for Dooley (which Dooley also repeats) before stepping out into the crowd, doffing his shirt, taking glasses from various audience members and piling them all on one audience member as a "glasses totem".  It's hard to effectively describe, but certainly a memorable live experience.

The overall show was so amazing that my wife and I had every intention of returning for an additional viewing but scheduling conflicts interfered with that plan.  Definitely the right way to start off our festival, an easy highlight.  My biggest hope is that one of the performances was captured on video as there's so much in there I would like to witness again.  I wonder if much of it was the live setting (I'm quite sure of it) but I also believe that it would translate well to home viewing.

Jerrod Carmichael (opener Mark Forward) - September 20, @The Comedy Bar, 9PM
 I've heard him as a guest on Comedy Bang Bang a couple of times and heard a few short sets he's done.  Carmichael is a new-ish comic that's garnering a lot of attention, and the kid has some definite comedy chops as well as charm to spare. . What he doesn't have is a solid 45 minute set, and thus it felt more like a workshopping appearance and less a refined headliner.  His attempts to engage the crowd weren't received well.  He basically just asked two or three times if anyone wanted him to riff on anything, and the only reply he got was "Rob Ford" (eliciting major groans from the crowd), but once he learned he was the crack-smoking mayor, his eyes sparkled and he went off.  Carmichael can riff, I'll grant him that, but while full of promice, overall the set was a scattershot work in progress.

Opener Mark Forward was great.  Forwards a Canadian pro, with a solid roster of odd material (including an opening conceptual piece about monitoring his phone for news about his grandmother which had a great payoff).  I got the sense he could easily have pulled a headliner set.

Sam Simmons - September 23, @The Drake, 7PM
"In Australia, all comedy is like this".
What a delightfully odd place that must be.

Simmons I caught on a Jon Dore hosted Just For Laughs alternative program earlier this year.  I didn't catch his name at first but upon seeing a clip while looking for shows at the JFL42 site, I immediately recalled how much I enjoyed him.  His hybrid stand-up/prop comedy/performance piece ebbs and flows between self-effacing, self-aggrandizing, hyper-sexual, off-beat, way-off-beat, outright bizzare, conceptual, clever word play, silly word play, groan-inducing wordplay, audience interaction, odd-ience interaction, audience berating, conversations with himself (pre-recorded), and things with food.  Lots and lots of food.  It's a little more than an hour of weirdness pummeling the audience, with an 80-to-20 hit to miss ratio, and a lot of those misses Simmons can turn into hits with his self-effacing or audience-berating tactic ("Fuck you guys, that was brilliant").  Simmons has no shame, even when he's pretending to be ashamed.  There's running bits throughout the show, with the Old El Paso Taco Kit playing a major part right up until the epic taco-crushing finale.  A decidedly entertaining and unique experience.

Marc Maron (opener Andy Kindler) - September 24, @Queen Elizabeth Theatre, 7PM
I've been listening to Maron once or twice a week, almost every week for four years.  His podcast, WTF, has reached over 400 episodes now, and each episode he engages in a one-sided conversation about his life and what's going on.  Maron's not just a comedian to me, he's a friend, a dear friend, someone whom I care about, yet I've never met.  I had only heard him perform shorter sets, seeing them on youtube or Comedy Central programs, but it was only early in the year when I received all four of his stand up records that I ever heard him as a full act.  But listening to him over those four albums is to hear him evolve as a person, not just as a comedian, and a lot of the stories and jokes were familiar to me in one form or another as he reshapes them on the podcast in rants or conversations (often he retells them in a "I have a joke about that with X as the punch line" way).  It's great stuff, but at the same time, knowing Maron so intimately -- as all his regular What The Fuckers, What The Fuck Buddies, What The Fuckanadians etc do -- is to worry about him and hope his show goes well (he had just had a bomb set a week or two before his JFL42 appearance so that was fresh in my mind).

But Jesus, what I forgot is that Maron is a fucking professional comedian, a 30 veteran of the industry, and seeing him on stage is to see a master at work.  He is incredible.  Within seconds of him arriving on stage you could tell he was loose, poking fun at his opener and friend Andy Kindler (more on him at the end), and he was ready to get into it (he followed that up with a brutally funny physical impersonation of his friend and fellow comedian David Cross).  Maron is a professional talker.  He has bits and his bits are incredible.  He's managed to hone his bits into a form where they don't sound like bits, they sound like conversation, and so when he's not in his bits you can't really tell he's riffing.

This was the first time I've seen Maron perform an hour that's wholly fresh to me.  I was thinking that because of his podcast that I would have known all the jokes or knew where he was going but I was absolutely swept up by seeing someone so capable of working a crowd and engaging them both as friends and potential enemies.  I love Maron, so there's total bias in this write up, but he absolutely killed and I was just floating by the end of the show.  It was like I finally got to put a face and physicality to that disembodied voice that rings around my earholes so often (Maron's also taller and more handsome than I had pictured).

Now Andy Kindler, on the other hand... well, I was immediately soured when he was announced and took the stage as opener.  I don't like Kindler for all the reason's he seems so completely aware about why people don't like him.  He's opinionated but in a manner that makes him seem bitter and envious.  His act is free of jokes, save for some Vaudevillian one-liners he likes to toss around knowingly, otherwise he's just got this shtick of being a jaded bottom-rung Hollywood type and completely self-denegrating.  He gets his laughs from his sad-sack self-awareness (he acknowledged the warm crowd at length and discussed how this was his best show ever, despite the fact that it was only a lukewarm crowd), but it wears thin very quickly.  His anger and vitriol towards specific individuals or organizations or movies or programs in Hollywood seem to have no other viewpoint than "I don't like it because it's successful", leading to no jokes, just hate.  The best thing to come out of Kindler's set was the end...no not that tired joke, but Maron's poking fun at him.  For all the jokes Kindler makes at his own expense, within a minute of being on stage Maron topped those two or three times over.

John Mulaney (opener Sean Patton) - September 25, @Queen Elizabeth Theatre, 7PM
If there was one act I could not miss this year, John Mulaney would be it.  His "The Best Meal I Ever Had" is my all-time favourite stand-up routine for a few years running.  His two albums, The Top Part and New In Town are comedy classics, the product of an affirmed comedic voice, one that seems to be getting better with age.  Mulaney's an expert storyteller, a gifted wordsmith, and he has mind-mouth coordination like few others.  His bits waver from funny to stitch-ripping hilariousness.  He entered the stage expressing that the evening would include a lot of new material, but if that was actually true, none of it was evident (except at one point where he declared "That's staying in the act!").  It seemed as polished a routine as either album, and whether it's just the confidence he has on stage or just general quick wit, there was nary a lull in his hour-long set.

Mulaney closed the show with a sister piece to "The Best Meal I Ever Had", which was a story called "The Best Night I Ever Had", about the time he was 8-years-old and met Bill Clinton.  The story takes a few necessary diversions (as most of his stories do) but it all builds an incredible picture that puts you right into the scene with young John as your avatar.  There's a moment in the story where Mulaney notes that the fundraiser where he would meet Clinton was held at the same ballroom that you see at the end of the Fugitive.  He drops a few notes of description, pauses for a moment to gauge the audience, then proceeds with the story, only to backtrack and detail more descriptors, not of the ballroom, but of the scene from the Fugitive.  He then pauses, assess the audience, then proceeds with the story once more, only to stop, backtrack and go off on a very intricate, 2-minute, obsessively detailed description of the climax of the Fugitive.  It's an applause worthy feat that sets a peak for the Clinton story that doesn't let down.

I was unfamiliar with his opener Sean Patton, but his set was entertaining, and I like his style, which was enough for us to fill in our Thursday night 9:00 gap with his headline performance.  More on him shortly.

Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet - September 26, @The Dakota Tavern, 7PM

Okay, I know it's not a JFL42 show, but it could have been.  Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet were the house band for the Kids in the Hall, which makes them a part of comedy history and certainly helped in endearing them to me as one of my favourite bands of all time.  The Shadowy Men, a not-quite-surf-a-billy threesome disbanded in the early 90's and after the death of bassist Reid Diamond were destined to be a band for the history books.  With their first album Savvy Show Stoppers reissued on vinyl last year, Shadowy Men reformed with Sadies frontman Dallas Good (if you're going to replace someone named Reid Diamond, only someone named Dallas Good can fit the bill), who played with Diamond and drummer Don Pyle in their post-Shadowy effort Phono-Comb.  The reforming was a three show event which led to a few more smaller shows last year, and a surprise residency during September this year at the Dakota Tavern.

This was my third Shadowy Men show in two years and where the first time was a quasi-religious experience (so many emotions from my youth came flooding back, as well having one of my best friends from high-school and adulthood there with me who lives on another coast, experiencing this live performance we never thought would happen... it was miraculous), this third time matched the second in a smaller, far more intimate venue with a hundred other devotees of old, and a few new.
The Shadowy Men rip through their repertoire at breakneck speed, one song leading into another, into another, into another...six or seven in a row without a pause.  I love the music and know the songs intimately, (though, through the years the names of the tracks have begun to escape me).  It's like a warm audio hug, just utter pleasure listening to Brian's guitar sing and watching his hands move, seeing Don's sweat over his drums and dropping a few pithy comments at rare intervals when he speaks.  I noticed I haven't paid much attention to Dallas Good in the past (since Pyle is the voice of the band, and Connelly is the spotlight, the bassist is easy to overlook), but I made a point to focus on what's going on with the bass this time.  Knowing that Good is playing Diamond's original bass I have to wonder just how much that particular instrument is integral to the band's sound.  The bass is so prevalent in the songs but also so overshadowed by Connelly's amazing hands that one so often wants to attribute signature moments in the songs to Connelly's guitar.

They played two sets, Connelly blowing out his amp at the end of the first set, causing a delay for the second, and thus causing us to miss out on its latter half as we had another place to be.  Still, absolutely amazing, every time.  I've had Shadowy Men songs running through my brain ever since.  I love it and will never tire of it.

Sean Patton (opener ?) - September 26, @The Comedy Bar, 9PM

This was a blessing.  Patton's opening set for John Mulaney was good, but it didn't imply how great Patton was a headliner.  The undersized crowd at the comedy bar spoke volumes as to how criminally below the radar Patton is flying, but judging by his uproarious, often shocking, often dark, often jubilant set, he's slated to appear all over that radar very soon.  Patton kicked off his act by sermonizing the crowd, then launching into his deep impression of Christian comedy, which at once is painfully unfunny, and conceptually hilarious in execution.  Patton then launches forward into a masterclass on storytelling, interspersed with some straight up jokes and aces crowd work.  His storytelling, an exaggeration of his own life, is filled with dark spots but presented with an affirmative nature so that it never drags too deep so as to take it out of comedy (though it threatens a few times in his closing story about his 12-year-old naive indiscretions).  He wavers in and out of hinting at a southern Nawleans drawling accent, and on occasion plays fully into it as a character type.  He knows his material and can command a stage, he's got a refined voice and he's ready for the next level.  His subject matter may not be to everyone's taste, and he likes to fuck with the audience's trust just enough to perhaps be off-putting to some, but overall should definitely break him out.  It was a revelation, one of my new favourite comedians.

His opener (whose name I've forgotten, but probably for the best) was a bit of a mess on the other hand.  Her act was a shambles, with punchlines flying out without jokes and jokes without punchlines.  Often repeated was "I don't know what I'm saying" which may not be a bad catch phrase if she's able to say a lot of hilarious non-sequiturs in a manner that seems like she doesn't know what she's saying.  Unfortunately it came across as her not actually knowing what she's saying, far too often.  It was continually unfocused and unrefined, there was a lot of senseless cursing and at times unbridled anger that seemed to have no direction.  Somewhere in there is a voice that has a unique perspective but judging by this performance it's a ways away from being found.

Kyle Kinane (opener Rob Mailloux) - September 27, @The Mod Club, 7PM

If there was a highlight of the festival, it would be Kyle Kinane.  I've been a fan of Kinane since he appeared on the Nerdist's first Comedians You Should Know showcase (episode 51) and he's only gotten better.  His first album Death of the Party found a not-so-young-but-still-young Kinane presenting his unique dark hilarity in a refined state, but his second album, Whiskey Icarus revealed the genius that was hiding from that first album.  Like Mulaney's set this year, Kinane has a new hour that seems polished and ready to go to press, his voice so strong that he fills every moment with a nugget of brain joy uniquely his own.

Comedy can be about telling jokes, but the best comedians are storytellers, those that can take even the smallest moments, like throwing out a handful of change, and turning them into epic reveals about the human psyche and making them relatable, as well as spinning them so cleverly on their previously unknown axis that they build in how funny they are.  Kinane this hour bares his soul, yet somehow in the most reserved way possible.  He's crying out about how lonely and damaged he is while contrasting it by doubling over his audience in laugher.  Kinane has a gift of riffing, able to talk and hit upon particular words that even if you miss two-thirds of what he's saying it's still going to perpetuate your laughter.  He has a bit about gay porn which is funny, but only crescendos when he starts expounding upon a scenario he's never seen but would like to see.  Though it's unlikely I'm ever to hear "butt-to-butt" out of the context of this joke, if ever I do I'll likely collapse in giggle fits.  His "butt-to-butt" riff sustained for so long that I nearly threw up from laughing so hard.  It's a good thing I didn't eat dinner before I went.

Kinane, even moreso than Mulaney, has one of the most unique voices in comedy, strictly speaking timbre and tone here.  The only other comedian who can make me laugh so hard just by talking is Buress (still sad I missed him).  Kinane's set was a gift, a treasure trove of turns of phrases that are so odd, yet sharp that you want to swirl it in your ear, rattle it around your brain and slide it out on your tongue again and again.  You will want to develop your own Kinane impersonation because half of the hilarity is in the delivery.

Rob Mailloux was the dark and tortured opening act.  Steeped in material from his seemingly very painful personal life, Mailloux talks about being adopted and his own anorexia as well as about horrifying medical maladies.  He's able to inject enough humour to make them palatable but they're still too shocking and too bleak of subject matter (and obviously still all too relevant to Mailloux) to fully transcend in the same way Maron or Bamford deal with their demons on stage.  His act is really good in foundation but it's still too much of a gut punch to be considered enjoyable.

Aziz Ansari (opener Kyle Kinane) - September 27, @The Sony Center, 10PM

In 2005, whilst visiting New York City, I bought 3-disc comedy compilation called Invite Them Up, a weekly premiere alternative stand-up showcase presented by Eugene Mirman and Bobby Tisdale.  It was a concerted effort on my part to discover more comedy, having then-recently found David Cross and Mitch Hedburg and realizing I liked this stuff.  On that compilation the stand-out sets came from two sources, one Demitri Martin, the other Aziz Ansari.

In that set, Ansari talked about a senator who compared gay marriage to bestiality, particularly with box turtles, and postulated that this senator was really into turtles.  He also had a delicious rip on Kanye West whose music he loves, and whose personality he's fascinated with, and speaking Tamin in a brief encounter with M.I.A.  Ansari's dive into both pop-culture and political arenas was just what I was looking for and he became a fast favourite well before his major turn on Parks and Recreation and his subsequently awesome comedy albums.

This time around Ansari is laser focused, a singular topic in mind...that of, err, being single.  His new set is part comedy, part culture study, as he walks through all he's researched and learned and observed on single life, dating rituals as they compare to other countries and other eras.  It's evident that Ansari is growing up, and despite being a successful actor and comedian he's still trying to figure out some aspect of life.  It was surprising to witness a whole act without a single story about Kanye, but also kind of refreshing to watch him interplay with the audience and build upon that freewheeling in his act.  It was a strangely intellectual yet no less enjoyable.

What I learned though was that a multi-thousand seat theatre, like the Sony Center, isn't the best way to view comedy.  Particularly after coming off of seeing Kinane in a few hundred seat room, it was interesting to see him repeat much of the same material in a much bigger room, on a much grander scale.  The comedy doesn't play as well, though still amazing, and I've figured out that, at least for me, it's the space.  The laughter doesn't fill the space of a big theatre like it does in a smaller setting, the laughter needn't drown out the comedian, but they should have to fight to keep pulling you back in.  For stand-up, the Queen Elizabeth Theatre is probably the largest venue that can house it without destroying the sense of intimacy.  Ansari has gotten used to working crowds the size of the Sony Center and has built an act that's meant for such a space.  At the same time, it doesn't have nearly the same impact as Kinane's Mod Club set or Mulaney or Maron's Queen Elizabeth Theatre set.

--------------

For JFL42 next year, some recommendations:
- Doug Benson for the whole week, doing stand-up, doing Doug Loves Movies, and doing Benson Movie Interruptions.  I would go to every single one.
- Deborah DiGiovanni I haven't seen do stand-up in some time, and I miss her.
- Kristen Schall and Kurt Braunohler
- Ron Funches
- Jonah Ray
- Kumail Nanjiani
- Headliner suggestions: Flight of the Conchords, Tenacious D, David Cross, Mindy Kaling, Joan Rivers (seriously)

...I've got more (I'll add them for posterity later).