Halting the Evolution of Comedy

I watched Conan's last Tonight Show last night. It was the 14th Episode of the Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien I watched... ever. I watched the first 11 episodes when Conan first became host. Then, I was present at a taping as an audience member. I caught one episode that a friend had Tivo'd on the most glorious, giant screen in the history of man, about midway through the run. Then I watched last night's final episode.

Two thoughts were going through my head as I watched the final Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien.

Why am I not watching my 24 Bluray?

And...

God, Late Night Talk Shows are lame.

Late Night Talks Shows are an outdated form of comedy. I suggest that they join the ranks of least entertaining comedy, a club they share with the CBS Sitcom and the TBS Show.

Watch any sitcom on CBS, whether it be Two and a Half Men, The New Adventures of Old Christine, or Big Bang Theory, and you will be transported back in time to the 1960s. The comedies on CBS seriously haven't evolved at all since the dawn of the sitcom. It's like they saw all the changes other networks have made over the years and intentionally ignored them.

Only on CBS will you find a complete comedy block of laugh track ridden sitcoms (I know most employ live audiences, but a live audience is no better than a laugh track), full of characters looking for love while making outdated sexual innuendos. Even though I hate The Office (US), at least it represents the fact that other networks have allowed the sitcom to evolve (though the fact that Parks and Rec and Modern Family are Office clones is very troubling). Honestly, the closest thing one can do to emulate traveling back in time is to watch a CBS comedy (until I finish my Time Machine). And, on CBS, if you're not watching a stale sitcom, you're watching a crime investigation show. Really, it's best never to tune into such a shitty network.

And TBS, well, one really doesn't have to say anything about TBS. Except that the choice of tagline "Very Funny" could not have been more poorly chosen.

I feel the Late Night Talk Show fits in the same camp as the CBS Sitcom. It is an incredibly outdated form of comedy that needs to be put down.

Leno isn't the only unfunny asshole in the bunch. Letterman, Fallon, Ferguson, and even Conan, are all guilty of holding the evolution of comedy hostage.

This was no more evident than Conan's clip show last night, highlighting the "best" moments of his Tonight Show run. Clips from lame sketches, clips involving "wacky" animals, clips of Conan goofing around on the Universal lot, and clips featuring "breath taking" stunts? Is this really all late night television can offer us?

I mean, seriously, in this day and age do we still need wacky and dangerous animals as guests? If you were to ask me, "What best represents the death of good television?" I just might say "Reality TV. And whenever an animal trainer is a guest on a late night show." I get it! They're animals! They're unpredictable! That bear COULD have ripped Conan apart (would have been far better TV if it had. And I wouldn't have to fearfully await ANOTHER new shitty late night talk show in 7 months.)!

 It's a boring formula. Host comes out, makes a few safe jokes about the day's news. The same jokes every other host will make that night. Then, a skit. Or something equally wacky. Maybe have bikes jumping off ramps (I can't believe something that lame made Conan's clip show) or attach Conan to a string and have him break stuff (again, super lame). Then, a guest. This is probably the only worthwhile part. But, even this is boring on a network Late Night Talk Show. No host ever asks a question that could possibly rub the guest the wrong way. No one asks anything interesting, it's just "Tell us again while you are so great? Pwetty pwease?" Then, second, B-List guest. End with a musical guest, that I never watch.

It's boring. It's not funny. Conan kept talking about how his Tonight Show was just about having fun on television. Maybe your staff was having fun, Mr. O'Brien, but I certainly wasn't.

Comedy should be about taking risks. If you're not risking alienating part of your audience, then you're not doing your job right, comedy writer.

Look at all the greatest Comedy shows of the last decade... South Park, Arrested Development, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, 30 Rock, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Daily Show With Jon Stewart... all have pushed the envelop on what you can and can't joke about (some, more than others). And yes, I'm sure all have lost a few audience members along the way, because they were just too offended by something or another. But these shows are all the cream of the crop because they take the risks. Because they mess with the formula. They don't follow forty-year-old rules.

The Daily Show is most relevant to my point (the point being that the late night talk show is stale and shitty).  It IS the next evolution of the late night talk show. It takes the age old formula and fucks with it.

First, the host's monologue. Jon Stewart briefs us on the news, poking fun at how stupid politicians and "real" newscasters are. His humor is much more offensive, much more of an attack against stupid people, than you would find on a late night talk show.

Then, your skits. Instead of a poorly written sketch or lame "awe-inducing" stunt, Jon turns his correspondents loose for some Borat style humor. When faced with a naive newscaster, how will these real people stick their foot in their mouth? How will they reveal the ridiculousness of their own cause by talking with a newscaster who appears to agree with them, but is really mocking them?

Finally, the interview. This is where Mr. Stewart most sets himself apart from the network-late-night-drivel. Sure, I've never seen him outright tell an actor a clip from their movie sucked (though he's certainly hinted at it before...), but he does make the effort Leno, Letterman, Conan, Fallon, and Ferguson all fail to make. His interview with George Lucas is a great example of what he can do. To the best of my memory, he never asks "Why do the three new Star Wars suck so much?" but he comes pretty damn close. And whenever he has a politician on, it's an absolute dream! His arguments with John McCain are stuff of television legend...

 

Obviously, part of the difference is that Stewart has been granted the gift of cable while Conan and friends are chained down by Network standards. But, still... Arrested Development and 30 Rock could be funny and push the limit on Network... so why can't these late night knuckle heads?

One of my friends suggested that the point of a late night show isn't to make you laugh until your side's split. It's to amuse you until you fall asleep. He used Leno as an example, saying that Leno provides a few laughs, while making him sleepy. Should that ever be the point of comedy? To bore someone to sleep? Every comedy show, no matter what the hour, should strive to split one's sides (though not literally of course, that would be horrible!). I mean, really, who wants the job of writing jokes that put people to sleep?

Conan said last night that the Tonight Show is a job any comedian dreams of getting. I don't think so. Do you really think someone like Jon Stewart would be happy with the mediocrity the Tonight Show brings with it? His pay check would be bigger, sure, and his audience would double, but at what cost? His very soul?

I may not have the talent to be a comedian, but if I were presented with the choice to host the Tonight Show or be merely a correspondent on the Daily Show, I hope I would choose the latter (but who can say for sure, really?). Likewise, I would rather be a faceless writer on a groundbreaking sitcom than the face of outdated television.

In my own career, I consider the Daily Show the gold standard of TV Writing. My dream job, if I could write for ANY show on TV, it'd be the Daily Show.  Sure, I consider South Park and It's Always Sunny funnier shows, but the Daily Show is the golden standard of joke writing, four days a week.

Anyway, that's my perspective. In hindsight, I should have never watched Conan last night, because if I hadn't I surely would have written a less serious and hateful blog. But, I have nothing but hate for people who drag down television. And I hope that occasionally amusing you in other blog posts has earned me the right to simply present my boring thoughts from time to time.

I love you!

Why George Washington Invented the New Years Resolution

I'm sorry.

What I did to you last night was inexcusable. Inexcusable!

That half-assed blog was very rude of me, and I apologize (in fact, that wasn't even a half-assed blog. More like a quarter-assed blog [which is a lot less sexy than it sounds]). The tempting powers of Colin Farrell and Samuel L. Jackson were just too much for my weak, human soul.


So, tonight I set out to right the wrongs of past Nick Doll (that lazy basterd... er bastard!). Since my Time Machine is not yet complete, all I can really do is try to write a really kick-ass blog. So, here goes nothing...

Fortunately, the God of Blogs hath smiled down upon us. Today, while hanging my 67th poster with Harrison Ford's likeness, I put a massive, hammer sized hole through the wall. After cursing the God of Poster Hanging, I found this wantless destruction was actually a blessing in disguise (as wantless destruction often is [I don't think "wantless destruction" is actually an expression]).

In this hole in the wall, I found an ancient box with a dragon on it. In it, were letters of an ancient correspondence between George Washington (yes, THE George Washington) and Alexander Hamilton (yes... well... Alexander Hamilton). Imagine that (I don't mean the final nail in Eddie Murphy's coffin)! Ancient letters between George Washington and Alexander Hamilton! In the wall of my apartment! In Los Angeles! In an apartment building that was built in 1990.



Well, as crazy as it sounds it is 100% true. I found ancient letters between George Washington and Alexander Hamilton in the wall of my Los Angeles apartment constructed in 1990 while putting up my 67th Harrison Ford poster. In these astounding letters, lays (lies? [not in this blog! Only truths!]) the discovery of a lifetime. In it, Washington and Hamilton outline the creation of the age old tradition of the New Years resolution. I have transcribed the letters below, for I fear the act of scanning them may cause them to crumble into dust.



First Letter from George Washington, Addressed to his Cabinet, 1789

"Dear Cabinet,

G.W. here. Capital job on that revolution dealy. I honestly though we were fuckethed. I mean, who would have thought a rag-tag group of sodomite farmers like us could beat an empire like that of bloody old England. Stupendous!

That crossing of the Delaware was a particularly inspiring maneuver, if I do utter so myselfth (and I do so utter such a proclamation). From now on, when anyone attempts an attack on Christmas, whether it be crossing a river or upon a yet to be invented commuter flying machine, they will certaintly think George Washington. There is nothing more American!

Now that praise has been garnished all around, like Franklin's seaman at a brothel (we need to do that again sometime, you old poop), I must cum (like Franklin!) to why I have taken the time to inscribe such words on parchment. Grave words! Grave words, indeed.

As you are all quite aware, I recently opened the world's first gym, which, I of course, named after the man whom I murdered for the idea. Unfortunately, Gym's idea was not as sound as he led me to believe that night at the brothel, after Franklin left to father more illegitimate hooker children.

My gym is, so far, a huge disaster. More disastrous than the time all the Indians threw that tea into the ocean and the British blamed us for it (someday they will pay for such treachery). That was the worst tea part ever.

Attendance is lousy. Fucking lousy. I have even made Jefferson the manager, but apparently, writing a half-decent Declaration of Independce does not qualify you to run the world's first gym. His ideas to increase attendance bloweth. They bloweth harder than a redcoat does to save his life (and they bloweth very hard, yet it was never hard enough to prevent their beheading).

Jefferson suggested I allow women to attend the gym! He says men will be more apt to work their bodies at an establishment where they can ogle oodles of women. Jefferson always has been a pussy. Who wants to get shirtless and sweaty when there are women around? What a queer idea. I think Jefferson is a fag. A total fag.

I write to you this morrow in hopes you can solve my quandary. I want a way to increase gym membership that does not give women any more rights than they already have. For they already have far too much.

Sincerely,
Prez 4 Life
George Washington

P.S. We also need to come up with a good ole' tradition to accompany the New Years holiday. Any suggestions?"

So ends Washington's first letter.


What follows, is a response from Alexander Hamilton...

"Dearest Prez 4 Life, George Washington,

My liege, I may have the solution to your troubles. BOTH your troubles! To kill two redcoats with one stone, as if were (I remember you were quite of fond of this in wartime. The boys and I are working on getting some redcoats and some very large stones for the office party).

Why not make the new years tradition encourage gym membership? Perhaps, the tradition could be that people make "resolutions" for themselves. These resolutions could be a number of things, but they would always include improving one's body. And what better way to improve their body than at your gym (as long as you keep the women out, that is)?

Food for thought.

Sincerley,
Alexander Hamilton

P.S. I agree that Jefferson is a total fag. Fucketh that cockface."

So ends Hamilton's world altering suggestion.



Which brings me to the final document in the ancient box. Washington's final response to Hamilton.

"Hamilton! You scally-wag!

Have you been smoking that plant the Indians like so much?

No matter, just as Jefferson has always credited the Mary Janice for the Declaration of Independence, it has led you to the most ingenious of conclusions. Why, did you know, Franklin was smoking Mary Janice when he decided to fly that kite in the lightning storm? Sure, it seemed like an unwise decision at the time, but now that he has super human strength, we have all been shut up. All been shut up indeed.

I shall implement your idea forthright!

I must suggest, though, that you consider faking your death. If the American people (bunch of bloody scoundrels!) learn that we have invented a tradition simply to sell them gym memberships, they will tear you limb from limb, just as they did to King George. Perhaps Aaron Burr can help you in this matter. He is quite astute, and a good listener.

It is regrettable that your brilliant solution means you shall have to fake your death, but as super human Franklin always insists "With Great Power Cums Great Responsibility." You have truly saved this seedling of a nation with your unconventional pondering brought on as a product of smoking the Mary Janice.

With Much Love,
Prez 4 Life,
George Washington

P.S. Franklin and I are going to the brothel tomorrow night. Wish to join us? Hookers are on Washington."

Wow. What a discovery right? I can hardly believe I found these papers in that dragon box in the wall of my apartment.

If you wish for prove, I can show you the lett...

Oh shoot. I just sneezed, which caused them to crumble to dust just as I feared the scanner would do.

Look like I was right. Again.

Anyway, seeing as how I have just shared a discovery that alters US History as we know it (in more ways than one), I think I will take the rest the evening off. Maybe watch SWAT again, which this time, I have truly earned.

Donate Your Cell Phone to a Homeless Man

One person can make a difference!

That's right, you can make a difference! Just you! All by yourself! Like a big boy/girl!

It's true. Just look at all these people who have made a difference...


Adolf Hitler

Joseph Stalin

Ghengis Khan


Ok, so all those people were evil. Just look at all the non-evil individuals who have made a difference...

Luke Skywalker
James Bond

Khan (I mean, Khaaaaaaan!)


Okay, so those were all fictional. And Khan was evil AND fictional. But there are non-evil, real, flesh and blood people who have made a difference too...

I just can't think of anyway.

The point is YOU can make a difference. Right here and right now (or, at the very least, right near here in a time slightly later than now [cause you're reading this blog at present]).

All you need to do is give your old cell phone to a homeless person. It doesn't need to have service. It doesn't have to hold a charge. It just needs to look like a cell phone.

It's a win/win!

First, the cell phone is recycled! So it's not thrown in some landfill where it eventually gets swallowed by a mutant (following the nuclear apocalypse of 2012 [damn those Mayans, there were right! But so was Planet of the Apes...]) who doesn't know better, causing it to choke to death (or, if it survives, the phone is still lodged in its mutant throat, so the poor creature can no longer eat, so it very slowly [and very painfully] starves to death. It's kind of comical really, the mutant gets so skinny that your old cell phone is visible, bulging out of it's skinny little neck). I know you've been saving all your cell phones to use the parts to construct your time machine and/or robot slave, but think about more than just yourself for a moment here! Who ever heard of anyone changing the world with a time machine!

Looking pretty insane...

Second (as in the second win in this win/win scenario), the homeless person who receives your phone no longer looks insane! Let me explain briefly (if I am capable of this).

All homeless people talk to themselves. This is a scientific fact. It has been this way since the beginning of time (well, at least since the beginning of homes).

They mutter to themselves, the carry out one-sided (sometimes two-sided) conversations, and they most certainly shout at the top of their lungs that their paper bag has been stolen by scarecrows. They appear insane. Each and every one of them. Fucking homeless.

But with cell phones, they need not look crazy! If you give a homeless person a cell phone (a much better choice than giving a mouse a cookie, because if you give a mouse a cookie, you are
just asking for a rodent infestation [which is preferable to a homeless infestation. Fucking homeless!), you are giving them their dignity back (what little dignity such putrid human beings like the homeless deserve).

Yay! Dignity!

If you see a dirty bearded man, dressed in rags, talking gibberish with a cell phone next to his ear, what is the first thing you think? I'll tell you what you will think, "I sure hope that man is not planning a terrorist attack. Perhaps I should notify the proper authorities." But this is good. This means you are not thinking, "That homeless person is insane. I should murder the lot of them someday.... That someday is today, mutha' fucka'! (*cocks shotgun*) Let's hunt!"

You don't know the phone isn't functional. That man could very well be talking to his lawyer about the seagull who stole his refrigerator.

And you don't have to donate an old phone either. Have a headset that came with your phone but don't want to look like a faggity douche (I do not use faggit as slur against gay people, I simply use it to explain people like Hollywood folk who may use a headset) by using it? Donate that to a homeless person. As long as he is smart enough to not leave the cord hanging at his waste (which may be too much to expect from the subhuman creatures known as the homeless) , that's enough to make him look like a faggity douche... a faggity douche who is not homeless or crazy (just a faggity douche).

Anyway, tomorrow, when that homeless person asks you some change, give him change instead (the Obama variety); give him your old cell phone or unused headset (assuming you are not a faggity douche). Because, that food he wants may keep him alive for a few days, but the dignity you provide him will feed him for a lifetime (because, for all we know, homeless people can live off dignity alone. We simply don't know, because there has yet to be a single homeless person in the history of man who ever had any).

Anyway, food for thought.

Be seeing you.


P.S. OF COURSE IT WAS DESIGNED BY A YOUTUBE EMPLOYEE'S FOUR YEAR OLD SON. IT LOOKS LIKE SHIT!

A Letter to the Man Who Invented Roller Shoes

Dear Man Who Invented Roller Shoes,

Are you out of your fucking mind? Was it your plan to become the most evil man since Hitler or were you just not thinking? Though I find it hard to believe that such an atrocity against the human race can be an accident, I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. Which is far more than fucking valueless scum like yourself deserves.

The only explanation I can think of that explains your mental retardation is that your mother and father must have been brother and sister, or possibly father and daughter ("My sister, my daughter, my sister, my daughter!"). And this unholy matrimony must have been that in a long line of incest dating back to when two twin monkeys (one female and one male, like Luke and Leia) stuck it in one another (the male being the one to stick it in the female ["it" being his little, hard monkey cock.]).

Nothing else can explain why anyone would look at a pair of children's shoes and say to himself, "I could stick a wheel in that." You sir, would disgust me less if you stuck it ("it" being your penis again) into woodland creatures, because that train of thought is far more logical than whatever was going through your head when you combined shoe and wheel (I mean, who hasn't felt a tingling in their pants at the sight of a Beaver slapping his dam together with that majestic tail of his?).

This guy totally has a hard on. Who can blame him?

Now, the Roller Blade and the Roller Skate make perfect sense. Without the roller skate, how would we preform the funky chicken without looking like assholes? And without the roller blade, how would we be able to tell the homosexuals from the general population? With these two roller devices filling every roller hole, why the fuck would you create the roller shoe?

With the roller blades cropped from this picture
you cannot tell which of these two men is gay.

The roller shoe has only served one purpose: it makes children more annoying than they already are. Before the roller shoe, children were the second most annoying thing in the world. Now, children have passed Fox News correspondents as the greatest annoyance facing mankind today. I would literally rather suck Glenn Beck's cock than witness one more child run down a stretch of hall, leaning back, letting his wheels take him in a maddening yet graceful spiral until he skids to a soul-crushing halt. Seriously, a child with roller shoes is like a Transformer combined with Spongebob Squarepants, if this crime-against-nature-Trans-Sponge-Bob was high on cocaine.

Seriously, Man Who Invented Roller Shoes, if I kill a child it is for one of two reasons. Either I was picking a song on my iPod while driving down a suburban neighborhood, or, more likely, I murdered a little bastard who broke into a roll while I was waiting in line at the movie theater. If this happens, the blood is on your hands. The former is my own fault, as I have filled my iPod with so much stolen garbage (meaning shitty music, not the band who sang "The World Is Not Enough") that the "Shuffle Songs" action is almost as unthinkable as the roller shoe.

How can you sleep at night? Knowing all the childcides and suicides your roller shoe is responsible for. I was not exaggerating when I referred to you as the most evil man since Hitler, earlier in this letter. In fact, I take that back. You, sir, are worse than Hitler. Worse than Hitler!

I would suggest you kill yourself, but that is not enough. Take that "genius" mind of yours and spend the rest of your life toiling to invent a time machine. Take that time machine back to your childhood, find your childhood self, attach a pair of roller shoes to your little child feet, attach rockets to your little child arms, and launch your little child self off a cliff with the aid of the roller shoes and rocket arms. Then, go back in time again and do the same to your little, tiny infant self for good measure.

If you do not do it, I will. And you don't want that, because I am dangerously close to cracking the time machine as it is.My time machine is close to completion.

Anyway, I hope this letter finds you well. And yes, I am still interested in purchasing your story to develop into a screenplay as earlier discussed.

Be Seeing You,
Nick Doll

P.S. I would love a pair of roller shoes since I bet you get them for free and what-not. Think about it.