I must preface this with saying that I love MELVIN KAMINSKY. also known as Mel Brooks, I believe I owe my sense of humor to him. Him and The Simpsons. I mean there’s a lot of other things but those are the two that really worked into my sense of whats funny. When I say I love him I mean it. I love every movie he made from The Producers in 1968 to Robin Hood Men in Tights in 1993. I did not like Dracula Dead and Loving It. I did not even like that as a child but still between 1968 and 1993 he made 11 comedy movies that I think are pretty swell and at least 9 of them are comedy classics. Like stuff that holds up so much. He also helped create Get Smart which was a pretty darn good 1960s sitcom if you ask me.
Anyway in 1981 he created The History of the World Part I. A very funny movie lampooning several historical events. In 2022 Hulu got him back….and also brought in Nick Kroll who just might be the least funniest human being on this planet. Jewish people had like seven trillion years of being funny as hell and Nick Kroll just comes in and ruins it. It’s very unfair of him to do that but still he just had to do it. So yeah this is why a LOT of comedy does not work for me these days and I’ll get to each reason.
1.) It tries way too hard: Something about it just tries way too hard with the simple easiest jokes (and even fails with them) oh Princess Anastasia likes a tiktok like thing. Yeah, just go with tiktok. Why bother trying to learn something about the actual person when you can just make fun of tiktok? You know that thing that will stay forever and ever. Why try to make a historical joke about Anastasia (that I probably wouldn’t even get but hey that’s that) but there’s a lot to go with. They just do a tiktok joke instead of something about the woman who pretended to be her. I guess that’s just too hard so LOL TIKTOK SHES SO VAIN LOLLLLL I SHIT MY PANTS HOH HOH
2.) It runs every single joke into the ground: Okay in this series there’s a running bit about the Civil War. The one joke it has is LOL ULYSSES S GRANT WAS A GIANT DRUNK WHO WAS DRUNK EVERY SECOND OF THE DAY HIS BLOOD WAS WHISKY HO YEAH LOL IM LAUGHIN SO HARD. Okay to be fair after a few parts they bring in a trio of loser soldiers that do something I guess. I’m going to be honest and say I didn’t see an episode. I thought I had watched it but I did not and not all the money in the world will get me to watch it. the two jokes are not well done and they run them into the ground. Another thing they run into the ground is the Shirley Chisohlm sitcom parody. They even do the hackneyed LOL YOU GOTTA BE AT TWO PLACES AT ONCE. I’ve watched a lot of situational comedy in my life and I cannot think of a time where that plot was used. I’m sure it had to be or was it just used in sitcom parody plots? I really can’t think of it right now but that whole thing has to go away right now. Forever. It is dead. Pick another supposed trope of sitcoms instead please. Sometimes one joke on a subject is enough and you don’t have to run it into the ground. They make a joke about a white guy taking Rosa Parks seat at a convention and she goes “Not doing this shit again” and leaves. You know what I would have given them credit if they didn’t fuck it in the ass and bring it back several more times.
3.) Meta Comedy: Before you come screaming BUT MEL BROOKS DID META COMEDY BEFORE IT WAS BIG! Yep, and you know what the man did it correctly. Meta Comedy, or Fourth Wall Breaking stuff DOES NOT FUCKING WORK IF ITS EVERY SECOND FUCKING JOKE. That stuff has to take you off GUARD like you don’t expect it to come. That stuff HAS to come out of nowhere. When it’s overused (which so much comedy of today does over us it) it takes away the charm of it all. It’s just not done properly and that’s sad because some of the best jokes EVER have been fourth wall breaking jokes.
4.) A lot of the jokes aren’t good to even begin with: You remember how John Lennon said the Beatles where Bigger than Jesus right? So how about you make the 12 Apostles just like the Beatles! Funny stuff right!!!!! No, that’s not even a good joke to begin with (and yes they run it in to the ground like there’s no fucking tomorrow)
5.) Nick Kroll tries way too hard: Period. He was one of the writers of this series and I don’t think he’s very good at comedy writing. He’s also not very good at comedy acting either. Some people were good at one of those. Some where good at both. Nick is bad at both. He literally tries way too hard to be the centre of attention and it just’s obnoxious. I do not like seeing him at all and I probably will not see another thing he makes because he’s not very good.
6.) A lot of it seems to play it way too safe: Mel Brooks did not play it safe. Mel Brooks made jokes about every single topic. I can understand maybe toning down on say the Gay Jokes because you don’t feel you can make a good one but well here’s a great opportunity. You know the Kama Sutra? Yeah well they make a joke about it being the Kama SOUPtra because the guy who was actually likable in the awful The Eternals wants to get people aroused and have them enjoy a nice soup! How about going hog wild with the sex stuff or something? I don’t understand how soup and sex work together but whatever.
7.) It wastes talented peoples time: I just can’t believe how many talented people got roped into this. If you were to see the list of people you’d find at least one or two of them that you liked in something else. There IS something sadder than a bad comedy. It’s seeing someone you know can be a damn hoot and a half being forced to preform bad comedy. Not cool. The guy from Spin City that I watched that show for (well him and the Mayor guy) gets a role here and he’s completely wasted too. The poor guy doesn’t even have that many roles I can think of but nope just wastes him as Peter in the Jesus stuff.
8.) Forced references to other Mel Brooks movies: They had a pretty good reference to Blazing Saddles. Then they just jammed in one from the Producers (Nick Kroll I hope will get punched in the head when he meets Gene Wilder in heaven. That’s all I will say) Then Spaceballs and then the Walk Like This joke that I’m sure was used many times. Maybe I’m just tired of seeing a reboot going HEY LOOK REMEMBER THIS THING FROM THE ORIGINAL MOVIE YEAH WE BROUGHT IT BACK!!!! so I might be just biased. Couldn’t you have made jokes based around those things instead of just using actual lines from those movies?
9.) I get wanting to make jokes about political historical things but can we at least make them just a tad not so much on the nose? Just a little bit. For me. Please?
10.) It does not feel genuine. No matter how cheesy, bad, unfunny, or just honestly mean spirited and offensive comedy of the past got it at least felt genuine to me. Like the people behind it believed in the jokes. Like they really WANTED to make this. No matter if it was Going Beserk or some random episode of The Nanny. They cared. I don’t think anyone in this series cared. They were hired by Hulu to shit out more content for the streaming services. I’m seriously thinking that Portnoyd is right when he says that we have enough content to never need any more again.
I’m gonna get a bit real with those who read this blog. I have weird anxiety issues. Like I’m afraid that I’m gonna lose my eyesight or my hearing and make it really harder to enjoy things like movies and that. I’ve been trying to pick better things to watch. Not gonna stop watching boring movies in the middle or anything but I’m going to at least try to make it so that I do not watch things that frustrate me. This frustrated me. an Incredible amount. I laughed twice at this, both times when Mel Brooks showed up. All I know is that I’m done with any reboot of any comedy thing that I like. I might try a reboot of some action movie from the 1990s or something. I’ll still watch the horror reboots (most of the best reboots were horror related) This is clearly the worst thing Mel Brooks has ever had his name on (the fact he’s like 187 years old is a big reason I believe he did not have much to do with it. That and the fact I laughed twice. Mel would have made me laugh more than that. I laughed more then that at Dracula Dead and Loving It. Yeah that also has a lot of the same flaws that I mentioned her but at least it felt genuine. Anyway please do not watch this series.
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