i think you should leave with tim robinson: sketch poll

obv don't know for sure but just given his age and general aesthetic feels like Mr. Show would have been a pretty big deal to him

I love this show but Patti Harrison makes me cringe and not in a good, funny way.

The Vulture article on him the other day mentions he was a huge Kids in the Hall and Chris Farley fan as a kid.

too many sketches with that same formula, that one was kind of weak

especially when there was another garment related office sketch (the pants website) that was way stronger

feel like he probably got this more from Mr. Show

OK I've never watched Mr. Show so it's totally plausible I'm incorrectly reading ITYSL's pedigree

the quiet/loud, sweet/dumb Farley/Sandler era of SNL feels like a bigger touchstone than Mr. Show.

Yeah actually one thing I was going to say is I felt like there were more "loud Sandler" moments in this season than the last, and I actually prefer less.

Chris L at 2:15 10 Jul 21

The Vulture article on him the other day mentions he was a huge Kids in the Hall and Chris Farley fan as a kid.

ha well there you go, that's pretty much it to a tee

xpost circa, I did enjoy this season, but I think it's not on par with the first season. some instant classics, but like for example compare this season's Heidecker sketch to last season's Colgate Comedy hour jazz bore and, like c'mon, it's not even close

come on man she had a standing invitation to drink puke

howie sketch depicted an archetype so perfectly that i feel most sketches in human history pale in comparison

the moment in season two that maybe equals it is santa talking about how detective crashmore is like a cosmic gumbo

yeah I mean that one w Heidecker was exceptional

I think anything less than out and out worship is probably a bad fit for this thread, I don't feel like I'm doing hot takes, rather just some relatively mild and - to me at least - very obvious flaws in a show that is overall good and creative and I'm glad exists

hey man i am just engaging with your points

i feel like when ppl point out the sketches they think are weaker they tend to be someone else's favorites (cf. karl havoc, identified as a not-really-funny sketch upthread, and for my money, maybe the funniest thing i've ever seen) which tends to be a mark of consistency and daring to me

i also don't think any sketch in the first season is quite working on the level of tammy craps. idk. both seasons feel about even in their merits

"there's too much tim yelling" was a criticism levied at the first season too and i legit can't tell if there's actually more this time around

i am a itysl character but my bit is nonstop doubling and tripling down on how good season two is

https://i.imgur.com/ACe5Wuj.jpg

lol Neon

I mean there's no quantitative Tim Robinson Yelling Index where you can see what is "too much yelling" but if it was starting to get to me in S2 and not in S1 maybe it's just the yelling was better used or more likely the show was new and there wasn't the hint of formula creeping in

I just feel like even if you are bonkers for the show if someone says "was a little too much yelling for me" it's like ok fair enough but I still love it

I dunno, it's like we are discussing Megadeth and I'm like "great band, Mustaine's singing is a little hard to take sometimes" and the response is like "WHAT?? number one Dave Mustaine is one of the greatest a singers of all time, and he's never been better than he is on the new album"

Well he’s no Roy Donk

Part of the diffs between S1 and S2 might be just the “second album” thing, where S1 was an assortment of all the sketches they had laying around for years from Tim’s SNL years on, and S2 was written over the course of a year or two

I’m curious if there’s any crossover between this and Tim & Eric(beyond just Heidecker’s appearance) due to how both shows had a knack for casting weird/non-actors

you dare sully the name biff wiff

I'm with UMS tbh

When the yelling isn’t working it’s when it feels like it’s forced, like he’s resorting to it to force the funny with that melodrama. Naturally we’ll all have different takes on whether it was called for or not case by case for all sorts of reasons.

I mean there's no quantitative Tim Robinson Yelling Index where you can see what is "too much yelling" but if it was starting to get to me in S2 and not in S1 maybe it's just the yelling was better used or more likely the show was new and there wasn't the hint of formula creeping in

I get what you're saying. I would definitely prefer there to be less shouting, even though I think the show is really funny.

I like the running thread of lame jokes about “swiping left”.

Yeah any criticism I have needs to be understood in the context of "Both seasons of this are by far the funniest sketch show I have seen in a decade"

Key & Peele maybe but I give this one the nod b/c it feels more modern and fresh, whereas K&P feels more like the ultimate iteration of SNL-style sketch comedy

ITYSL feels influenced by stuff like Twitter and Vine, just showing funny things & funny situations with little to no set up, or a set up which is basically unrelated to the main idea. a bunch of the Abso Lutely shows do this too - one of Nathan For You's central jokes is how he always takes the most convoluted, nonsensical path to do anything, Eric Andre and Tim & Eric keep doing that thing where a bit will switch genres twice in a minute, etc. I think it all sort of culminates in this, a sketch show where each season is only 90 minutes long but still contains as many funny ideas as two entire years of SNL.

It's odd to me to say K&P is SNL-style sketch comedy when A) most of their bits follow the same "escalate into insanity" template as ITYSL and B) Tim Robinson is an actual SNL alum.

also K&P is funny

a crucial distinction yes

ITYSL struggles with sketch endings slightly less than K&P did imo but they also produced a *lot* more material

i showed my brother the Big Wave sketch (he'd never seen the show before) and he about fell over when Tim flipped the table. glad we have the same sense of humor.

I mean, this is brimming with the same level of chaotic energy as ITYSL:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pKt4gaErvU

"escalate into insanity" is the template of SNL (and most sketch comedy) as well, K&P just generally takes it a step or two further. what ITYSL does feels different, things go insane but often in a wildly different direction. like it's pretty much impossible to predict where things are going because they don't follow any sort of linear path

Monty Python or Mr. Show did that

So we watched the first episode of season 1 and I was, uh, really underwhelmed based on all of the hype. My wife is still giving me shit, three days later, for "that horrible comedy show you made us watch". The brunch skit was funny and I guess the baby of the year thing had a few good lines, but I don't think I laughed the rest of the episode. The gift receipt skit really felt like an SNL skit to me, decent premise and initial joke, but then just immediately landed in the bizarre without any ramp to it, felt really forced in a weird way.

I don't know how representative the first episode was, but I'm guessing that not finding the baby of the year skit to be absolutely hilarious means this show probably isn't for me.

i think you should watch the good car ideas sketch before giving up but yeah bad sign

are they ticklish?
are they jigglish?
can they be tricked?

i did not even try to watch this show with my wife. doesn't feel like a 'wife show' to me, idk

she's heard me occasionally singing "little buff boys" to myself under my breath and i honestly think giving no explanation is a better option than trying to attempt to get her to understand this kind of humor

jvc i think you have to kind of get lost in its world a bit. binge the next couple and try to hold evaluation until after

I would try the funeral skit or the plane revenge skit, tbh

funeral is one of my favs but not representative of the show generally

maybe skip to ep 5 the one with the hot dog and the johnny cash skit, which both feel like relatively accessible permutations of the show's thing

My enjoyment of this show is based on the sheer levels of absurdity reached by most of the skits. Especially when someone's boilerplate nicety ("I liked your gift", "did Christmas come early?") is challenged relentlessly.

I'll probably watch more, they aren't a lot of time to invest (def without my wife).

I didn't like baby of the year much either but there are some very good ones. The Johnny Cash one is probably the most I've laughed this year

in memoriams don't usually include how they died

SHUT...UP!