Xiao-boYuan

Yeah - I love everyone on this podcast, so much. I just wonder how much already-established good faith it takes to make this material palatable, and not just a devolution into one-upsmanship about how much hi-la-rious cruelty they can come up with to inflict on imaginary girls. You're totally right that ironic commentary on real misogyny is hard to pull off in comedy without reproducing the actual misogyny, and to attempt it in improv? Man, that's a highwire act. I guess I felt that they fell off the wire on this one, not that the attempt itself is anything to be scorned. Anyway, this podcast has really, really heightened my appreciation of Matt Gourley. He's the softest touch but insanely funny. Between his presence on this show and appearances on Dead Authors, I think I'm in love.

I definitely agree with this as well. From a comedy standpoint, there were all these tonal shifts that were kind of jarring. My disturbance goes a level further though. I wasn't stifling my laughter so much as feeling depressed throughout the episode. It's not like crazed brutality against women hasn't been played effectively for laughs. But in the past, because it's been in DiMello's totally bizarre voice alone, it's really been a joke about Andy Daly's hilarious delivery of these twisted fucked-up tales, and his warped personality. Plus, we had a perfect balance with the likes of Scott and Patton as his grossed-out, shocked and dismayed audience, being forced to listen to this depraved shit. Part of the enjoyment was just hearing Scott like really not want to know any more about what goes on in international waters but unable to resist asking. I feel like this dynamic didn't work during this episode. Since Jason played it rather straight and didn't bring anything in the way of a weird performance, the hilarity was supposed to ride on the simple twisted of, like, oh dismembering tons of girls! keeping them in pens! HAHA! ISN'T THAT FUCKED? It's a subtle shift, but for me, it was an important one. Absurdity becomes shock jock stuff. And misogynistic at that. Maybe it was the sheer repetition -- joke after joke about girls losing their limbs, getting shot, etc. The joke is on the level of brutality, not the level of the performance of brutality. I will probably get accusations of humorlessness tossed my way. Oh well. This episode made me feel humorless and bummed ... bummed, too, to read that everyone else seemed to have to stifle their laughter. Yikes.

LOVE THIS. Love these ladies so much.