Sunday, May 23
· Recap of the Week – Upcoming Supreme Court case on abortion rights, ridiculous city and state primary candidates
o John noted just how long the GOP has been working to maneuver the Supreme Court into a place where it could take on Roe v. Wade – “Rolling back abortion rights is basically the reason why we had to listen to this human beer-bong [Brett Kavanagh] scream and cry his way through a job interview.”
o John was queasy at the “Jason A. Banks of men” crowded around Texas’s governor in the photo of him signing the punishingly-restrictive abortion bill in question – “You don’t usually see that many men in suits lined up to disappoint women outside of a first episode of The Bachelorette.”
o We looked at a number of horrifying primary candidates in state and local races, such as a candidate for Philadelphia’s DA who had this choice tidbit to say – “I understand Black people just about as well as a Black person. I’m not gonna say equal, but pretty good.”
o I laughed at John’s reaction to a montage of Andrew Giuliani’s costars from a reality show complaining about how annoying he is – “Andrew Giuliani is a nightmare! Imagine being the worst person on a golf reality show!”
o As John pointed out, Trump proved that “extreme cartoonishness isn’t a dealbreaker, it’s a selling point,” and he warned that while these candidates are “clowns,” there’s a reason clowns are so horrifying.
· And Now This – Public comments at San Francisco Board of Supervisors meeting
o Naturally, this was a Pawnee-worthy montage of residents getting up to say whatever nonsense they wanted into a mic, and it was a delight.
o For whatever reason, a bunch of people sang their remarks – My favorite was the guy who sang, “City Board of Supervisors, some of you are fucking liars!”
· Main Story – Sponsored content in local news
o We opened this story with the old way of advertising in local news, with an anchor in the ‘60s awkwardly transistioning from a story about racism to a sponsored ad featuring a guy who was way to excited about ham – This of course led John to hawk his own preference for sexy meat instead, a brand of ground turkey that was “the only turkey that’s 93% lean, 100% fuckable.”
o The brunt of the story, though, was on ads that are disguised as legitimate segments on both morning and evening news. We started with food-based segments, where anchors offered “fun recipe tips” using products they just so happened to be paid to be mentioning – John said of some sort of mozzarella-filled Dorito, “Now, that product has been discontinued, probably because it looks less like a snack and more like someone deep-fried a fidget spinner.”
o Much more worrying, though, were the segments that touted expensive medical treatments of dubious-at-best effectiveness, in which cities’ trust local anchors gave uncritically-glowing softball interviews on these treatments and products – “That is a hell of a positive spin: ‘There’s no better time to have prostate cancer! What are you waiting for?’”
o The show demonstrated the danger of sponsored content by making up their own bogus product and flogging it on no less than three local news shows – The product? The Venus Veil, “the world’s first sexual health blanket” that purports to achieve its utterly-ludicrous blankets by suspiciously using “technology that was pioneered in Germany about 80 years ago.”
o While the clips we saw of these segments were laughably ridiculous, John hammered home the main point – “The truth is, none of this was nearly difficult enough to get on TV.”
The Daily Show is off for a couple of weeks. The other day, I was watching an old clip of the show, and I realized how weird everything looked to me: the studio and the desk, Trevor’s suit and short hair, Trevor and the guest being in the same room as each other. Trevor has been filming from his home for over a year now, and what began as an emergency pivot now feels very natural.
Part of it, of course, is just how I as a human have adjusted to circumstances. Just like I don’t have to remind myself to grab a mask when I leave the house and I’m accustomed to Zoom gatherings, I’m used to Trevor’s afro and hoodies, to no live audience reactions, to occasional remote-interview tech glitches. But honestly, the way the show has acclimated to going remote is more than just making the best of a bad situation.
There are the cosmetic and technical differences, as well as the oblique references to our current situation (like a correspondent standing up in the middle of a Zoom interview to reveal they’re in their underwear,) but what I find really interesting are the ways that the show’s humor has physically adapted to the remote medium. It reminds me a little of how single-camera sitcoms brought their own type of humor. It wasn’t just the lack of the live audience – the filming techniques expanded what kinds of comedy shows could employ.
Those are the kinds of things we see here. I like the use of quick cuts when Trevor does a mini “skit” with himself, along with the occasional bit of intentionally-terrible CGI to give him a prop/glasses/a granny wig/etc. for the sake of his “character.” The graphics are made to look silly and cobbled-together, which add to the overall effect of Trevor going a little stir-crazy in his apartment. I also get a kick out of his close-up asides, and I love him making comments/asking questions to an invisible “someone” just off-camera. Even though some of these are similar to bits Trevor used to do in the studio, the remote setting allows the show to take them further, to highlight them more. In addition to making Trevor sitting alone in his apartment feel a little more dynamic, they’re also just wonderfully funny.
I loved the show in its original incarnation, and when the day arrives that Trevor goes back to the studio, I’m sure I’ll quickly get reacclimated to the old way of doing things. The show might find a way to bring some of its new remote bits back with it, adapted for a different setting, and it will most likely continue testing out new comedic styles and beats. But for now, I have to applaud the show for creating something that feels uniquely its own, something much more than just a pale imitation of what they wish they could be doing in the studio.
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