LONG DUK DONG

when did ilx u-turn on Arthur Chu?

wow - that Arthur Chu bit nails it.

― Brio2, Thursday, March 26, 2015 5:56 PM (two years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This is not the first time I've read something where Arthur Chu articulates a really relatable position that just makes sense. Love that guy.

― mh, Thursday, March 26, 2015 6:00 PM (two years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

kind of wish I could hire him to follow me around and explain my life to me

― mh, Thursday, March 26, 2015 6:01 PM (two years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the Hong Kong/"oriental" music cue stuff just seemed to me like they were emphasising the idea that the villains were being sent very very far away from our heroes, Hong Kong as somewhere exotic and remote, rather than anything more specific about how cats might be treated in HK? idk

just like making clear that the mice have definitively escaped from the cats, "that's the last we'll be seeing of them" or whatever

No I like HL's interpretation

yeah.. i'm gonna give it a 7/10 on the "probably racist" scale

soref, I think he stopped being at all relatable and stopped making sense, but we have an entire thread for that

http://www.stereogum.com/1961930/chainsmokers-apologize-for-joking-that-chinese-people-eat-dogs/news/

I'm cackling at "because I have read reports" in the apology

At least some percentage of Switzerland apparently eats cats, that should be the default stereotype.

I've heard they don't even really have cuckoo clocks

it's a dumb joke, but what there's a meat festival??

David Cross, Charlyne Yi.

http://www.yomyomf.com/charlyne-yi-dumbfounded-by-the-racist-comments-comedian-david-cross-made-towards-her/

imo david cross is someone who comes across as obv an asshole but wow

he does seem like he would be insufferably jerky irl

Bob otoh seems like a total bro

lol maybe that's just southern vs. midwestern

Cross is a jerk and he has always been a jerk and also he is not funny. I do not know why anybody likes him. But yeah, Bob is great.

his stand-up is generally pretty unfunny - I was into it pretty big at the age of 19, but I went back and listened to some of it, and yikes. the jokes aren't necessarily terrible but he can't help but come off like a total prick. nowadays it sounds like he's trying to do a Louis CK type set but doesn't have the personality.

he's good in other people's stuff though.

he's great in Mr. Show. His standup is hard to take.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3KX8g00kCQ

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-soft-racism-of-apu-from-the-simpsons/amp

The Current South-Asian American Comedy Renaissance (Kumail Nanjiani, Aziz Ansari, Hasan Minhaj, Hari Kondabolu, Aperna Nancherl etc.)

Was searching for a GIF of rice in Facebook's Messenger app, because I wanted to send a message to somebody about eating rice, but the first image result was

https://i.imgur.com/26NnBGp.jpg

Is that filthy Frank?

apparently. whoever that is.

Oh, apparently he is part-Japanese.

I don't feel that fact makes it any better, in terms of content that Facebook is actively pushing out.

Good thread:

The Simpsons, 1989 - 2018 #RIP 😢 https://t.co/FLTsUwFBsQ

— Wakanda Kamau Bell (@wkamaubell) April 9, 2018

That sucks so much ass

Like, especially since the last 10-or-so years of Simpsons has just been "invite every comedian on for a guest spot," imagine what a fully engaged Simpsons writing team could do in collabo with Hari Kondabolu exploring and having fun with the issue instead of being petulant brats.

a fully engaged Simpsons writing team

well there's your first stumbling block, there's hasn't been one of those for decades

i remember when i used the say how the Simpsons was great but "the last few" seasons haven't been up to par, and i realize it's probably been about twenty years since it's been near the peak (and even then it was on the descent a bit.)

It really does blow my mind that the Simpsons has basically been on autopilot for nearly 20 years. You have one of the most successful brands in television history and you just squander it year after year. Like there would be any real consequence in just, like, doing a good job

Wow @ that clip, how is this show still going?

one of the few new Simpsons episodes I've seen in the last decade actually addressed this issue head-on. before even the documentary came out. it was about Apu's cousin or something. mostly jabs at millennials (ugh) but there was one poignant bit

it's a pretty obvious sentiment but comedy is extremely difficult, and i think even more difficult is trying to maintain a consistent comedic tone w/different creative types being brought in. the peak era staff wasn't just funny but also extremely smart about their humor and knew how to effectively deploy it, you watch old episodes and they're very understated and not wall-to-wall jokes, and they deeply understand the characters. seems like the staff at present tried and failed to get into the writer's room at AFV but sneaked into the Simpsons somehow.

and i think the animation style over the past however many years hasn't done the show any favors, it's a bit uncanny valley so i can't quite explain it but there's not nearly as much personality or humor in the way the characters appear, it's too polished or something.

in addition to the poor writing the show's standoffish tone is really irritating these days. I remember one that had a card in the end that said, "okay, you can all now log on to your computers and complain about this episode now", which would have sounded dated in 1999, much less 2006 or whenever it actually aired

Yeah, one of the odder but sorta unsurprising thing is that the writing staff were online pre-web and paying attention to Usenet very early on

pretending Apu was ever acceptable is bullshit isn't it? I mean here they are getting called out on it 11 years ago
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/jul/16/theaputragedy

i remember when i used the say how the Simpsons was great but "the last few" seasons haven't been up to par, and i realize it's probably been about twenty years since it's been near the peak (and even then it was on the descent a bit.)

sigh, that clip...

tbh what's on tv now isn't really the simpsons. this is a disappointing response but modern-day simpsons was never going to be capable of the smart + nuanced response this deserved.

we're all praying for an end to the depression at this point

that response is some bullshit you'd see in a libertarian meme cartoon

This is similar to recent Seinfeld bullshit in that the sheer witlessness is more shocking than the defiant commitment to bigotry if you stopped paying attention a long time ago. Like, ppl becoming more shitty when their shittiness is pointed out is not uncommon, and obv everyone knows they've lost it but how do you lose it this much?

what recent Seinfeld bullshit? as much as I love the show he's always had a huge blind spot when it comes to race

my original answer ITT was way wrong and I'm sorry for it

Simpsons used to be subversive (like 25 years ago) and most of the targets were the super rich, the media, idiot cops, etc. and now this, it feels like punching down in such a mean spirited cynical way, fuck this show & that smartass response

Let’s not invent some “always punching up” narrative about the show that gave us Cletus the Slack-Jawed Yokel

And said they wanted to blast Al Sharpton and Spike Lee into space

yea I think the Simpsons has always been fairly right-wing as a whole

television has always been fairly right-wing as a whole tbf