Weekly Comedy: The Prodigal Shit Returns

The Olympics are over, which means one good thing and one very bad thing. The good news is that Community, Parks & Rec and The Office are all back with new episodes this week. The very very bad news is detailed at the end of this post. All you can do is shake your head in disappointment.

DVD

Cold Souls – Paul Giamatti’s black comedy involving his soul being put in cold storage so he could become a better actor came out quietly last year and is out on DVD this week, where people might actually see it. Set your Netflix queues!

Gentlemen Broncos – Pretty much every single critic out there thought this thing – which is from the people responsible for Napoleon Dynamite (is it time to start ironically wearing Vote for Pedro shirts yet?) – was a total disaster, and so 20^th Century Fox actually cancelled its theatrical release. It also features Flight of the Conchords’ Jemaine Clement and Sam Rockwell, and that might be enough for some to roll the dice.

Rifftrax Double Feature – Best of Shorts vol. 1 packaged with Night of the Living Dead for cheap. THRILLING!

TV

Players – A new comedy from Matt Walsh airing on Spike TV Tuesday night, Players is being advertised as kind of an obnoxious sitcommy spin on Waiting…, set in a sportsbar. The commercials are probably not doing it justice based on the talent involved, but this is Spike, so who the hell knows. Check it out for yourself and judge away.

Big Downer of the Week

The Tonight Show with Jay Leno returns March 1^st, which is today. A nation mourns.

Weekly Comedy: Amazing News That Will Amaze You

This week’s comedy offerings are a mixed bag with some excellent stuff, some promising stuff and some crap, as usual. But that's not why we're here today - there is some STUNNING NEWS to be found at the end of this post!

IN THEATERS

Cop Out – Kevin “Southwest Airlines” Smith is now directing movies he didn’t write, which could be a really good thing. The premise of this is simple: it’s a buddy cop movie where one of the cops is Tracy Jordan from 30 Rock, as portrayed by Tracy Morgan. Looks like it could be fun. We’ll have a review up on Friday.

DVD

The Informant! – Easily the best thing out this week. This is a really unique comedy wherein Soderbergh has cast a bunch of recognizable comedians – Paul F. Tompkins, Patton Oswalt, Joel McHale – in serious roles as FBI agents and lawyers surrounding Matt Damon’s comic performance as a corporate whistleblower. There’s a lot more to this film than just that, though; it’s very entertaining and funny and ultimately a really fascinating true story. So go rent it already.

Superjail! Season One - Superviolent abstract comedy from Adult Swim. This one doesn't seem to have nearly as many fans as Metalocalypse or even Tim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!, but hey, here it is on DVD if you're curious.

Night Court Season 3 – WHO is buying Night Court DVDs? Seriously, who? Is there one sad old guy sitting in his crappy apartment, coffee table littered with divorce papers and beer cans, scratching his gut and chuckling at Night Court Season 3? Answer: probably.

Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead – Some Troma thing that fans of Evil Dead or whatever will probably like. Sounds z-z-z-zany!

HOLY SHIT

Sinbad: Where U Been? – And now your promised BREAKING NEWS!

Sinbad is not dead or in rehab or the subject of a depressing VH1 reality TV show - he has a new Comedy Central special out on DVD this week.

REPEAT: 90s COMEDIAN “SINBAD” IS NOT DEAD OR IN REHAB OR THE SUBJECT OF A DEPRESSING REALITY TV SERIES ON VH1. PLEASE ALLOW YOUR MIND TO BE BLOWN.

Weekly Comedy: The HBOpocalypse

There aren’t a whole lot of exciting new DVD releases this week, but there’s enough new stuff on Friday night alone to keep you busy for a while. HBO is doubling down on comedy programming and the winner is (potentially) us (maybe).

DVD

Black Dynamite – Surely to be the most-played DVD in college dorms for the next 3 years, this blaxploitation spoof has gotten pretty mixed notices from critics. Basically, if you saw the trailer, you’ve pretty much seen the film. Or so I’ve heard.

Good Hair – Chris Rock’s amusing but admittedly thin documentary about the African-American hair industry. It’s certainly eye-opening and actually pretty funny; worth a rent for sure, or catch it on cable in a month or two.

TV

The Ricky Gervais Show – HBO is launching their new Friday night comedy lineup with this, which seems like a really weak premise – they’ve taken the old Ricky Gervais podcasts and animated them in Flash with Hanna-Barberra-esque cartoon versions of Gervais, Stephen Merchant and Karl Pilkington. If you’ve heard those podcasts – and millions of people have – then you’ve seen this material already (and frankly it was funnier when Pilkington's nonsense wasn't visualized Shorties Watchin' Shorties-style). Hopefully there’s some original stuff in here and it isn’t 100 percent rehashed, but we’ll see.

Funny or Die Presents – This is the highlight of the week and is not to be missed by any discerning comedy fan. It’s not clear if this is going to be all original material – the trailers suggest it’s a mix of stuff from the website, with more new stuff than old – but it seems every talented comedian and comic actor is taking part in this sketch show, including most of Human Giant, Zach Galifianakis and more. It’s on at midnight on Friday after Real Time.

The Life and Times of Tim: Season 2 – More of the somewhat-animated comedy series I haven’t seen nearly enough of to comment on. Time to rent season one!

Real Time with Bill Maher – The world’s smuggest (and probably most entertaining and interesting) talk show is back after a long hiatus this week. Last season Maher experimented with his format a lot; sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t, and he seemed to be running low on interesting guests (every panel should probably have at least one person whose job it is to be entertaining), but it was certainly more hit than miss.

WHHHHHYYYYYYYY

Small Wonder Season One – Shout! Factory has given unto us many marvelous things on DVD; Mystery Science Theater 3000, Freaks and Geeks, Undeclared and a whole bunch of other great, somewhat obscure shows.

They have decided to abuse this magical power they have and are releasing the first season of one of the worst sitcoms of all time, Small Wonder. Feel free to give this a rent at some point and make sure you have a stopwatch handy so you’ll know exactly how many minutes you were able to tolerate how horribly, embarrassingly bad this show is.

Weekly Comedy: A Rollercoaster of Quality

One of the best movies of 2009 is released this week alongside one of the worst and they’re both in this column! Fancy that!

DVD

A Serious Man – Even though this black-as-pitch comedy was nominated for Best Picture, it still feels underappreciated. The Coens have constructed something special with this movie; it's structured almost like a traditional joke with a really hilarious punchline at the end. It’s probably one of the darkest comedies ever made, and it’s certainly not for everyone, but since you’re reading this on a site aimed at nerdy comedy snobs, odds are you’ll dig the hell out of it.

The Life and Times of Tim: Season One – The barely-animated HBO series featuring the likes of Nick Kroll and Eddie Pepitone is out on DVD now, so if you missed the initial airing, here’s your chance to catch up. It’s definitely hit and miss, but there are some really funny episodes in here. Worth a rent, at least.

The Sarah Silverman Program: Season 2 Part 2 – Sarah Silverman’s sitcom had a pretty strong season 3 premiere last week, and the rest of season 2 is (finally) out this week, so there’s enough Silverman material for you to figuratively roll around in. If that’s your sort of thing.

Gary Unmarried Season One – wait a second how did this escape the toxic waste pit

COMEDY TOXIC WASTE OF THE WEEK

Valentine’s Day – Gary Marshall rises from his cursed crypt to once again inflict his particular brand of focus-group-tested “romantic comedy” treacle on the unsuspecting public, this time with every shiny-faced actor and actress accepted as “pretty” by empty-headed housewives who snap up new episodes of People Magazine as though its foul pages provide them with the very putrid nutrients they need to keep their black blood flowing.

Anyway it looks pretty bad.

Couples Retreat – But it’s hard to tell if it’s as bad as this fucking nightmare, the latest from the now-untrustworthy Vince Vaughn –Peter Billingsley duo who are now responsible not only for this unfunny pile of laugh-free white bread bullshit but also Four Christmases and Fred Claus. Fuuuucccckkkk

Weekly Comedy: Not Half Bad

Not a whole lot of stuff out this week but what is there is generally of high quality, which hey, let’s call that a win!

DVD

Zombieland – This wasn’t really marketed as a straight comedy per se but it absolutely is, and it’s one of the funniest films of 2009 (not to mention it features one of the best cameo appearances in, uh, forever). Zombies are kinda played out these days, but this movie feels fresh and doesn’t pander too much to the nerd audience. Definitely worth a rent.

Insert joke about Jesse Eisenberg amusement park movies here.

TV

The Sarah Silverman Program Season 3 – After what feels like a multi-year hiatus, Sarah Silverman’s sitcom is back. According to the many, many, many podcast interviews I’ve heard with the show’s cast since they wrapped filming last year, this is the best season yet! Also, there is apparently more screen time for Brian Poshen and Steve Agee, which can only be a good thing. Check it out at 10:30pm Thursday on Comedy Central.

Important Things with Demitri Martin Season 2 – Have you ever wondered what it would be like if Mitch Hedburg hosted Chappelle’s Show? Now’s your chance!

Seriously though, Martin’s show is a little hit-and-miss but generally the first season was pretty funny and had plenty of good material in it, so here’s hoping season 2 at least maintains that level of quality. Premieres at 10pm Thursday on Comedy Central.

TOXIC WASTE OF THE WEEK

Larry the Cable Guy: Tailgate Party – If you actually know anyone who wants this, I pity you. My deepest sympathies.

Weekly Comedy: Bad Things from Good People

It isn’t listed here, but just in case you’re not sick of Tracy Ullman’s shtick, her Showtime series is back this week for a third season chock full of high-pitched impressions and fat suits. So yeah, that’s also happening.

DVD

A Boatload of Rifftrax – A bunch of new Rifftrax DVDs are out this week, which include such gems from the public domain as Planet of Dinosaurs, Voodoo Man (featuring Bela Lugosi, who no one gives two fucks for) and yet another Plan 9 from Outer Space release, this time with the new “live” version from the theatrical events they held last year. There’s also a new DVD full of shorts, which are usually really good. In any case they’re all criminally cheap so there are worse ways to blow your money (although if there are honestly still people out there who want to sit through Plan 9 again regardless of new jokes, color me surprised).

Whitest Kids U Know Season 2 – The Whitest Kids U Know have had some absolutely stellar sketch material over the past few years, and if you completely ignore their theatrical disaster Miss March (which you should), they’re still one of the most promising new sketch comedy groups to emerge in recent memory.

That said, pretty much none of that great material can be found in Season 2, which is out on DVD this week. If you’re looking to get in to the Whitest Kids, who are worth getting in to, check out season one or season three and skip this one completely. You’ll be much happier for it.

Parker Lewis Can’t Lose season 2 – I find it completely amazing that enough people bought Parker Lewis Can’t Lose Season One on DVD to warrant the release of the second season.

COMEDY TOXIC WASTE

I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell – This dubious “comedy”, based on a book by the odious Tucker Max, was unceremoniously dumped into theaters at some point last year. Here’s the premise: unbelievably misogynistic douchebag Tucker Max, who sleeps with a ton of women because he treats them like shit and they just can’t resist him, fucks up his life by being a complete asshole to everyone around him. He is then redeemed at the end by saying “I’m sorry guys, aren’t I a lovable rapscallion?”

The “comedy” in this movie is supposed to come from all the hyper-misogynistic dialogue about how all women are dumb skanky whorish sluts and aren’t really people and all that bullshit fratboy “humor” that isn’t funny if you’ve got more than two brain cells to rub together. Avoid this shit like the plague it is and if anyone tells you it’s an undiscovered gem you just have to see, stop being friends with them.