I was feeling particularly masochistic today (probably because of my sour mood), so I decided to sit through the premier of The Lance Krall Show. Sketch comedy is in such a pathetic state.
I don’t know how this got on air. What focus group found this funny? And no, Mr. Krall, your group of friends does not count as a focus group. My guess, actually, is that he’s some kind of relative of some higher-management-uppity-up-muckity-muck at SpikeTV. How else would such juvenile crap get on air? I mean, this isn’t the internet, where you can post some random webcomic. This was webcomic quality stuff on television.
What do I mean by webcomic quality stuff? I mean, the reason most people post webcomics. It’s just stuff their friends find funny. And that’s the case with the show. Case in point, the prank phone call sketch. Yes, they really had themselves doing a prank phone call on the TV show. That’s so frickin’ mature. I’m sure it must’ve been funny at the time, but the rest of us, the viewers at home, the ones who matter, we’re not amused.
It could be funny. You see some stuff that could be jokes. But the set-ups and executions are so off, it just doesn’t work. It seemed like they were taking one-line ideas and going, “Let’s make a sketch about someone doing this.” “Yeah, that sounds funny.” And that was the extent of the development of the idea. Improvise the idea for the sketch as you go along, bam, there’s the idea, no need to actually try to make it funny, no need for tweaking or refinement, then just film.
Or maybe I’m giving it too much credit. The humor was juvenile to begin with. Stinky smell, bathroom scene. Girl coming. Maybe that’s funny in real life in retelling, and maybe it could be funny on TV, but it just was not pulled off. Like I said, they probably just sat in a circle, patting each other on the back with their funny idea, but didn’t put any thought into the actual execution.
It got even more mature at the end of the show. So, Mr. Krall is attempting humor at reading e-mails on the first episode. Which he has the gall to explain. “It’s funny because it’s the first episode and I couldn’t have received any e-mails yet. That’s the joke.” FUCK! If you having to explain the fucking joke, it’s not funny! And interspersed into him trying to read this fake e-mail, are his friends interrupting him. Another tip: Breaking the fourth wall does not save a crappy joke. Then, to top it off, he gets in a fight. Wow, that’s real mature.
Another sketch that was done was a parody of Punk’d. Now, I’ve definitely had this idea before to do a parody of a candid camera type show. (I must give him at least credit for not letting the sketch run on too long… pulling an SNL, so to speak.) However, parody for parody’s sake is not funny. If there’s any faux-comedic technique that pisses me off more than anything else, it’s parody for parody’s sake. Once more, an okay idea that was ruined by execution.
Anyone with a budget like his, and marginal video editing talent, could make a show just like his. Unless you’re feeling masochistic like me, don’t watch the show, okay.