Fat Guy Stuck In Internet

I know John from his frequent work on skits for MC Chris albums, and he got his own show on Adult Swim playing a bunch of different characters, including the star and villain. He's not as funny as he is in the skits, partially because he's not cussing so much, but the show is still an entertaining farce of epic action shows. Like Saul of the Mole Men, it lampoons those old series with deliberately horrible special effects, bad acting, and cheap props (the hero's weapon is pretty much a broom handle). It's not the kind of show that sets the world on fire, but I wonder how much of its lame dialogue and trite plots are intentional and how much is just lazy.

The premise is a computer programmer gets sucked into the web and has to save it to get out, and a large part of the humor I enjoy is how hackneyed the references are to the fact that they're online. They'll just randomly insert words like "digital" or "silicone" into object references to remind you of the setting, but really it's mostly irrelevant except to explain the obviously green-screened backgrounds and silver jumpsuits. It's far from the funniest show on Adult Swim, but it's usually solid enough, and there's a cute little storyline that runs through these ten episodes, leading to a teaser for a second season (which will not occur). Gemberling's friend and fellow Chris-contributor Curtis Gwinn plays Chains, the bounty hunter-turned-ally who follows him around everywhere, and the two have a fun chemistry that keeps it watchable even when the episode's subject matter might be getting boring. You probably know whether you'd like this kind of show already.

Tropic Thunder

Tropic Thunder is another solid action-comedy hybrid for this summer. The concept is fun, it's about the actors in a big-budget Vietnam movie getting stuck behind actual enemy lines in the jungle. Ben Stiller, who also co-wrote and directed, is the action hero, and the last one to figure out that it's all real. Jack Black is the low-brow comedian (quite a stretch) who has a drug problem. Robert Downey Jr. is terrific as the foreign thespian who never breaks his character as a black soldier. He's quickly become one of my favorite actors in the last couple years, and he's the best reason to see this. Tom Cruise appears as a vicious studio mogul, and he's mildly entertaining, but I thought his performance was over-hyped just because he's Tom Cruise. Other big names play small parts, and a huge portion of the movie's humor is the jokes about the movie industry, especially the politics with the Academy Awards. Downey's speech about Best Actor nominations is one of the funniest things I've ever heard about Hollywood. The film also begins with fake ads and trailers featuring the characters, and it sets the tone quite well.

Besides all the meta-jokes though, it's still a fun movie. The movie has the most fun with gore that I can remember seeing since the Monty Python movies, and it's a sort of gross-out humor I like more than just bathroom stuff. Not everything in the movie succeeds, but it's crass and silly enough to be fun without thinking too much. The movie does a lot to offend different groups like the mentally challenged, and just doesn't care about it. It's all just comedy, and doesn't step lightly. There's some good silly action-dialogue and pointless explosions going around everywhere, and the pacing of the comedy and violence are pretty good. Stiller's act is a little tired at this point, but I thought this was a pretty decent return to form.

Sam and Max: Ice Station Santa

Telltale went forward with the second season of their successful take on the Sam and Max characters earlier this year, although I didn't buy it until recently. The first episode picks up quickly on the same foot as last time, now featuring an introductory puzzle before the stylish opening credits. The new location is the North Pole, where Santa seems to have been possessed and done some destructive things, like sending a giant robot equipped with high school level philosophy and 80's pop music quotes to the titular heroes. As a way of getting back into the swing of things, Ice Station Santa does a solid job with consistently clever humor and some enjoyable puzzles. I still haven't mastered the logic of adventure games, as I will occasionally read a clue the wrong way or ignore what seems like an innocuous detail, but I'm getting a better hang of it. I liked how they mixed up the street where all of the games start too, adding a new location and character to help prevent staleness. Good for anyone who likes to laugh and think in a new way.

Pineapple Express

Pineapple Express is yet another success for Apatow Productions. He and his crew rose to fame by bringing back the fun of sex comedies, but they've branched out, and Express' humor is all about pot, with Seth Rogen and James Franco's characters being high for most of the picture. Whereas they usually do straight comedy, this is sort of an action hybrid as the two friends get in trouble with crooked cops and drug lords and end up experiencing quite a few thrills. In some ways, it's more like a lower-intensity action film than a comedy, with most of the humor arising just from the way the characters talked instead of more discrete jokes. The pacing is a little strange, as several scenes, usually involving baked characters, go on for quite a bit longer than you'd expect, as they just keep riffing off each other. I wasn't bothered by it at all though, it fit the characters and gave it a unique feel that I enjoyed a lot.

The cast is full of the usual suspects, with funny, small parts played by Gary Cole, Craig Robinson, Bill Hader, and others. Like with Superbad, Rogen co-wrote with friend Evan Goldberg and does a solid job, but he gave the best part to Franco. I saw one reviewer say he was the funniest stoner character since Brad Pitt in True Romance, and it's not a thought I'd disagree with, although Pitt didn't have nearly as much time to be hilarious. Franco sometimes seems off-putting to me, but he really is great in this movie. He's never without something strange yet poignant to say, and has a great chemistry with Rogen. The movie is full of "bromance", possibly too-friendly, ambiguously gay camaraderie between two guys. There are tons of tropes from normal, heterosexual relationship development in other movies, and once in a while they get downright obvious with it to comedic effect. I haven't seen any of Green's other work as a director, but he does a fine job balancing the action and comedy. The climactic encounter is probably too over the top, although I strongly suspect it was intentional. I liked it quite a lot, and you should see it if you can see the humor in stoned idiots just acting like stoned idiots.