Three episodes into the new Kids in the Hall and either the surrealness of seeing new KitH sketches has been wearing off or they’ve been slowly getting better (there’ve been good bits in every episode, but the runner in episode 3 with Dave (and Melanie) was really tops).
In addition to the weirdness of this thing’s existence and a handful of jokes that I think just don’t land, I think part of me having a hard time really connecting with it is the overall change in aesthetics and structure. Rather than mostly being taped on a three-camera stage live in front of a studio audience with a handful (more in later seasons) of location segments, it’s all single-camera setups that are lit and framed like any streaming production in the 2020s. These aren’t bad per se, but I don’t know that they work to play to the strengths of the material or the performers (I tend to also think that traditional 4:3 aspect ratios work better for sketch comedy, but whatever).
Anyway, I’m going through it slowly partly because I want to let the sketches sit with me instead of blowing through it all fast and making it all seem like a fever dream.
Every show that brings back the cast for a decades-later followup ends being kind of about aging, whether on purpose or not. Kudos to the “kids” for allowing the HD cameras capture every tiny little thing age has done to their bodies.
I finished the KITH episodes yesterday and felt like there was only one recurring sketch that didn’t work.
Coincidentally, it was one that didn’t work back when Mark McKinney tried it on SNL (though I’d argue the weird child talk show host Taddli worked better than this new one), but maybe “running a bad skit into the ground” is just a Mark McKinney thing, since I looped back around to the very first episode and writhed in agony at the Mississippi Gary skit, for obvious reasons!
As for the new episodes - it might be because I had subtitles on, that described the sound of what was happening, but I was dying at Scott Thompson slapping the Swedish woman’s boob during sex. The cat sketch was really good, too, and I feel like the mustache sketch was good traditional one to end it on.
Just caught up with the latest Better Call Saul myself, and… damn. The slow burn was worth it for that final scene. That was electric.
Speaking of electricity, my most wild and stupid imagining for this show’s ending is Kim somehow ending up as a high-powered in-house lawyer for Madrigal Electromotive. Posting it now in the extremely unlikely event it comes true.
Started Ash vs the Evil Dead and finding it surprisingly really good. It’s so dang stylish. I have been playing the recent videogame and was curious who all these characters, brand names, locations and stuff were from. That thing is full of mythos from the show, it’s cool.
Still kinda weird to me that the game, an M-rated venture, has Shemp’s as a soda instead of a beer, and censors the name of Ash and Chet’s other drink. Minor stuff, but I’m pretty sure they can say “fuck” in a video game if they want to!
re: the show, I was pretty surprised at how well they get you kinda attached to these new characters who all usually have a maybe six or seven episode lifespan, tops, before meeting a grisly demise. I guess it’s not that different from the movies, in that way.
yeah I thought it was shockingly good! it’s like the most polished thing they’ve ever done with that property by far without losing the spark (until s02e10 when the showrunner lost an argument and quit)
It’s almost funny how clearly Shemp’s is not soda. But I think I’m reading that into it because I don’t think there’s much of a elbow nudge in the writing. I had never heard of Shemp’s before and I just felt like it was beer, but I’ve also never had reason to doubt that the characters really thought what they are drinking is soda. That naivety is kind of the funny charm of the game, which feels like it comes from the camp tone established in like Friday the 13th the Videogame.
