Betraying Expectations

We have talked in class about how comedy is unexpected and the simple unexpectedness is what is funny about it.  Like in The Naked Gun, where they are showing baseball bloopers in the stadium the funniest blooper is where a player goes to field a ground ball and gets mauled by a tiger.  Its hilarious because nobody expects a baseball player to get mauled by a tiger, or hit by a car, or have his head knocked off by the ball, all of which happen in the video.

            But there is something funnier than comedy that just comes out of the blue.  This comedy involves setting you up so that you know what the punch line is going to be and then hitting you with another punch line.   A prime example of this is one of my favorite clips from the popular TV show Family Guy.  Now I don’t know how professor Leeper feels about Family Guy, but I would believe he considers it a highpoint in storytelling and the pinnacle of animation, but nevertheless this video proves my point.  The video needs a little bit of a set up before watching.  It is a cut-scene, which Family Guy is famous for, and the setup for the cut-scene is peter complaining about a horrible day he had and Lois saying “there are plenty of people who have had worse days then you.”

            Yes the monkey is unexpected proving the first point, but what really makes the monkey funny is the fact that your expecting something else to happen.  It may sound like a contradiction but the best kind of comedy is the unexpected comedy that has been set up for the viewer.