Gotta hand it to South Park for always being relevant, no matter what the topic. I caught this video last night on a finance/economics blog of all places, and I have to say I laughed out loud. This video premise kind of reminds me of a previous South Park episode where they make fun of Family Guy, saying that all ideas for the show come from Manatees with Idea Balls.
Similarly, in this episode, bailout decisions are made from where an object falls on the mat of bailout options (similar to Tom Smykowski’s Jump to Conclusions Mat). In order to choose what to do with an ailing bank or insurance company, the government (in this case white wig wearing bureaucrats out of the 1700’s) cuts off the head of a chicken, and another person plays a Kazoo. The chicken runs around with its head cut off, and wherever it lands, we have our solution! Instant Bailout! I like the other options as well:
Let Fail
Try Again
$90 Trillion
$1 Billion
Indian Casinos
Tax The Rich
Telethon
Print Money
Given those options, I actually think that maybe South Park is right and we need a bailout!
Of all of the videos I post on this site, it seems like the most commonly featured act is Will Ferrell. Maybe I should call the site Will Ferrell Search! Well, I guess I would never really do that, but you have to give the guy credit for always being “out there.” He’s a rare talent.
In this clip, he’s crashing the set of a CNBC show called Power Lunch as they are making closing announcements. It’s live television, and the male host is NOT impressed. The hostess (Sue Herrera) does a pretty good job of laughing it off, and she even gets a little hot and bothered when he starts kissing her on the set!
I couldn’t stop watching this clip… it’s the perfect combination of embarassing, funny, spontaneous and just all around great! I don’t think anyone else could pull this off. I love how half way through the clip, John McEnroe interrupts and tries to reign Will in (I think Will was on John’s show later that evening). Once Will sees McEnroe, he breaks into an impression of the famous Tennis Star known for his rants on the court every time the umpire made a bad call. “YOU CAN NOT BE SERIOUS!”
I also like how the male newscaster really had no idea who Will was at first, and then suddenly realized it was Ferrell and tried to dig into his pop culture knowledge base and spit out “Ladies and gentlemen, Roy Burgundy” – referring to Will’s character RON Burgundy in Anchorman.
My favorite lines (there are many):
“This is live Television” “This is Live?… well, this just in, GE is bankrupt”
“Sue Herrera… Are we going to make hot Spanish love now? “
“Did you hear the announcement? Dick Gephardt is Vice President.”
“I just wet my pants”
“This is getting spicy”
“John McEnroe and ‘Sting’ ladies and gentlemen!”
“I’m Sting’s Brother”
“The Legendary Roy Burgundy ladies and gentlemen”
“This computer is fake! All of your computers are fake everybody”
This video might be a little older, but I just noticed it today for the first time.
I have never flown Southwest Airlines (because they didn’t service Minnesota until a week ago), but I have heard nothing but good things. If this video, where a flight attendant raps the normally mundane instructions you hear on every flight. He does a pretty good job too!
I fly a lot (probably 1-2 trips a month), which means I hear these instructions about 30-40 times a year. If this guy were on my flights, I think I’d have a much better time!
Hopefully this is a new trend in rap; flight attendant on southwest airlines, then recording contract. It would be a big departure of the normal path taken by rappers, minus the ’street cred.’
The latest Will Ferrell video from Funny or Die. I will link to any video that features Will Ferrell singing for 80% of the time, and he gets his ass kicked the other 20%. More than anything, I think that this video represents a big advancement in the career of Will Ferrell. It seems like his last several movies have been so formulaic that they forget about being funny through witty dialogue, and try to be funny by putting Will Ferrell into a formula.
Basically, the formula is this: Will Ferrell is a very polarized character with a hobby/sport that he’s not particularly good at, but loves to play, he has some kind of funny hair style, and all jokes revolve around the hobby/sport/hairstyle. It started with Talledega Nights with NASCAR/Sideburns, went to the Ice Skating movie, and peaked with the awful Semi-Pro where he was a 70’s ABA basketball player with a big fro.
All of these ideas sound hilarious on paper. Will Ferrell is funny enough where he can pretty much do anything on camera and it’ll be funny. However, the comedy wears off a lot more quickly than the duration of a feature film, and most of his fan-base has grown tired of wasting their time on seeing these movies in the theater.
Enter Funny or Die, an online sketch comedy site where Will can satisfy his urge to create funny characters who fit a funny profile (in this case, long white hair, sunglasses, and a hobby of fighting with baseball bats). Interestingly enough, this is the exact same character Ferrell had played on the previous week’s episode of Eastbound and Down. We’ll call it a 2 for 1, because both were pretty funny in small doses.
Now that I’m done with my commentary on Will Ferrell’s career, the real star of this sketch is Will’s singing. Although not a strong singer, Will pours his heart out on this track, and does a pretty good job of getting his song into your head (I found myself singing it the entire weekend). For anyone interested in the lyrics of the song, here’s what I was able to get out of it (gave up after a few listens):
Something’s in the air, feeling uptight
It’s the right mood for a
BAT FIGHT
Bat Fight – It’s anyone’s game
Bat Fight – A Test of Wills
Bat Fight – Who’s gonna win?
Bat Fight – You Never Know Who!
Looking for a sign of weekness
Totally Even, Anyone can Win
Athletic Prowess, let’s Begin
Bat Fight – A Gentleman’s Game
Bat Fight – You know the name
Bat Fight – Tensions are High
Bat Fight – An Eye for An Eye
Bat Fight – Feeling So Good
Bat Fight – Connecting with the Wooooooddddd!
Circling and Circling and Circling and Circling
Also, great job from the guy who plays Darryl Philbin on the Office for becoming a major “that guy” in all kinds of comedy movies. You are worthy of a link to your IMDB page, Craig Robinson.
I try to avoid political and financial talk at all costs in my personal life and on this site whenever possible, but this is just too good. John Stewart goes on an amazingly long and targeted rant about CNBC, and their poor financial predictions over the past few years. I have seen a few clips on YouTube showcasing the so called Wall Street “experts” saying that the market would be just fine as stocks were going down. Through the magic of video and the Internet, they look foolish now! (not that I should talk… I never really thought it would sink this low… but that’s why I don’t go on TV and talk about it).
The premise behind this video is that a CNBC correspondent, Rick Santelli, was supposed to go onto the Daily Show with Jon Stewart and explain his position. He must have canceled at the last minute, because Stewart was very angry, and went off on an 8+ minute rant about the topic. Lots of good lines and clips here, including predictions that many failed/plummeting banks (Bear Stearns, Bank of America, AIG, etc.).
I know that hindsight is 20/20, and it’s easy to judge people based on their opinions when they seemed like sound advice 1-2 years ago. However, these CNBC pundits say their predictions with so much conviction that I think that they deserve to be ridiculed posthumously. When you have a money show on TV, scream into the camera to get attention, and thousands of Americans listen to your advice, you deserve to be ridiculed on a much larger stage than Comedy Central. You should be forced to publicly apologize for being wrong.
It’s funny how things come full circle. A few years ago when I was really into MySpace, I was updating my page all the time, adding funny videos, pictures, etc. and constantly changing them. It was basically a way of showing everyone the funny videos that I have seen and writing a 1-2 line comment about them. This is actually where I got the idea for Funny Video Search. I figured that if I could entertain a few friends every week by posting this stuff, I might as well make a site for the masses. Now this site is up, and the only visitors I get are STILL my friends, so I’m not sure that it worked.
With that said, the reason why I say things have come full circle is that on my MySpace page today, there is still a video embedded on there that is from the last time that College Humor posted a prank war… all the way back in 2007. The fact that this video is still prominently displayed on that page shows two things: 1) I don’t care about MySpace anymore and 2) this most recent prank has been years in the making.
The prank on my page features Amir at Yankee Stadium setting up his friend Streeter with a marriage proposal to his girlfriend on the jumbotron. It was really well done and I thought it was absolutely hilarious. It also served as a foray into my daily viewership of College Humor original videos. These videos are short enough to hold my attention, and are very funny. They have become one of the sites that I track regularly for this site as a result.
And this is where things come full circle. I went to their site because of that video. I arguably started THIS site because of that video, and now I am posting the sequel, almost 2 years after the original. I hope that you all can enjoy, becuase this is a great prank!
For this video, Streeter sets up Amir by having a mutual friend take him to a University of Maryland Terrapins basketball game. At that game, they arrange for Amir to take the half court shot for $500,000. Blindfolded!
Without ruining the video for you, I just need to let you know that after Amir is selected, he goes back stage to do paperwork. At that time, Streeter tells the entire crowd the premise behind the prank, and tells them to cheer for Amir no matter what happens. Hilarity ensues.
Congrats to Streeter for finally getting Amir back! Can’t wait to see the next round. Just hope that it comes sooner than later. Hopefully this site will be around too. Otherwise, I will be posting it on my Friendster page!
