Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!

Don't stare too close at your TV while watching the Tim & Eric Awesome Show... You might see a part of TV you try to avoid. Worse yet, you might laugh at it, and not understand why...

This show is the first highly specific 10-minute jab at the cable/public access TV parody & relies on heavily subversive & confrontational humor. Tim & Eric's breed of improv is more thematically constructed than average, which lends it to break out & resemble sketch more often than not.

But the genius is that the show's structure is just a playhouse for the obscene dramedy that inadvertently gets put on broadcast, much like an out-of-control public access TV channel. Inspired hilarity, featuring some of today's best sub level comedians working in a very large creative space.

The natural progression of Tom Goes to the Mayor, and something very new & differently funny.

Although this comic gem may just seem like random trash to some people, others, like me, find all sorts of pleasure and entertainment out of this show's absurd style of comedy. It manages to make some nearly die laughing, and others just question the appeal of it all, and I cannot blame people who simply do not get it. Tim and Eric's style isn't for everybody, but I'm glad to see that there's plenty of people who are really into this surrealistic and hilarious show!

While every episode has a basic theme throughout, and a lot of the time even some sort of basic plot structure, it's normally all over the place. It'll mix celebrity cameos with fake commercials with some skits that come across as just plain uncomfortable and unsettling. If you're a newcomer to the show, you must be warned that at times there will be a sketch that will make you CRINGE, whether it's the over exaggerated gross out sound effects or bizarre dialogue, there's definitely plenty here to make anybody feel just plain odd. But it's all just simply part of the journey that is "Tim and Eric, Awesome Show, Great Job!"

The show also has a really satirical edge to it. There's plenty of sketches that are clearly mocking something, whether it be 90's television or even nature shows, they are absolute satirical masters! With all it's intentionally bad green screens, sharp satire, and just flat out uncomfortable scenes, "Tim and Eric, Awesome Show, Great Job" is truly something to behold!

"Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job!" picks up the torch that Bob Odenkirk and David Cross dropped when their cutting edge sketch comedy show "Mr. Show" was cancelled after four whirlwind seasons on HBO. Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim, previously the inventive minds behind "Tom Goes to the Mayor", took that torch and set the concept of sketch comedy ablaze.

As a genre, sketch comedy has been stagnant for a number of years. MAD TV is horribly unfunny and garish. Saturday Night Live, once brilliant, is now all but completely unwatchable. Several easily forgotten sketch shows have come and gone in the meantime. Gone is the biting social satire of Monty Python and the Dave Chapelle Show.

"Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job!" attempts to shock life back into the comatose art of sketch comedy with rapid-fire edits, grotesquely memorable characters and crude animation bits all wrapped up neatly in about 11 minutes. It is as if the show's creators have taken every bad public access television cliché of the past 20 years and tossed them mumblety-peg into the editing room. The sketches seem ill-conceived and hastily thrown together, as if the show is literally produced just minutes before it airs. Many of the skits lack a clear punchline or point, which is perhaps Tim and Eric's greatest feat of all.

The show is actually well scripted and rehearsed. Characters are conceived then fleshed out. The comic timing, in most cases, is painstakingly perfected. By the time the credits roll, one might be unsure of what they've seen or if it was even funny and that seems to be Tim and Eric's point: The joke is on you, audience! Andy Kaufman pulled similar pranks in his stand-up shows. It was nearly two decades before the majority of comedy fans came to realize how brilliant a comedian Andy Kaufman was.

As taught by Mr. Kaufman, the only dangerous aspect of comedy like this is that it tends to disorient, confuse, and annoy. It is not immediately apparent that the slipshod manner of each episode's assembly is all part of the gag. "Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job!" has broken the monotony of formulaic sketch shows by using herky-jerky editing to great comedic effect. In that, Tim and Eric, like Mr. Kaufman, may be way ahead of their time. No doubt, advertisers are already taking note and will begin showing commercials in a very similar style within the next few months.

"Tom Goes To The Mayor" had the most evenly divided audience of any show in the Adult Swim line-up. "Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job" seems to be quickly following suit in avoiding viewer apathy which means Tim and Eric (and co-writer/editor DJ Dougg Pound) must be doing something right.

This show gets so much undeserved criticism, mostly from your average viewer who is used to being spoon-fed the setup, the joke, and punchline all in one. These people will be left slack-jawed and drooling as they try to figure out what they just witnessed. It's funny to read these reviews that insult the intelligence of the writing or the maturity of the comedy, when half the people leaving these reviews simply did not (perhaps cannot?) attempt to fathom the nature of the comedic style beyond its surface level.

I'm not trying to say that only smart people can appreciate Tim & Eric-- it certainly isn't a show for everyone. A lot of Awesome Show is directly parodying crappy late-night 90s TV shows & infomercials. And while not everyone may understand that, there are so many 1 star reviews here whose writers clearly didn't have the basic intelligence to realise that there can be things that they don't "get"... and that doesn't make them bad.

If you recognise that nearly all of the show's content is heavily layered in irony and mockery, and that the main intention of Mr Heidecker and Mr Wareheim was just to have a lot of fun while making the show, you might find yourself enjoying it a lot more.

The actual quality of this show's humour is outrageously high. Every second of screentime is packed with jokes upon jokes. From the way the scene glitches into being shown, to the absurd or deadpan way the dialogue is communicated, the recurring themes like dads, eric's unchanging voice (even as a woman) and completely unnecessary and useless products.

There are actors who seem like they were brought off the street (and sometimes literally are), editing effects you'd expect from windows movie maker... The whole show is like one big late-night broadcasting acid trip. And I have never seen anything funnier, aside from maybe other T&E works.

The only issue I have with it is its duration. 10 minute episodes, 10 episodes per season, 5 seasons... the whole show clocks in at around 9 hours total, which is honestly pretty depressing. Thankfully Tim and Eric have worked on several other projects of a similar nature, some of which help fill the void.

Awesome Show remains my favourite show of all time, and my go-to show for a good laugh, for both sobriety and being stoned. Give it a go, keep an open mind. Have a few laughs and enjoy the ride.

When I first came to see the IMDb rating of 7.0 on Tim and Eric Awesome show, Great Job! my jaw hit the floor at why it could have such a low rating in regards to what the show is. Upon further investigation, and reading the reviews, I should have known all along that it would be a situation like this. There would be virtually no average reviews. It is either people who love it, and see it for what it is...which is some of the best comedy out there at the moment, and those who just don't quite "get it".

I don't want to be too patronising (british spelling) and say that the people who don't get it are stupid idiots...which i secretly think ;) but I do think it takes a certain amount of understanding to fully appreciate it. I think that there are several layers, with each layer getting more subtle and intelligent. Many of the people who see this show may only see the first layer, and claim it is base, toilet humour, which some have. This is because this is the easiest layer of the comedy genius to see, and they see it as this, and nothing else. The blatant toilet humour is almost just an exterior, which does have its use, and in many cases is genuinely funny. However those distracted by this will miss the far more intelligent humour that runs beneath. The way it mocks all aspects of television, from the cheesy shows of the last 2 decades, to the contemporary fads and phenomena that you see today. It doesn't just point it to you. some of it is obvious. Some is less obvious. I have found that I find an episode more funny after several viewings. This is a satire of the highest order. It is far from JUST toilet humour. It is supposed to be low budget. That is part of what makes it great. The show doesn't take itself too seriously at all. This show has made me laugh out loud more times than I can remember in a show.

I really like the actors in this show. These people are either the worst actors of all time, or the best actors of all time. I can never be sure, but either way the effect is the same, which is pure hilarity. The humaness, and realness of the actors in the show really makes them a lot more appealing. I freaking hate the fakeness and lack of realness in people in TV these days, but the actors they have in here I can really relate to. Their little nuances, the awkward silences and quirks makes them the most funny and humorous actors on the TV. I especially like David Libre Hart, Quall, Dunn, and all the rest of them that I am starting to recognise. There is a quiet but lovable desperation to it, which makes for some of the best black/dark humour out there...again...its not JUST toilet humour.

This show really is great. I am looking forward to future things from these guys. I think they have got a great formula here. I wouldn't want to see them get stale and stagnant, and of course I would like to see them experiment and push new frontiers, but I sure hope they don't sell out and become too mainstream. That would suck ass. Mad Props to Adult Swim for always taking risks and pushing the boundaries, and not opting for the formulaic mainstream crap thats out there (T & E do an excellent parody of this in season 4, with a sitcom, with canned laughter, and all the cliché mainstream comedy charcteristics. Its one of my favies). Basically, I think this is like classical music. Its one of those things that only the most sophisticated and intelligent people can fully sppreciate, but will never be adopted by the greater populous. Thats just the way I want it to stay.

I must say, that there is some really good comedy coming out of the USA right now, and this is definitely my favourite at the moment. Although I am British, I can still fully appreciate it. I did live in America for about 2 years, and so in a way I can relate to it more in terms of the things like the cable access style editing, and the commercials, etc but I think this stuff would be appreciated anywhere, and is really putting America on the comedy map, and showing that there is some really good cutting edge comedy in America, that isn't all about formulaic sitcoms and laugh tracks.