Jon Benjamin Has a Van

I am a huge Jon Benjamin fan. Archer is on my weekly watch list, and I have all the episodes recorded so I can continually watch. Benjamin was also brilliant in Important Things with Demetri Martin, so my hopes were pretty high for this new show.

At first, things started off pretty badly. The first two sketches were dull and overdone; kind of like a high school writing class, the show was telling rather than showing.

After those however, the show just took off. The "You can't shoot here" sketch had me crying; Benjamin's voice mixed into awesome subtitles and an overall hysterical sketch made for the hardest laugh I've had in a while. The ongoing "Push the producer over the border" sketch was incredibly original and funny, nothing else to it. Benjamin's line, being in the pilot episode, "As you surely remember from our last episode," had me crying.

To fans of Archer, you will not be disappointed. Just about every line could be a possible Archer quote, which obviously sweetens the deal. To people who have not yet heard of Jon Benjamin, give this show a chance; some sketches may be too dry and repetitive, but I guarantee that as the show goes on, you will grow to love it. This show is not meant for the Tosh.0 audience who enjoys watching random videos with homosexual jokes (I grew tired of Tosh after the first season), so not the best show for Comedy Central to have it slotted after.

For 20-50 year olds however, this show has the possibility of being an instant classic with quotable lines and sketches that will no doubt be repeated by college kids everywhere.

Jon Benjamin Has a Van is like if Mr. Show and Borat had a (somewhat) civilized, chubby, tiny, Jewish, adorable man for a baby who has the voice of John McGuirk from Home Movies.

The writing of the sketches reminds me of shows like Mr. Show, Kids in the Hall, and The Ben Stiller Show. The tone and pace of the humor is on the slower, more subtle side that reminds me of a lot of shows in which H Jon has stared in the past including Home Movies, Dr Katz (sans improv), Lucy: The Daughter of the Devil, and perhaps even shows like The Sarah Silverman Program and Arrested Development.

The humor is not slapstick, voyeur humor. It's not a show where you just sit and wait for transparent, shallow humor to entertain you. It feeds the audience the necessary resources to imagine and plot out their own versions of what funny things might happen later in the episode and then surprises the viewer with its own twisted and genius take on the scenario.

I am very surprised that H Jon has waited this long to make himself more prominent in live action shows. He's a very tiny and cute human being who's very relatable and who does adorable things while maintaining his trademark manly and raspy voice. I am sure he knows this and he knows how to work it. I am a straight man, but I would be delighted to hold his hand if I ever walk beside him on the street.

So, in conclusion, if you have even a slightly imaginative mind watch this show! It's very very funny and I await more episodes of this genius program.

This delightfully dark and sardonic 'on the road' style news show, with its small cast of quirky but true-to-life characters, can get away with almost any absurd or offensive bit with just one twinkle from the eyes of its lovable-jerk host, Jon Benjamin.

Jon Benjamin Has a Van is not going to be everyone's cup of cake, but for people with a taste for weird-brow humor, it will be something truly special. The guerrilla street pieces, twisted reality shows, and written sketch pieces all feature Benjamin as a borderline mean-spirited prankster, who for whatever reason is undeniably likable. Seeing what he comes up with to pull on people next and how he'll talk his way out of the trouble his mischievousness seems to lead him to makes the show worth watching.

For anyone who is a fan of Tosh.0 who does not like JBHV, that makes a great deal of sense. There are two opposing styles of humor happening in each show, and if you are partial to the slaphappy viral video style of Tosh, you are likely to turn the channel from the calculated, thoughtful, sometimes meta approach of Jon Benjamin.

The payoffs of JBHV are best absorbed after soaking in an entire episode (the sketches and short pieces juxtaposed with the unraveling news-stories). I find the re-watch value of the show tremendous-- I watched the pilot "Border" on Comedy Central's site twice in the last month after watching the premiere, and caught myself cracking up at parts I'd laughed over and subsequently missed in previous viewings.

Hoping the show gets picked up for a second season, and also that more episodes are released online so that those without cable can indulge!! A real treat if you love great comedy and killer cameos from folks on UCB, Mr. Show, The Mighty Boosh, 30 Rock, Tim&Eric, and more!

Just watched it after Tosh.O, and wow, just wow.

I didn't laugh once, not even a giggle or a chuckle.

This show was terrible, boring humor, used jokes over and over and very dry. Just not very funny.

Even though following Tosh and that's a show on just videos from the internet, you can find more amusing things going to YouTube and watching funny cat videos and kids hitting grown men in the balls, than watch this show.

Will not watch this show again and highly doubt it will last the next few weeks.

I'm tempted to be become filthy rich and just give inhumane amounts of money to all the people engaged in making Jon Benjamin Has A Van.. I'd even buy a van if necessary. Fortunately I'm not filthy rich, not even slightly rich, and I would never be able to watch what they would come up next, which should probably contain dead hookers and real children torture, which is not bad and not unexpected at all.

Maybe I still have a glimmer of hope for restarting this show, but first most people that are vocally against this show need to be removed using all my riches made from investing in a brilliant show like Jon Benjamin Has A Van early, when it isn't getting enough support.