Sanity Not Included is the definition of 'critique proof'. Will anything I say have any impact on this video whatsoever? No. Will that stop me from saying my piece on it? Hell no! I'm a rebel, baby!
Since this will probably come up, yes, I did go into this video with poor expectations. I didn't really follow the first season after the first few episodes, and even then I only looked forward with vague disinterest. Even if I was interested, it's another comedy series, and lord knows we have enough of those. Secondly, it's in that increasingly popular genre of comedy that I like to call 'ramcoms', or 'random comedies'. Examples for this genre are Family Guy and, of course, Robot Chicken, the oft-cited source of inspiration for this series.
I'm not a fan of either show. Partly it's because I don't like the style of random comedy, but mostly because I simply cannot be assed to follow most TV shows. Therefore the prospect of random comedy in the hands of people who aren't professional writers or comedians wasn't very promising.
Don't get me wrong, I like GuitarMasterX7 and Dexterboy124. They've done some good work in the past and Master Chief War remains one of the funniest Halo machinimas I've ever seen, and certainly one of the most technically inspired. But Sanity Not Included is just tortuous to watch. Seeing all these scenes flash by and building up to nothing was eerily reminiscent of the mind-breaking scene in A Clockwork Orange. When I wasn't being horrified to my very core by the sheer inanity of it all, I was scratching my head that people genuinely find this funny.
See, the thing with random comedy is that it's like a firecracker. You set it off once and sure it'll be loud and fun, but it won't last for long and you're probably not going to remember much of the aftermath. The only scenes I do remember were the ones that were so obnoxiously offensive that they literally had me yelling 'what the fuck' at my laptop screen.
And of course I couldn't proceed without mentioning the 'interactive' segments of the video. Now, I'm all for experimenting with audience interaction, and there are lots of really cool things you could do with it, like a 'choose your own adventure' series. Adding an option to add a few seconds on to an ultimately pointless scene? Not quite the best use of interactivity. Let's face it, the only reason most people do it is to get more views with less effort.
There was one good scene though, and that was the one at the very end between Dexter and the (drunk) GMX7. Why? Because it had time to develop and I was able to make sense of it. It just proves my point for me: these two are undoubtedly very funny and talented guys, but random comedy just doesn't suit them as well.
But hey, what do I know. This video's going to get millions of hits and people seem to like it, so I guess they know something I don't. It's like getting angry at Stephanie Meyer, Michael Bay or Glenn Beck. Yeah they're untalented hacks, but they entertain the masses and make lots of money, so can you really complain about the quality of their work?
Maybe not, but that didn't stop me from wasting twenty minutes of my life in order to do it. Sanity Not Included isn't all that good, and I guarantee that all the other ramcom knock-offs that will get made because this made money won't be any good either.
Daemon Productions. We're so serious that we have friggin' business cards.
Welcome!
honestly, random comedy has its own valor. most often people just want to watch something that'll make them laugh, without having to wait, watch through the show, follow the story of said episode, and then finally reach a moment of hilarity, to only wait again for the next moment.
ReplyDeletewhen it comes to the random comedies, it allows the viewers to quickly reach punch-lines in order to gain a laugh in just moments. additionally, it doesnt take multiple watches and double-takes to remember most jokes and punch-lines. this makes majority of the jokes, especially the one's that stand out, memorable, and can easily be repeated to friends (this is how i found out about sanity).
not only that, sanity gains a large amount of its humor through its familiarity, being as all the footage, except for their original animation, is taken from many memorable videogames. this allows for a deeper level of humor seeing as if someone knows said game, they can enjoy the surface humor/ dialogue, with an additional deeper sence of humor when it comes to their experiences with that game and its characters. (ie Gears of war in episode 1, any/ all final fantasy references and characters, and many, many more)
Not to sound like a fan-boy, but Sanity Not Included may be one of the BEST internet/ machinima comedies i have ever watched. it really caught me with its "watch once, remember the joke" moments, the total "character personality invert/ remodel", and hilarious original animation and character interactions (the ending animations with Dexter and Lyle). all in all, though it may not be completely original, it is a good comedy which hasnt gotten the credit it deserves, and hopefully not to many terrible clones reproduce from this.
if you want to find me, look me up on youtube. my name is the same as the one i used to post this comment.
I can understand why some people would be anxious for a show to 'get to the meat'. People are impatient as a general rule, and that goes doubly so for the audience, but at the same time most TV shows I've ever watched were easily accessible, even the ones that did have long ongoing plot threads. I've never seen episode one of House, but I can immediately sit down and watch any of the episodes and be enthralled by House's cynicism and his snarky attitude towards his co-workers. Ditto for RedvsBlue. It may be a series with upwards of eight seasons, but I can sit down to pretty much any episode and be entertained. Provided you're doing your job right you should be able to make every episodic series worthwhile without resorting to throwing a million jokes at the wall and seeing which ones will stick. Even Family Guy and Robot Chicken have overarching themes with their episodes.
ReplyDeleteYou mention that one of the strengths of the series is its instant 'familiarity' to the audience, but that's going on the assumption that everyone who will be watching this has played the games in question. I've never played a Final Fantasy game, so any jokes they did based on it would go completely over my head. It doesn't help that since the average skit in SNI is about one to two seconds long, I probably wouldn't be able to recognize it in time to appreciate it.
Both Dexter and Lyle have made better machinimas. You could argue that I went into this slightly biased due to my dislike of ramcoms, but the bottom line is this series was poised to make me change my mind and it didn't succeed.
Thanks for posting.