Oh, the conspiracy goes far deeper than that: If they continue their once-a-month release schedule, then in just a scant few years (i.e. on the first of April, 2680) they’ll be able to release IRTD episode 8008 as another April’s Fool episode.
As anyone who’s ever had an LCD-display pocket calculator and a juveline sense of humour will be able to tell you, the number 8008 looks vaguely like the word “boob”.
It is a tradition of the podcast that we release one on April 1st every year.
I suppose we could do an April Fool’s segment… But I don’t like practical jokes and Roger doesn’t have a sense of humour at all so we’ve never bothered.
(This is my shorthand for “the vast majority of what’s labelled as comedy leaves me absolutely cold, in large part because I don’t find ha-ha-this-person-is-doing-something-wrong funny”.)
And, of course, none of the topics alluded to in that link – dictatorial fiat, abuse of power, and shady back-room deals with corporate overlords – could ever fall under the heading of “this-person-is-doing-something-wrong”.
Fair. I think we both know what I mean, though - the canonical scene I hate to watch is the one where all of the audience, and everybody in the scene except that one guy, knows something, while that one guy doesn’t know it and proceeds to dig himself deeper and deeper.
Some years ago I went to a lecture by Antony Jay (one of the writers of Yes, Minister); his theory of humour is that it’s essentially about people getting stuff wrong, and his evo-psych model (which I don’t think stands up well but is still potentially interesting) is that you can’t say to a tough manly hunter “don’t trust a boar when you think it’s dead”, because he’ll say “of course I knew that”, but you can say “this guy thought the boar was dead and got a tusk where it hurts, har har har”.
The vast majority of humour wants me to say “that person got something wrong, har har har”.
And… I find that very difficult. If a person deliberately makes themselves the fool, that can work. Otherwise I think that I can too easily see myself as the unknowing victim rather than as one of the laughing mob.
Contrast a couple films I’ve seen recently, both basically action comedies in which an ordinary person has to try to operate in Spy World. In The Spy Who Dumped Me (2018) our heroine is allowed to be her own person and prevail through her own virtues even though she doesn’t have the skills needed to play in Spy World. In Spy (2015) our heroine prevails largely by chance, and not only everyone in the film but the framing of the film itself is constantly pouring abuse on her: she’s fat and unattractive and embarrassing and gets her clothes caught on things and has to ride a tiny moped. Also she’s fat and unattractive and fat. And that one just didn’t work for me.
