February 17, 2005

One's a dog... one's a robot... together, they're cops!

TV gets such a bad rap sometimes. How could you hate an invention which has produced shows so unintentionally hilarious, there's no way anything intentionally funny could compete?

Just the crazy-buddy-cop shows alone send me into fits of laughter. Some examples:

Future Cop - Ernest Borgnine and his cyborg partner fight crime as cops.

Tag Team - Jesse Ventura and Rowdy Roddy Piper, um... fight crime. As cops.

And then there's my favorite example:

Tequila and Bonetti. Take Jack Scalia. Pair him with a talking dog (!). Watch them fight crime as cops.

It would be funny enough with just the talking dog, but when you throw in Jack Scalia, who, while filming a scene for a different show at Andrew's high school gym, famously yelled at Andrew's friend for "laughin' while I was tawlkin'"... well, I don't see how anybody could purposely come up with something funnier than Tequila and Bonetti. They even remade it as an Italian show years later. Hilarious.

Speaking of unintentional hilarity, don't forget there's a lot of buzz around Son of the Mask, which comes out tomorrow. As I write this, the Rotten Tomatoes meter stands at a favorable review rating of 0 percent. The prospect of making back that $100 million is not looking so good.

James - 3:26 PM
Comments

Re: Tequila and Bonetti ... was titled (while in development) Tequila and Boner. And then someone realized that "Boner" is not the best word for network TV ...

Rebel Dad - Feb 17, 2005 - 5:50 PM

James, this presents yet another opportunity to film the pilot we've always talked about.

He's a rabbi...
He fights crime at night...
He's...
NightRabbi!

Big Pinz - Feb 18, 2005 - 5:55 PM

Regarding Son of the Mask, I think that a favorability rating of 0 percent is a bad sign for unintentional hilarity. Every unintentionally hilarious movie has its group of people who don't get the hilarity and actually like the movie. A hypothesis: the most unintentionally hilarious movies will maintain their favorable rating above 10%.

kk - Feb 18, 2005 - 9:44 PM

Follow up on my hypothesis: The data is not so strongly in support of my idea. It is indeed true that unlaughably bad movies fall below 10% (Catwoman: 9%, Battlefield Earth: 4%), unintentionally funny movies are all over the place.

The only noticeable trend? Movies that Andrew L. Furdell thinks will be comically bad indeed get truly awful ratings, while movies that Robert J. Morrison thinks will be comically bad get slightly more mediocre reviews.

Andrew L. Furdell:
Boat Trip: 7%
Kangaroo Jack: 8%
Sextette: 0%

Robert J. Morrison:
The Book of Mormon: 19%
Bulletproof Monk: 21%
The Transporter: 50% (!!)

kk - Feb 18, 2005 - 10:00 PM

Thank you Mr. Data.

Wait a minute...it's a GAY cruise?!?! Ah, Boat Trip.

Andrew F - Feb 18, 2005 - 10:38 PM

I wonder how many people become treckies for the first time in their 20s. . .

kk - Feb 19, 2005 - 11:49 AM

It's not a theory. BoMM IS hilarious.

Bulletproof monk I don;t recall thinking it would be hilarious I suspect I said that just because I wanted to see a movie that week.

Transporter is odd. it had hilarity, but it also had some half decent action.

RM - Feb 19, 2005 - 2:07 PM