Things My Roommate Taught Me

Basically, he's introduced me to The Office, a show I'd never watched before. This should be a physical impossibility. Consider the following:

• I love Steve Carrell's work.
• I was a big fan of Office Space.
• I am a big fan of clever TV shows.

The Office has all of this and more. What the hell was I waiting for? No more, my friends. I have now seen the entire first and second seasons, and will begin watching the third season sometime this weekend. I have my roommate to thank for that, since it was his idea, and he keeps dragging his DVDs out for me to watch.

For those of you who have not watched The Office, it is best described as a series of awkward moments interspersed with genuinely affecting moments. There are far too many for me to list here, but let me break down a few of them that were particularly affecting. Keep in mind I have not watched anything beyond the second season currently.

Michael Scott has to fire someone. It has been said that if you don't know a Michael Scott, you are a Michael Scott. Steve Carrell's character is the boss, and will not hesitate to tell you. When forced to do actual boss stuff, though, he balks because he tries very hard to be everyone's friend. He has no friends at work. When he actually has to fire someone, the look of dejection and heartbreak on his face is something that really hit hard for me.

See, it's like this: Michael Scott is an annoying, abrasive, obnoxious, and clueless boob. But he, just like anyone else has enough of a good person in him to find the thought of damaging someone's life unconscionable. Leadership is not always about resume-building. The biggest thing that people need to know about stepping up and making their mark on society is that inevitably you will have to do something that you don't want. Michael Scott fails as a manager because he wants to be everyone's friend. You cannot succeed without pissing someone off, though. Simply put: if you have made enemies, you have some semblance of professional success. Don't revel in it, though, you asshole.

Michael Scott comes alive entertaining the kids. The office decides to have Daughters at Work Day, and Michael tries to tell people that he doesn't like kids, and he's not good with them. This turns out to be untrue as kids are drawn to him. This seems natural to me since he's basically just a big juvenile. At one point he tells the kids that when he was a kid he was on a children's program. He shows them the footage, and 8-year-old Michael Scott tells the puppet interviewing him this when asked what he wanted when he was older:

"I want to have 100 kids so that I will have 100 friends because they'll have to
be my friends."

Again with the heartbreaking look, as he apparently forgot about this part of the show. He spends a great deal of the rest of the day in his office, dejected.

It's one thing to be young and have no friends because no one can stand you. My fellow nerds and I all understand this feeling. Fitting in as a child is hard, and can sometimes be the source of a lot of problems and therapy sessions. It's another thing entirely when you are a full-grown adult. Michael watched his childhood self tell him that he'd essentially failed at something as simple as having friends when he was older. The look on his face as he sees this says a lot. It means that Michael desperately wants someone to relate to. It also means that deep down, despite his endless clowning and vying for attention, he knows that no one there really likes him.

The lesson here is obvious: as an adult it is considerably more easy to make friends because adults are not kids and will give you a lot leeway to act like a dipshit. Hell, I go out with friends sometimes for the expressed purpose of acting like dipshits. If you look around you and realize that all your acquaintances you call "friend" find you disgusting, you need become a lot more likeable. People want to listen and be listened to. They want friends, not bad entertainers or makeshift professors.

Jim and Pam. Don't spoil the ending for me yet because I don't see how this ends up, but the characters of Jim the salesman and Pam the receptionist are some of the most relatable on television right now. I like Jim on The Office. He's self-aware, kind, and gets along with everyone without having to strain. He also has a huge crush on Pam, seeing her for the complicated and real person that she is. He loves her for it. She likes him back too. Oooh, DRAMA!

But she's getting engaged to a guy who is, for all intents and purposes, not an asshole in the strictest sense. Roy, her fiancee, is a good guy and likes Pam. He recognizes the person she is, but he doesn't get it. He is unaware that he is suffocating her. He's obtuse and clearly believes the best years of his life are behind him. He's accepted this, but in a way expects Pam to do the same. Jim has told Pam repeatedly to make her own life, and make herself happy. He also really wants to make out with her, eventually telling her he loves her.

Guys, we all have or have had a Pam. Screaming in your mind at Jim to take the initiative and tell her how he feels is essentially the same thing as doing it to yourself. I put it out there that if you don't know a Jim Halpert, you are a Jim Halpert. Or perhaps it's possible to know and be both. I don't know. I have a Pam. I'm a pussy about it just like he is. Therein lies the beauty of it all: I can distract myself by setting someone's stuff in Jell-O.

Independent Films

I have a penchant for movies. A lot of you know this. I have a bitter and pronounced hatred for certain films, and my favorite films are ones that I will love my entire life. I rarely go to the theatre because I find it hard to cough up nearly 10.00 these days on something that is likely going to leave me longing.

Here is a short list of the last few films I have seen in theatres:

• Juno
• Knocked Up

And that's pretty much as far back as I can remember. Don't get me wrong, there were a few films that recently came out that I would like to see in the theatre (Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Iron Man, There Will Be Blood, Across the Universe) but I never got around to it because going to the movies is fucking expensive these days.

If there were more independent films in theatres, I'd probably see more of those. Juno would technically qualify as an independent film, and it's something I would like to discuss here. Juno was, for all intents and purposes, a good film. I enjoyed it. It does, however, fall prey to a trend that I find particularly annoying in independent film: quirkiness.

Why does this happen? It started with Garden State, continued through The Royal Tennenbaums, Rushmore, and now Juno. For what it's worth I liked all of those films because their work rises above the self-imposed parameters of quirkiness they set for themselves. Here's a question, though: why do they have to do that?

My theory is that a lot of mainstream films have a tendency to almost always take themselves way too seriously. Independent films then feel that it's necessary to counter this by going the opposite direction: NEVER taking themselves too seriously. What is the end result?

The end result is best exemplified by the main character in Juno. Would you ever, EVER, in a million years, meet a 16-year-old girl this self-actualized and snarky? When a 16-year-old's water breaks, I'm thinking the utterance "Thundercats are go!" would be way, WAY down on the list of things they would say. Perhaps "oh, God!" or "The baby's coming!" would be the choice phrase. Everyone in the theatre laughed at this, but it took me out of the movie for a second. Quirkiness was a big detraction for this movie.

What is my point in all this? I'm not sure. Perhaps it's that I would love to see a movie sometime soon that throws out predispositions and just plays itself out. There is a time for spectacle, there is a time for quirkiness, even. But sometimes I just want to keep it low-key and do my own thinking for once. Is that so hard to ask?

I Swear I'm Not Making This Up

If you go to the first post from my old Xanga blog (yeah, I had one... it sucked), I say "The revolution begins NOW!"

Jesus. What the fuck was I thinking?

I don't even post in that damned thing anymore because it wasn't anything really worth reading about. The only problem is that I now have that unfortunate feeling whenever I'm writing in this thing. Oh well, whatever.

"The revolution begins NOW!" God, I hope I was kidding.

One Day I'm Gonna Lose the War

Despite this reference to the saddest/creepiest Sublime song ever composed, I feel okay. That's the problem, though: I feel just okay. I'd like to feel good, but that ain't happening right now. At least if something traumatic were happening, I could have an excuse to feel bad. The thing is, though, nothing bad is happening right now, really.

But that doesn't necessarily mean that I can't find a reason, right? Let's get this train wreck-a-rollin'!

Each day I wake up it always seems like it's a lot later than I'd like. I've become so nocturnal without school-related matters to keep me focused that I have occaisionally been unable to sleep until the sun peeks up over the horizon. For most, that would be the welcome of a new day. For me, it means the end of one. It's heroically morose to think that a sunrise means the end for me, but whatevs, yo.

There's also this thing about going to bed alone every night. When my room got really cold this winter I could count on a girlfriend helping me keep my covers warm and comfortable. I don't have this anymore, but luckily the weather is picking up in both temperature and outlook. Each day I am trying to tell myself to bide my time until the day that I meet someone else, because it will happen. I am far too fucking awesome to be single for very long. At this point it's a timing issue more than it is a personal issue. That doesn't mean that I can't get frustrated, women popping up at every opportunity like so many pop-up ads on a computer screen. Clicking them away won't keep them away. God, where is my firewall?

Also, my arms are a tad sore from carrying around my tuba all night last night. Woe is me. Everyone is out to get me.

Okay, so maybe I'm not very good at this. Where's an emo kid when you need them?

The Essence of Atheism

There are a couple of words I can think of that have a special power. This power to render a person completely uninteresting when they are used by said party to describe themselves. They are:

• Emo
• Born-again
• Bisexual
• Indie-rock fan
• Atheist

I am going to take a constructive look at that last one. Don't get me wrong, I find the endless needling and near-insane attempts at guilt-tripping done by evangelicals to be far more irritating. A quick word on the evangelicals: they are scum. They are a group of people who are quick to tell you their opinions on religion but don't want to hear shit about your opinion, lest they dismiss you as a blasphemer. They are bullies in their most simplistic form. Anything that challenges their system of beliefs is deemed dangerous and should be eliminated, often through letigious means. They are also (not) ironically the first group of people to cry foul when they feel that their rights have been challenged. Some would be perfectly happy if public schools led each day off with a prayer, but when they are told that this would be a clear violation of religious freedom, they cry "discrimination" and make comparisons to the Holocaust with no semblance of perspective or even good taste.

There. That's one man's opinion. In other words, eat shit, you peddlers of misery and intolerance.

If evangelicals are scum, atheists are fucking boobs. There are those atheists out there who are perfectly happy with others believing in a higher power, but these people are very few and far between. The majority of atheists have adopted these beliefs because of somewhat varied reasons, but the result is always the same. They view your attempts at faith as laughable, and in need of ridicule. Then they will give you a litany of reasons why.

Look, if you don't believe in God, kudos. Now SHUT THE FUCK UP. It's (not) ironic that a lot of atheists adopt their beliefs because they believe religion can cause a conformist mentality, it restricts free thought, and marginalizes human achievement. Then they tell you why they are atheist, which I can only assume is because they want you to join them.

CONTRADICTION, ASSHOLE. BURN IN HELL.

Christ, even Satanists believe that pretentious is a dangerous sin (go look it up if you don't believe me). You will never hear a Satanist try to push their beliefs on you because their religion forbids them from doing so. Atheism annoys me because the noble cause of humanism is tainted by the pretentiousness that almost always comes with it. I want to acknowledge the belief system of someone who doesn't believe in God (I don't agree with them, but I'll hear them out), but for some reason every atheist I've talked to always ends up sounding like the kind of pissy, smug cunt-sniffer that owns a Mac.

If any of you can give me a good reason why I shouldn't believe in God, I'm waiting to hear it. For all of the accusations I get of being a pessimist, a cynic, and a hater, at the end of the day I still harbor the belief that there's a higher power ensuring that we'll make out okay in the end. And no, I don't think that "because you're a sheep" qualifies as a good reason to convert to atheism. Hypocrisy is a stinky cologne.

If Everyone Was Super, No One Would Be

There's something really annoying about a lot of people. It seems that there's a set of things that people think that they are good at, and no amount of evidence to the contrary will ever make them think otherwise. Here's a brief analysis of some of those things, in no real particular order:

Singing. You are not Mariah Carey. She has a four-octave range (or something) and despite the fact that nearly every one of her songs is aural eczema, she can sing. All you really need to do is watch the early episodes of American Idol for examples of this phenomenon. Hell, I'm sure you know someone who is like this. For some reason there's a lot of people out there who think that they are fantastic singers, despite professionals telling them they are garbage (American Idol again), and often rightfully so. I think the reason behind this is that if you play a musical instrument, for example, you really can't fool anyone. You have to spend the time to learn how to play the instrument well, or even to get a note out of it. Theoretically, every human has the ability to create different pitches with their voices. This is where tragedy begins, though, because most people who think they are good singers when in fact they are massive idiots all have one thing in common: they can't carry a God damned tune. Don't insult my intelligence. You suck at singing.

Poetry. Here, I wrote this haiku for you:

Haiku is easy
There is an obvious form
Please just stick with that

There is form to poetry, even when it doesn't rhyme. Oh, and contrary to popular belief, free verse is a lot more difficult than poetry that rhymes. Simply put, if you are writing a poem in free verse, it had damned well be worth saying. Screw that... if you are writing poetry at ALL, it better be worth reading. This is usually not where people fail, though. Most things people write bad poetry about are a good source of inspiration: love, nature, family, musings, etc. The problem is that poetry takes a certain amount of skill with words. Poetry should be like painting with words. More often than not most people just paint with whatever they found in a used Kleenex. This is why I don't attempt poetry anymore. I'm no damned good at it.

Music criticism. I don't have much to say about this that I haven't already said. There is a general rule of thumb that you should use whenever you talk about music to someone else.

If you can't write a song yourself, you have no business telling others what you think is good.

To be fair, I think most human beings have the potential to write songs. Moreover, I think that every once in a while they'll be pretty good. If you have never attempted to do so, shut up. Don't expect to have people agree with you on your appreciation of The Strokes if you don't know what a bridge is (no, it's not something you use to get across a river). And you BETTER not get down on others for their tastes.

Driving. I suck at driving. I know this. If you have ever pulled out in front of someone without realizing it, cut someone off, have been legitimately honked at, YOU SUCK AT DRIVING. It's okay, we can't all be Emerson Fittipaldi. But I recently read somewhere that over 65% of the populace considers themselves good drivers. Based of what I've seen, 65% of the populace is full of copious amounts of doo-doo. You WILL be a better driver once you realize that there's room for improvement. Trust me.

Great Moments In Honesty, Vol. 1

Part of a new series I'm starting, Great Moments In Honesty is dedicated all those whose honesty will grant them peace. More importantly, it will grant me something that I find absolutely hilarious.

Our first inductee: semi-prominent artist Steven Chandler.

Steven Chandler has created a painting from what I am assuming is Georgia mud. You can view it here. It's a pretty interesting work of art, but the Great Moment In Honesty I want to nominate this man for is what he had to say about his motivation behind creating this provocative work.

The money from this auction? Will I donate to another horse charity? No, not this time. I have an adopted parrot and a bunch of stray cats to feed. The fallen race horse industry is y'alls problem, you created it, you fix it. You people invaded my mental art making space and I make art, that's what I do, deal with it. No, I'm going to roll around in the money, just like you all do. I'm gonna roll and think of all you horse racing people that race your horses, gamble and send your kids to college on that money. Thousands, millions even, you make on those horses-I'm gonna roll in it. I hope that disgust you as much as you disgust me.If the painting doesn't sell, well that's fine too. I'll hang it on my wall and when another horse goes, I'll paint another until there are no walls left or until there is a great wall to China made of Michael Vick Rides....whoever is next.......

So there you have it. Steven Chandler plans on using his proceeds not for charity (as he did in a similar painting he made of Barbaro last year). He's going to spend it on himself.

A couple of things here. First and foremost, Steven Chandler is the fucking MAN. An artist who has had a decent amount of success selling past paintings has told his public that he doesn't give a shit if his painting sells, and I find this to be a breath of fresh air.

Second, there are those of you who know of my recent attempts at satire by referring to Barbaro as a "fallen hero," an "inspiration" and "possibly even Jesus Christ the almighty in horse form." Can I just tell you that there is a method to the madness. Barbaro was just a fucking horse. He died racing against other horses, and when they found out his leg was broken from racing, they put him down. He's dead now. So is this other horse that went down at the Kentucky Derby recently. They are not heroes. They were animals pressed into service for the amusement of a diminishing group of enthusiasts.

Sports involving humans are a different animal entirely, if you'll pardon the expression. I love football, which involves the slamming of hormone-fed beeftanks into each other at speeds unattainable without drugs. It's badass, and it's barbaric all at the same time. But the big difference between that and horse racing is that these creatures (football players, not horses) volunteered for it. I have a problem with anything that involves one party's entertainment without the consent of another. Horse racing is no exception.

Steven Chandler is on to something with his parallel of horse racing and pit bull fighting. But more importantly, he doesn't give a shit what you think. So here's to you, Steven Chandler:

STEVEN CHANDLER

Georgian artist

For excellence in the field of not giving a rat's ass.

The Nerds Win

Some people say that their high school experiences were some of the best of their lives. Others have contempt for their lives throughout high school that carries well into their 40's if they let it. Personally, I fall somewhere in the middle.

See, I grew up in a town about fifteen miles from Iowa City. West Liberty has a healthy and prominent Mexican population in a town of about 3,500. In other words, I had the small-town experience with very little of the small-town bigotr that goes with it.

This translated into my own experience being quite interesting. When I was young, I was far from the cutting edge of hip. I wore ridiculous outfits, never said the right thing, was a big introvert, and had a tendency to talk to myself a lot. You can imagine that I wasn't at the top of the invite list to the first boy-girl party. At the time I craved acceptance from everyone, but it just wasn't going to happen. I did, however, save myself a lot of potential beatings by somehow (to this day I'm not sure why they liked me) making friends with the kids at West Liberty who got into trouble a lot for fighting. No one screwed with me even though some of them wanted to because they would have to worry about repercussions.

Still, a big part of my personality is to want to show people how incredibly entertaining having me around can be. Once high school rolled around (and I started showering regularly), people began talking to me and being nice without there being any sort of cruel, sarcastic connotation behind it. I was starting to be known for playing tuba. In a town of only 3,500, I was the only one who could really play the tuba with any kind of ability, and for some reason I got to be a small celebrity for it. After a while, the inevitable gloriously occurred: I was invited to the cool kids' party. The best part was, no one really seemed to think anything of my presence. Even a kid who tormented me all throughout junior high even spent sometime talking to me because he found out I was a sports idiot savant, something that is still true even now.

So my first boy-girl party with the cool kids didn't really happen until I was 16. I was okay with it then, and I'm okay with it now. I had found my niche at Wet Lib: not really giving a shit. This became apparent one day in Psychology class when our teacher asked the class if there was anyone in the class they felt was self-actualized. A girl raised her hand and said "Marc." The class vocalized their unanimous consent.

Some of you may think I'm full of shit when I tell that story. I'm not lying to you. Rather, I'm trying to tell all of you of past experiences that have become a big part of the kind of person I am even now. I'm okay with tooting my own horn every once in a while because damn it all if no one else will. And that's fine, it's not their job to do so. I also make an effort to be as intuitive as I can with my friends because I appreciate the company of every single one of them.

All of this because of my tuba-playing, and my propensity to not give a shit.

Movie... Or Porn?

This is a recycled rant. I apologize for my laziness in advance.

There's an interesting pseudo-paradox at play in the minds of Americans. All you need to know about it this: take a good look at anything playing on FX. This is the network that brings you "The Punisher" with very little of the graphic violence removed. You will never see a boob or a wiener on television, however. FX will make damn sure of that, after they tell you about how there is no box.

FX: There is nothing to see here.

A bit of a sidetrack, I can't think of anything more irritatingly bloated and rediculous than the "edginess" that is "The Shield." This. Show. Fucking. SUCKS. Believe it. Type "the Shield" into a Google image search and you are assaulted by Michael Chiklis in all sorts of overly dramatic poses. Wow. What a badass. Douche.

My original point is this: I saw an episode of a mostly-lame show on FX called "Rescue Me" which went so far as to nearly show Denis "my career flamed out in 1994" Leary dog-styling some blond chick. I was titillated, disgusted, and had to retreat to my bedroom to violently masturbate. Sadly, the only thing that could get me to stop was realizing I was masturbating to Denis Leary's naked ass. GROSS'

Now I'm sure they did that to show you how "edgy" the show was. At some point "edgy" became a part of the vernacular, I would euthanize the person who did this if I knew who they were. "Edgy" does not mean good, and really, what the fuck does edgy even mean? Moreover, if we all pretty much agree that "edgy" is a word, what is so damned "edgy" about sex? When you plow your girlfriend or get plowed by your boyfriend, do you consider it "edgy?" No, I'm willing to bet you consider it ball-drainingly satisfying or orgasm-inducingly liberating.

Unless, of course, it's this genuinely disturbing piece of work brought to you by the fine people of Montana. Now THAT'S fucking EDGY, son!

But back to my original point.

You see, the problem is that we as Americans (this is NOT a European phenomenon, as far as I can tell) revel in the destruction of things. We love it when buildings explode, we watch that reprehensible "Bumfights" series, and we watch all the cop video shows our brain can handle before it has an aneurysm of stupid. Janet Jackson shows some boob, and suddenly we are "A Nation In Crisis." I hear people say "My child was watching that!" and my only response is "you think that's bad? Wait 'till your kid finds out he SUCKED on one of those for nourishment!" Actually, that's not true... my other response is "Man, I wish this woman would get the fuck off my TV screen before I hit her in the back of the head with a wiffle bat."

Hopefully in my lifetime we will be at the point where we can show a fine set of titties on television (and some of the not-so-good ones, I'm not a hater). Right now after nearly sixty years of mainstream television, what do we have?

This man's ass on prime time television. Hellloooooo ladies.

Let's make sure that we unite as a people and demand better alternatives. For God's sake. Dennis Franz's ass.

21st Century Courtship Rituals

A man sits in front of his computer. He sits and stares at his desktop for a long time, wondering if he has the nerve to admit to himself that what he'll be doing qualifies as creepy, or worse. He tries to convince himself it's in the name of getting to know someone a little better. He tries hard, but he fails. His inner-demons hold the truth over him like a torch, lighting the way towards his journey of pathetic.

He sighs. He takes the mouse reluctantly, and clicks on his Mozilla Firefox icon. He types in the address for Facebook, and stares at the screen again. This time the guilt is a tangible feeling in the pit of his stomach. He knows full well that what he's doing is sad and lonely. He tries to make one last attempt to reason with himself. He fails.

He types in the first three letters of her name, and the box appears. It shows her name, and status. It hasn't changed since the last time. He clicks on the box since it would be even more shameful somehow to type out her whole name. Her profile comes up. His mixture of guilt and being smitten overtakes him. There's essentially no turning back now. He clicks on photos, looks at a few and sighs audibly. He grows resentful of the vague allusion her relationship status. Married to her best friend? Really? Why can't she be honest! It's not funny anymore!

Now is the time we have reached the point of no return. He feels even more compounded shame and disgust with himself. He sighs one last time, and clicks the X on the top of the window. He decides he needs to stop doing this. He knows she's not single. Why submit yourself to that kind of torture?

He thinks for a few seconds, then clicks on the Mozilla Firefox icon again. He watches some streaming porn videos, tops himself off, and heads to bed. He'll likely go through the same routine in a few days.

Pretentious Nonsense

There is no such thing as honesty. Everyone's perceptions are shaded to the point where everything you say is a lie. Even the attempt of being completely truthful will betray you because your subconscious is a gossiping, dirty whore.

Everyone has an addiction. I don't mean the fun "I am addicted to new episodes of Lost!" kind of addictions. Everyone has an addiction, whether it be one to drama, hate, another person, self-destruction, or food high in preservatives.

Not everyone is special. In order to completely be at peace with yourself you must realize that at some point someone is going to have to finish dead last no matter how good they are at something. Someone is always going to be better than you.

There is hope. It can be found in the moments you have that end in an epiphany. It could be in the moments after screaming at someone. It could be found when you weep bitterly at the prospect that something you wanted is gone, and it's not coming back. If you can come back from that, you've already won something.

(puffs on pipe)

Damn, I'm good.

The Critic vs. Family Guy: An Unobjective Analysis

I'm really, really dating myself by making this statement, but here goes: The Critic was, and will always be one of my favorite television shows. A surprising number of people considerably younger than me (some of you would have been seven when this show was actually running) are aware of this show and enjoy it as well.

Go here and see a good example of what I'm talking about.

This show was taken off the air after only two seasons. There was a time when I would have said that it was easy to see why that happened: the show's frequent cut-away jokes became increasingly more hit-or-miss, and a lot of people couldn't quite get with it. My opinions on this have changed quite a bit, my understanding of this show's early demise being slowly replaced by bitterness and irritation.

Why? Because Family Guy has taken the things that made the prior unique and interesting and paid no dues. Essentially, I invite you all to my atomic piss-ranting at any and all Family Guy fanboys (the fact there even is such a thing makes me want to jump off a fucking cliff) in a point-by-point deconstruction, using The Critic as a comparison.

The Staffs. This is not totally fair just yet, since Family Guy is still running, and The Critic's last episode premiered in 1995, but take a look at some of the genuine talent this show had:

• Voicework: Jon Lovitz, Nancy Cartwright (The Simpsons), Maurice Lamarche (numerous cartoon credits, including Animaniacs), Christine Cavanaugh
• Creators: Al Jean and Mike Reiss, James L. Brooks (producers of The Simpsons)
• Music: Hans Zimmer (the guy who did "Pirates of the Carribean")
• Animation supervisor: Brad Bird (you know, that guy who does PIXAR now)

How about Family Guy?

• Voicework: Seth McFarlane in several different roles, Seth Green in several different roles with barely any variation on his voice, Mila Kunis (the girl from That 70's show), Adam West (they get points for this, actually)
• Creators: Seth McFarlane (has gone to do several other projects, all of which involve basically the same group of people that does Family Guy with him)
• Music: Ron Jones and Walter Murphy (not going to dog them... they do good work)
• "Animation" supervisor: some fucking idiots.

How very underwhelming. Have you noticed that none of the people currently involved with Family Guy really do anything else, and haven't for quite some time? There's a reason that they started doing this show after it got cancelled again: nobody else fucking wanted these talentless hacks.

Humor. I understand that The Critic had some gags fall flat, especially in its second season. But compare that to Family Guy, whose writing team simply HAS to look something like this:

Here's a clip from The Critic.

Here's one from Family Guy.

Now here's a comparison of that last one versus the source material.

I find myself asking this a lot: WHERE IN THE NAME OF FUCK IS THE JOKE?

Ask the people in the photo above, because I don't know. For the people who like Family Guy, pointing out pop culture references with no actual punchline apparently qualifies as comedy. Pat yourselves on the back, you worthless mutants, because someone just appreciated the vast expanses of your intellect! And for you Family Guy fans, "intellect" means smarts.

The Critic died a dignified death, Family Guy gave us THIS:

I was going to write more, but now I think I'm just going to let that one speak for itself. Christ almighty.