Last Comic Standing: Season 6, Episode 11: The Five Finalists

So this is it? The last performance show? Did they cut it short for some reason? I guess it’s probably the fault of the Olympics. This season has been so unbalanced, I wish I had had a blog back when things were a little more stable. Oh well, it should only end up being two more posts, right?

They opened with a musical number as though it was the Oscars or something. Everyone’s doing the Jack Black thing lately, even Marcus! Marcus and Iliza got the most applause when they came up to announce that they were going to be the last comic standing.

Luckily we went right to the performances. Here’s my review of each comics in order of least-liked to most-liked.

Bill Bellamy doesn’t believe in punchlines? I never thought I’d be asking for them to bring back Jay Mohr.

Jeff Dye did a whole section on a board game, a man after my own heart. Who knew “Guess Who?” taught racism? I like him a lot (I’d be happy to see him win) and I smiled but I didn’t end up laughing enough to rate him high enough on this list. Plus he was mean to his parents. Who does that?

Ron G rocked the mohawk. I think that’s about all he rocked. He has really good energy, though, and he tied everything up in a neat little bow at the end, calling back all his previous jokes and impressions. He is technically very talented but he just doesn’t do it for me. So sad when they kick someone off the show just after they come off a performance!

Sean Cullen fell flat except for the Australian James Bond villain. That one short bit redeemed the whole act for me.

Adam Hunter always goes for the political stuff. He seemed nervous up there but I think he did really well. The jokes came rapid fire and they didn’t really tie together very easily, but it didn’t really matter becaue his energy kept it moving. I feel like everyone did well tonight.

Marcus gets his first real chance to perform on stage tonight, and he gets to go first. Hopefully that doesn’t mean people will forget his performance. Doing a whole music-themed set with some impressions and some standup seems like a great idea. A few more impressions would have hit the spot, but he did well as was expected.

Louis Ramey goes the patriotic route, he does a great redneck impression and he has them pegged. He doesn’t go negative, he’s even, experienced, and he finds a tone right down the middle: a consummate showman. Of course he made it into the final five.

Iliza Shlesinger represent! She started off on drinking games, which I don’t have enough experience with to relate to, but then she got into office culture and it was good. So smarmy! I think it’s to her credit that she’s the one on the show with the most balls. I’d be happy to see her win the whole thing.

Jim Tavare I had very expectations for. I think he met them, I’ve liked him since the very beginning, I like that he carries around a giant Bass and finds good and interesting ways to incorporate into his act. I laugh when he tells jokes. He’s in the final five and he’s going to WIN!

Vote for Jim Tavare!

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Last Comic Standing: Season 6, Episode 10. Surprise Democracy!

Midgets? They stooped this low?

Marcus finally got to do some impressions in the Hibachi section of the show, and Jeff Dye just ruined it. It made me laugh, actually, but the little people didn’t seem to care too much for his irreverence.

Actually, everyone seemed to do alright in the Japanese restaurant warm-up challenge thing, and since it didn’t seem to really matter to the outcome of the show, it was nice of the producers to skip over most of it and just show the funniest clips.

Then we arrive at the challenge that does matter: telling bedtime stories. I don’t know whether to be happy or unhappy that every season they seem to end up doing less and less in the house and more and more at auditions and in the finals. They could have stretched this season out 3 more episodes by only eliminating one comic at a time. That being said, they seem to have eliminated the right people and those who remain I want to see perform on stage. It ends up okay.

Marcus did a great job, more impressions this episode; he was wrong about being the only one to do voices, though, Iliza also did some. He was one of the few who didn’t seem to get nervous being around the girls next door. I also liked what I saw of Iliza and Jeff’s stories. Marcus definitely deserved the immunity he got.

They really put the pressure on the comedians with this rule change. But it also means the comedians will be judged not only on their comedy, but on their personalities and their daring and their perserverance.

I guess I’m obligated to vote, since I’m so invested in the show as a self-styled LCS-blogger. I’ll cast ten votes using nbc.com, and I’ll tell you how I voted right now. My thinking on the various sets tonight, in order from worst to best in my humble opinion:

Adam Hunter – 1.877.386.6901 He started out very strong. The first two jokes, I laughed. The last joke was crude but it got me. In the middle there were a few smiles, but it wasn’t overall what it needed to be to earn my vote. I’m also still angry at him for the vegetarian joke in auditions!
Sean Cullen – 1.877.386.6903 “Thank you humans!”? Is he channeling the Interloper from the first episode? The jokes fell flat. The song was good, but it wasn’t as good as the one he did in Las Vegas, and it feels like he’s channeling Jack Black who simply can’t be beat for showmanship. I like Sean Cullen a lot, but this performance didn’t get me there.
Jeff Dye – 1.877.386.6905 I really like Jeff Dye, I think he’s creative and pretty cool, but essentially he didn’t tell enough jokes. He stretched out the first joke way too long and then all of them sort of ended up running together as if he ended up only telling one joke. I did like to see him get in a few Nintendo reference at the end. I’ll toss him a vote for that.
Ron G – 1.877.386.6906 I didn’t like Ron G in Vegas or in the auditions, but he has high energy, which I respect. His set about being single also happened to resonate with me at this point in my life. I laughed. I’m gonna toss him 2 votes.
Louis Ramey – 1.877.386.6907 Louis seems like one of the most experienced comics on the show. I thought his set was solid, good, I smiled, a few chuckles. I think he’ll move on and so I’m not going to cast a vote for him.
Iliza Shlesinger – 1.877.386.6902 **** I wonder which of these were the new jokes. The whole thing was good, but the audience didn’t seem to get into it until around the middle section. She ended very strong, which is what you need in a competition like this. She’s also going to get sympathy votes because she is having to work a lot harder than the other comics, having been up 3 times already. 2 votes for her.
Jim Tavare – 1.877.386.6904 Jim Tavare brings out the bass! And he does the British humour so smoothly. I was grinning the whole time and there were a few laughs. Mostly grins though, the kind you end up with when you’re watching Monty Python. I predicted he would win, and I’ll stand by that judgment based on this performance tonight alone. He gets my remaining 5 votes (plus one phone vote just to see what it’s like (Bill Bellamy yells in your ear, it’s unpleasant)).

Let me know how you voted!

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Last Comic Standing: Season 6, Episode 8: In the house, finally

Well, we’re finally in the house, where the real drama begins.  Challenges!  Eliminations!  Rivalries!  Less Comedy…  Photo Shoots? Hm.  I hope this episode was supposed to be devoted to “getting to know you” type activities because a lot of it wasn’t that funny, but was rather a little more dramatic.  I was okay with that because I also appreciate good reality shows that throw interesting people into houses.  One of my favorites was Amish in the City, for example.  Still, I hope next week we see some stronger comedy.

One problem with the show is that the comic who is the funniest often wins immunity, which means you see them do less stand up!  Shouldn’t we be wanting to see more stand up from the funniest comic in the group?  In any case, Jim Tavare, my pick to win the whole thing, got immunity this week and I think he deserved it.  He didn’t get to take his bass into the boxing ring but that didn’t slow him down.

The other comics who made the semifinals in the boxing challenge seemed to deserve it.  Sean Cullen and Jim Tavare are among the strongest.  God’s Pottery really had an advantage in the non-stand up portion of the show because they could always fall back on their characters.  Like someone said (was it Ron G?), “it’s like going up against Borat.”  Unfortunately that didn’t save them when it came time to perform on the stage.  I didn’t think they deserved to be in the finals here in the house but they do grow on you.

Except for the calendar part of the show, and the “10 best jokes” filler (was it me or did they choose sucky jokes?  Even from the exciting visages of Dat Phan and Doug Benson), I was okay with it.  The people who got eliminated were probably among the weakest comics.  Esther Ku repeated some of her jokes, which never bodes well, and wasn’t that funny.  It was a little scary that the only two girls on the show could have been eliminated, and I’m glad they weren’t.  No matter how much I knock the producers for choosing diversity over talent, at least some diversity is necessary!

I was told before watching this episode (on Tivo; was at a dinner party yesterday) that it wasn’t very good.  That’s probably true, and it could have been cut down from 2 hours, but it was good enough that I’ll stick around for the next few episodes.

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