Chris Rock: Kill the Messenger

[TacoSmith]

I'm surprised there hasn't been any discussion on this yet. Unless I missed something in which case this thread can be deleted and I will gladly accept my 3 demerits. So I thought this was a really hilarious special. MAJOR improvement over his last special which I wasn't too crazy about. The political material was all great. I was shocked at how current everything was, this obviously was filmed relatively recently. My favorite bit was probably about the 4 black people in his neighborhood being him, Jay-Z, Mary J. Blige, and Eddie Murphy and his white neighbor being a dentist.

But enough from me, what do you guys think? Pookie's doing alright for himself, am I right?

[Itslikeimsayin]

My favorite bit was probably about the 4 black people in his neighborhood being him, Jay-Z, Mary J. Blige, and Eddie Murphy and his white neighbor being a dentist.

I've only seen the first hour so far, but I agree this was the highlight.

As I mentioned in another thread, I find it sort of weird that both this special and Louis C.K.'s special on Showtime next weekend both have long bits about the usage of the words "faggot" and "nigger." What a weird coincidence, especially among two friends like that. I liked Rock's bit about when it'd be appropriate to call him a faggot. The one about when white people can say "nigger" wasn't nearly as funny.

[HeadEgg]

The editing of this special made me kinda dizzy. I thought it was pretty funny but honestly I couldn't get through the whole thing.

How about that Eddie Murphy/Kanye West outfit he was wearing in NY!?

[smartbunny]

I was like WHY DOES THE BACKGROUND KEEP CHANGING?! Oh I see...

[bao]

Yes to everything already mentioned -- it was better than his last special, the editing made me a little dizzy, and the Eddie Murphy, Mary J. Blige, Jay Z, and the dentist bit was funny and insanely clever.

To me, Chris Rock is like a pitcher who won the Cy Young in his second or third year, with one of the best seasons ever, and will never be able to duplicate that season. Its just too hard to live up to the standard of Bring the Pain, which I thought was a nearly perfectly crafted one hour of stand-up. So now his specials are very, very good (mostly), but get lost in the shadow of Bring the Pain.

[Fentmore]

I actually just thought it was OK, with the second half a vast improvement over the first. Most his political stuff just wasn't registering with me. Making multiple "John McCain is old" jokes seemed really easy and, quite frankly, making jokes about the guy's age has been done to death during the begininng of this year when the primaries were winding down. Again, thumbs up on the second half (some really great stuff in there) and a "meh" on the first part.

Also, re: editing. I thought it was an interesting thing to do the three locations and I have to say they edited the sound near flawlessly, there wasn't an interrupt anywhere I could hear. It was very smooth and with unnoticeable transistions. Was it a good idea or not? I don't know, it didn't really bother me at all, but at the same time, why do it?

[MongarEric]

There may not have been any interrupts, but it got annoying when they edited it so certain lines would repeat for each location. That was kinda cheesy. Although, if they hadn't done that I wouldn't have noticed he was doing 3 different shows.

[dogsdonttelljokes]

I thought the show was pretty good, although the crowd reaction shots were (as usual) kind of cheesy and the 10 minutes of post-show audience praise at the end felt like a bit much.

I agree about that 4 other black people in the neighborhood bit being pretty memorable. Also, I thought that "women can't go back in lifestyle and men can't go back sexually" was a really amazing premise.

[disl]

i just watched this tonight. if he would have cut the 'faggot' and 'nigger' bits entirely, it would be have been a grade A special. with those bits, though, i still give it an A-. i don't usually laugh out loud when watching comedy by myself, but this special had a lot of laugh-out-loud moments for me. loved it.

[scamboogah]

I agree with Mr. Labia.

I remember literally LOL'ing at least 5 or 6 times. And if you compare that to the zero times I laughed at Jim Norton's Monster Rain special (and I like Jim Norton usually), that's pretty good.