Stand-Up Comics: The Best, The Good & The Awful

THE BEST

Strengths: Imitations of various demographics (which are spot on), descriptions of childhood and private life, willingness to mock himself in a way that isn't phony, the courage to call out women on bad logic/egotism/hypocrisy, great analogies, being natural on stage, the balls to discuss racial issues in a way that doesn't exempt minorities from ridicule.

Weaknesses: Despite being very perceptive, he is also of low education, so occasionally makes observations based on disinformation, propaganda or other nonsense. Comedy generally only works to its full effect when it's rooted in reality, so when it isn't then it has low(er) chances of success. Fortunately, this rarely happens because he is intelligent enough to usually detect bullshit.

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In rare instances he tends to feel the need to over-compensate when he feels he'd gone too un-PC, by going the other way but without rooting the jokes in facts or reality. There is no question that even the bravest of comics sometimes feel the heat, i.e. feel the pressure to curb their honesty by going with the flow i.e. saying what the Establishment and the NWO Police want to hear. He seemed to stray somewhat that way (roughly) around the mid-10s, but fortunately seems to feel more at ease lately again to say what he really wants to say. Not WHATEVER he wants, because even he can't do that, but as much as is humanly possibly in this moronic, restrictive, decadent, dumb era.

Style: Brutal observational comedy, self-deprecating, gender-focused, honest, stories, many F bombs, lengthy anecdotes, anti-religious but not atheistic, racial humour.

Recommended: All of his stand-up shows (altogether 8 or 9), his YT channels, his American tour-guide clips (YT), even his appearances on talk-shows (though I generally dislike it when comedians chat with these hosts).

Avoid: "Bill Burr - Friends That Kill"

THE BEST

Strengths: Perfect timing, natural, total confidence, goes un-PC often, a very diverse range of topics, great at making faces, imitations of stereotypes and animals, pretending to be a narcissist asshole, originality.

Weaknesses: By far his biggest weakness is the need to indirectly apologize for his un-PC jokes, by explaining before or usually after the joke why it should be acceptable that he make such a scandalous joke. This is somewhat annoying because it sounds like he is patronizing his audience, plus makes it seem like he wants to have it both ways - be PC and un-PC at the same time. By rationalizing his own right to tell a certain extreme joke, he is in effect seeking acceptance or even to a lesser extent begging forgiveness for being so non-PC. He should never do this, because Lenny Bruce I believe never (?) apologized, so why should he? Either you do or not do the damn joke: leave it up to the audience to decide whether you're out of line or not.

The other major weakness is his bad habit of trying to "educate" an audience in how to appreciate humour or to preach even about tolerance or whatever rubbish. Nobody sane wants to be moralized to at a stand-up gig. I don't know whether Gervais is aware that he is doing this, but it comes off as if he is constantly apologizing for his material, out of fear that it might be construed as racist or whatever. REALISTICALLY, the Left should hate him for the stuff he says, but he probably appeases a bunch of them with his numerous excuses/"instructions" how to interpret/listen to his jokes. If he took out these needless moments of "I'm a good guy despite these crude jokes" his routine would be flawless. At an older gig he once mentioned Marxism, almost reverently, then FAILED to make any jokes about it. That was unforgivable too. Maybe he just failed all his History exams as a kid...

Admittedly, despite being a left-winger he has come out publicly against the PC Police on several occasions, even during his recent shows.

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Gervais is a natural. There is no forced BS to his comedy, the jokes flow very well, and he has good diction i.e. is understandable.

Style: Stories as well as brief jokes, anecdotes, observational comedy, satire, political/social commentary, lots of references to animals and biology, atheistic perspective.

Recommended: All of his stand-up shows (around 7), Golden Globe host clips, anything involving Karl Pilkington (especially the travelogue "An Idiot Abroad" and the animated podcasts "Ricky Gervais Show" - both very highly recommended), "The Invention Of Lying".

Optional: "The Office", "Extras", "Derek".

Avoid: "Life Is Short", "David Brent - Life On the Road", "Special Correspondents".

THE VERY GOOD (though beware of his more recent appearances)

Strengths: Great diction, supremely confident, amazingly quick-witted, destroyer of hecklers, banter with the audience, absurdist humour, often un-PC, doesn't shy away from poking fun at Moslems and other "protected minorities".

Weaknesses: Overdoes it with the sexual humour, similarly to Gervais tends to sometimes explain the way comedy works while doing a routine which is pretty pointless. Don't "educate" us, just tell the jokes. Also, sold out to the Establishment somewhat in recent years. Clearly, he hasn't got the courage to risk losing some revenue by going against the incoming Marxist tides, the Communist Tsunami...

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Jimmy is possibly the crudest of the top comedians on this list, but gets away with it to the most part, because of his image as a clean-cut middle/upper-class banker. His appearance and what he says seem to be in strong contrast which helps him get away with some of his extremely raunchy material (not all), and which makes him unusual. If his explicit material were used by someone like Louis CK or Andrew Dice Clay it would come off as way too extreme, it wouldn't work.

I avoid his recent shows, i.e. the ones after he changed his face. What am I on about? Well, relatively recently (I don't when) he had several plastic surgeries done. It seems that at some point he must have gone mad, spontaneously/inexplicably morphed into a NY or L.A. yenta, then decided he needs to start looking like a cross between the Frankenstein monster, Roger Federer and GWAR's manager Sleazy D Martini. (Admittedly, he always looked like Federer, something he'd joked about on occasion.) His new face creeps me out, so no matter how funny he still may be, no thanks. It's like he's a different person but with the same voice and same style, which is too crazy... Besides, I hear he's sold out to the NWO mob, so no thanks...

Proof that even very intelligent people do incredibly stupid things. As if we needed any more proof for that though...

It's always disappointing when someone who appears to be intelligent DEVOLVES with age, instead of becoming even smarter and wiser. I never quite understood this.

Style: Very short jokes, rarely stories, play on words, absurdist humour, sexually very explicit, taboos, insult comedy, F bombs, less political than others, atheistic perspective, frequent interactions with the audience whereby he usually insults them.

Recommended: Stand-up shows until the early 10s.

Avoid: The most recent stuff.

THE VERY GOOD

It would be false to judge Carvey based on his movie appearances which were never particularly good. He'd never made a good movie, basically. His stand-up stuff however was among the very best in the 90s, and he was known for his excellent impersonations.

I haven't watched his routine for decades, so I have no idea what his exact status would be now. I gave him the benefit of the doubt with the high ranking. In that sense a similar case to Eddie Murphy.

THE VERY GOOD

"Some people think Dave was anti-religion. Actually, he wasn't, he had huge respect for religion, he just didn't like being told what to think, he didn't like brainwashing." - his 2nd wife

Sound familiar? How can this be applied to current times, I wonder...

"... And he didn't like a sort of prescribed guilt [coming from the Catholic Church]."

Guilt? Sound familiar? White guilt, maybe? Just substitute the Catholic Church of that era with today's Church of Cultural Marxism. Has anything really changed in this sense? How are liberals "progressive" when they actually copy-paste the bad behaviours of the past? And from religion, which they allegedly despise...

"People were outraged, his TV show was banned in Ireland after a sketch [with the Pope doing strip-tease in front of a bunch of cardinals]. Women wrote angry letters to the BBC, complaining about his jokes about the Church."

Sound familiar? Could this possibly have any parallels with today's PC Left, its Twitter karens, and how they try to cancel comedians and Free Speech?... I wonder...

Fun fact: the very Marxist I.R.A. (so popular among Hollywood's liberals) threatened to kill Dave Allen over his jokes about the Catholic Church.

Strengths: Excellent imitations (especially involving anger and imbeciles), great grimaces, perceptiveness, originality.

Weaknesses: The sketches were often not good. They were usually combined with his sit-down routine. (He didn't usually stand, he spoke from a chair.)

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The reason most of his sketches ridiculed the Catholic Church is very simple: as a boy he was routinely tortured and screamed at by nuns at his Catholic School, an upbringing that helped define him.

As for his stand-up, it wasn't classic stand-up as we know it, usually it was in a studio with him sitting in a chair.

One of the best of the old guard, though unlike some of his contemporaries he didn't have to resort to the F word to be funny. (He used it once late in his career and got a backlash from prissy, hypocritical BBC.) Allen loved to bend logic in order to draw absurd conclusions, to feign ignorance in order to make a ridiculous joke. He toyed around with logic and words. Allen's attitude was never vile or aggressive, even as he mocked clergy he did it in a way that wasn't loaded with negative energy or any kind of below-the-surface sense of righteousness.

Fanatical, righteous humour very rarely works, because pure anger is a negative energy that most people don't want in comedy. At least mentally stable audiences don't.

His earlier TV shows aren't nearly as good as his much later specials.

Style: Raconteur, observational comedy, anecdotes, anti-religion (specifically Catholicism), usually sits on a chair, no F bombs or only very rarely (in his latter shows), atheistic perspective.

Recommended: The more recent the better - a very simple rule.

THE VERY GOOD

I've known Pryor from his comedies since I was a kid, but only recently watched his stand-up routine. I knew he was famous for it because Eddie Murphy impersonated him in his own routine in the 80s, and I knew of his legendary status, but didn't know what to expect because so many "legends" turn out to be overrated, whether in music, literature, comics, cinema or whatever else.

I was pleasantly surprised how original, funny, and above all how natural he was. A terrific impersonator. The 1979 show is very good, and it was great to sort of experience again the 70s through it, to get away from the 00s and 10s, when most of the other stand-up DVDs were filmed. A much more relaxed atmosphere reigned in the 70s, before you-know-whos took over and poisoned everyone with lies and hatred.

He did lots of racial humour but his topics were diverse, not limited to just that. When Pryor mocked whites it wasn't mean-spirited the way some other black comics are/were. His humour comes from a genuine, very silly place, without nastiness - at least that's how he appears. Privately, he definitely harboured some racism toward whites, but it was never on farrakhian levels, or I don't believe it was. It'd be pretty hypocritical if it was, because he preferred dating and marrying white women.

Born to a pimp father, a prostitute mother, and a madame grandmother, his biography is absolutely nuts. He probably lead the craziest life of all the people on this list, and that's saying something.

THE VERY GOOD

He made me laugh when I was a teen with his two legendary comedy gigs which must have sold really well on VHS, but now I'm not so sure I'd enjoy it nearly as much. Still, very talented and irreverent back in the day.

Some of his racial routines would probably be banned today, especially the stuff about Italians and the Chinese. The 80s and 90s were more relaxed about these things, when things weren't anywhere nearly as uptight and insane as they are now, with the Far Left running everything (into the ground).

Not too crazy about him as an actor though, a very mixed bag with too much snickering.

THE VERY GOOD

Same as Dana Carvey. Been a very long while.

Benefit of a doubt ranking.

THE VERY GOOD (WHO IS OCCASIONAL QUITE MEDIOCRE)

Can be great, some top material, but also occasionally quite unfunny because full of s*** which is when the comedy suffers - because it has no truth at its foundation. And considering that he does lots of political/social commentary he (as all such comics) needs to do proper research i.e. needs to understand the situation on each issue REALLY WELL in order to joke about in a way that reflects reality as opposed to someone's fantasy or sponged propaganda. He understands the gender stuff very well, he's as clever as a shrink, but when it comes to politics and social issues he bases his jokes on complete fabrications and lies. Sort of like making a joke centered around the perceived truth that Italians are introvert and quiet: such a routine would never work because the crowd would be totally confused. "What's he talking about? Italians aren't introvert and quiet." (This could work only as absurdist humour used ironically, but that's not what I am referring to here.) Sometimes he nails it (but only gender relations and stuff that doesn't require research i.e. stuff he can pick up from personal experience), but sometimes he just goes into outer space and bases the jokes on total baloney, which is the political stuff that he knows absolutely nothing about. He is one of those "headline readers". They understand 5% of an issue but feel as if they know 90% of it.

Basically, he is one of those intelligent people who are too lazy to better themselves. Such people have great observation skills in terms of personal experience i.e. they can excel only at things they have close and direct contact with (i.e. women i.e. his great understanding of the genders), i.e. stuff that doesn't require extraneous effort, but he's completely hopeless with the stuff that requires study, lots of reading, and deep analysis. Such people let the media and their schools do ALL of their thinking for them, which is why 95% of all people are zombies essentially...

For example, his slavery jokes often bomb because it simply isn't true that blacks were the only slaves and that whites were never slaves themselves. He clearly knows zero about the history of slavery - a trait he shares with 90% of the American/Western populations... You gotta root your comedy in reality, especially observational comedy, otherwise you can only make equally clueless people laugh.

But that's why great stand-ups are so rare. Not only do they have to fulfill the various high standards required to be funny and likable, they also have to be educated and intelligent enough to base their social humour on facts, not fiction. Chris Rock is severely under-educated and under-informed hence nearly all of his political humour is idiotic.

His "racism" doesn't help either. I'm not saying he hates white people, but does he like them? Certainly a question mark there. Someone this biased should not be doing racial humour. In the 90s his racial stuff was much better than it's been recently, and was incomparably funnier. Lately he's been sounding like a bitter old racist (I'm not saying he is, just saying how he comes off), and even the blacks in his audiences aren't laughing nearly as much because they can tell that he's going too far, and that the "points" he is making are far-fetched and fallacious. In the show "Tamborine" he sounds like a mini-Farrakhan. If a white person talked about blacks the way he does about whites in that show they'd be crucified, jailed, perhaps even threatened.

On that same DVD he states that "only in America is the legal system unjust". That is typical American-centric imbecility that one only hears from totally clueless Americans who seem oblivious of the fact that there are 200 other countries out there, and that the majority of them are far worse off than even the poorest regions in the States. But he can't know that, because he only reads headlines and has never spent any significant amount of time abroad. The "ghetto" and Hollywood is all he really knows, and those are very niche. To even suggest that America is the most corrupt country in the world is amazingly cretinous, but to actually say it - without joking - is a sign of extreme naivety and very poor education. Stupid he certainly isn't, but if he passed 5th grade it would only be because they let him slip through.

In "Never Scared" he actually says "drugs will never be legalized in America because then the white man can't make money from putting brothers and sistaz in jail". Now, how the hell does anyone make money off holding all these people in prison? If all American prisoners worked in labour camps and actually produced something in factories doing 12-hour shifts, I might even semi-agree, but they produce almost nothing (on average), but instead cost the state (hence the taxpayers) huge amounts of money. (Chris probably thinks prisons cost nothing, he has no clue how the world really works, he is rather paranoid and preoccupied with the "white threat".) The gov't would much rather prefer that the "brothers and sistaz" were all free and employed, rather than being on welfare or in prison - because that costs the state money, it's a huge burden on the system. Besides, if drugs were legalized then EVERYBODY would be in on the cocaine and heroin trade, hence blacks (who Chris implies are the main dealers) would no longer hold a monopoly on that (new) industry.

Furthermore, in that same show Chris goes on an incredibly silly rant about a white conspiracy to keep "brown countries" poor on purpose. This was so idiotic that I found myself smiling at the very idea, because it's such a typically anti-white dumb racist conspiracy. But don't think he was saying it for a laugh, he wasn't: he was using this as the TRUTH onto which he'd string jokes. (Modern stand-up comedy has as much MORALIZING as actually humour, jokes.) That show is generally completely off the charts crazy in terms of its "logic", as if Rock were himself high on crack which he's advocating should be legalized. There's some great material in that show too, but ALL of the political stuff in it is so utterly illogical, and so rooted in racist fantasy that most of it fails to be funny. Because, as I said numerous times, satire and parody are funny only if they are rooted in reality. If they are based on a fictionalized version of some quasi-reality then the routine makes no sense and has no point to make. Hence not funny, but pointless and random instead.

Then he goes on a rant about Affirmative Action, giving us a Mickey Mouse version of the history of slavery, all sorts of nonsense that liberals use as an excuse to keep the status of blacks as a "special minority", even decades after AA was started. (AA will be in place even in 100 years, and they will still be making excuses for it.) He makes a few good jokes, but most of this bit fails because it's rooted in nonsense. When you joke about fantasy you end up with jokes about a non-existent fantasy world, which is bewildering and confusing rather than funny. The crowd, despite being at least 50% black in this venue, was noticeably quieter during these bizarre segments than during the first 15-20 minutes which were quite funny. Evidently, even his hardcore fans were a little confused by these theories.

Make no mistake though, the first 20 and the last 20 minutes of that show are great, it's just all the middle stuff that's quite bad.

He too like Chapelle seems obsessed with scandal comedy based on racial themes, which is sometimes corny and can become overbearing. When done right racial humour can be great (Russell Peters), but it needs to be balanced AND rooted in reality otherwise it won't work. I am anyway wary of black comedians doing racial humour because they by default have the "upper hand" (in America) hence can abuse this unfair advantage as a minority bestowed upon them by Cultural Marxism - which they sometimes do, such as what Chris did in "Never Scared". To Rock's credit though, he does lots of balanced racial humour, i.e. isn't afraid to spill the beans on black vices as well, which he does more of in some of his earlier shows, when he was younger, less known hence braver (because less dependent on the left-wing entertainment industry on whose support he relies to stay wealthy - plus it was a much more free era). After all, black audiences enjoy laughing at themselves as all normal people do - something liberals don't seem to understand because they never bothered to get any black friends, or pretend not to comprehend because that wouldn't suit their agenda (which is to "protect" black people from those horrible horrible evil white people). Most crowds on his DVD gigs are black, and they absolutely lose their minds laughing whenever he jokes about the foibles of the black culture. They CAN laugh at themselves and they DO enjoy it... all ye liberals ought to know this.

He may be a bit too PC for me, though, sometimes, though that all depends on the gig. Certainly his Oscars clips hold zero value for me. I don't need to watch them to know he plays it safe with the trickiest issues. The fact that he got to host the Oscars in recent times is a strong indication that he is willing to bend over for his Overlords, which by default means he doesn't mind straying into PC territory - for that extra cash. In recent decades NONE of the other Oscars hosts were non-PC so this sends a clear message about Chris's integrity. He will "ho" himself (as he puts it) for money and prestige, something Ricky Gervais wouldn't. Ricky, despite being a liberal just like Chris, willfully provokes the ire of the entire American show-biz industry (which is 95% communist), best exemplified by his Golden Globe appearances as host. Needless to say, Ricky will NEVER be asked to host the Oscars. They prefer the likes of Amy Schumer and Jon Stewart who far more accurately represent what Hollywood stands for now: elitism, privilege, hate, bias, lies, non-talent, political compliance, ethnic preference and nepotism.

Yup, integrity. Whereas I can choose to ignore an actor's political stances, because a movie is not his own product and films are a huge team effort - and may not even be a political film at all, stand-up comedy is far more personal: there's literally just one personal in charge, hence this person's political attitudes and personality are of paramount importance, defining the entire tone and attitude of the show. I can completely ignore a singer's political orientation - or even their extreme criminal record - but I can do no such thing for a comic. I have to like and respect a comic as a person (at least to some extent) in order to listen to his routine, and if his integrity is void then there's no respect and no likability... Very simple.

What Rock is far better at than political issues (which he doesn't understand) is gender comedy, this he excels at. Only Burr is as good at understanding and relaying male-female relationships as Chris is. These two are the best at it, no question, because both have great instincts about human behaviour and they are brutally honest in exposing the foibles of both genders - especially women whom they understand far better than the average guy (who is by all accounts a totally dumb simp in this regard; guys need to watch Alexander Grace more to learn what it's really all about). I would even go as far as to say that no comic understands the female psyche as well as Chris does. Neither of them are too savvy about political issues but when it comes to day-to-day real human issues they are great. It shows that they are very intelligent, but lack the education to extend that intelligence to the more complex issues that require a lot more reading than merely personal experience which is easily acquired, with less effort.

Rock has some great material, but a thing he'd need to fix is his delivery, his style. It's over-the-top black preacher stuff: shouting, repeating SEVERAL TIMES what you just said, making bezoomny faces, the whole lot. The older he gets the more pronounced this over-theatrical delivery becomes. Just like a cliche of a black Southern priest - which unfortunately he does not do ironically. He'd be (much) funnier being more himself (advice I'd give to most comics - except the ey-holes), rather than play up the "ghetto stereotype" that is expected from black comics. (God forbid any of them "act white" (whatever that means, because not all white ethnicities act or speak the same at all), because then they run the risk of becoming the laughing stock of many in the black community who expect everyone to say YO in every sentence (which, hilariously/ironically, many white people do too, in their lame attempts to sound street-smart). Nowhere is it written how a black American man must speak: they should be able to speak in any way they choose, but are constrained by their own prejudices and deeply ingrained habits of what's acceptable and what's not.) Chris talked normally when he was starting out as a comic. When he was 21 there was none of that theatrical crap in his speaking. Now he jumps around the stage like a preacher begging for donations.

Chris does lots of non-PC material, but similarly to Gervais he feels the need to occasionally "remind" the crowd that he "supports" social justice and all that stuff. Comics should NEVER have to apologize for their material, and if they feel they must do it (i.e. are pressured by their sponsors, corporations, the media and all the other virtue-signaling hypocrites), they should apologize AFTER a gig or tour in interviews, or on their Twitter accounts... Because there is a difference between unconditional courage (which gets my maximum respect) and conditional courage (which doesn't get my full respect). And they should NEVER praise themselves during gigs about how socially aware they are, which Chris did on several DVDs. Nobody (aside from fools) wants to listen to anyone praise themselves - much less a comic doing a routine that's supposed to be FUNNY as opposed to a public test of his morality.

THE GOOD

By no means a great stand-up comedian, but very solid observational comedy, and keeps it old-school by not getting too political, nor does he need F words. At least not in the 80s/90s, I have no idea what he's like now.

Hence it is very telling that even Seinfeld had recently spoken out against PC lunacy, because of how his college campus crowds react to some of his older material. Seinfeld's material!!!!!!! Imagine how far gone this brainwashing is that even Jerry's fairly safe and tame comedy routine is deemed "offensive" by all these Zoomer snowflakes at red-infested colleges. All these completely dumbed-down kids trained not to think, only to obey, their minds and morals completely crushed by neo-Marxists hellbent on the destruction of everything and everyone they deem "not PC".

Speaking of those embarrassing yet ultra-expensive institutions, WHY would any sane American spend any money on "educating" their kids in American universities? US colleges have become IDIOT FACTORIES in recent decades, breeding grounds for extremists and dummies, they are no longer places of intellectual development they once were, they're the exact opposite. You actually exit a university with a NARROWER intellectual horizon than what you entered with, not broader. This applies to top British universities as well: recently Oxford's "smart new kids" had drawn up a manifesto of all sorts of things that comedy should NOT contain. Imagine what kind of a future awaits us when these Orwellian morons take up residence at Downing Street 10.

Here's what Cleese said about comedy being scrutinized by these lunatics:

“PCness starts as a half way decent idea and then it goes completely wrong and is taken ad absurdum... You can make jokes about Swedes and Germans and French and English and Canadians and Americans, why can't we make jokes about Mexicans? Is it because they are so feeble that they can't look after themselves? It's very very condescending there.”

Not only is it condescending, it is actually downright racist. The great irony that I always try to explain to people is that liberals who feel they are "the guardians of minorities and the Third World" are the biggest racists of all, because they treat all these demographics as children, or as idiots that need THEIR protection. By treating them as children - and by appointing themselves as their saviours - liberals exhibit not only racism but their own immense narcissism. Unfortunately, too few smart people are out there to understand what the hell I'm even talking about...

When even Cleese, a left-winger, starts complaining then you know things have gone very extreme indeed.

THE GOOD

I'd never heard of him until after I started this list. He is a Canadian born to Anglo-Indian parents (which I assume means both are part-British), yet they immigrated directly from India not from Britain, so already his background is very unusual.

True to his bio and very suitably, almost his entire routine (in certain shows not the case) is based on racial humour and cultural observation comedy, which he does in a way that is friendly, non-hateful and non-aggressive hence why he isn't pelted with food at his shows. He gives off somewhat A-holish vibes, in fact I suspect he might be unlikable in private, but his routine is entertaining and chill. Unlike some other "race comics" he creates a friendly environment, not a lynching mob mood with racist overtones. A lot of his ethnic imitations are very funny, especially when he does his fellow Indians, or the Chinese. Not often hilarious, but different from other comics, because he relies more on improvisation than most. He involves himself in even more banter with the crowd than Jimmy Carr, and that's saying something. You need to have balls to stray so often from your material by talking to the audience, especially at large venues filmed for a DVD. Or you need to have low criteria, however you wanna interpret it...

The great thing about his routine is that he makes it very international, poking fun at foibles from nations that NEVER get discussed by other comics, such as the Lebanese or Filipinos for example. He doesn't bore us by doing the umpteenth impression of a Texan hillbilly or an angry Scotsman, instead he does impressions of Saudis, the Chinese, the Poles, which is much more original hence more interesting. After all, the world doesn't only consist of North American culture, there are numerous other regions to explore, analyze and mock too...

It does help that he'd apparently traveled a lot which gives him first-hand insights or at least impressions, unlike typical UK and US comics for whom America and the UK are the entire world. Chris Rock, for example, once said (in earnest) that "everybody hates America because our god is money" - which is a very idiotic thing to say as the entire world revolves around money, and always did, always will. Nor does "everyone" hate Americans, that is also baloney that he was taught by Chomsky and the like. But Chris had probably rarely ventured outside the States or read anything substantial about the rest of the world to know this... Which is why comics unfamiliar with history and other cultures should stay away from overly political comedy: they usually embarrass themselves by revealing their ignorance and their overly US-centric attitudes.

Still, despite his travels he sometimes makes gaffs such as referring to "the English accent", as if there was just one. Of course, he meant the BBC English, the Queen's English, but being Indian and an accent impersonator he ought to know that English accent come in a wide variety. It's possible that he does know this but chose to simplify the truth jut to get a joke out of it.

When he strays away from racial humour he sometimes does well, but sometimes goes overboard, such as his sexual humour which gets cringy at times.

He is the ONLY comedian who stated a very obvious truth about white Americans, paraphrasing: "I feel sorry for the white people, they'd been made to believe that they are the biggest racists - when in fact Orientals and Indians, us Asians are the biggest racists by far."

It takes balls to say that, though I suspect he wouldn't say it NOW, not in this decade...

He also once mocked American whites for being so afraid of being accused of racism that they even pretend not to notice when a person is black. He did this in one show and it was very clever. He is practically the only comedian who clearly named the elephant in the room, by discussing how cornered white westerners have become in terms of this type of "reverse-racist bullying". If anyone was going to do it, certainly it wouldn't be a white comedian because he'd be afraid (ironically) of being labeled racist, and it wouldn't be a black comedian because they hardly ever give white people slack, so I suppose it makes sense that it took an Indian comedian to openly talk about this. And I'm pretty sure the Overlords weren't too happy that he did this... because white Americans aren't "supposed" to find out, i.e. not supposed to realize how they'd been blackmailed and cornered by their own liberal insanity.

And because he goes in detail about various races/ethnicities/cultures, you also get to learn something, which is extremely rare to get from a stand-up routine. There is never a sense that he is trying to pit the races against each other. Rather, he uses racial and cultural differences to make everyone laugh at each other - and at themselves - in a way that is non-toxic and amiable. I suppose certain black comedians (and a few white ones) could take notes from this. But then again, why would they? Controversy sells better, and extremism and bias pay off more. Though only the Left type of extremism.

His imitations are very good, sometimes top-notch, both of "stereotypes" and random individuals. He does a variety of accents really well.

As I said, 95% of his stuff is racial/cultural, but one of his funniest bits is the breakdance story. His bit about the need to hit one's children is great too: very un-PC, brave, funny.

I prefer Russell's earlier stuff, from the 00s, for example "Outsourced". But you can pick almost any show. "Notorious" is weaker though, pick that only if you liked all the others.

THE GOOD

I have seen only little from his stand-up stuff, but just to be on the safe side I gave him a decent rating because he's been very good in most of his comedies. His placement could change when/if I check out more clips.

THE GOOD

One of the most unique comics with deliberately eccentric and absurdist humour, very laid back without ever raising his voice or overacting. Very low-key and different.

THE GOOD

I haven't watched as much from him as stand-up aficionados and his numerous fans, so I'm not an expert, but he appears to be more interesting than funny. I feel he's overrated, because many people consider him the very best. He's not though. In his special "Life's Worth Losing" he starts off with a boring fast-talking self-description that is impressive in terms of memory and speed - but isn't funny. And this goes on for 4-5 minutes. And it's all about HIM, which I'm not a fan of. When a comic says ME ME ME too often I start getting self-importance and narcissism vibes, which I am repelled by. It's perfectly legitimate and even advisable to use one's own private life as a source for comedy (gold), but this bit is just a narcissistic self-description to which my reaction was "who gives a s***?" And "this isn't funny, it's just like a rapper doing vocal acrobatics: I can respect the speed and the focus but I don't find it musical at all".

Later, he goes into a political rant about America's Overlords, and almost nothing in that rant is comedic in nature: it is mostly just a guy making an impassioned political speech. In-between these two sections there was some genuinely funny stuff, no question, and he's interesting, but compared to "the best" from this list he isn't up there with them. He could have been very close if only he'd ease up on the preaching and the "educating" and remember to always have the jokes taking center stage. I perfectly understand his compulsion to say it all, because I rant all the time. But I'm not the one doing stand-up comedy; what he's doing should have been STAND-UP COMEDY, not STAND-UP PREACHING. This is where some comedians get lost somewhat and start overdoing it with the moral/political posturing. When a comedian gets lost in political/social commentating and forgets to add enough jokes, it makes him appear like he's bitter and angry and seeking a political platform, which is NOT a good look for comics. You want them to be above such "lowly" human emotions, you want them to be funny, not frustrated. You want them to MOCK zealous preachers, not to BECOME zealous preachers themselves.

Gervais NEVER appears angry or frustrated, for example. Bill Burr is angry, but it's anger with a smile, and it's a kind of "ridiculous" and amusing anger that he routinely mocks and exposes, gives examples of it and then admonishes himself for it or makes jokes at his own expense. All the best comics don't give off vibes of personal frustrations. They all must have some (to varying degrees) but they must bury them because a crowd doesn't show up at a comedy gig to listen to an angry bitter man rant. (Unless they're bitter communists and show up for a very bad Frankie Boyle show, for example...)

The 2nd half of that show isn't particularly good anyway. I couldn't even finish it, the last 10-minute bit being too uninteresting.

THE GOOD

Enjoyable routines, but not great, and he's way too reliant on shock comedy and playing the jock. He may have really been the guy he "portrays" (?) but it comes off as too much, not grounded enough. Too much "act", not enough "real".

Still, he had his own thing going and he was rather solid at it.

Again, it's been a while, so this rating is unsure.

THE GOOD

A competent joke teller with a good speaking voice and timing, but you could tell that he was often phoning it in, i.e. being like a robot programmed to behave in very calculated ways. Even though very amiable, he wasn't as natural and spontaneous as I'd prefer. He is a dull interviewer, but that's well-known.

And I dislike phony laughter, even when it's not annoying.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find much stuff, aside from his insult shticks. I know him from several "Roast Specials" - while I was still somewhat interested in that stuff (I no longer am).

Jeff is a very typical Jewish comedian: likes to go too far, has quick wit, and has the right face for comedy. He has that Jewish shtick going, and in a good way. (Some lesser Jewish comedians desperately try to squeeze some laughs from their jewishness, but to no avail because they're simply not funny.)

Essentially, from what I gather, he only does insult comedy, hence all those roasts. I don't believe he does anything else.

THE GOOD

Was funnier as a stand-up than as the semi-righteous semi-grumpy host of the misleadingly titled "Politically Incorrect".

Has a great voice for comedy and a face that is both puncheable and good for comedy.

THE GOOD

It's been a while... I am not sure how to rate him.

THE SOLID

Started out poorly, then got good around the early 10s, but gradually became a sell-out.

His material is better than his skill-set, i.e. it'd be better if he wrote for a more charismatic, more capable comic. His timing is good and his delivery solid, but it's his unlikability that makes his routine less than it could be. It is abundantly obvious that he is privately an unpleasant person. He has a face that just screams "dourness". The cliche of the "angry clown" i.e. the "bad-tempered comedian" might very well apply to him.

Not that he clowns around much, he doesn't. He is quite reserved and rarely goes to broad impersonations and excessive gestures.

The second big drawback is that he turned into a coward. His latest show (2018) has plenty of racial humour but it is all directed against whites, in the most NWO-pleasing way possible. Seriously, even Amy Schumer might consider this too blatantly biased and obsequious. Just to illustrate what a coward he is, in one sketch he used the Williams sisters as an example of how he'd like to die happy - as if he actually has any attraction toward them. He doesn't: he was merely virtue-signaling, playing it safe, trying to score points with the left-wing media and culture on whose acceptance his career and finances depend. Among tennis fans the Williams sisters had always been relatively unpopular, but this never stopped many of them from pretending to support them, because THAT'S how extreme virtue-signaling has become among white Americans. From all the celeb women to choose from, he picks those two? Total phony.

I dislike his fake grin, total d***** face.

Nevertheless, some of his routines are quite original.

THE SOLID

Can be funny at times, but more amusing than hilarious. I am not a big fan of the way he talks, his voice, which seems too over-caricatured for what a stand-up comic should be doing - namely being themselves. (Some may not agree with this, which is fine. To each their own. I prefer stand-up comedy to come from a genuine, real place, not as an overly artificial "persona". But that's just a general rule, there are good comedians who had a fake persona.)

I don't like his over-focus on race and controversial issues, that's all he seems to be babbling about - which is too narrow in scope and tiresome. He seems to be a scandal-seeking type of comic who more-or-less avoids personal, grounded comedy. Then again, I'd need to check out more of his stuff to be sure, so take this with a grain of salt.

Not too charismatic, though unusual enough to have his own niche in the business. Appears somewhat unlikable, like he's hiding something, and I wouldn't be surprised if he were a ***** in private. Like Robin Williams, stems from a very privileged background, totally anti-ghetto, so this is a distinct possibility.

This wealthy upbringing makes his racial humour a bit dodgy, because he CANNOT speak from the point of view of a typical American black male who unlike him was NOT brought up in wealth and opportunity, yet he does this. (As Chris Rock once joked, "I may be rich but I identify as poor." Of course, Rock was born into the lower-class, unlike Chapelle who is practically upper-class.)

THE SOLID

"They always want black people and white people to be at war, for some reason..."

Smartest thing he ever said, but I doubt many in the crowd took note of it.

His racial humour is very black i.e. almost openly racist, but unlike Chris Rock he doesn't have any mockery reserved toward black men, and only occasionally for black women. For racial humour to work i.e. not to be malignant hence repellent it needs to be somewhat balanced, which from what I know he didn't do. He was decent at it, and he didn't seem as genuinely angry as Rock is, but he also wasn't as funny.

His gender humour is sometimes amusing but mostly it is off, because he doesn't seem to understand women that well. Rock, again, has him beat by a long shot. Rock and Bill Burr are like expert shrinks, they recognized all the cons that popular culture throws at us, celebrating the imagined purity of women. They see through that BS and nail it every time. O'Neal however "fell" for the con hence his gender humour fails, at least when he's comparing men and women, because he was too naive. I can't laugh at jokes when they're based on a flawed premise.

For example, "ask a woman on a lie detector test whether she'll leave you to be with Brad Pitt or Denzel, she'd pass it". This was intended to be interpreted as "she is loyal" not as "she lies like a psychopath". This is already so untrue, that whatever he says next is bound to fail, the whole joke fails (unless he can save it by introducing some great new angle). The vast majority of young women will leave their boyfriends in a flash, without a second of guilt or remorse, in order to be with someone of a higher status, not to mention someone connected to huge fame and money. Hypergamy is what young women are about, though unfortunately we are taught since childhood that women are morally upright romantics whereas men are sneaky opportunists, which is a huge left-wing fallacy. (Western neo-Marxism: always out to glorify "minorities" and urinate on (white) men.) This is why I enjoy comedians who are smart enough to cut through the BS, true freethinkers who can expose all the BS and mock it in a way that annihilates these absurd myths completely. O'Neal wasn't a particularly good observer - at least judging from his routine - hence some of his observational comedy doesn't work, no matter how he packaged it. Plus, all his nonsense about women falling deeply in love, which has also been disproven. How am I supposed to laugh at a routine based on women being romantic idealists? I can't, because it isn't true, hence whichever joke you drag out of this false idea is going to sound confusing hence unfunny.

Now comes the weird part. In private, O'Neal was perfectly aware of the existence of hypergamy. (You can find that interview on YT.) He clearly did understand women very well, but chose not to divulge his true non-PC opinions... His routine sent the opposite message, which was a pity, because if he'd had had more courage he would have written much better gender jokes. In interviews he comes off much smarter, and appears to have been very likable and down-to-Earth... as much as that is even possible with stand-up comics. (I believe most of them are ey-holes in real life.)

The main problem with his routine was a lack of discipline. He stopped mid-sentence far too often, he'd pause, he'd get distracted bantering with the audience, so his act tended to be too messy for my taste. I am listening to him, then he intrigues me with what he will say next, but he says nothing! He just skips to the next topic. Some would say this is "spontaneous" but to me it's a bit lazy. I don't mind spontaneity, that's always welcome, but you can't waste too much time bullshitting. Stick to your routine - unless you're brilliant enough to diverge from it in a way that is effective. I prefer quickness and efficiency, no lulls. An act is 70 minutes long (on average) so don't waste time. Keep it interesting. There's only one person on the stage so they'd better keep things moving.

The good thing is that he was more-or-less himself. He didn't fake a persona or talk in an overly "ghetto" way. He only talked "ghetto" when he impersonated certain black stereotypes.

THE SOLID

He has tons of stuff, so I'd need to check out more of it to form a more accurate opinion. So far I get the impression he is quite uneven: some bits are quite good, some border on dull.

I never really liked him much. In the one or two movies I know him from he was OK, but not terribly interesting. Still, the stand-up turned out to quite alright, much better than I expected. He covers a very wide range of topics, unlike the black comedians for example who over-focus on racial humour, with occasionally original ideas, focusing on lengthy anecdotes which sometimes take a while to get to the punchline or funny bits.

I do believe that the heavy Scottish accent (obviously, there are much heavier ones than this: for one thing, he's understandable) benefits him greatly because the Scots, like the Irish, are "hip" in the media and among people. (As Russell Peters said, "everybody in the States claims they're Irish".) The English are considered prudish, cold and arrogant, while the Irish are allegedly jolly and friendly, and the Scots are dour but honourable - at least those are the approximate stereotypes. I believe these particular stereotypes are mostly rubbish, but hey, Hollywood and the media have hyped this nonsense for a century. I believe that at the root of this "northerly glorification" lies a left-wing willingness to hate on the successful and the rich, while glorifying the poorer. At least that's my take on it.

Personally, I find the Irish dialects far more likable and interesting to listen to than Scottish ones, but that's just me. Hence Billy's accent is not a bonus for me, perhaps even the opposite, a slight annoyance, because it sounds as if he's playing it up somewhat - which if he is I can't blame him for. If the masses like it, then play it up, obviously, make more money.

Showed that he has balls when he mocked suicide bombers and their "virgins in heaven" reward. Very few comedians go anywhere near ridiculing Moslems, because they know that mocking Christians is the safe - and PC - option.

THE SOLID

Has some funny bits but is overall too dishonest and full of ****. Sold himself to his Overlords, which kills comedy, completely. When you sense that a comic is not being genuine and is only after money (willing to kiss ass of his masters) then that largely or totally neutralizes his comedy. If you can HIDE the fact that you're not genuine and are only after money then you can be funny (to me at least), but that requires intelligence and better acting skills than he has.

Wasted potential, because money is god... Spineless, no balls. A cowardly comic is like a castrated comic - losing 80% of his use.

But these days comedy is routinely killed i.e. castrated by political bullying. It is up to the comedian to fight against it or to cow-tow to it to avoid endangering their careers, or having them limited by the Overlords and their well-trained cancel-culture moron squads. Obviously, the less skilled a comedian is the more likely he is to sell out, to be PC, which is why we find that the most PC comedians are nearly always the least talented ones anyway.

THE SOLID

Likable, and his routine isn't bad at all, but he seems like a robot that you press the button for and he just does a shtick that appears to be too forced. I like his lack of PCness but it's just not my kind of comedy... Perhaps going "Back to School" is too old-school for me. I generally don't like old-school comedy i.e. the stuff from before the 70s, and I'm assuming he started in the 60s when stand-up humour was only starting to develop.

THE SOLID

I liked some of his film comedy (at least until the early 90s, before he completely lost it), but his stand-up from the 70s isn't great. It is interesting and unusual, but I'm not sure it ever made me laugh. I believe he could have had a great stand-up routine because he is very expressive and knows how to deliver a good line, but he'd always been a bit of a snob which is why "originality" was prioritized over being truly funny. It's as if at some early point in his life he started regarding comedy as an "art form" rather than just "making people laugh" which lead him astray and eventually to even losing interest in doing comedy. He turned very "serious", a bit of a "philosopher". Even his autobiography is rather sterile.

THE OK

From what little I know from him, I get the sense that his material is better than his delivery i.e. he should be writing for other comics rather than doing the stuff himself.

He has some courage to criticize PCness, but he also makes sure that everybody knows that he supports gay marriage, which is the ultimate litmus test for courage among comics - in the sense that NONE of them dare to admit they're against it, or at least to admit they couldn't care less either way. Literally not one comic has ever dared say this, as far as I know. Which goes to show what an Orwellian world we already live in. EVERY comedian supports gay marriage or cares about it? Not a chance. I am convinced some of the most well-known comics are against it or don't give a damn either way, but don't dare say it

In fact, isn't that stance now punishable by death in the States? There is no death penalty in California anymore, but I do believe the exception is if you say you're against gay and lesbian marriage, then you get the chair within an hour, with no due process obviously. Because as a "racist Fascist homophobe psychopath" you deserve annihilation, or at least total cancellation.

Has too little charisma for this business. His material would have to be wildly brilliant and unique in order for him to be elevated to a higher level.

THE OK

The jury's still out on this one. I have contradictory impressions. Wildly uneven.

I like his energy, quick wit, plus he's eloquent for a comedian, but he is such an obvious narcissist, so in love with himself, a character trait that a comedian needs to hide REALLY WELL or else he is faced with plenty of hate, which he does get. It's one thing when Gervais pretends to be an egomaniac for laughs (which he very well may be, who knows), but it's a whole other ball-game when you listen to some self-loving brat whose personality is so obviously awful.

Hence it was downright laughable when Brand tried to portray himself as a "compassionate" person. Narcissists by definition have no empathy toward anybody. They don't even understand what it is.

He seems to have recently undergone a change, becoming one of those communists who are starting to share their worldview with conspiracy theorist right-wingers, a development that I could have predicted, maybe, because he clearly is intelligent. However, he is one of those bright people who don't bother to get properly informed but prefer instead to just read the headlines, then rely on what they perceive is "awesome intelligence" to make up for the gaps in knowledge. Unfortunately, that's how many intelligent people shoot themselves in the foot. They fail to reach their potential through sheer laziness borne out of arrogance - of which he has bundles. That's how "intellectual morons" are bred - or breed themselves.

In his show "Messiah Complex" he makes several key errors, all of which are the results of his narcissism, his arrogance, his laziness and him overrating his own intellect. Firstly, he wants to use a comedy show to indoctrinate people politically. That's not what stand-up is intended for. You wanna be a political rebel? Run for mayor or something. Secondly, he lampoons idol worship (to some extent) while secretly wishing he could be revered like Gandhi, Christ or Che. He jokes at his own expense once or twice, but it doesn't appear to be genuine and his narcissism is so strong that it always comes out as the primary force in his personality. Thirdly, by being PC he completely demolishes any semblance of rebellion he is fantasizing about: going after Tory politicians and the Daily Mail makes you a compliant sycophant, not a renegade freethinker.

I still have to complete that DVD. Might check out more later, or not...

THE OK

THE AVERAGE

There's very little in her act that is funny, I never laughed. She can be mildly amusing, a tiny bit clever, and she can be interesting enough for me not to press the STOP button quickly, but that's the extent of it. The material is occasionally solid but her delivery ruins or lessens the potentially good jokes, because she isn't likable enough. She is mildly charismatic, but she doesn't have that natural talent to get the most out of a good line.

Being (presumably) a left-winger, and a woman, she gets away with outright racist material. Worse, she addresses her audience members with racial slurs which makes even me cringe a bit. A comic that wants to play around with these ultra-controversial monikers really needs to be smart about it, to try to do it in a way that is funny and makes it clear that "it's all in good fun". But she doesn't do that, she doesn't know how to use these slurs without embarrassing herself.

I'd never heard any other comic do this kind of blatantly racist shtick - especially no male comic. Because if a man did this, especially a white man, he'd be out of work, permanently. Perhaps he'd even be assaulted, murdered. By a gang of Antifa psychos, for example.

I don't blame Lampa Nelly for this though. It's not her fault that as a woman she is far more free to joke how she wants. She uses and abuses this privilege as many people do in her place and many who would given half a chance. What I do mind is that she can't make her racist act funny. She thinks that by using racial slurs she's somehow "edgy", but her act is just slurs, there's very little actual substance surrounding these slurs.

Her humour is mostly basic, almost predictable in a sense. There is very little originality in it, very few sudden surprises, no lateral thinking that defines some of the best comics. Her jokes are intended for a less intelligent audience and for lower-criteria crowds - which is pretty much the same damn thing anyway. Even that I wouldn't mind, if only she was funnier. She utilizes crude humour only, because she lacks the ingenuity of Gervais, the creativity of Burr, or the wit of Carr. I have a feeling like I could write a routine like that in a day. Her use of "don't" instead of "doesn't" i.e. her phony street-wise speak is slightly annoying because it sounds way too forced. You can tell that she's trying hard to be edgy and even "ghetto", and perhaps that's why she recently retired from stand-up, because she realized that she has no such credibility and standing among fans of comedy.

There's no way she would have retired if the money were pouring in for her shows... Stand-up is very lucrative if you're "killin' it", and it's great for the comic's ego, so few comedians give it up on a whim. They give it up for being too old, or for health reasons, or because they're blacklisted by liberals, or because their film career is doing very well - they never give it up to become a life coach, as she did.

THE MEDIOCRE

His routine was generally rather pathetic, with very rare moments of amusement. It's not that he wasn't gifted at all, he did have some ability, but his stage persona was FAKE. He was like an angry, frustrated clown on uppers, there was little to nothing genuine about him. Bill Burr is genuine, Gervais is genuine, Dave Allen is genuine - Robin Williams was an invention. He was a clown rather than a stand-up comic but he was a bad clown. Most clowns are bad so it's not as if he isn't in "good" company...

His face was always so SOUR, with an unnatural smile badly "disguising" the fake grin, like an angry frustrated little proto-SJW trying to be funny. This had always bothered me about him. When it later turned out that he was a severely depressed suicidal, I wasn't too surprised, even though they blamed it on Parkinson's or something else. In fact, he'd been alcoholic years earlier, which in Entertainese translates to "depressed celeb unable to cope with fame or life". There is no doubt that his disease made him more depressed hence suicidal, but I am convinced he'd always been somewhat depressed. It is this inherent glumness which he could never completely conceal that's part of why I never liked him much - especially not his stand-up act which is poor. He was better in movies. Some movies. He was quite bad in a number of them.

He did have some talent, could have been better if he'd been more confident and less bitter (about whatever). This undercurrent of ANGER that he dared not display (i.e. tried to hide) hurt his comedy too. Also, far too frantic, in a rush to cram as many jokes as could in rapid-fire style, which made him appear insecure, as if going at a slower tempo would make people realize just how mediocre he really was. He wouldn't even let a second of silence flow by - because he was fearful the crowd might catch on to him. Most (good) comics seem very confident, but Williams seemed anxious, nervous. More proof of this was his smile which was not genuine, it was so obviously fake, he didn't appear too relaxed, which is a big minus in stand-up comedy. He was hiding behind a mask that represented a successful happy comedian - which he probably never was. Just as most audiences failed to notice that awful fake smile on Will Smith, so did they with Williams too. Celeb phonies can fool a lot of the people all of the time. Everyone was shocked by Smith's psychopathic behaviour at the Oscars, but for me - who knew all along that he was a typical show-biz narcissist - it came as no surprise whatsoever. You can rarely run a fake smile by me and not have me notice it...

His 1986 "Live at the Met" gets tiresome rather quickly, the material very rarely being up to scratch: it's all rather average, bad even. Plus his timing is awful. Rushing through lines and punchlines as if he were on speed isn't my idea of funny, it's my definition of overacting and insecurity. Ironically, he does a routine on his cocaine addiction, though he never picks up on the irony that his entire routine is like that of a drug addict out of his mind. Some people found this style funny, I didn't. I watched that show 35 years ago and I re-visited it again recently, and it hasn't aged well. To illustrate just how bad it is, consider the fact that I'd completely forgotten that I'd watched this show, and only after 5 minutes did I realize that I know this gig. Or the fact that I was so bored I had to stop halfway through; I still haven't completed it.

Totally inferior to his contemporary Eddie Murphy, who would out-do him by a light-year. Just as it is inferior to all good comedians that currently do stand-up now.

Stems from a very privileged background, which is why he very predictably went the liberal route, because if there's anything rich (show-biz) people have learned it's that pretending to care for the underprivileged makes most people forget about your own privilege... Though the funny side is that his great-great-grandfather was a Democrat Senator who curtailed the rights of blacks. There was nothing funny about that at all, just as there wasn't that much funny about Williams. Irony is a bitch. I wonder why he never joked about this distant ancestor... Or maybe he did?

Robin's appearances on talk-shows were generally just as cringe as his live act. The phony frantic grin was always there, the fast jabbering, and the average material.

THE MEDIOCRE

Nothing funny here at all... His delivery is bad, his personality is average, the humour is mostly primitive... Maybe some people consider him "edgy" because he's dressed like a punk hipster (or whatever you wanna call that "image" of his), but this is just a weak comedian trying hard to distinguish himself from the sea of other mediocrities by dressing up differently.

That never works.

THE BAD

The biggest joke in her entire act is herself, and that's not meant as a compliment...

THE BAD

Very similar background as Sarah Silverman and Amy Schumer, a nepotist, rich, privileged princess who gets by on her political correctness, not her lame humour and very limited abilities.

Like Sarah, she got her own TV show. Shocker.

Very predictable scenario. Get ready for a LOT more scenarios such as hers. As America's media/entertainment landscape sinks further, there are bound to be a bunch more chelseas and handlers overflooding the market, while real comedians are forced to get by posting clips on YouTube...

Until of course YT itself (and all the other major internet places) cancels all dissenting voices, and we find ourselves in a totalitarian world.

THE BAD

The material is fairly boring, so it's not a pity that he is such a weak speaker because even a more competent comic would have not done much with it. His face is wrong for comedy, his voice is annoying and whiny, he has virtually no charisma, and his impersonations are borderline cringy. He isn't funny, only very mildly amusing - on a few very rare occasions. He is that unfunny guy women ignore who wants to hog all the attention, but just lacks the chops to pull it off. Any time he raises his voice he appears extra-desperate, so he's less pathetic when he does more deadpan stuff. As soon as he gets animated it's immediate embarrassment on behalf of the audience - or at least a halfway intelligent audience with criteria.

It's weird how some people are so easily entertained that just seeing a big round man with a "funny face" makes them laugh. To me his face is the opposite of funny: he seems mean-spirited and frustrated - at least that's the vibes he gives out. But to his fans he probably appears as "a jolly little fat man". Weird stuff...

Because I am almost totally cut off from mainstream American TV/cinema from the last 15-20 years, I didn't know who he was, I literally found his name on some random comics list. After checking out a 20-minute routine, which I described in the first trollagraph, I wondered if he even got any proper employment, being so bad.

How naive I was. His IMDb filmography/TVography is EXTENSIVE. This guy is busier than Bruce Willies in his 40s. I was very surprised, asked myself, how the hell is this possible? Then I read his Wikipedia page, and all became clear. You have just one guess as to why he is so "in demand". Come on, it is obvious...

Poster-boy for an Establishment sycophant. If he were outspoken against his Overlords he'd be NOWHERE. Literally unemployable. It is admittedly tough to be politically courageous when you have nothing to back it up with. Gervais and Burr can say whatever they want because they're so good they will always be able to make lots of money anyway, even if all SJW nitwits cancelled them, or tried to, but people like Oswalt would stand no chance because his talent is minuscule.

THE BAD

This guy's routine is totally cringe. Between being politically correct and making very lame jokes (with garbage impressions), there is absolutely no part of his material that has any worth at all. Completely boring, totally unfunny, very fake personality...

THE BAD

The only good thing about her is her voice, which is very NY-Jewish, but everything else is annoying, and she is very rarely funny.

A very similar privileged background as Amy Schumer and Chelsea Handler. If this is where comedy is heading they may as well ban it altogether - which would at least mean that these mediocrities and hacks wouldn't have media careers anymore either. (Until they reinvented themselves as civil-rights activists, game-show hosts or whatever other garbage that requires fake smiles or fake anger...)

THE BAD

Angry, frustrated chubby guy who relies heavily on his thick Scottish accent to get the laughs, because his material consists almost solely of crude shock and insult comedy, because that's what you do when you have nothing else to offer, when you're not smart enough to write genuinely clever and funny observational material. Being Irish and Scottish is popular and hip even, which explains at least half of his success. If he delivered those jokes with an American accent he'd lose half his fans. The other half would be his communist fans who finally found a comic extremist enough to rage about how wonderful the USSR must have been...

Crosses the line of bad taste to extreme extents, far more than politically moderate/less-left-wing comedians, but because he is a staunch Marxist he gets away with it, at least as far as The Guardian is concerned. If a right-wing comic had mocked disabled kids the way he does they'd be crucified then out of work, they would have to retire, sort of like Seinfeld's Michael Richards after his heckler rant about blacks. But because Boyle is a Chomskyite, The Guardian still lets him write for them. Would communist Guardian ever allow such a right-wing comic to contribute even a line of text for them? Obviously not. The only way a right-winger can make it into The Guardian is by getting misquoted in an attempt to cancel him.

His idea of "funny" is to ridicule kids with Down Syndrome and to call out Rebecca Adlington for being ugly. Would he do that for Serena though? Of course not. Imagine ridiculing Rebecca Adlington's appearance while pretending not to notice Serena, who is 1000 times more famous than Rebecca hence far more ripe for parody. But hey, Rebecca is white, so let's go after her. Of course, you can mock celebs for their appearances, but this can be done in a clever, roundabout way, not like a sledgehammer - which any average drunken yob can do just as well. "Ha ha she ugly!" Any ass can do that.

Exposed several times for his hypocrisy, including the time he criticized Gervais for his jokes on "transgenders". Ain't that the pot and the kettle and at least 11 kitchen sinks thrown in... Not only had Boyle done the same thing, but his entire routine is based on hateful bile directed at political opponents and anyone else he deems fair game. Gervais doesn't base his entire act on shock humour the way Boyle does (because that's all he can do). The height of absurdity is however that a third-rate comic would have the balls to actually criticize Gervais who is among the very best of all, and in a way that is cringingly virtue-signaling i.e. the opposite of brave. There is no question at all that Boyle had harboured deep resentment toward Gervais's success for many years, then suddenly couldn't take it any longer and allowed himself to let it out, stupidly believing that he can put him down to his own level by "letting the public know" how awfully non-PC Gervais is. (Ironically, I'm sure Gervais was amused by the "incident". Double ironically, by "exposing" Ricky as non-PC his popularity can only increase even more.) If there's anything I know about communists (my field of specialty) is that they are extremely jealous of other people's success - and especially financial success. Boyle criticizing Gervais would be like me criticizing Nadal for how he plays his forehand. It'd be like Jimmy Savile taking the moral high ground against a parent who smacked their child lightly, or Dustin Hoffman lambasting Epstein. Boyle is a deeply frustrated malcontent who turned to political extremism the way most malcontents do... "The world isn't how I want it to be so I just hope it buuurrrnnnnssssssssss in huge flames reaching up to the sky, so I can laugh till my lungs hurt."

Boyle is nevertheless very useful, for precisely all of the same reasons listed, because he shows everybody just how vile, grumpy and immoral a typical "morally righteous" communist really is. His numerous statements and tasteless jokes reflect a deeply ingrained narcissistic disorder, and a man full of loathing for the "oppressed" whom his pathetic ideology supposedly seeks to protect. Poster boy for "Marxist hipster gone cuckoo".

THE AWFUL

Cringe. Big mega-cringe. Overacting to try to attract more interest.

More? I meant any.

Shameless media ** that would do ANYTHING for some attention, because certainly her "comedy" isn't enough to get her the amounts of attention that her enormous Ego requires.

Resorted to all sorts of shameful behaviour just because her career was heading to the toilet... where it rightfully belongs.

With appy-polly-loggies to toilets, even the worst ones at train stations.

THE AWFUL

Why Eddie Murphy ever agreed to team up with this dilettante is anybody's guess. Had no choice? Friends? Lovers? I really don't understand. Perhaps Murphy felt unthreatened by Arsenio's total lack of talent?

Nobody who had any sanity understood how this guy managed to get to host a major talk show in the 80s. No, I don't think it was because he's black, there were many black comedians back then that could have been far better choices. So it is a mystery...

THE AWFUL

When you're this unlikable it is virtually impossible to be funny, I don't care who writes your jokes - you stand no chance. Everything about her is grating: her appearance, her awful voice, her arrogance (that's simply impossible to hide - not that she tried too hard), her toxic personality, her hatred...

So it's a good thing her material sucks anyway, meaning that there is a balance to her badness. It'd be a pity if good material was wasted so routinely on someone this atrocious.

THE AWFUL

Absolutely abysmal. This guy was always the epitome of unfunny. The stupid fake "funny" voice he did was the most annoying thing about him, but it wasn't the only issue.

Now, before you accuse me of being a jump-on-the-bandwagon hindsight-critic, let me tell you that I used his name as a symbol for bad comedy MANY YEARS before he was exposed as a serial rapist. Decades before. You can find his name mentioned in some of my old film reviews from the 90s and 00s (some of my 00s reviews were written up in the 90s) in which I use him and that terrible sitcom as a measuring stock for badness. Similarly to the way I use Sean Penn to describe "extreme intelligence", or "Friends" as the worst sitcom in more recent years...

I saw through his phoniness and very obvious ultra-fake smiles way before any of you even got a whiff of the fact that he was actually something like a serial-killer - in a manner of speaking.

I read people very well. I don't always get it right, nobody's perfect, but my assholism radar detector works far better than that of most other people. No false modesty from me, nope, never...

THE ABSOLUTE WORST - ENEMY OF COMEDY

She is the niece of a powerful Washington politician and she is also that other thing, so all doors to show-biz were open for her. The entitlement and the brazen arrogance and pomposity simply ooze out of her. Not to mention what a horrible "comedian" she is. She isn't even good at stealing material, because she steals crap.

It is up to us to distinguish between talent and zero-talent, which - as amazing as it sounds - isn't something the masses are good at even at something as very basic as humour. Yes, there are different tastes, but that relates to whether you prefer great comedian A or great comedian B, not that you can't tell the difference between lame comedy from great comedy. That's rather autistic.