Original subtitles

As styles of comedy go, spoof movies are arguably the most despised and

critically panned, despite it creating many of the all-time greatest movies.

Like the stool sample of a drug mule, you have to sift through a lot of crap

before you get to the good stuff.

So, where did it all go wrong, and will it ever come back?

I've loved spoofs since I was a kid. But what is it?

Well, it's like an adult version of Mean But Much Younger. But that's not

important right now.

Spoof movies are surprisingly hard to define.

They're often mixed together with parody movies, which isn't wrong.

It takes some kind of predefined piece of media, typically another movie or the

tropes of a genre, and then subverts it in some way.

Sometimes this is a loving tribute or pastiche, or sometimes it could be

critical or satirical, highlighting the faults of a heightened situation with

some applied logic.

Who throws a shoe?

Honestly. For example, take WandaVision. It replicates the look and feel of

sitcoms from different eras, but with a kind of superhero twist.

It's a parody, but it isn't a spoof.

But is Shaun of the Dead a spoof? Or the South Park movie?

Or The Third Thing, the movie I just made up about how the third thing in

list is always a twist?

To me, spoof movies feel different, and where you draw the line is subjective.

They operate in some kind of alternate universe, where even reality itself

bends around whatever is funniest.

where even the most basic cause and effect could be subverted in some way.

There's slapstick, non sequiturs, misdirection, sign

gags, cartoon physics, innuendo,

metahumor, satire,

exaggeration,

and so on and on and on and on and on. That has a lot of crossover with comedy

in general, but I think the biggest difference is that spoof movies carry

with them a layer of heightened absurdism, where it constantly toys with

your expectations.

Amen. It can remove or lessen any sense of peril, and it can reduce characters

into caricatures.

On paper, this sounds like this would ruin any movie. Like, who would watch a

movie where the plot wasn't important?

In 1980, the movie Airplane was a commercial and critical hit, and not

because it told a really, really good story.

It was the jokes.

Jokes delivered by some of the finest performers, such as Lloyd Bridges and,

of course, Leslie Nielsen.

Oh, but not this guy. I hate this guy.

Airplane remains one of the most beloved comedies of all time, and it's a full-on

spoof. But I wouldn't blame you if I said spoof movie, and your first thought

was, oh, I don't know, a baby Shrek vomiting on a Spartan from 300.

So, how did we get from here to here?

Well, I spent all of last month watching over 60 movies determined to answer the

question, why am I wasting my life?

But more importantly, what happened to spoof movies?

And if at any point you feel like I forgot a particular movie, just know

that I left it out on purpose just to upset you personally.

Now, let's dissect some frogs.

That is wrong.

Oh, where were we?

Trigger warnings!

Why is everyone so sensitive?

In 1903, Edwin S. Porter directed The Great Train Robbery. He was a pretty

innovative filmmaker, but what no one expected he would innovate...

would be a remake of his own movie, but starring children instead, called The

Little Train Robbery. It's not exactly packed with laughs, the kids riding on

miniature trains is quite endearing, and there's this bit where the actor playing

the engineer, who's meant to be knocked unconscious, gets up, smiles at camera,

remember it's meant to be unconscious, and lays down again.

But this film is widely credited as being the very first spoof movie, and

one that was made by someone parodying themselves.

The 1930s and 40s heralded the era of the talkies and many of the most famous

silent film stars started making parodies like Buster Keaton, Laurel and

Hardy and of course Charlie Chaplin. The Great Dictator is a political satire

released in 1940 during World War II.

This was highly controversial as the United States was still technically at

peace with Germany at that point.

But Chaplin was worried about the growing surge of fascism in the 1930s.

Boy, I'm glad that stopped and never happened again, huh? And stated that

Hitler must be laughed at.

The Great Dictator is a kind of Prince and Pauper tale where Chaplin plays both

Adenoid Hinkle of the fictional country Turmania and the unnamed Jewish barber.

This is a long movie, over two hours long, and the switcheroo doesn't happen

till the last 15 minutes.

So instead the movie ensures an emotional hook of the plight of the

Jewish people whilst portraying the Nazis as cruel, foolish and disconnected

to the real world.

A bulletproof uniform and 100% perfect.

Far from perfect.

The physical comedy is hilarious.

It has great set pieces that could stand alone as comedy sketches.

And of course, the climactic monologue is beautiful and still resonates today

as one of the greatest speeches ever recorded.

It did me a big cry.

The 40s and 50s had several films that were kind of parody itself.

Abbott Constello would meet several universal movie monsters and even films

like Sunset Boulevard and Singing in the Rain were movies about making movies. So

it was becoming increasingly self-conscious, like me about my fake

nose. Meanwhile in the UK, the late 50s saw a movie franchise that would

introduce the camp and saucy humour of the British seaside postcard. So keep

calm and... Oh, matron! You may not realise it, but I was once a weak man.

Once a weak's enough for any man.

Carry On is a series of 30 movies, no one counts Carry On Columbus, sorry,

with a regular cast of performers including Kenneth Williams.

Into me!

It's Britain's second longest-running film franchise, with number one being...

And with the popularity of Doctor No in

1962, it inspired spy parodies such as Casino Royale, no, not that one, Our Man

Flint, Get Smart, and the Carry-On team had a swing with Carry-On Spying.

double o o carry on would only occasionally make actual parodies like

spying and carry on screaming it would generally take a broad theme typically

british institutions like the nhs and camping and then get their innuendos out

i'm afraid he's got a very small dossier He's got a very small dossier. Very

small dossier. And even here, James Bond isn't the sole source of humor, as it

parodies general spy movie tropes. It has the idiot hero, well-meaning and

sometimes capable, but otherwise bumbling and only really succeeds with

dumb luck.

He is the last resort.

It has an easy to follow mission, and even though people die and get injured,

it remains light-hearted and never violent.

And it is, of course, very raunchy.

Don't be a fool.

We don't know which side she's on. Well, I'm not fussy. But carrying on into the

70s, and the Carry On team weren't the only British comedians making parody

movies. So keep calm and... Monty Python.

Life of Brian is about a man whose life runs parallel to Jesus Christ.

Like The Great Dictator, this too was highly controversial.

The mere notion of mocking Christianity resulted in numerous calls from

religious groups who never even watched the movie for it to be banned.

This famously culminated in a 1979 TV debate, which itself got a Monty Python

-style spoof in 2011's Holy Flying Circus.

Despite the no-one-is-safe-from-satire approach, the film really isn't about

Christianity. If anything, it has more to say about organised movements than

organised religion, as much of the mockery is pointed at how blindly people

follow Brian despite his protests, and

how overly bureaucratic the bickering independent movements are.

with the overall message being, think for yourselves.

Brian is the last sane man and it's the world around him that's weird. With the

odd non-sequitur moment and people doing the totally illogical, like this Roman

centurion correcting Brian's Latin graffiti.

Despite this lack of logic, usually to infuriate or obstruct the main

character, there are many scenes where rational thinking is applied to

highlight a flaw.

Much like the Holy Grail before it, it has a story, but it's told in a series

of short skits, making the film effectively a collection of sketches

strung together with a paper-thin plot.

And it is one of the greatest comedies ever made.

This runs in stark contrast to Holy Moses, released a year later in an

attempt to make a Moses version of Life of Brian, but without any of the

subversion, rational thinking or even jokes.

Seriously, this film uses anti-climax as a punchline constantly.

Top tip, if your script has a lot of, but then nothing happens, maybe don't do

that. I've found through the years that it's less funny to watch characters

trying to not do something. That's interesting. Than it is to watch them

actually doing something. And now onto something completely different.

Mel Brooks is easily the grandfather of spoof comedy, bringing his

endearing style of lightheartedness to the silver screen, writing and directing

films like The Producers, Blazing Saddles, and a direct spoof of Star Wars

entitled Young Frankenstein.

It's a pretty faithful retelling of Frankenstein, even directly remaking

some scenes.

Frederick Frankenstein is a descendant who has disowned his

family in shame. While an eccentric character, he is still able to be

something of an outsider and comment on the weirdness.

But as he gets swept up in following his ancestor's legacy, which abandons the

ashamed descendant premise pretty quickly, it removes his ability to

deconstruct the tropes and instead just become a participant.

We see recurring elements that Brooks will continue in his films, such as

breaking the fourth wall and wordplay.

Thank you doctor slapstick and sign gags such as this brain depository mill also

loves the toy with Juxtaposition so putting elements in situations opposed

to what we'd expect like put it on the Ritz perfect

This is a slow film.

Brooks makes a genuine attempt at replicating the same sense of atmosphere

and it's quite clear that this is a loving tribute of the original classic.

Which brings me to Spaceballs.

This too was a parody that follows much of the main beats of its source of

inspiration. In fact, Brooks worked directly with Lucas for the post

-production. This wasn't the first Star Wars spoof ever made. That's credited to

Hardware Wars.

I must try to find that tractor beam.

Much of the elements we saw in Young Frankenstein are here too, along with

some great misdirection. But there's more pun-based humour, cartoonishness,

and juvenile humour.

There's also a greater emphasis on fourth-wall-breaking meta-humour, now

actively stepping into the plot of the movie.

which I have mixed feelings on. For example, there's this gag about

merchandising. Merchandising, merchandising, where the real money from

the movie is made.

Which then causes Spaceballs merch to pop up throughout the film, which is

great because it's commenting on something. The over-commercialization of

Star Wars.

But moments where it turns off the movie or it hits crew members during a fight,

all that says is, get it? You're watching a movie.

Which is like being told the same joke over and over and over again.

oh no not again this is put to better effect in robin hood

men in tights and it's generally less invasive well to the

story i mean and it's kept to more of a wink and a nod unlike some other robin

hoods i can speak with an english accent

Here the humor is less juvenile and more farcical in nature with more slapstick,

cartoon physics, and yes, pop culture references.

I mean, obviously Robin Hood is a pop culture reference of sorts, but this is

where they bring another pop culture reference outside of the one you're

already referencing. And the joke is... I gotta go home alone now.

Right, right.

That thing you know.

Get it? And we're going to see a lot more of that, don't you worry.

In fact, do worry. Do worry a lot.

Something important to remember about the films of Mel Brooks is how uncynical

they are. There's the odd satirical moment, but it's largely just light

-hearted silliness.

The characters are silly, the villains are silly, the jokes are silly, and none

of it comes from any mean-spirited or cruel angle.

There are some elements that haven't aged well, sure, but there's a comfort

in how harmless it is. They're comfort movies.

But now for some comfort food. Anyone up for Kentucky Fried Theater?

This is the bit about airplane, by the way.

The 1970s were the golden age of disaster movies, like The Poseidon

Adventure. And there was a film made to spoof the disaster movie genre, and it

was called The Big Bus.

It's a disaster movie, like the Poseidon Adventure, but on a domestic scale and

the intro wants you to know what a silly premise this is.

I like this bar fight scene and the ongoing jokes, like the character's

shoulders constantly fainting.

But perhaps in an effort to be satirical, people are framed as selfish

and opportunistic, even the overly aggressive lead character.

It doesn't really parody the tropes of disaster movies, given that the disaster

doesn't happen until towards the end of the film. Instead, take an aim at

society. Maybe the Joker was right all along.

Do you mean the Chaos Emeralds? So along comes a comedy theater trio, Kentucky

Fried Theater, a.k.a. David Zucker, Jerry Zucker, and Jim Abrahams, a.k.a.

Zazz. and for some reason they don't like Detroit.

To write their sketches

they'd often record late night TV and pull material from the commercials and

shows they taped.

One night they accidentally taped the movie Zero Hour, a disaster movie like

the Poseidon Adventure, but on a plane.

So they secured the film rights and planned to remake it as a comedy.

However, initially no one was interested, so instead the group adapted

a selection of their theatre sketches into a movie called Kentucky Fried

Movie. It's a movie-length sketch show, and you can see those late-night

recordings in action as the sketches are mostly commercials and TV shows and

softcore porn.

Some of those airplane-style traits emerge here.

Such as this sequence with the roving boom mic.

Have you verified this idea of distinct territory?

There's a lot of unrestrained, edgy comedy, like a white guy yelling the N

-word to a group of black men. So this movie has not aged well, and without the

basic skeleton structure plot, the pacing drags. This is why I think

Airplane works so well. The pre-existing script and the ongoing peril keeps the

plot driving forward, which ring fences Zaz to focus on what they do best.

Gags. What does Airplane do differently?

Layers of gags. So whilst the action is focused on one element, there's

something else happening, like in the background or with voiceover.

Sight gags, where the comedy doesn't need dialogue to sell the punchline,

almost like an optical illusion.

Airplane 2, which will only get one mention in this whole video, has

precisely one good joke in the whole film, and it's a sight gag.

Casting serious actors.

Instead of hiring a group of comedians, they purposely hired actors who have

never done comedy before.

This added one of Airplane's key ingredients, deadpan.

How soon can you land?

I can't tell.

Why can't you take a guess?

Well, not for another two hours.

You can't take a guess for another two hours?

Given there's always something weird going on, having the characters treat

this as normal adds to the absurdity and delivers some of the most iconic

dialogue.

Use of double meaning.

It's like a double entendre, but without the sexy bits.

It's a form of pun, and thanks to their snappiness and beautiful simplicity, it

remains super quotable today.

And also there is neither the idiot hero nor the last sane man. No one person

stands out and goes, huh, well that was weird. This time everything is absurd

and no one is safe.

This element's carried over from Kentucky Fried Movie, like the name Rex

Kramer, this time without the M word.

Even the numerous flashback sequences play out like sketches from Kentucky

Fried Movie.

It has all the other spoof elements but also brings dark humour, which manages

to be edgy without resorting to gross out.

For Leslie Nielsen, who performed in movies like The Poseidon Adventure, this

was a role that forever changed him into a comedy actor and would redefine the

rest of his career.

1982's Police Squad was a TV series made to spoof police dramas, much like how

Mel Brooks' Get Smart spoofed spy dramas.

As with Airplane, Zaz lifted much of the source material, this time from TV crime

dramas like M Squad.

Police Squad is amazing, employing all the tricks from Airplane, but this time

with things they can only do on TV, like title cards, recurring characters, and a

title sequence with a guest star who doesn't appear in the episode and

immediately dies.

They also start doing these establishing pans at any new location, where they'll

pack in even more sight gags. It allows for the episodes to be textured with

jokes without interfering with the plot or the pace.

The series introduces Leslie Nielsen's best-known character, police detective

Frank Drebbing.

Who are you and how did you get in here?

I'm a locksmith.

And I'm a locksmith.

And once again, this is all played incredibly deadpan.

Married, one child.

That didn't work out, so he married a grown woman. But sadly, it was cancelled

after just six episodes because, get this, you had to watch it

chronologically to appreciate it. Which, as we know, no TV ever does that. Well,

apart from soap operas, reality shows, documentaries, mockumentaries, period

dramas, high fantasy, horror, romance, sci-fi, sports, crime. So they moved on

to another movie, Top Secret.

A kind of Elvis Presley spoof mixed together with a World War II spoof.

It has some incredible gags.

But in an effort to force these two different movies together, the plot

breaks up the fun too often and causes the whole unstructured thing to drag and

bomb in the box office.

After directing Ruthless People, Zazz, along with frequent collaborator Pat

Proft, reunited with Leslie Nielsen to pull an old cop out of early retirement

with an iconic siren.

The Naked Gun trilogy acts as a kind of reboot for Police Squad, repeating some

of the old jokes whilst reinventing Frank Drebin himself.

You see, in the TV series, Frank is way more serious. Even whilst the world is

weird, he played the part completely straight.

We're sorry to bother you at a time like this, Mrs. Twice.

We would have come earlier, but your husband wasn't dead then.

But in the Naked Gun series, he's changed to a more clumsy, Mr.

Bean-esque character.

In other words, the idiot hero.

Further into the trilogy, even more characters become idiots.

But it started with Frank.

It still played largely deadpan.

Now let's grab a bite to eat. But instead of everyone being caught up in

this absurdist world, it's now like everyone is mostly grounded, but Frank

is the spoof element.

So he generates moments of outrage or big reactions from his elaborate

improbable situations.

Well, when I see five weirdos dressed in togas stabbing a guy in the middle of

the park in full view of a hundred people, I shoot the bastards. That's my

policy. That was a Shakespeare in the Park production of Julius Caesar, you

moron. Now that Frank is an idiot, we get more idiocy, like clumsiness, more

slapstick, and taking

things literally.

With a moustache, about six foot three.

An awfully big moustache.

There's also a change now in how sex scenes are done in spoofs.

Nice beaver.

Thank you.

i just had it stuffed let me help you with that gone are the scenes of full

frontal nudity replaced instead with more pg friendly scenes that turn

titulation into this

the

third film has its moments which is a shallow sentiment i can say about

literally every spoof movie but it's easily the weakest of the batch and an

early sign that the genre is starting to wane In an almost desperate attempt to

keep the genre going past its prime, there's a bigger reliance on easy shots

and low-hanging fruit like a lot of pop culture references.

And problematic stuff like the big transphobic twist where Anna Nicole

Smith's character strips off for Frank to reveal a penis and he runs away to go

vomit. Yeah, we'll get back to that later.

Despite this, the Naked Gun series is the comedy renaissance of Leslie Nielsen

at its absolute peak.

and would come to define the kind of character he would continue to play for

much of his career.

Spoof movies operate as a kind of call and response, so the 60s had spy movies

and the 70s had disaster movies.

So for the other spoof movies of the 90s, it was time to turn to the defining

genre of the 80s. And I don't mean jazz styles.

Another word for spoof is lampoon.

However, National Lampoon didn't make spoofs all that much, sticking mainly to

raunchy comedies like Animal House, The Vacation Series and Van Wilder. But they

did dabble with a lethal weapon parody called Loaded Weapon 1.

Give me a name. Weren't your parents supposed to do that? A bold assumption

there, much like Doug's first movie.

The problem is, compared to the stuffy spy and disaster movies, action movies

like Lethal Weapon were already very self-aware, so this didn't really offer

anything new.

Perhaps in an attempt to address this, Last Action Hero

is an Arnie movie set within an Arnie movie.

which uses a regular kid who is pulled into the cinema screen to point out the

illogical nature of action movie tropes.

Much like how Galaxy Quest

has actors from a TV show forced to live the real thing, which in turn addresses

the tropes of Star Trek and sci-fi as a whole.

These aren't really spoofs, more like metacontextualization, a way to have an

outsider address the tropes of a genre but still with some real-world

grounding, much like how a mockumentary like Spinal Tap uses an outsider

influence of a camera crew to highlight the absurdity.

A parody for sure, but not technically a spoof. And if you want to fight me on

this, then please don't because I'm very weak. In 1991, Zazz members, Abrahams

and Proft, created Hot Shots.

Starring Charlie Sheen, it's a parody mostly of Top Gun, and it is an

excellent spoof.

Don't, don't look.

It runs with the cartoonish elements and slapstick, but remains delicately

balanced by actually telling the plot. This ensures that one side doesn't

outweigh the other, and the performances being kept straight and deadpan really

allow the comedy to stick the landing.

You're behaving like children.

He's being a jerk.

I'm not. R2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2. R2 times 10.

That's it. The exception to this is Admiral Benson.

Pudding!

No, thank you, sir. He remains the out-and-out oddball with his slapstick

and exaggerated war injuries.

From the Pentagon, sir. We just decoded it. Oh, good. Here, help me with this.

My eyes are ceramic.

A bazooka round, a little big oil. But because the weirdness is mostly kept to

one secondary character, and with Lloyd Bridge's excellent comedy performance,

it never outstays its welcome.

Oh, by the way, I want to thank you for having us over to dinner the other

night. Cheryl and I thought the stroking up was marvelous.

But, sir, we didn't have dinner the other night.

Really?

Where the hell was I?

And who's this Cheryl?

This was followed up with Hot Shots Part Deux, this time focusing on Rambo. While

it still has a ton of funny moments, Geronimo!

Geronimo!

Me! there is a noticeable tonal shift to more goofy, more crass and even more pop

culture references.

I love you in Wall Street!

The first film had pop culture references too, but they were mainly

limited to montages.

This time it's just a lot of stuff happening because it's something you've

heard of before and that's it. It does offer more of a commentary on action

movies, but when the villain is a clumsy,

domesticated Saddam Hussein with a lisp, The balance is off. The last spoof

to really explode in the late 90s was Austin Powers.

You

could argue this

is meta-contextual, as the story of a man from the 60s brought to the 90s

would be a fish out of water, but everyone is still a bit silly, so not

really.

We have some great physical comedy and double entendres. Did you get my other

gift? Yes, Basil, nice rack.

But now we're seeing an increase in cringe comedy in spoofs. Given the

increase in self-awareness in and of films, like action movies, it would make

sense that cringe would awkwardly arise to embarrass our empathy.

Because we're so...

gosh darn aware of things.

Tropes are still being challenged, like Dr. Evil's son pointing out the flaw in

every Bond villain's plan.

Wait, aren't you even going to watch them?

They could get away.

No, no, no. I'm going to leave them alone and not actually witness them

dying. I'm just going to assume it all went to plan. What?

And Elizabeth responded to Austin's outdated free love attitude.

Did you use protection?

Of course.

I have my 9mm automatic.

In fact, despite Austin being such a sex-driven character, I'm pleased to see

that he refuses to take advantage of a drunken Elizabeth without question.

It may be just basic human decency, but it shows that this character isn't just

a two-dimensional caricature, and after all these movies, it's nice to see one

that has actually aged well.

But it was clear, spoof movies were a dying breed, a corpse starting to

rot. And the only way to bring spoof movies back to life was to do something

scary.

Oh, that's good.

After directing I'm Gonna Get You Sucker, Keenan Ivory Wayans created the

90s TV series In Living Color, a sketch comedy show to rival SNL.

It would launch the careers of performers like Jim Carrey and Jamie

Foxx and included many of his family members, including his brothers, Marlon

and Sean.

It was hugely popular, but due to the network's censorship and creative

control, Keenan and his siblings would leave the show throughout the third and

fourth seasons.

So the Wayans turned their attention back to movies and made Don't Be a

Menace to South Central Whilst Drinking Your Juice in the Hood.

God, I sound so white.

Written and starring Marlon and Shawn Wayans, it's a classic spoof in nature,

but much darker in tone.

This ain't your baby.

Hey, that's some shit.

Much of the comedy goes for big reactions like shock, violence and gross

out. Probably as a result of trying to mash up many movies together, not a lot

really happens. It feels more like a series of slice of life moments.

Should I wear this check now?

There's one particularly good scene where they go to a store and are accused

of shoplifting by the Asian store owners, all the while there is a white

guy blatantly stealing everything.

But the high ground is lost with a sucky sucky $5 joke.

So a mixed bag overall.

Don't Be a Menace came out in 1996, the same year as the slasher movie Scream.

Scream briefly revived the slasher genre with its subversive meta take. It's

pretty much a parody of horror while still being a horror, much like how

Deadpool is both a superhero movie and a superhero parody.

Scream was huge, so Sean and Marlon set out to create a spoof, directed by

Keenan, called Scary Movie.

This was a smash hit at the box office, and it's clear to see why.

Following the footsteps of American Pie's revival of the raunchy sex comedy,

Scary Movie is loud, wild, and very, very crude.

It's probably the most impactful spoof movie since Airplane, because it

radically alters the genre for a teenage audience, meaning more sex, more drugs

and it reinvents traditional spoof elements like misdirection.

But the inherent problem with making a spoof about

Scream is, like action movies before it, Scream itself was already very

subversive.

They had a killer at your old high school, shorty? Nah, it was in this

movie Scream. Same dialogue and everything.

This is ill.

Shriek, if you know what I did last Friday the 13th, came out the same year

with the exact same premise, but at least tried to acknowledge the rules of

spoof, much like how Scream does with horror.

There are certain rules you have to follow in a parody situation if you want

to survive, okay? Number one, exaggerate everything.

Number 88, accept the ridiculous as logical.

Scary movie does poke fun at the horror tropes as well.

But to parody something that's already a parody generally results in the humor

aiming much lower.

It is cruel and sadistic and the characters are reprehensible.

Which isn't unexpected in a slasher movie, those kids are gonna die after

all. But the most mean-spirited part is the portrayal of the disabled special

officer Doofy, the standing for Scream's Dewey, portrayed like... this.

Look I loved Scary Movie when I saw it in the cinema 20 years ago and there's

still much that holds up.

The Wayans have never been beholden to political correctness much like their

wheelchair-bound character in Don't Be a Menace.

but the relentless cruelty aimed at Doofy just feels like such a cheap shot,

especially compared to the more cutting satire of Don't Be A Menace.

This is why I much prefer Scary Movie 2.

After Scary Movie's massive success, Miramax greenlit a sequel to come out

the following year, leaving the Wayans with nine months to make the whole

thing. This grueling process impacted the film's story, turning it into a kind

of hodgepodge of various horror film influences held together by a string of

jokes, like a series of moments.

She won't eat, she won't talk, the child won't even let me touch her.

Yes, sometimes you have to give them candy.

And while it's not perfect, given what the Wayans do when they actually have

more time, this is a marked improvement.

Because they had no time for bigger set pieces, they had to fill the blanks in

the script with more pop culture references.

You are the weakest link.

Goodbye. Like, they redid the what's up Budweiser advert in the first film,

which at least fit into the ghost-faced phone call thing. What's up?

But this time it's just an out-of-nowhere remake of that.

Nike basketball advert?

You remember that?

But this aside, because it was more gag focused, this got bigger laughs out of

me than the first movie.

Scary Movie was the shot of

adrenaline the spoof genre desperately needed.

So, what happened next?

Despite turning around a hugely successful sequel within a year, When

the Wayans asked for more money, once again, their creation was taken away

from them.

Scary Movie would continue to produce progressively worse sequels, but now

with some of the Zaz team.

While the sequel sequels cast spoof movie veterans Charlie Sheen and Leslie

Nielsen, they continually tried to force multiple film plots together, and not

just horror. But there's no subversion to it. It's just pure noise, and without

the Wayans' touch, it's completely toothless.

As for the Wayans, they would continue, but now more on their own terms.

Of the 50,000 people that call themselves actors, there's only 500

working actors.

Of that 500, most of them are white.

There are a few roles for black people, but those roles are usually for the

Wayans brothers.

Scary movie co-writers Phil Bowman and Buddy Johnson would also co-write Not

Another Teen Movie, a spoof that targets the tired tropes of high school romance

movies while still being a gross-out sex comedy.

Also, Naked Chris Evans.

Marvelous. Marlon Wayans would go solo and make A Haunted House in 2013.

And you know what? I like this movie a lot. Wouldn't it be great if we all

spent the night?

Well, that's an interesting idea. What do you think of that, Malcolm? Naked

sleepover? No. No?

It's weird. Oh, yeah, but it's definitely going to be weird, but are

you saying weird good or weird bad?

It's naturally a paranormal activity spoof, but it uniquely dedicates a lot

of time allowing us to get to know these characters now in a kind of hidden

camera meets mockumentary kind of way.

Marlon's usual cartoonish performance is reined in and saved for the bigger

reactions. What if it bites me? It's not a zombie, it's a ghost.

But this allows us to become endeared to this sweet couple who feel like they

have an actual dynamic.

Nobody's going to hurt you on my watch.

Okay? Okay.

Unless a nigga got a gun.

Then you on your own.

What? It has its problem areas, sure, but what I'm seeing here is a huge

growth from the scary movie days.

A more recent Marlon Wayans spoof, Fifty Shades of Black, sadly reverts back to

the low-hanging fruit of early Wayans movies, but given that he's one of the

few still actually trying, there's hope for the genre yet.

Fun fact, if you look at who wrote Scary Movie 1, you may also see the names

Friedberg and Seltzer on there. They get a code credit because they had also

written a Scream spoof and their script got bought just so that it could be

permanently shelved. But now their names are attached to a movie they did not

write and had nothing to do with. What a fun fact.

So now you may be wondering, who are Friedberg and Seltzer?

Oh god.

There's no nice way to say this, so I'll just say it.

Writer slash directors Friedberg and Seltzer are a scourge. They're a plague

on our cinematic landscape, a national shame, a danger to our culture, a

typhoon-sized natural disaster disguised as a filmmaking team, a Hollywood

monster wreaking havoc on the minds of America's youth and setting civilization

back thousands of years.

Okay then.

In 1993 Leslie Nielsen starred in a series of parody golf instructional

videos starting with Bad Golf Made Easier. The difference between a one

dollar ball and a three dollar ball is two dollars.

This was directed by Rick Friedberg and during filming he presented a script to

Leslie Nielsen that his son had written.

And so in 1996 Jason Friedberg and his creative partner Aaron Seltzer got their

first movie credit for Spy Hard.

Directed by Daddy Friedberg, this almost feels like a spoof of a spoof in that it

has all the style with none of the substance.

For example, here's a joke from Airplane. This woman has to be gotten to

a hospital. A hospital?

What is it?

It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now. And here

is the exact same joke in Spy Hard.

Sir! I hate to disturb you but we're picking up something very interesting on

the compound infrared detection system. Well, what is it? Oh, it's this really

neat security system, sir. It picks up the body heat... And they do this twice.

Sir, we've intercepted a very disturbing satellite transmission from our

listening post on the Rock of Gibraltar. Well, what is it? It's this really big

rock sticking out of the water there on the south coast of Spain.

It's like they're copying without understanding why it works.

They also sporadically throw in one-liners that aren't jokes.

You know,

I'm not sure they know how to tell a joke. For example, during this nightclub

scene, which becomes a Pulp Fiction reference for no reason, there's this

guy caught in the crossfire.

And then he's hit again later with a crossbow bolt.

Or is that a sword? Anyway.

Later, during this nun scene, which also becomes a Sister Act reference for no

reason, the nun throws a scalpel which hits him. Rule of three, well done.

Except, the scene actually has the guy turn up before the punchline, which

ruins the punchline. So instead of the basic joke format of set up, beat,

punchline, it's now set up, punchline, beat, punchline. It's like they're

trying to idiot-proof the film by showing you what the punchline will be

before they finish telling the joke. And they do this.

All the time.

To take his proposal and shove it.

What the hell?

What? You came on to me.

I did not.

Dog, your wife's a hoe.

Sounds like meat and stress.

Leslie Nielsen does his best with the material provided, but Spyheart's only

saving grace is Weird Al's feed song.

For the next movie, Jason Freeberg and Aaron Seltzer would take the director's

chair, and their debut movie was 2006's Date Movie.

This is a deeply sadistic film, and says that an overweight Alison Hannigan is

undeserving of love, and hideously disgusting to everyone around her, until

she gets all the fa- drained out of her like they're overhauling a car they

tried to add that she's disgusted because she has bad feet or a hairy back

but it's clearly the cellulite and fat that these people are reacting to and

this is within the first 15 minutes of the film what happens in the rest of the

film nothing in one word this movie is shallow there's a rise in pop

culture references that do nothing other than be the equivalent of dangling shiny

keys in front of a child.

Hey, is it too late to crash the funk your daughter wedding?

There's scenes that drag out forever and don't go anywhere.

And characters with no personality who... I object.

Oh, wait.

Is this actual character growth?

This isn't what you wanted.

It's what I wanted.

What was wrong about Grant?

He's a good man.

He even liked you when you were butt ugly.

Oh, well, they fucked it.

It was at this point any remaining shits were never given again.

Epic Movie is the forced amalgamation of multiple movies rammed together like

some kind of Hollywood monster.

And when it's not a pointless pop culture reference, it's gross out.

Okay, look, I don't mind lowbrow humor. For example, my all-time favorite

Newgrounds animation is two butts fighting.

But this isn't some low-budget internet video.

This is a multi-million dollar movie.

You could see this as a time capsule of the state of pop culture in 2007.

But it has nothing to say about pop culture. Nothing about the religious

undertones of Narnia. Nothing about the popularization of conspiracy theories by

the Da Vinci Code. Nothing about the abundance of adaptations or remakes.

Just, what if Harry Potter was a pervert?

Meet the Spartans is a 300 spoof, or a 300 rip-off as they call it. Well, Harry

Knowles at Ain't It Cool News says this movie is just a cheap rip-off of 300.

Which doesn't make sense, it's a spoof.

Anyway, it pulls back on forcing different movie plots together but still

finds ways to force references in any way.

Like for no reason, Carmen Electra turns into Venom's Spider-Man and fights this

guy who's like Sandman now.

And there's incessant cruelty aimed at female celebrities.

Like they attack Lindsay Lohan for no reason.

Paris Hilton stands in for the deformed outcast.

Britney Spears gets kicked down a hole.

Because, you know, a woman having divorced her husband, lost custody of

her children, entering drug rehab and having a public breakdown deserves to be

taken down a peg or two. Get fucked, Britney.

Oh, and leave Britney alone is also referenced.

It just plays on the Transformers chest.

For no reason.

Oh, and of course, if it's not pop culture, it's gross out.

As of right in this video, IMDb ranks Meet the Spartans as the 22nd worst

movie of all time.

Epic Movie is 12th. Number 1 is Disaster Movie.

Reviewers say it would be the worst movie ever made if it was actually a

movie at all, and I just don't see how anyone could not find Disaster Movie one

of the worst films of all time.

The opening quote of this segment was from a review of Disaster Movie, so it's

pretty bad then.

Disaster Movie goes back to the epic movie style of forcing multiple movies

together, somehow with even less cohesion. Pop culture references come

from everywhere, and again, for no reason. They'll just walk in, say

something, and leave.

They're not even popular references.

Like the film opens with a parody of 10,000 BC, and who remembers the movie

10,000 BC?

But it came out in 2008, so Disaster Movie just throws it in, because it's

quantity, not quality. It's stuff. It's just stuff.

Noisy, noisy stuff.

Sure, Kung Fu Panda is here, Batman is here, Beowulf, Dr. Phil, Hellboy, it

doesn't matter.

Whatever fills the time. Here's Hannah Montana under a rock, and she just talks

and talks and talks and nothing happens, and she keeps talking, and it goes

nowhere, and it's just stuff!

Stuff, stuff, stuff, stuff, stuff!

All gross out.

Exhale. In many ways, the style of Freeburg and Seltzer defy the standards

of spoof movies.

It's largely instant gratification with little care for its shelf life. If it

can make you laugh today, it doesn't matter if it will make you laugh

tomorrow. And they know they're not going to win any awards, like how on the

date movie DVD they invite actual movie critics to lay into the film on the

audio commentary, which is really funny.

And by about this point right here, people started walking out. I envied

this guy.

These movies feel like a pair of dudes spitballing ideas where nothing was off

limits. On the one hand, that sounds quite nice, liberating, freeform, dare I

say fun?

But their machine gun fire approach to gags just led to constant cheap shots,

which didn't help the frail reputation of the spoof movie genre.

Freeburg and Seltzer did not kill spoof movies.

We did.

The late 2000s, early 2010s were a tough time for spoof movies in cinemas. There

were successes like Johnny English, modest successes like Superhero Movie,

and box office bombs like Walk Hard.

The deserved bankruptcy of Pure Evil Incorporated brought an abrupt end to

the scary movie franchise, And following Vampires Suck, Friedberg and Seltzer

left Regency and no one rushed to fill their place.

So it seemed like studios didn't want to make spoof movies anymore and audiences

didn't really care all that much.

This led to spoofs being made more independently and released in limited

cinemas, straight to DVD or video on demand.

Because if they won't do it, we'll make it ourselves.

In order to be more of a surefire hit on an oversaturated marketplace, these

films tend to be more on the nose about what kind of film you're getting.

such as 2014's The Hangover Games, where various pop culture references are

forced to compete with each other.

Now, if this sounds like another Freiburg and Seltzer movie to you,

that's because they also made their own Hunger Games spoof. God damn it. This

could have had potential. Like, unbeholden to any studio, this was an

opportunity to critically analyze the state of pop culture, a response to the

Freiburg and Seltzer era of pop culture obsession.

Instead... It's exactly like a Freiburg and Seltzer movie.

I'm not a racist.

I got like eight black guys on my fantasy football team.

I mean, not the quarterback, obviously. That's a thinking man's position.

Seriously? There's literally a pair of characters called gratuitous nudity, and

that's their entire personality.

Tits. My friend is stuck.

The hungover games was made by Silver Nitrate, who in 2010 made the 41-year

-old virgin who knocked up Sarah Marshall and felt super bad about it.

Now you might be thinking that this would be a cut in deconstruction of Judd

Apatow movies.

I'm sorry, is that your ball sack?

Observant you are. Don't lie, you didn't think that at all. Like I said before,

subverting something that's already a subversion tends to aim much lower, like

Scream to Scary Movie, but by subverting comedy movies, this becomes a

desperately unfunny film.

What the fuck is that smell?

I don't fucking know, dude.

I should stress that the problem isn't with gross-out or toilet humour, because

it can be done well.

But the so-called

edgy humour the 41-year-old virgin resorts to is just lazy.

Shock is easier to write than comedy because we all know what is not allowed.

So you can just say or do that without any subversion or commentary and pretend

it's funny. Something's got a hold on me, will it? Baby hands. Oh, good God,

Lord, the baby's got a hold on me, wanker.

But the goal at that point isn't to make you laugh. It's to upset you.

And boy, do they lap that shit up. Like, oh, boo-hoo, snowflakes triggered much?

Which you know is actually a sign of a really good comedian actually we have a

rape scene played for laughs and it's not the first We

have transphobic jokes and it's not the first

I want you all to call me Loretta.

What? It's my right as a man.

You're getting lucky tonight.

He doesn't know you're a guy.

And how many times do we need to see a woman having a shit?

Too many peanut shoes.

The 41-year-old virgin is the culmination of all the nastier elements

spoof movies have passed on to one another, like a photocopy of a photocopy

getting worse and worse over time. Now, I don't think they were necessarily put

in with malicious intent, but when a genre is based around filling scenes

with as many jokes as possible, the temptation is always there to take the

cheap shot.

But we have also seen they don't need to.

And going forward, if spoof movies are to shake off their trashy reputation,

then they need to get out of the trash.

Which brings me to... Airplane Mode.

Starring noise enthusiast Logan Paul, this was planned to have a huge release

on YouTube, potentially sparking a brand new trend of movie distribution.

Until Logan's trip to the Suicide Forest, which nuked the whole deal with

Google, and the movie was later just pooped onto iTunes in 2019 with much

less fanfare.

Come in full circle, this is a loose remake of Airplane.

Very loose.

But it has more in common with the edgier humor of South Park and Family

Guy, or a knock-off approximation of it.

There is an attempt to be a spoof movie.

But instead of subtlety, it goes for screaming.

Instead of wordplay, it goes for memes.

And instead of creativity, it goes for... Tonally, it is very

nihilistic. The characters are cruel and insidious, and the portrayal of the

influencers seem to be completely non-human. Or maybe in LA, that's just

normal. I think I'd rather die. The result is uncomforting and gives little

to actually root for.

It's like they had to add this Hannibal Lecter-esque character to be the

unambiguous villain to avoid being the villains themselves.

Logan is somehow both the last sane man and the idiot hero, which means he's not

there to point out the flaws and neither is anyone else, losing all grounding in

reality. There is a vague attempt at self-aware satire like with the

influencers and the villain talking like a YouTube prankster, but overall this

plane flight feels more like an ego trip.

Now what?

In his review of 2015's The Walking Deceased, Matt Fowler says, It's hard to

say in this new world of honest trailers where parody fits in anymore.

But what is grief, if not love persevering? The internet is so

responsive to current media trends with parodies and memes, it renders any films

hitching their bandwagon to those same media trends completely obsolete.

So, outside of low-budget independent films, spoofs have stopped trying.

Instead, they go for more evergreen intellectual properties, like 2017's

Lego Batman, the best Batman movie, or 2018's Holmes and

Watson, the worst Batman movie.

It's safe bets like this that prevents us from getting something totally

inventive like Naked Gun.

Except they're trying to remake Naked Gun, and it's like... Don't.

Don't do that.

So what else can spoof movies do to fix themselves?

Watching all these movies, one thing I hadn't realized before was just how

horny they were. Like, lots of the nude and the crude, the slut and the bimbo.

It's all a bit male gaze.

It doesn't escape my notice that out of all the notable spoof movies I'd

watched, none were directed by women. So I added some more movies to my watch

list and...

Frozen challenges some of the Disney princess tropes. Clueless takes Jane

Austen's Emma, but with a 90s twist.

The Love Witch is a pastiche of 60s horror.

CB4 is a mockumentary of a phony rap group. But I'm a Cheerleader is a

romantic comedy juxtaposed against gay conversion therapy.

But none of these are really spoofs.

In fact, Shrek, of all things, is the closest we get to a spoof movie directed

by a woman, although it's actually co-directed by Vicki Jensen.

Oh shit, and Wayne's World. I nearly forgot about Wayne's World.

Not sure what it's technically spoofing, but it has big spoof energy.

Excellent. So maybe in future, the Boys Club could invite more women to join in.

Just a thought.

But looking at the spoof movie genre as a whole, they should be pushing

envelopes instead of pushing tastes.

They should be independent of their source material instead of codependent

on it. And they shouldn't be afraid to take shots, but just be considerate.

about which way they're aiming to each other movie studio who finally decides

to bring back spoof movies once and for all i just want to tell you good luck

we're all counting on you oh hi welcome to the end of the video as we saw making

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