The Highbrow Fart Joke: Misleading Metaphors, False Themes and Other Comic Devices in the Buffyverse
The Highbrow Fart Joke:
Misleading Metaphors, False Themes and Other Comic Devices in the Buffyverse
by Lostboy
Yea, noise? Then I’ll be brief.
O happy dagger!
This is thy sheath.
Juliet in Romeo and Juliet (V, iii, 169-170)
WILLOW: Maybe you're trying too hard. Doesn't this happen to every vampire?
SPIKE: Not to me, it doesn't!
"The Intiative", Buffy the ( Read more... )
Comments 19
Have a good holiday!
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Also you needn't worry about ruining all comedy ever by breaking it down...I always knew I loved the comedy of extreme understatement, but when I found out the Greeks had a word for it, it lost none of its luster.
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Plus, I hadn't fully groked the Spike = banished Puritan equation when Harmony boots him, being too focused on her hilarious "empowered woman" delusion -- which I suspect fits in nicely with your HFJ theory
It really does fit it, and I almost included a sentence about that. It's almost a throwaway line, since Harmony and her current reading material isn't really too involved in the False Flag, but now that you say it, I do wish that I called it out as a HFJ because it so totally is.
Also you needn't worry about ruining all comedy ever by breaking it down...I always knew I loved the comedy of extreme understatement, but when I found out the Greeks had a word for it, it lost none of its luster.
Hahahahah. Mei osis, you osis, I guess. ;-)
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HARMONY : No. (She pushes him away.) I'm powerful, and I'm beautiful, and I don't need you to complete me. (She goes around the bed and lifts the matress revealing a stake which she grabs.) And you're mean. (She stands up holding the stake up.)
SPIKE : (Backpedeling, then falling off the bed.) You had that in our bed? Do you know how dangerous that is?
Hahahahah. Now I'm thinking maybe I ought to revise my essay and put this one in, because it is so obviously a HFJ, tossing in the old "stake as phallus" canard.
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I think one reason there is a lot of confusion (and, also, a lot of healthy debate) about the themes of "Buffy" is that the show is so reference-rich, it's easy to mistake a false theme used for parody or satire from the intentional themes and the meaningful subtext in service of those themes. - I also believe that it's easy to read too much into the subtext and give it more power than was intended by the writers, or to infer something based on personal experience that maybe had nothing to do with the subtext, hence all this confusion about themes. It's why comedy is so subjective in the first place.
When it comes to writing comedy, I think the first question is, "Is this funny?" If it's funny, then, "What does this add?" If it adds something, then, "But what does it mean?" I agree that often times the writers use your term of HFJ to dispel any viewer's inference of something obvious, because that's so stylistic of Buffy writers to do ( ... )
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When I spoke in the first paragraph about subtext and how easily misread it can be, really, I'm speaking about the more dramatic themes. When it comes to comedy, I believe it's more of a gut reaction for a viewer. You either get the joke or you don't. And then there are people who get the joke, and then think about it. I imagine Buffy writers love that type of person, because that's the person who makes a meta post about high fart jokes, hahahaha ( ... )
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Yeah exactly. In the moment of watching the episode, I wasn't thinking about why it was so funny. I was too busy laughing. It's only by going back to the material afterwards you can figure out why it was so funny. And the only reason I think that's somewhat important is because, well, I don't see people doing much of that, and I think some running gags in the Buffyverse are occasionally mistaken for serious themes.
You need to have balance, and the writers were constantly tipping scales between drama and comedy. It's not easy to do well, but it should be tried.
Yeah. Shakespeare was pretty good at swinging the pendulum from comedy to tragedy, which is probably why his work endured. Before BTVS came along, much of TV had grown very stagnant and mono-tonal, like it had been doing a slow dive into mediocrity ever since "M.A.S.H" ended.
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Just a quick thought. Harmony kicking Spike out could also work as the young upstart America kicking out the old English imperialists. Plays also because Spike represents the imperialist position in the debate, though toned down a bit for TV, no doubt, considering the racism that's part of imperialism. ("We have the right to conquer because we are civilized and they are savages. In fact, it's our God-given duty to civilize them!")
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An interesting thought, but the reason I disagree is that this is the "Thanksgiving" episode. The Revolution wouldn't happen for more than a century after the landing at Plymouth Rock, and when Spike comes to the Scoobies (on the verge of sizzling death) he is the very picture of the desperate, starving pilgrims at Plymouth who were saved by the Wampanoag tribe's neighborly generosity.
Plays also because Spike represents the imperialist position in the debate, though toned down a bit for TV, no doubt, considering the racism that's part of imperialism.
See, the way I see it is that Spike isn't representing any position. He sort of whining (but in an aggressive way), because he used to be powerful, and now he isn't powerful anymore because the Initiative chipped him. He can't stand listening to people complain about having power, because he doesn't have any power anymore ( ... )
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Sorry, I just realized that I should have explained my reasoning here better. I think what's important about him invoking "Julius Ceasar" is that the Britons (i.e. Spike's ethnicity) were conquered and colonized by the imperialistic Romans, in much the same way that Scoobies are complaining about how the Chumash were treated.
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