12oz Mouse - Defend Your Show

[Graham]

Okay, this came up in a video discussion thread.

I cannot stand the Adult Swim show 12oz Mouse.
I have watched several clips, on different occasions, and I do not see why people say it is funny.

- The animation is crap. This can totally work, if there are other redeeming features (see XKCD) but there are not.
- The audio sounds like it's their first time reading the script, or possibly it's just improv'd.

and my main issue:
- It's not funny. Comedy is about the unexpected, and when you establish a world that is entirely different from our own, where anything can happen, and then show anything happening, that is not unexpected and it's not comedy. Weird for the sake of weirdness isn't funny.

Whenever I tell fans of the show that I don't think it's funny, they respond in the same way, every time: "You don't get it."


Now, look son. I love comedy in all forms, from the driest/wryest Fry & Laurie sketch, to Jason Biggs fucking an American Pie.
I love the offensive humour of South Park and the absurdest humour of Harvey Birdman (which works, because it has an established structure to mess with).

Explain to me what, exactly, I am not getting, when I watch 12oz Mouse.

[Interruptor Jones]

Oh Harvey Birdman. Good times.

I don't get 12oz mouse, and I don't find it funny, but when I lived in a house with cable I would choose it over Tom Goes to the Mayor because it hurt my brain less. It was sort of like watching Dadaism argue with itself.

Late-night cartoons are the 4chan of television. My preferred memes were Clone High, Harvey Birdman, Venture Bros., Squidbillies (oh god why) and Aqua Teen Hunger Force for the sole reason of the Mooninites. I eventually had to file for media divorce because cable and I were having codependency issues.

[Jillers]

Whenever I've seen 12 Oz. Mouse (among other Adult Swim shows of that ilk) I say frequently: "Well, why the hell don't I have my own poorly written, poorly drawn piece of crap cartoon show on Adult Swim?"

...Why don't I?

[Interruptor Jones]

You'd have to make a burnt offering of your self-respect and many hundreds of brain cells, and after that the rewards don't seem as appealing.

[Jillers]

You'd have to make a burnt offering of your self-respect and many hundreds of brain cells, and after that the rewards don't seem as appealing.

I went to a very liberal liberal arts school... I'm surprised I have any brain cells left.

[Fuzzyfreaker]

I assure you, I don't believe that there is anything to get. I like some Adult Swim shows. I enjoy Venture Brothers, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, and Robot Chicken. I sometimes even enjoy the sheer absurdity of Superjail.

But shows like 12oz Mouse, Squidbillies, and the multitude of others on that channel I believe have no other reason than to appeal to the desire for weirdness that stems from folks who are horrendously baked and want to watch moving pictures.

[Interruptor Jones]

I do believe that's why they exist - nothing short of being stoned could make me understand The Brak Show, what the hell was up with that anyways.

[Cybren]

If I may be so bold, I would agree with but expand Graham's point to include that Tim and Eric are the Jason Friendburg and Aaron Seltzer of television.

[Joshua]

I like 12oz mouse, couldn't tell you why, but I do enjoy watching it. And no I don't get high to watch it. I also enjoy most of the shows on adult swim barring super jail, but that is mostly because the way some stuff is drawn makes me kinda sick feeling.

[Evisr]

I haven't seen any clips from it.. but sounds like a stoner show.

Edit: after watching some clips I do agree with Graham. WTF is this? This just looks like horrendous dry comedy. Maybe I will update this if I am high or drunk to see if it has the same effect or not.

[Cake]

I tried to watch some clips on youtube, and it makes me want to punch a baby.

[wedrinkritalin]

I want more space ghost

[King Kool]

I recall some people saying things about Aqua Teen Hunger Force. The thing about that show is that it's only funny when you really know the characters, so it takes maybe a whole season to start to like it. As they said in a commercial, "First you hated it, now you love it more than you've ever loved anything before."

12 Oz. Mouse is different. It's obviously completely absurd (12. Oz Mouse is to Aqua Teen as Aqua Teen is to Will and Grace), which I always appreciate. But as the show went on, it got a very strong meta-plot. The characters that seemed random seemed to form something slightly coherent. There was harmony from dissonance.

Some shows take a while to grow on you. Like Assy McGee. At first, I thought it was awful, but as it started turning into a parody of Dirty Harry and Sly Stallone and those putrid Law and Order shows, I started to like it.

Then there are shows that defy you to watch them, like Tom Goes to the Mayor and TAEASGJ. The problem with TAEASGJ is there's no point to it. It's all senseless. Sure, it's a parody of television in general, but to no real end. It's sometimes funny, but mostly just relentless.

I'm not saying I loved 12. 0z Mouse, but I appreciated it. Then again, I also like Xavier: Renegade Angel, which is the only show on AS that I think is strange even for me.

[Dave-O_Boy]

heh well this got out of hand.

Since the [adult swim] board doesn't allow direct linking for whatever reason, I'll just copy and paste some of the explanation by some of the fans.
The general idea is that you can't understand it from just watching clips. The animation is meant to be a parody of whole poorly animated adult cartoons thing.

Don't kill the messenger.

Its about a bunch of animators and writers who tried to make a smart comedy to challenge the hordes of mediocrity. Its a story of both victory and defeat, the 300 writers and animators vs the millions of mentally retarded robot chicken viewers with their peat rose hair cuts and askew pupils.

They didn't win the battle but they changed the world with their actions.

It's about a bank-robbing mouse being stuck in a holographic, cardboard city. Haunted by memories of the past, he rallies off-the-wall friends to try and break out of a cycle.

The whole show takes place in the time span of a minute.

it's about an alcholic mouse, a shark out of water, an incredibly wealthy box, a potsmoking officer, a rapper in debt, a corndog farmer, a record producer, a squrrel that plays the drums, a transexual, a hypnotizing umbrella, a hand that gone off on it's own, a pair of cross eyes, a ninja archerist, an anoying terminator, a shadow figure, a clock, and a cardboard city.

It's more fun to figure it out by yourself.

But in a nutshell, it's a surrealistic mindfvck centered around a mouse and his efforts to make sense of, and ultimately escape from, an imaginary world and the group conspiring to keep him trapped in that world, for purposes unknown.

Now imagine it in a cartoon form where the military scientists are placing unwilling subjects in a halucinatory simulation to test the effects of psychotropic drugs on it's subjects and how it effects them in certain scenarios. Then imagine one of the test subjects that has a stronger will than most and begins regaining memories of his past before being abducted and forced to take part in this project and fights back... you have the visionary briliance that is Ozmo.

Or if all you do is get high as hell and watch it to laugh... it's about a drunk mouse, a talking eyeball, a stoned cop and a no eyed square guy.

12 oz mouse is a strange little show
that gets stranger still when you look below.
its surface is tricky for some to get past
but if you can, the story is vast.
a hip little mouse who likes liquor and guns,
living a life of unanswered questions.
his friends try to help him along as he goes
the question then is.. are they real friends or foes?
his enemies are crafty.. oh they have their ways
of gleaning his mind while they mix up his days.
theres flashes of stuff that make no sense
then the pieces fit together and it gets more intense.
so watch 12 oz mouse in the vids on may 16th
and open your mind to whats underneath.

Oh and this one was my favorite.

It's about seeing how many fanbois will bend over backwards to convince people that the latest piece of [as] neurotic-talk-comedy tripe is really high art that most of just don't 'get' because we aren't 'smart enough' to 'laugh' at things that 'aren't funny' etc etc etc.

Honestly, I think it was created solely to cause these kinda of discusions over the internet.
But why talk about Ozmo when there's SuperJail!

[Jillers]

Oh and this one was my favorite.

It's about seeing how many fanbois will bend over backwards to convince people that the latest piece of [as] neurotic-talk-comedy tripe is really high art that most of just don't 'get' because we aren't 'smart enough' to 'laugh' at things that 'aren't funny' etc etc etc.

Fun Thing I Learned Which May or May Not be True (ie: I read this in college, and remember it, but don't remember the text book): "High Art" was not a term coined by artists, but by sellers who would call crap "High Art"s because it wasn't selling in order to persuade people into buying these pieces of "art" on the premise that if they couldn't see the piece as "high art" then they aren't "smart enough" to "get it".
So, when people refer to anything as "high art" I'm highly suspicious of it.

[Graham]

None of those posts actually explain anything about why people love the show, they're just saying what it is.

If it truly is being stupid for the sake of being stupid, that's not clever, that's stupid.

And SuperJail is crap too.

[Dave-O_Boy]

*shrugs* It's refreshingly different I suppose.

As for Superjail!, the animation is wonderful. It may not be Ghost in the Shell, but it's all hand drawn and really detailed. Sure the writing isn't that great at all, but it's visibly driven. It may not be funny, but it's entertaining.

[Interruptor Jones]

Yeah, I can't tell you why people like it either. It terrifies me when it's not being off-the-wall stupid, or on fire. Again, like pitting existentialist philosophies against each other in an arena made of restroom graffiti and silly string - pointless, but tries very hard to catch the eye.

[King Kool]

I should also point out that how good a TV show has to be to hold my interest that late at night isn't very high, in the same way that I don't worry about the vitamins in a Big Mac at around the same time.

This reminds be of conversations I have with my comedian friend. He hates Larry the Cable Guy and a handful of other comics. I'll watch most of the ones he hates because what I'm asking for from comedy is not as specific. When you study humor, and especially when you create it like the LRR guys do, I can imagine it's harder to entertain because it's less unexpected when you have a great understanding of humor itself.

[spartanhelmet]

Boy do I feel a little out of it here. I've never seen nor heard of 12oz Mouse before, so yeah.

I blame living in this country

[Metcarfre]

I think the only Adult Swim program I've enjoyed was Harvey Birdman, and that on DVD. Harvey Birdman is tremendously awesome, though.

[Bananafish]

Birdman was probably my favorite show on there, cant really remember any others.

I just cant get into that stuff like Robot Chicken, 12oz Mouse, etc. That one show I dont know the name of where its some 2 guys just...doing things? I never really saw it, just the commercial but it turned me off right away.

[Genghis Ares]

For Adult Swim I loved Birdman, and of course there's Venture Bros., and I like Robot Chicken for the most part, they usually are pretty good, sometimes they'll have some bad ones, but every show is like that now it seems. Some of Stroker and Hoop is alright, ATHF is usually bad but sometimes they'll have something ok.

But 12oz Mouse, Assy Mcgee, Tom/Mayor, Super Deluxe, Tim/Eric are all pretty lame and pretty much suck ass most of the time.

[Bryy M. Miller]

The only part of 12oz. Mouse that I actually liked was, when everyone started shooting guns for some reason, the Chinchilla rises up out of the background with this gattling gun.

[The R]

I have only seen a little bit of 12oz mouse, and I could say that if this were 1995 when I was 10, I would have loved it. But present, its just juvenile garbage that's LOL RANDUMB XD, and from what I hear that it's late-night makes it even more baffling.

Speaking of 1995, YTV did have this sketch comedy show with hints of randomness that was executed quite well, and it was called SQUAK BOX. But there really is no comparison since Squak box had actual sketch comedy and writing.

But at least 12oz mouse isnt youtube poop. I can never comprehend how many 5-star votes and comments of "HILARIOUS" can come from an old commercial or mario animation with lots of video filters and repeating parts and alternating pitch & loudness.