Beyond a Joke, Beyond a Genre – Week 4
Parody Week – Keeping Up With The Assessment
- What is your understanding of the comic form and concepts explored this week, with reference to the reading(s), in-class discussion, and/or your own research?
The focus for this week was investigating ‘Parody’ as a mode of comedy. I have come to realise that there are many definitions and ways that people absorb comedy. Many genres have been created which include comedic moments yet are not classified as a “comedy”. Action comedy, Romantic comedy ect. However, are there types/modes of comedy that allow other genres to play within? That sounds complicated… I guess it is!
After class I thought of a comparison of two similar hybridized films, both being action/comedy. One example is The Avengers (2012), and the other is Deadpool (2016). The Avengers has many comedic moments, however Deadpool is overall comedic. Even though both films have superheros and villains, and are also apart of the Marvel universe, Deadpool is by far more amusing… is this because of the mode of comedy it uses? Would Deadpool be considered a paradox of a superhero film?
- How does your media artefact respond to these constraints and concepts?
Our sketch for this week is titled, “Keeping up With The Assessment”, and as you may be able to guess, it is a parody of reality TV. The idea was quite simple and inspired from the class discussion we had with comedian, Hannah Camilleri. It was interesting when she was asked about how she generates her ideas, and she replied saying that many of her scripts are written with the same structure. For example, one character is logical, the other characters are unreasonable and ridiculous. As well, the humour comes from the conflict of her scenes, and because she has one reasonable character and one non reasonable, they collide in a humorous way.
- What have you learned about comedy’s relationship to other forms/genres by making this sketch?
Making this sketch has made me realise that it is important to research as many details you can about the other form/genre. Doing this detailed research will allow the comedy to fall more naturally because a lot of the time, doing something opposing or surprising in a hybridized form will cause people to laugh. We chose reality TV to parody in this sketch. I think with more research we would have been able to amplify our comedy even further. Our sketch is amusing, however there are areas that could be amplified.