Tosh.0 started out great but has become kind of mean-spirited.
But his stand up continues to be exceptional. Completely Serious and Happy Thoughts are well worth the time to watch once and IMO the funny stands up to repeat viewings, too.
The 1% is that I think Tosh.0 has always been mean-spirited and I personally know someone who was very negatively affected by that kind of “make fun of people on the internet thing” (I know the “boom-goes-the-dynamite” kid), and saw what it did to him.
So I hate Tosh.0, but not because of Tosh himself. He, on the other hand, is downright hilarious.
Interesting… I know a kid (well college student) who was the subject of a “Web Redemption” and he loved the experience. He said Daniel couldn’t have been nicer. They spoke before taping and agreed to boundaries. He thought it was hilarious (as did I) even though he was being made fun of and said he would do it again in a heartbeat.
Nope.
As others said, offensive doesn’t mean funny, expecially if it is the only thing you know.
Every once in a while I catch Tosh-O and it always seems like the same episode.
He’s not unfunny and can nail it, but he gets old quickly.
The show is sometimes very funny, but usually derivative, repetitive, and mean. The standup of his I’ve seen is some of the best I’ve seen in recent years.
He was a college student at the time too and (IIRC) I believe he got a web redemption of his own.
But the beginning of it all was actually because of the website ebaumsworld. They found the video and caused it to go viral with the “this kid is so stupid hahaha”, which led to other people calling him stupid etc. etc.
Tosh.0 is just the most well-known example of the “find videos of people on the internet and make fun of them” kind of show.
Sure. Funny guy. Quick wit. But I cannot take his whiny-bro dilivery. And I suppose that fact that he has that Tosh.0 show taints him for me too. I just frigging hate shows like that … it’s one step away from Ow My Balls.
Agreed. I love his show, it doesn’t always hit, but it’s usually funny. Sometimes it has me practically rolling. For instance, the one with the angry ginger kid and mee-maw a few years back, that they were related and just feeding off each other… I completely lost it.
Generally, mean-spirited and shock humor would turn me off, but this is the impression I always got which is why it didn’t bother me. How could he keep getting this people on his show, particularly people who seem traumatized by the situation, if it wasn’t part of his shtick that he’s making fun of them, but ultimately he’s trying to help them out. That is, some of them seem to take the approach that they realize they come across silly and they want to engage in some self-deprecating humor, and these are often the best ones, but for some it’s clear he’s not going as far as he might otherwise and it’s a way for people to recover. After all, he even had the “Boom-goes-the-dynamite” guy on his show as a web redemption and it seemed like one where he was a bit hamstrung by his sensitivity to how it was initially received. How did he react to seeing himself on the show?
The one complaint I do have, which I can’t really blame on him, is that the level of satire in terms of his shtick and delivery seems lost on a lot of the audience. In that regard, it’s not that unlike South Park, where some people criticize the potty humor in it and seem to miss the satire, meta-humor, and social commentary. Now, I don’t think Tosh has that level of sophistication, but there is more to it than just the apparent laughing at people on the internet and potty humor.
I find a lot of other shows of that nature seem a lot more mean-spirited than Tosh.0. There is more to that job than showing idiots doing stupid things and making fun of them publically. Sure, Tosh makes fun of them. But he isn’t afraid to get in on the act and make himself look stupid.
His movie reviews on the show are hilarious IMHO (particularly The Human Centipede).