Sounded like him to me in the clip, actually.
Yeah, I was really disappointed in that moment on Modern Family. Such a funny joke, but the moment they feel the need to spell it out it just disintegrates.
Arrested Development was never afraid of letting jokes go over your head, because they knew that the ones you have to jump to catch are so much more satisfying. It was never obtuse or referential for obscurity’s sake; everything paid off.
I suppose that depends how you define it, but the “Mr. Roboto” joke, IMHO, was pretty obscure. Of course, I love it for that fact, though. It’s still amusing on the literal level, though.
Actually, this article about AD jokes kind of goes into part of why I love it so much. You can write it off as jokes “too clever for their own good” or “inside baseball” or whatnot, but the literal level of comedy stands up, in my opinion. I just love how they can weave all these levels of comedy in so seamlessly.
I am surprised if this is an obscure reference.
Unlike Hulu Netflix doesn’t have commercials so each episode should be pretty close to 30 minutes. Is AD airing on any actual TV channels overseas?
It is the way you’re using the word. Technically a network is an assortment of TV stations broadcasting over the airways, but in practice it just means whoever distributes at TV show to the public. At least that’s how it sounds on DVD commentaries when the producers keep refering to “the network” even on cable shows.
But they could set it up to go into syndication in a year or two. Netflix may very well want to sell it to a Network (or IFC) to make some real money on it after the initial viewing slows down and they’ll need to be less then 30 minutes for that. Of course, they could be 30 minutes on Netflix and shorter on Network/Cable TV.
Also, regarding some of the visual jokes, on the youtube thing I mentioned earlier, the cast mentioned that they weren’t even in on some of them. Jason Bateman and Will Arnett mentioned catching some of the background props and stuff on the fridge between takes or even watching it years later on TV.
shrug It may be, or maybe it’s not. I don’t remember that commercial being an integral part of pop culture. I certainly didn’t remember it, and it’s one of the “‘53 Arrested Development’ Jokes You Probably Missed” article I linked to. (ETA: Although I see this is a 1999 commercial it’s a reference to, and I wasn’t around in the US from '98-'03, so it’s absolutely possible I just missed the cultural reference because of that. Still, it shows up on the list and you have to make a small series of connections to fully get it.)
I think what a lot of people missed was that it’s the same actor.
Yup. I totally got the level of the joke that it was a reference to an old commercial, but had no idea that Tony Hale was actually the guy in the commercial.
Ah! Did not realize that.
I’ll reiterate what others have said, and add this: Arrested Development’s humor was dense. The reason it never quite found an audience was because you couldn’t eat dinner and watch the show at the same time, because you’d miss too much. There were jokes that I didn’t catch for a hell of a long time- one, in fact, took me three years to get.
As seen in this very thread with one aspect of the “Mr. Roboto” joke. 
Wow. That bench sign gag is a complete AD rip off. I think fans of shows like Modern Family and the Office don’t understand how much these shows take from AD.
Here’s a list of 53 hidden jokes from the series.
Fun list, but can someone explain this one to me:
In the first episode, Buster’s first scene (or at least one of his first) starts with him saying “Heeey, brother,” and giving Michael (as I recall) an unwanted backrub. The narrator describes Buster as a perpetual student, taking classes on a variety of topics (including therapeutic massage - as well as cartography, though he was left with the impression that blue regions on maps represented land) because the family’s wealth meant he never had to actually do anything.
The joke being that even at that early stage, Buster had a lot in common with Oscar, his real father.
Ah yes! I had forgotten that Oscar was Buster’s real father.
That clip was supposed to be amusing?