This isn’t an example of wit by any standard, although many do think it’s funny.
Okay, stand back. I may blow your mind here. Perhaps the single biggest reason this kind of stuff is funny is that it makes people like you tense up and say things like “insulting people intentionally - or not even knowing that you insult, which is forgivable - shows an obvious lack of any decent upbringing.” Get it?
Hmmm… I’ve seen the Star Wars bit and I did think it was pretty funny. I saw a few more bits of Triumph and it was less funny, but I definitely understand what the character is about. Which is why I see the humour in:
“So you’re French and Canadian, yes? So you’re obnoxious and dumb”
It’s about on the same level as when he asked a Star Wars geek:
“You’ve been waiting in line for tickets all night? What are you going to tell your imaginary girlfriend?”
In both cases, he’s playing common stereotypes. It’s not PC, but that’s the point of the shtick. Worth a laugh, even though the second line is funnier IMO.
However.
He crossed the line with at least one comment:
“You’re in North America; learn the language.”
Pretty bening, you think. I can’t blame you, as taken for itself, it is. It crosses the line because this utterance has a history. Triumph wouldn’t go around Louisiana telling people to go back to their cotton fields. It’s not as bad, but it’s closer, historically. The comment above was, and perhaps still is, said seriously to French Canadians. It’s about as close as you get to real racist slur towards French Canadians. It’s that bad.
I would say that Triumph is that part of the show with the highest following. And that his bits are the ones which are most traded around the internet the most. He’s the only part of sketch form the show to lauch several thread in Cafe Society. He’s even done guest bits on other shows. And now he’s got his own comedy CD out. For Conan not to take his top bit to Canada would have been odd.
Watch some if you want. The Star Wars one is really the best. I’m partial but I loved his weather report for Hawaii.
No offense, mattmcl, but Triumph has some hillarious moments, and some not so hilarious ones. C’mon, lighten up, I know you guys enjoyed the Rick Mercer stuff, I did.
That’s pretty funny.
Did you guys see the American Idol Triump? That was hillarious.
I may have this wrong, but I believe the voice and hand behind snort Triumph is Robert Smiegel, of SNL’s TV Fun House comics (Ambiguously Gay Duo, etc.).
I dunno, when Ali G did his thing in Northern Ireland, he really went to town, and it was hilarious. I don’t think that many people were offended.
E.g. to a unionist:
Ali G: So is you British or is you Irish?
Unionist: I’m British!
Ali G: So is you here on holiday then?
Satire (or even dumb humour) is good when it’s dangerous.
Damn, I thought this thread was going to be about “Talking to Americans” on This Hour Has 22 Minutes. Well, never mind.
If you really only like ‘reasonable’ comedy, who do you find funny?
It also helps to know the stand-up of Don Rickles, to truely enjoy Triumph the insult comic dog.
Possibly the funniest five minutes ever committed to videotape.
All you overly-sensitive Canadians need to take a look so you can understand Triumph’s schtick.
Yeah, but if you want to play that game, then you have to be sure to understand what’s at stake. Getting the satire right is a tremendous balancing act. I’m just afraid the writers didn’t know what buttons they were pushing when they came up with that one.
Ah, I forgot the rest of my post.
The ultimate irony is that Triumph the Insult Comic Dog is a blatant rip-off of Ed the Sock, a, yes, Canadian invention. Note the similarities: sock puppet on late-night TV show, cigar firmly clenched between “teeth,” lewd commentary directed at nearby females, strangulated voice, often lame attempts at “celebrity roast” humor. Verily, even our grimier attempts at humor are stolen from the Canadians.
But geez! I remember sitting at a party a year or so ago in Toronto with a group of locals who were desparately trying to convince me that, no, really, “Talking to Americans” was in no way whatsoever trying to be offensive to Americans, that it was just trying to show the “reality” of how “Americans are ignorant of world affairs,” as one person put it to me. Gimme a break! I could go to Toronto tomorrow (why, I will be in Toronto tomorrow, come to think of it) and find at least one or two passerby out of 100 who I could convince that Canada was about to sell Alberta to the US. If I filmed all 100 of those people, and then made a TV program that only showed the one or two gullible folk, would that be an accurate depiction of Canada? No, any reasonable person would assume that I was trying to provoke insult. And that was the entire import of “Talking to Americans.”
Look, matt, every country has made TV programs that play on stereotypes and cross the line into national insult. I remember a program in the UK that “proved” that Germans liked to steal beach chairs while on holiday. My ex saw a program in Norway that made fun of the Swedes (Norway, I tell you!) It’s a deplorable thing, yes, but it makes no sense to point fingers at somebody for doing what you do, especially when the irony seems lost on so many viewers.
First of all, I don’t think that you can compare this with what Rick Mercer did. He went down to the states, talked to people, and compiled the really dumb ones to make a satirical portrait of Americans. If someone went to Quebec and interviewed a bunch of Quebecers who said some really stupid shit (and you can find people who say stupid shit almost anywhere) then it would have been funny. But nobody’s going to Houston, calling it Homoston, and yelling insults at the locals for a laugh.
Triumph isn’t only stupid and inane (and racist), but he’s also a total fucking rip-off. (Please disregard the misuse of ‘begat’ in the headline… fucking Toronto Star…)
Oh for God’s Holy Sake. Have you ever seen a Friar’s Club Roast, where it’s an hour DEDICATED TO INSULTING ONE PERSON? On every level?
Triumph insults everyone EVERYONE, race, creed, color, social class. Get this, he even openly admitted that “CATS ARE CUNTS”. And it’s a riot. I think he’s one of the funniest characters on t.v.
And I think to compare the term wetback with “Quebecker” is…over the top at the least.
I don’t really get insulted to my core when someone calls me a Chicagoan. People making fun of my city makes me MORE proud of it. (And Chicago is the butt of a TON of jokes)
I think that as people, we should not tolerate the insults hurled at us by dogs. Who are they to stereotype us?
What is next? When I’m competing for a job with a giraffe, others will look at me and have impressions formed by the comic stylings of a dog named Triumph! That’s not right.
The OP makes great points…
…for me to POOP ON!
This reminds me of the furor over Dame Edna’s comments about learning Spanish being helpful so you could speak to the gardener.
If you knew who Dame Edna was, no big deal. Out of context, it’s outrageous.
matt_mcl, you may not be aware of this, but your TV has two buttons. One controls the volume, the other changes the channel. Get more familiar with the second one and you will find yourself being less insulted by a fucking hand puppet.
Lighten the fuck up.
Actually, in an interview with Mercer, he said that the biggest problem isn’t weeding out the knowledgeable responses from the funny-gullible ones, but that the biggest challenge was getting people to stay on topic.
Dewey Cheatum it’s not an “oversensitive Canadians” thing. Conan O’Brien just waded bigtime into a major political hotbed.
It doesn’t seem that his team did the background research before they decided to have fun with “good-natured skewering”. Triumph would be received quite differently in Ontario, BC, or on Canada’s east coast. Going into Quebec and telling a “fat guy” to try “separating himself from donuts” is treading on very dangerous waters.
You have to understand that Trudeau had to enact the War Measures Act – martial law – during the FLQ chaos of the 1960s. The separatist issue is still extremely dicey and volatile. Rocking the boat Triumph-style is a tremendously ill-advised and not funny to those living in Quebec. Yes, indeed they are highly, highly sensitive, “oversensitive” even to some issues. With good reason, even though it’s not quite the powder keg it once was. It’s still not a bruise you want to be poking.
Triumph needed to select his insults carefully if they were to be funny-scathing as opposed to genuinely appalling in the context of the setting.
Geez, I hope he doesn’t visit some First Nations and start joking about Oka.
I hope I get to see this! I love Conan and Triumph. 
matt doesn’t have a TV.
oh even better! A second hand rant.
and I can hardly believe that telling a fat guy to stop eating donuts is go to lead to martial law in the streets of Quebec. What the hell does a fat guy have to do with separatism?
Also, I have to keep repeating: IT’S A HANDPUPPET ON A LATE NIGHT TALK SHOW.
They also have a bear that masturbates, just so you know what you’re working with.