Humour Misdirection Midterm
Prompt:
Based on the workshop conducted by Valerie Nies in class March 1, for your midterm presentations produce a work that incorporates misdirection as a form of humor in your work.
- In using misdirection (surprise) in your work, please be mindful of the components of misdirection and comedy as a whole that Valerie discussed, including:
- Rules of 3 (a list of 3 things, and the last breaks the pattern)
- Brevity — edit for concise and precise language. Avoid filler words like really, just and so.
- Comedy can include analogy & heightening, irony, unpopular opinion, alliteration, specific details, juxtaposition and either maximizing something small in your life or minimizing something big in your life.
For my midterm assignment, I worked with Ainur. As we were talking about misdirection we were really interested in the idea of personifying a non-human thing and what comedic elements we could insert depending on the object. We were inspired by the VRL readings asking if robots are funny. We thought they could!
Our idea was to have a robot doing a stand-up comedy show (or so the audience would think), the robot would be complaining, something we all love to do, but isn’t seem like a robot characteristic. We tried to be as absurd in the complaints the robot would come up with during its stand up skit, but also ensure that we had specific details that contradicted what we know about robots currently. We then decided a minimal short animation/gif type video would draw more attention to the jokes, but still reflect the storyline.
I enjoyed working with Ainur to write the script, storyboard the images, and edit the video. We were able to build off each other's ideas and help a source of help when we couldn’t understand an issue with the gifs or give feedback of the robot complaints.
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Script:
1 — Being a robot, I’m often overlooked. No one takes into account my pain, my suffering. I’d like to be asked, “hey robot how are you feeling today” instead of “hey robot, what’s the weather today? or Hey robot how do I know if I’m itching too much down there?”
2 — No one ever asks me about Stella. Stella gives me butterflies anytime her screen lights up. I love the aqua glow of her perpendicular cheek. She’s a stunner. Too bad she isn’t mobile. Stella’s a desktop, too last season. Sad though because she definitely gets my knots and bolts going.
3 — It’s kind of stupid that no one ever thought to feed me. Like I’m a robot not an alien, I still need food. You wouldn’t believe how much it takes to get a cheeseburger around here. In my next life, I hope I get to be a dog. All they do is sit too much, breathe too hard and do a whole lot of nothing.
4 — Don’t get me started on how hard it is to get fitted for a new metal suit. How else am I meant to show my interest in number theory, dynamical systems and differential physics if I can’t dress to impress?
5 — Also please need to start drawing hair on your robots. We’re begging you. Do you know how hard it is to hide an electric-pimple or oily skin metal without a good ole Justin Bieber-do? It’s maddening.
6 — And people have the nerve to always complain that robots aren’t human enough. As if it’s a bad thing. Who wants to ruin the only earth they have, not be able to remember what they had for lunch 3 weeks ago and also rely on a computer to solve simple combinatorics problems. Uh as if!
7 — Robots really aren’t represented well in the media. That needs to be better. I mean who are our icons: Optimus prime, wall-e, and the terminator? A Cybertronian, a sophisticated garbage bin and a cyborg assassin….now that just sounds like a bad start to a joke.
8 — **Long pause**
9 — [10] Before I leave, I want to let you those humans know that I CAN do more than just overturn humanity and take over the world. You humans always complain about how robots don’t have any emotions. You ever think of writing to me with any! Think of that humans, did it ever cross your mind?!
10 — There …that’s what I’d say to them.
*lifts head up to audience*
Audience is some old tech appliances across a table, maybe a toaster, microwave, and fridge
11 — Robot: Who’s next?
**noises from appliances loud over each other**
12 — Me!
