Fellatio del Toro posted:

I'm excited but I don't know how they're gonna cover a week's worth of news in half an hour. Especially since I'm hoping John will bring more of an international slant.

raditts posted:

HOW DARE YOU SAY I TAKE MONEY
This was a great first episode, it's like The Daily Show and The Bugle had a baby with all their strengths and none of their weaknesses. I wish it were an hour long though.

CobiWann posted:

Seriously, in one of those vignettes they kept telling the same joke over and over again!

raditts posted:

What the gently caress was that even supposed to mean? I guess the real joke there is "McCain is senile as gently caress and lol you people wanted him to be president."

CobiWann posted:

He was making the same joke along the lines of "Prussia is just an army that happens to have a nation."

I think.

Don't look at me, I voted for Biden.

Ape Agitator posted:

I just moved to Oregon and saw those commercials and they're strange but very, very Oregon. What's amazing is that the website is as much of a disaster as it is. As far as I can glean, they contracted with a recognized company for the website (Oracle) with a reasonable development timeline and it completely poo poo the bed. His outrage would be fine if the website worked, but as mentioned it's like the band on the Titanic was playing folk music instead of classical.

Bass Bottles posted:

I was really confused by all the weird apologetic build-up the death penalty segment got, as well as the "Here's a reward, you deserve it" thing. Was it just meant as a joke, or were the writers genuinely worried about overwhelming viewers? Why would this segment overwhelm people more than other topics the show covers?

Tiny Brontosaurus posted:

How are all these rodents able to afford personal chefs when good honest Americans are barely keeping their handguns fed?

geeves posted:

zoux posted:

LWT seems more willing to take a position than the other two, at least.

Drifter posted:

So it seems like the segment about Bill Nye was really showcasing how Bill's not only rather ineffectual in getting his point across to 'the other side' (it's a communication bridge that probably can't be crossed at this time) but how he's actually doing a disservice to the scientific community/crowd at large by willingly allowing himself to be this sort of easily disregardable figurehead of the idea of climate change by the owl deniers.

He may have significantly come back into the limelight as a result, but it feels like it's either for misguided or greed-based purposes.

The Climate Change deniers already exist in some sort of echo chamber of ideological comfort, but being able to have a specific figurehead to rally against seems like it helps to entrench ideas more successfully than having a constant steady exposure and pressure to alternate thoughts. It's harder to talk over a general social realization than a person.

Drifter posted:

Scientists should only be going on the Late-night talkshows, of course. Most news is for silly people who want to affirm their beliefs and confirm their fears.

Who wouldn't want to see a scientist play "smash an egg on my head" with Jimmy Fallon?

Drifter posted:

I love the silliness of the whole thing. One guy's all, "...but look at what this stuff has brought us, in spite of global warming. In the 1900s per capita income was $500 and now it's $8000..." like that's some sort of good thing. The relative value of that $1 back in 1850 is ~21 times the value of the current dollar. Using that guy's numbers, back then, now, per capita would've been around 10k. But this whole thing still an incredibly simplified representation of cost and value.

It's so frustrating that many people look at changes in things without understanding the context within that change. That applies to every thing, not just that silly money example.

Drifter posted:

And that's why I think it's pointelss to have Bill or someone approach this in a form of a debate. The 'Bible is my science' cum Fox News crowd sees the world in a totally (wrongly) different way. There's no communication happening, they' just setting him up to be pilloried within their circle. But he still does it; it's utterly pointless.

raditts posted:

That won't really change much either because the foundation of Fox News is putting itself on the cross of the LIEBERAL MEDIA and being the "one true news source" to the millions and millions of persecution-complex-affected retards who believe that poo poo and watch the channel. By the law of averages they'll be able to get some unscrupulous shitlord in a lab coat to tell them that global warming is actually good for life on this planet, and the echo chamber will be intact and tightly sealed.

Don't take this to mean I think scientists or anyone with a grain of sense or a moral compass should go on a Fox channel, at best it would be a complete waste of time for them.

EL BROMANCE posted:

It's a shame that TDS covered the GM thing a while back in a pretty similar detail, but it was still a good piece and the commercial was excellent.

Is the 4 weeks on, 1 week off thing pretty much how they're running the show? Or does anyone know if it's booked for x amount of episodes, then takes a longer break?

I'll use the week off to dig up some clips of some of the types of British shows that are definitely influences on his show (and possibly TDS itself). We haven't done anything great in the last decade, but in the 90s we had a pretty good run of current affairs comedies.

Drifter posted:

I think the show is fun but 30 minutes sure feels pretty limiting for a week.

Unibrow posted:

HBO effectively wrote John a blank check to do whatever the hell he wants for a half hour on Sunday nights for two years. If HBO subscribers want more, then HBO will give him the option of either doing the show multiple days a week, or doing an hour-long program, whatever he (and his writers) would be more comfortable with.

His show obviously does not suck, and I fully expect to tune in to HBO two years from now to still see him on the air.

Drifter posted:

That's what I'd like, yes. There's so much in the world/US going on I'd like to see more than "spelling bee", "Tony Abott's an rear end in a top hat (he really is, though)", and "internet providers are really pretty much the worst thing not currently giving us cancer or slavery".

I'm not ungrateful, but a once a week thing for this short a period makes me more want to check out a clip on youtube than sit through an episode. It's not an 'event'. But it's better than Maher, yes.

SpookyLizard posted:

Ill be honest, i have no idea what any of this means.

Echo Chamber posted:

Bill Maher is an Islamophobe and an anti-vaxer.

With John Oliver, HBO subscribers don't have to pretend to like Bill Maher anymore.

Timett posted:

I think the interview bits are my least favorite part of the show. They take up a good block of time and I don't feel like what you see on the show is ever more interesting than the fact that they are doing the interview at all. "Oh neat they are interviewing that person." Until they get more time or an extra show per week I think I would prefer them just telling you about the interview that you can watch online.

Bown posted:

This episode seemed less funny than usual. A Twilight joke? Really?

Duzzy Funlop posted:

To clarify, as an unwashed hipster from the socialist hellscape that is europe, I don't see any necessity in general for the type of hardware sold off to police forces at all, but not even checking what they might need it for is exuberantly stupid as opposed to giving it to them to execute search warrants and such, which is "just stupid".

Echo Chamber posted:

You would say those 60 Minutes montages were amazing.

bobkatt013 posted:

I just want an Andy appearance and Scottish related pun run

KIM JONG TRILL posted:

It's really refreshing. I had heard nothing about the Cuba embargo renewal and, while I'm not sure I'd go so far as to call this investigative journalism, it's really nice to see someone calling out bullshit that would otherwise go unmentioned.

Astro Nut posted:

I think it helps that Oliver and his crew have the rest of the week to decide, research, and then summarise whatever issue they want, as opposed to going from night to night with maybe a weekend extra to get set up. As a result, whilst he'll use the first half to maybe react to things, the latter segment is clearly planned out and likely well set up before hand, which makes it easier to get songs written, guest stars available, etc.

GaussianCopula posted:

It is not a sham though. They are the largest provider of scholarships exclusivly for woman regardless of the way you count. It is not their fault if woman do not want to take the scholarships they provide and we did not hear for pageant contestants that they felt cheated because they did not get the scholarship they wanted.
The only thing in the whole segment that was questionable is the fact that they "provided" three different scholarships to one contestant and count all 3 (of which only one can be taken) for their total, but on the other hand, they have provided all three scholarships and it's the schools that save money if the contestant does not pick them.

SlothfulCobra posted:

I knew that there was an embargo, and I guess I just assumed it would go on indefinitely. I had no idea that it had to be constantly renewed, and all Obama would have to do is not sign something.

God knows why it's still going. The cold war's long dead, and even Fidel Castro is out of power. And we dropped the embargo against North Korea of all places.

richardfun posted:

Well, that didn't take long.

John Oliver’s ratings have now surpassed Bill Maher’s