New York Comic-Con is an extreme event. It’s easy to forget this, now that Comic-Cons and cosplay have crossed over into mainstream culture, but when you step back and consider the outlandish costumes, massive crowds, huge weapons, and rival factions, Comic-Con sometimes feels like a war zone or a disaster area in a far-away land. Overthinker Shana Mlawski plays off this idea in her special “report” from New York Comic-Con.
This video is partly a commentary on the way that news reporters inevitably distance themselves from phenomena that are wholly foreign to them, both by virtue of their events and their cultural/geographic context, and partly a commentary on our own alienation from Comic-Con. Without speaking too much for Shana, I think we both approach Comic-Con partly as outsiders looking in: although we’re both big fans of various genre fiction properties that are well represented at Comic-Con, we’re not quite participants in “fan culture,” at least not in the way it’s practiced at Comic-Con. We didn’t spend all night waiting in line for the big panels, so we didn’t get to see Patrick Stewart. We didn’t wear costumes, so we looked more like…members of the media reporting on the event, which, appropriately, we were.
So we made this video, mostly to help process our feelings towards this, but also to remind ourselves that Comic-Con is in fact madness. Mostly wonderful madness, but madness all the same.
Glad to see “Special Reports” back on OTI!
I thought this was really well done and funny and clever and et cetera, and any video that posits Oprah as some sort of cult figure is going to score points in my book, but I am curious as to whether or not Shana was reading her remarks off of something? I only ask because her eyes drifted away from camera a couple of times like when somebody is reading a cue card or what have you. Is this a big deal? No. But should Overthinking It be held to unreasonable standards of perfection for off the cuff humor pieces being done in chaotic settings? I think we all know the answer is yes.
Yeah, yeah, I have a bad memory and need a teleprompter (otherwise known as a phone). I am a WRI-TOR, Chris Morgan, not an ACT-OR. Plus I was in a real hurry to get to the Comic Con speed dating event (more on that tomorrow), so there was no time for perfection.
I REGRET NOTHING!
Well, you still read your dialogue with more subtlety than Frank Zappa on Saturday Night Live. Also, if you can offer up one tease for this speed dating piece, how many people showed up to it dressed like The Flash?
No Flashes, but there was an impressive Akuma from Street Fighter. Red contacts and everything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2e3ID0WIkVs
So does this mean that the strength of my mental association between Shana and Tina Fey are based on my lingering Tina-Fey-crush, rather than on any actual similarities between the two?
If so I’m crushed (but not surprised).
Also if so… why did Shana just say “I am a WRI-TOR, Tracy Jordan, not an ACT-OR.” ?
I am no longer able to navigate this plane we call reality…
ps. I SWEAR that the above comment was entirely developed BEFORE clicking on Ben’s youtube link…
then I spent 5 minutes trying to figure out if “WRI-TOR, Tracy Morgan. Not an ACT-OR” was actually a direct 30Rock quote I’d forgotten.
Then I spent a moment in Existential wasteland wondering whether the internet actually exists, or if it’s a personal hallucination.
My line about navigating reality is becoming more and more true. I am uncomfortable on this plane; and would like to get off before we land.