Anthony Jeselnik: Thoughts and Prayers

It is paradoxical that the biggest drawback of the stand-up that is based solely on controversy, is lack of any kind of edge. Jeselnik does not balance / seek / push the limits of the viewer's hypocrisy or what they can bear and where the boundaries of a good (poor) taste are blurred. He just tells the ordinary harsh jokes, as in some variation on Czech TV shows Joke worth one hundred CZK or Golden bars. And he just keeps saying well-known and similar jokes in a way that after ten minutes from the beginning, you already know exactly what each of them is about and how they end (yes, the end is the harshest possible). It´s like dancing cha cha. The routine keeps repeating. Yes, those ordinary harsh jokes are often brilliant and really funny, but we are so used to such a thing that it can't even have the same effect as in a more decent overseas. Especially when the joke telling lasts about 45 mins in a row; one after another, and all the same. What is interesting is the final part, when Jeselnik starts pushing the above-mentioned borders, for example, through the segments showing hypocritical participation in social networks or the part like "is sometimes too early for black humor after tragedies and misfortunes" But even here it is true that for a country where God and many similar to him run everything, this is simply not strong enough (19/03/2018)