Gorge Hinks has it right: "applause comic" means that you are trying to get people to applaud more than laugh. He's not really telling many jokes; he's mostly stating opinions and, if people agree with him, they applaud (and if people don't agree with him, they get into a shouting match, but that's neither here nor…

Hard to argue with that, Arsenio; I might have been throwing around "quintessential" a bit too freely. Let's just agree that they are both applause comics.

Well put. I think people are afraid to say they're not really into Bill Hicks or Lenny Bruce because they're afraid that the hipster crowd will chastise them for it. It's the Emperor's New Clothes.

I agree - this thoroughly sucks. He was funny, and was the only guest on Tough Crowd who managed to be funny while actually knowing what he was talking about.

That's a weird audience - they're a cadence crowd. When you stop talking, they laugh. That's a big part of why one-liner comics do so well on this show. Kathy Griffin isn't right for that crowd, both in terms of style and in terms of substance.

I agree - Betty seems like a lot of people I've met in real life, so I don't really know why Todd feels that Weiner has made her less believable. Todd says that the Sopranos and Mad Men have previously "portrayed people like this with some degree of psychological acuity." Some people are selfish and spoiled, and so is…

You're right - Tommy doesn't really need this, but it wouldn't hurt. He's not the only one with a Comedy Central special, though - Myq had one, Rachel Feinstein had one. Felipe's been on the Tonight Show. Everyone except maybe Jonathan Thymius has been on TV before.

The crowd didn't help Tommy Johnagin
They liked slow-talkers, people who would do that one line, applause…one line, applause kind of cadence. Tommy has that rapid-fire, get-a-roll-going cadence that most working comics have. They were also a bit slow to get stuff. I hope the sub-par audience response doesn't send him…

You're right, Noah: having a two-drink minimum is the norm, and not having one is the exception. Not sure where Steve is getting his information from.

@Nameless jerk - no question: they CAN do what they did. In fact, it wasn't even the fine print in the contract: the central point of the document that they can do whatever they want. But everything in comedy is spread by word of mouth, and they spread the word that they weren't going to pull a lot of the same tricks…

@ Nameless Jerk: yes, they can edit it however they want, but the word they put out is that they weren't going to cut out people who "won" or pull many of the other behind-the-scenes shennanigans that they had become known for in seasons past.

I don't really know. It wasn't a falling out or anything; they just advanced too many comics to the semis, so they axed six of us. AFTER flying us out to LA for a week to perform in the semi-final shows.

They did. I was one of the six.

For the record…
Last Comic Standing said that they weren't going to do the thing this time around where they advance people to the semi-finals and then edit them out of the show. But they did. There were six comics who advanced from the showcases in New York and performed at the semi-finals in LA who were completely…

Yes! I was thinking the exact same thing!

Completely agree - that sketch was shit. What's the premise…she's got funny teeth? It's basically When the Whistle Blows with teeth instead of glasses.

I just blue myself.

I was thinking the same thing. I like this feature, but I'm not sure that these clips really prove (or even support) the contention that comedy is now democratic. Most of the people in these clips made their name through television work, and many of these clips involve cameos and production values that are beyond the…

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I don't think that's even really them making out in that clip. Unless there's something revelatory in the missing 20 second, I can't understand why the director would conspicuously shoot around the actors involved in that mouth-on-mouth action if it was actually Fox and…

This one is a pretty good microcosm of my political views: