Hello all and welcome again to internet masterpiece theatre. This week we join our host Gerard Pilkington for a look into the wonderful world of the quartertothree forums. User ZekeDMS decides that the Tomfoolery of a certain Jon Rowe is enough, and lets his voice be heard! This dramatic reading was performed by Jonathan Thames Rowe, no relation to the user in question.
Episode in Player
Link to the Qt3 Forums thread.
Jon Rowe –
What worked for her, did not work for Troy Duffy.
That being said, writers and comics are complete dicks about stuff usually. Because usually to get anywhere writing or doing stand up you have to climb on the backs of your peers, step on lots of toes and grab for that ring. Then, when you do get there, you feel very entitled, and pretty much treat everyone, including the people that used to be your boss like crap, because you can, and you won.
If you want to have an interesting experience, go to an Open Mic night for stand up, and watch what all of the comics in the back of the room do. They ain’t laughing, even when the guy up there might be killing it, that guy is their competition. Him getting laughs is bad.
I love Roseanne to death, but reading that article gave me the feeling that there was another side to this story. I can believe that her assessment of writers as being pricks is somewhat accurate.
ZekeDMS –
Why don’t you try saying that again when someone actually thinks of you as a writer? Right now you’re just an asshole making plans to be a bigger asshole that we’re fortunate will never come to fruition.
Maybe you’re surrounded by equally petty fucks, and if that’s the case up in Madison, I feel bad for Flowers. But I bet when he’s up, they’re laughing.
Jon Rowe –
Zeke why does everything have to be about me with you? I tend to ignore your posts, but I just have to know this. Why are you obsessed with me?
Zeke DMS –
No, Jon Rowe, you’re generally only a passing thought when I see one of your posts, as you can infer from the fact it took all day to actually bother come back to insult you. Occasionally, though, you post something both ignorant and disrespectful enough that it needs addressed. You’re like Jpinard (who gets some shit when he fucks up, but goes unloathed and is often cared about) with a giant ego and without the good intentions. Which is to say an insufferable and perpetually menstruating dentata-laden cunt.
And when you attack an entire profession that you’re desperately attempting and failing to break into out of jealousy, I get mad. I get mad because I’m fairly sure the closest you’ve ever gotten to any sort of comedy is watching Funny People, and you base everything off of the petty dickery that went on there. You’ve maybe, MAYBE been to one open mic night, and didn’t figure out nobody was laughing becuse you’re the Randy in this situation. Excepting, of course, that Randy is a parody of Dane Cook, and even that egotistical twat gets a few laughs. You haven’t even managed that.
You’ve convinced yourself you’re the pinnacle of comedy and you’re pure bottom rung. You might actually become funny at some point if you gave a shit about the art and started to work at it, to study your shortcomings and study what worked. You instead make a deliberate effort to say anyone who doesn’t like your work “doesn’t appreciate it”, which is bullshit. Even people who don’t like Chris Rock, say, appreciate the talent. People who don’t like Eddie Griffin or Louis CK can appreciate that what they’re doing is funny, even if not relateable.
What you’re doing just isn’t funny, and everyone knows it. Natural aptitude is only a small part of making it in most jobs, but you don’t have the attitude for it. You only have the self-delusion of hilarity which you post the audio logs of. It’s not even bad in a deliberate inaccessible Tim and Eric/Andy Kaufman way, it’s too painful to find the laugh of the built-in irony, because you haven’t put any in it.
You’re a jealous hack and you show your true colors by insisting everyone else who’s trying to make it in art is a bitter, resentful twat. Sure there’s a few, we all know it, anyone who’s made any effort in the arts has met them. The only people who think they’re the majority, however, are those same entitled pricks who can’t stand to face the reality of other people getting recognition because they EARNED it, and they’re not naturals like you, the mighty Jon Rowe, bringer of laughter and insight. It takes work, Jon. The kind of work that usually comes from deep personal insecurities and overcompensation for perceived flaws. THAT’S the root of art, and if you’d just called writers “insecure fearful shits who’re desperate for attention”, I don’t think anyone would have argued. But you don’t work for it, you just assume it. Allow me to illustrate.
If you take a drunken shit on your neighbor’s lawn and you’re just an asshole. Shit on a piece of cardboard after he pissed you off, carry it over in the middle of the night and slip it into his car through an open window and you’re a brilliant asshole. In both cases you’re dropping a steamer on the neighbor’s property. The difference is planning and execution, something you lack. You just drop trow and shit out whatever you happen to have backed up willy-nilly instead of actually making something of it.
I’d tell you to fuck yourself, but I bet you also think you’re the greatest lover around, so it’d just be doing you a favor. You know nothing of what you speak, you’re an internet libertarian who just took Economics 101 and understands the world while insulting the actual experts. You’re comedy’s John Gray, talking out of your ass and insisting the world is clueless and must worship your shining light. Or perhaps you’re Dr. Phil before he got a TV show-a giant egotistical penis (go ahead, make the obvious and terrible “hurr at least I’m a large penis” joke) fucking everyone around with horrible words.
Addendum. You may notice how many times I’ve edited this, Jon. I edited it a lot more before I posted it, and even after I’m constantly working to refine and improve. That’s where actual quality comes from.
Warren M –
Man, this place can turn on a dime. Jon’s dramatic readings were a huge hit at one time. Apparently now they’re the worst thing ever recorded.
Zeke DMS-
Remember how awesome the Matrix was the first time you saw it? The special effects, the originality of the concept, the execution? How you wanted more, forever?
Remember how the second was still pretty good, but some of the shine had come off, and you weren’t in love anymore?
Remember how awful the third one was, and how much you hated The Matrix as a whole? How even the first just felt like a knife being drawn across your hand whenever it came up because you thought about the other two?
Same thing here. Jon’s dramatic readings were fine on their own, but much like The Matrix, it wasn’t his own work to begin with. Once he starts doing his own thing, it goes to hell.
Examples, you say? “Dragon’s Age is a Brain Age style game for Dragons”, “The Ghostly Visage of Babar’s Ghost”, or from a fresh article about Amazing Spider-Man Issue 1 because I really did check to see if I was being unfair before posting my treatise, “I am sure when she arrives, Spidey is going to spend a lot of time hanging out over Mary Jane’s windows. Maybe this is the explanation for those under-arm web secretions? If he doesn’t watch out, he might end up blind.”
See, that. That right there is the total lack of polish and revision. There’s a potential joke in there, but Jon isn’t going to bother finding it, setting it up, delivering, and definitely not putting a tag on it. Instead he just haphazardly sticks together three pieces from three different jokes and calls it done.
“Given Spider-man’s proven propensity for peeping, we can easily make an assumption about his actions once Mary Jane makes her first appearance. Poor Aunt May’s going to be cleaning an awful lot of tube socks in the next few issues.”
That took about five minutes after the idea was presented. It’s not great, but it’s got the setup, a build, and a punchline that are all RELATED.