David Cross "Jesus Talks"

David Cross "Shut Up, You Fucking Baby" Portland, Oregon and Atlanta, Georgia. Youtube 2.25.09

In David Cross' stand-up comedy he often talks about religion (Christianity, Judaism, Science in relation to religion, reason, etc). As an atheist jew who grew up in the south, he clearly has an opinion on religion and he shares it frequently: religion is ridiculous. Usually he flat-out mocks religion, referring to the bible as something similar to dungeons and dragons and citing and pointing out other ridiculous aspects of christianity and Judaism (like how it's not fair that in Judaism, no matter what you believe, whether you're an atheist or think that God is a unicorn and babies taste like lemonade, if your mother is Jewish, then so are you). In this youtube audio clip David Cross takes a less risky, less offensive stance on religion. He observes how in all depictions of Jesus, actors attribute him to having a somber, knowing voice of reason and wisdom, but in reality nobody really knows what Jesus sounded like. Jesus could have had any number of voices, and David Cross wonders what if Jesus spoke in a really effeminate southern voice. His humor here is potentially offensive, but for the most part it is innocuous. It makes no groundbreaking observations about religion or christianity, all Cross does is ponder a what if and runs with it. The absurdity and unfamiliarity of this "what if..." is what makes it so hysterical.

Xavier: Renegade Angel

Xavier: Renegade Angel is a 15 min show on Adult Swim. Its first airing was November 2, 2007. Adult Swim is currently airing the second season.

Xavier: Renegade Angel's loose story line is that Xavier, who is a grotesque creature that is the combination of a man, a snake, a bird, and maybe a monkey, is traveling through the desert in search of the meaning of life. The show is very random in nature with odd characters appearing and crazy flashbacks happening consistently. The show's humor comes mainly from altering reality, which it can do easily through its use of computer animation. This "altering of reality" comes from Xavier travels through space and time. He is goes forward and backward in time, seeing things in his own past while also witnessing things like the destruction of Earth. His time travel is sometimes explained, but most of the time is not. These random jumps in time provide humor because the audience is never really sure where Xavier is going to end up and whether what they are seeing is real or not. Xavier also breaks the audiences normal perception of space; leaving our normal sense of reality in favor of abstract worlds that are far removed from any part of human existence. An example of this removal from human existence can be seen in the following clip.

For context, in this episode Xavier is stuck in a circular room with different colored doors, each one transporting him to an abstract place. That clip leads to my next point about how Xavier provides humor. At its core Xavier is a show about philosophy and religion, and that clip, along with many others throughout the series, touch on the belief in God and the search for some purpose in existence. The clip can be taken on the surface to be making fun of belief in God, but more importantly is the way it conveys religion as a viewpoint that is black and white. When asked the question "do you believe in God?" Xavier goes into his own views on existence and a higher power. The bar-code man is there to represent religion(from what I can tell the Judaic God) with the belief of God being either yes or no. Xavier on the other hand takes the role of philosophy, not only questioning the belief in God but going as far as questioning belief itself. I think the humor comes from showing how narrow minded religion can be while also highlighting how abstract philosophy can become. Bringing up philosophical questions is a common theme in Xavier and contributes greatly to its abstract humor. But Xavier: Renegade Angel's humor is not always so abstract in nature. The show also touches on the cultural issues of race, religion, and sexuality. The following clip touches on all these issues. On a side note, this show is made by the same people who did Wonder Showzen on MTV2; the following clip is very reminiscent of Wonder Showzen in its use of race, religion, and sexuality.

Lewis Black: The Old Testament

Lewis Black. The Old Testament. Dir. Keith Raskin. Comedy Central. 2008


This skit involves Lewis Black discussing evolution and religion. The major themes are of course Christianity and Jewish religion and how they are related to each other through "The Old Testament and the News Testament". The whole skit deals with how evolution is talked about in the Old Testament which was the Jewish book, but it wasn't good enough for Christians and therefore made a "New Testament". Most of Lewis Blacks stand up comedy deals with racism, everyday life, absurdities, sarcasm, exaggeration, and politics.