Dang it, posted something here for a second I meant to post in the TBS thread. That’s what I get for putting my phone down to get some eggs and forgetting where I was. Must be getting old.
The Critic was great but it is probably the most "you had to be there" show maybe ever. The jokes rely so much on those references and pop culture callbacks. It will be interesting to see if that translates to the modern day since the idea of a high-profile critic is mostly gone.
it's been a very long time since i've watched it, but my dad showed me a bunch of episodes growing up and i loved it.
As a kid I just remember loving the fake movie trailer bits, completely forgot everything else that happens inbetween.
They really went after certain celebrities. It is a level of Nineties cattiness that you do not really see anymore. Celebrity Deathmatch was similarly venomous.
i have memories as a kid of the episode where that woman kidnaps Jay (akin to Misery), and when his family holds a press conference looking for him, his dad goes up to the mic and says "if i could be any vegetable, i would be a carrot", and everyone in the audience furiously takes notes (i believe around 2:30 in the video)
The Critic was the first time I ever heard of Orson Welles and I can't help but think of those scenes whenever Welles comes up. They also went hard after Schwarzenegger and Jim Carrey in their early careers.
I left the gym early because there were too many people dancing and when I was going back to my apartment a little kid walking with his father pointed to me and said "look it's a monster!". I don't know if he was riffing on the Kramer episode or not.