TDS 3.0: Season Two Talk

[Victor the Crab]

Anybody think Trevor will lead off tonight's show with last night's Best Picture Oscar fiasco and then somehow end the segment by telling Steve Harvey he's off the hook?

[zxy556575]

1 hour ago, Victor the Crab said:

Anybody think Trevor will lead off tonight's show with last night's Best Picture Oscar fiasco and then somehow end the segment by telling Steve Harvey he's off the hook?

Ha!

I'm looking forward to all the late night hosts sticking a fork in it.

[ganesh]

I really don't care about the oscars, but I understand why the fiasco is newsworthy. I actually hope Trevor goes off on how "no one knew how complicated health care was." That's a real fiasco imo.

[Delwyn]

Did anyone else get the impression that John Oliver doesn't care for Trevor? Did he poach the Janice DGAF joke without permission? The vibe was so different from his other interviews. 

[Brandi Maxxxx]

3 hours ago, Delwyn said:

Did anyone else get the impression that John Oliver doesn't care for Trevor?

No but I was distracted by how tan John looked. Peak Blackness taking effect?

[peeayebee]

I didn't get that impression, but I did assume that John was being very polite considering how dumb Trevor's questions were. I mean, come on. "Did you enjoy anything about Trump?" I think I get what Trevor was going for, but couldn't he come up with any better questions? Let me rephrase that: He could have come up with better questions. "How long do you spend preparing the main segments?" "Are there any subjects that are almost too complex to tackle?" "Are you working on the Trump/Russia connections?"

Oh well.

On the lighter side, I always get a big laugh whenever Trevor does Trump's voice.

[Victor the Crab]

Never got that impression either. But what I did hear was Trevor telling Ollie that he had the only late night show that gets away with big time swearing, completely forgetting or ignoring Bill Maher from Ollie's own network. lol!

I did wish they brought up Steve Harvey from all that Oscar cockuping.

[Delwyn]

8 hours ago, peeayebee said:

I did assume that John was being very polite considering how dumb Trevor's questions were. I mean, come on. "Did you enjoy anything about Trump?" I think I get what Trevor was going for, but couldn't he come up with any better questions? Let me rephrase that: He could have come up with better questions. 

I think that's what I was picking up on. John is usually very animated in interviews and gets great set ups to his jokes and anecdotes from other hosts. That didn't really happen here. I thought it created a bit of awkwardness in their interaction. YMMV, of course, and I can understand why other people did not feel that way. 

[ganesh]

I always like when TDS sends their people into the field because I'm continually amazed at the abject denial and willful ignorance that they show. It's such a nonargument: Well, of course they wouldn't say they're paid protesters, but they're here.

If you're so convinced that there's paid protesters in your town hall, shouldn't that incentivize you to be better organized? I would have liked Desi to get loudmouthed woman to confront the other people. 

[ChelseaNH]

42 minutes ago, ganesh said:

I would have liked Desi to get loudmouthed woman to confront the other people. 

I see potential liability issues.

[ganesh]

Maybe so. Perhaps she should have just asked her if she thought the people who actually live in the district are paid protesters. When people talk in generalities, I think it's important to pin them down on it. She did when she asked the guy if he saw any buses and he said no. 

[nodorothyparker]

The field piece was unsurprising but terrific just the same with its final reveal that the woman doing most of the bitching about out of district protesters doesn't even live there herself but had driven up to counter demonstrate.  But I know, somehow that's different.  

I got kind of burned out on the show doing field pieces before the election because they became rather pat go tos and the willful cognitive dissonance was just so strong that I was honestly at a loss as to how you even begin to over come that.  I still don't know when it's painfully obvious that these are mostly the same people who are swallowing everything they're being told hook, line, and sinker no matter how clumsy or patently ridiculous it may be.  Used as a followup to the town hall piece though, they're incredibly telling.

[iMonrey]

I felt the field piece was rather superfluous once Trevor brilliantly deconstructed the notion of Democrats paying protesters. Not paying them to vote for them, mind you . . . that's too easy! Paying them to protest afterwards. All these mouthpieces on cable news - not to mention Sean Spicer - need someone to replay this segment every time they try to claim there are paid protesters.

[zxy556575]

Trevor hasn't stood for his opening monologue in quite a while, right? I think his skinny suits were getting too tight. ;)

And yes to this: "Don't shoot the messenger? Maybe don't suck the messenger's dick either."

The obvious cuts in Tapper's interview were odd. I'm going to make a point of watching the whole thing online when it's posted. I really like Tapper.

[walnutqueen]

All I could think of every time the "Trump pivot" was mentioned was the Friends episode when they tried to get the couch up the stairs, and Ross yelling "PIVOT! PIVOT!".

I liked Tapper's answer as to how he can keep a straight face sometimes : "Botox.  Lots and lots of Botox.".   heh

[nodorothyparker]

Thank you, Trevor, for calling out the obvious that this is by no means the first time the orange one has managed to get his shit together for a prescribed amount of time and everyone fell all over themselves for it and that it certainly won't be the last.  It's been kind of mind-numbing to behold, knowing that on a couple of topics he contradicted what he'd said earlier on the very same day.  "Maybe don't suck the messenger's dick" indeed.

I quite liked the Tapper interview.  I don't watch much CNN these days so I know him more by reputation than actual viewership, but he came off very clear-eyed about the problems the national media is having with fake news accusations and covering this administration with its fluid ideas of truth or facts.  It was a good conversation and an important one.  I especially liked his comment that "It isn't partisan to want facts or truth."   The extended interview didn't really provide any additional insights on anything but I agree that sometimes the editing of these things for the show version can be a bit clunky.

[ganesh]

So Trump not throwing a fit for an hour and acting like an adult is somehow presidential? Forget that most of what he said was wrong and is proposing awful things. Who cares what he sounded like? Thanks, media. 

[Pyralis]

Dear Daily Show Writers, the only hobbit Jeff Sessions should be compared to is Ted Sandyman.

[redfish]

Even though the double gavel "guilty!" bit was silly I thought it was hilarious at how that's how I felt when I hear them  talk total BS. I want to chant "guilty!" that way too. Even though the snake popping out of the nesting doll is an old comedy cliche it was almost a metaphor of the snake resting in a Trump White House staffer.

Edited March 4, 2017 by redfish

[nodorothyparker]

I liked the Russian nesting doll bit.  Either it didn't go off at all how Trevor thought it was going to or he was doing a bang up job of acting like it.  Adam Lovitt may be a great writer or producer for the show but his segments tend to fall kind of flat for me and this one on a fairly serious subject was no exception. Congratulating the orange one on at least managing to condemn anti-semitism in his big speech while failing to note that he had blamed the Jewish population earlier the very same day for the rise of attacks and threats as some kind of false flag was exactly the kind of thing Trevor was talking about the previous night with the media falling all over itself.

I don't know if Trevor is getting better at interviewing or he's just getting better interview subjects because I've really liked the last couple he's done.  Evan Osnos was terrific in talking about how like with Watergate, the cover up for the entire Russia mess may turn out to be worse than whatever is the administration actually did.   Learning that the White House won't answer a simple yes or no question bur rather tells him to come back when he has more to go on, thus spurring further investigation, was both fascinating and kind of alarming.

[Victor the Crab]

I honestly thought Trevor was having difficulty opening that Russian nesting doll. I had a big laugh of the spring coiled snake popping out of that thing as well as Trevor's reaction to it. I also had a big laugh over how Trevor used those gavels.

[Bastet]

I loved Trevor’s take on the George W. Bush nostalgia.  Because, yes, I would take Bush back in a heartbeat if I could somehow sub him in for Trump, because Trump is just that horrifyingly, on a level never previously imagined, sweet heavens, someone save us dangerous, but only because of that – I haven’t forgotten how awful Bush was.  The blank canvas for Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction was great, but my favorite was Trevor's "Really, you were set up for something light and funny like choking on a pretzel and instead made light of destabilizing an entire region on false pretext?" part of that segment.

I liked the tapped calls, especially calling the NY Times tip line to say “You’re fake news” and hang up.

“What’s one of the things Republicans hated most about Obama?  That he was –“
“Black.”

I liked the Benghazi/Yemen comparison, and that whole “Republicans, how is this your guy?” piece in general.

I don’t normally watch the celebrity interviews unless it’s someone I really like, but I didn’t change the channel for Jennifer Lopez, and thus greatly enjoyed her and Trevor grooving per the video to If You Had My Love.

[ottoDbusdriver]

43 minutes ago, Bastet said:

I liked the tapped calls, especially calling the NY Times tip line to say “You’re fake news” and hang up.

Conan O'Brien has been doing fake recorded phone calls between Obama and Trump for a while now -- and they are pretty funny.

[Lantern7]

Trevor does a decent Dubya. Nowhere near as good as Jon's, though.

[ganesh]

11 hours ago, Bastet said:

“What’s one of the things Republicans hated most about Obama?  That he was –“
“Black.”

I thought he was going to say "woman" for Clinton. 

11 hours ago, Bastet said:

I liked the Benghazi/Yemen comparison, and that whole “Republicans, how is this your guy?” piece in general.

That was good work by Neil. Even if you say, with Pence, that his email server didn't have classified information, ok, but Trump still uses an unsecure phone, and literally was going over sensitive information at the dinner table wide open in public, but nbd. 

[possibilities]

He should have known, though, that this isn't the first time the Republicans ballooned the deficit. Reagan did that shit in the 1980s. SAINT REAGAN! So it's practically s.o.p.

[Hooper]

Quote

I loved Trevor’s take on the George W. Bush nostalgia.

I kept saying "finally!" throughout the Dubs segment.  I find the sudden rehabilitation of Shrub even more discombobulating than the media gushing about how awesome sauce it was that snatchgrabber managed to recite off a teleprompter competently enough to impersonate a non-institutionalize person for an hour. 

Ben Carson recently suggested that sticking a few electrodes into the hippocampus allows one to remember the exact text of something we read 50 years ago.  If that's true (which by the by, it isn't) we all need to have our collective hippocampi zapped so we can remember way back 10 years to the 100's of thousands of Americans and Iraqi's killed in a war justified by imaginary WMD's.  Among other things.  How pathetic is it that someone who was a teenager living in South Africa when Shrub was appointed president seems to be the only person in the media recalls this?

[peeayebee]

21 hours ago, Lantern7 said:

Trevor does a decent Dubya. Nowhere near as good as Jon's, though.

I thought this was the first bad impression Trevor has done. It didn't sound at all like Dubya to me.

Loved Trevor doing Trump saying, "Hold my beer." I don't know why, but I love when that phrase is used. 

Press: Dude, you can trick us if you want.
Trump: Pass. And that's with two P's.

I hardly listened to the interview. Also, I had no idea that Shades of Blue was doing all that great. I was surprised at JLo's cheering section.

[ganesh]

I thought the interview was cute, but that's about it. Shades of Blue sounds fairly derivative to me, but I'm not going to begrudge anyone having a successful tv show. Not knowing the cost of a subway ticket was funny, and she seemed chagrined about it. 

I thought it was appalling that Bush went right to 'mission accomplished' and laughed on the talk show. 

[peeayebee]

Geez, Ben Carson... Maybe even if he knows the definition of immigrant, he doesn't understand the meaning of "come," esp versus "brought unwillingly."

I liked the interview with Apatow. 

[ganesh]

It's amazing to the degree that these cabinet members are either bent on destruction of the agency/department they now run, or just completely tone deaf. Either way, the gross incompetence is galling. 

Also, Dr. Carson, don't tell me that "maybe I should look in a dictionary." That takes less than 2 seconds to do to prove you wrong. 

[Arcadiasw]

Michelle Wolf nailed it on Ivanka Trump. 

Ben Carson. Just ugh. 

[peeayebee]

Yeah, Michelle Wolf was great. I'd never seen an Ivanka commercial before either. Loved Michelle's last line. I think it was, "She's not a feminist; she's a Trump."

[DXD526]

There was an odd moment before Trevor did his coin trick where I was wondering what he was doing. I assume that he was digging around in his pocket to retrieve the coin before he made it 'appear', but for a moment it looked like he was playing with himself on camera! No, he just apparently forgot to leave the coin handy and had to do a bit of frantic last-minute grabbing. Nothing to see here...

It took some time for Trevor to hit his stride with this show, but he's really been killing it the last couple of months. Interesting that my favorite commentators on the American political scene are Trevor, Samantha Bee and John Oliver: a South African, a Canadian, and a Brit!

[Victor the Crab]

That might have been Michelle's best TDS segment. She really captured the true essence of Ivanka Trump and why nobody should believe her to be the conscience of the Drumph clan.

[zxy556575]

Fun episode tonight. I'm all over Third Month Mania!

The BBC clip cracked me up -- the PwC Oscar fuckups should take a tip from the wife making her Kramer entrance. "Mistake, mistake!"

I wouldn't mind if they never get around to doing a Trumpcare segment; the quicksand of coverage is already pulling me under.

Edited March 14, 2017 by Lord Donia

[TVcritic]

Now THAT'S a Third Month Mania I can get behind! Btw, imagine all the people who had to go through Agent Orange's tweets.  I fear for their sanity ... ;-)

[Arcadiasw]

8 hours ago, Lord Donia said:

Fun episode tonight. I'm all over Third Month Mania!

The BBC clip cracked me up -- the PwC Oscar fuckups should take a tip from the wife making her Kramer entrance. "Mistake, mistake!"

I wouldn't mind if they never get around to doing a Trumpcare segment; the quicksand of coverage is already pulling me under.

I've seen it at least ten times before last night and I lose it when the baby rolls in. 

I'm in for Third Month Mania. I hope I can stomach reading all the tweets though. 

[iMonrey]

OMG. When they did the mock-up of Sean Spicer talking while a baby Trump and a baby Carson came up behind him then Kellyanne Conway came rushing in to corral them I just about died. I must have laughed for a good solid minute. Best clip they've done in a long while.

Unfortunately the follow up bit with Trump Tweets made me switch the channel. I'm getting into the habit of only watching the first segment of this show on a regular basis. The bits are still very weak and I've no interest in 99% of the interviews.

[ganesh]

I really like the piece on the South Korean president. I've been following it for some time. 

[Lantern7]

Stupid question: will there be a new TDS tonight? I don't think New York got the storm of storms, but I'm thinking you'd have to live close to the studio to attend a taping today.

[tribeca]

I really enjoyed the Lee Daniels interview. Trevor's questions were interesting.  It seemed like the interview was to short and that Trevor had many more questions.  

[peeayebee]

I didn't know that Lee Daniels had come out, so his comment about being gay surprised me. Still, I only half-listened to him. I'm not a fan.

The best thing from the Third Month Mania segment was 'GUIDANCE'! I would love to be with people who were wise to that reference.

[mariah23]

4 hours ago, Lantern7 said:

Stupid question: will there be a new TDS tonight? I don't think New York got the storm of storms, but I'm thinking you'd have to live close to the studio to attend a taping today.

 

No, but according to this FB video no one told Trevor

Spoiler

 

[possibilities]

I love Trevor-- that video is great.

I am a huge fan of Hasan and Roy, but I have Trump Fatigue, and I wish they hadn't spent time highlighting his tweets. We've already heard about them, and there's other stuff to cover that's more important.

I like when the show delves into international issues, like the S Korea situation, and tells me something that hasn't already been beaten to death.

I think the interviews have been improving a lot.

[Lantern7]

Nice video. I think TDS has aired with more snow outside, but better safe than sorry.

Is snow possible in South Africa? I mean, it's away from the equator and maybe closer to Antarctica.

[Temperance]

I don't think that video was necessarily filmed today. It looks too calm. There was a lot of wind outside especially near the coastline. It also rained on the show here, which makes for slick conditions (ice can be the real problem.) I don't live too near the show, but where I live shares conditions with NYC.

[zxy556575]

What's happening to me? I loved Ronny's piece tonight. Laughed and everything. A  year ago I was all, "Guh, what a hack."

Edited March 17, 2017 by Lord Donia

[ganesh]

Ronny is better when he doesn't rely on the 'asian parents disappoinment' schtick. Yelling at his mother about the password to the vacuum was funny.

No joke, me and my colleague are taking apart a Keurig to read the machine code and hack it from online. We were talking about doing a fridge next if all this works. 

[Skyfall]

Anyone who liked Jesse Williams can find him on Desus & Mero tonight apparently