blog 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVzBKGyoU5s
In my opinion, Will Ferrell is a comedic genius. He’s not just another guy standing on a stage trying to pull laughs out of people; he’s genuine. It’s absolutely mind-blowing to see him morph into 3 or 4 completely different characters within an hour and a half time span (something that takes an incredible amount of talent). Harry Caray, James Lipton (Inside the Actor’s Studio), Robert Goulet, Neil Diamond, Ted Kennedy, Janet Reno, and a plethora of other personalities have been portrayed by Will Ferrell. These characters are vastly different in their genders, ages, voices, and mannerisms, but he manages to look, sound, and act absurdly close to the real thing. My personal favorite is his impression of our oh-so intelligent president, George W. Bush. It is uncanny to me how he has every last stutter down; if you were to listen only, you would find it almost impossible to tell the difference between the two. He imitates Bush’s mannerisms in such a clever way, as to create humor, but without making himself look like a total fool. Of course, he makes Bush look like a fool, and it’s interesting to see just how he does it.
At the beginning of this SNL skit, “Bush” mentions that there are “some” who are beginning to doubt his administration. The audience is immediately delivered humor in the form of an understatement. Assuming that people in the audience have at least a slight idea of what’s going on in the world around them, they would find this very funny because in actuality, there are a great deal of people who doubt his administration. To contrast this, a rash overstatement is made when “Bush” calls anything he dislikes the “Axis of Evil”. This idea is emphasized and built upon throughout the skit, and by doing this, Bush’s irrationality is highlighted and made fun of. He includes many things in this Axis of Evil, including Iran, Iraq, “one of the Koreas”, Enron, Tom Daschle, the economy, France, Evil Kineval, the original Axis of Evil, Dick Cheney, and math (Dr. Evil didn’t make the cut). This provides humor not only through a ridiculous overstatement, but through an incongruity as well. In World War 2, the “Axis of Evil” was made up of Italy, Germany, and Japan…which are all countries. It is an incongruity that Bush has added every little thing that irks him or is critical against him. Of course this is an exaggeration of reality, but the point of this skit is to poke fun at how Bush misuses the phrase “Axis of Evil” in order to protect his administration.
In addition to pointing out his apparent irrationality, Bush’s stupidity (which he has shown in reality and publicly numerous times) is poked fun of throughout the skit. Going back to Meyer’s essay, the humor found in this may be a result of the audience feeling superior to Bush. An example of how his sub-par intelligence is made fun of is when Ferrell says that “one of the Koreas” is included in the Axis of Evil. There are obviously two Koreas, and he doesn’t even know which one he is in conflict with (this can also be related to the irrationality section as well). Another example is when he mentions Enron, says that people “probably wouldn’t get Enron”, then states that he doesn’t either, and that it “hurts his head” to think about it. Not only does this hint at his foolishness, but it also hints at the idea that he, as a president, has been hypocritical at times. He states that people don’t understand anything about the Enron situation, then he says that he doesn’t understand it either, which doesn’t really make much sense, especially because he’s the president. Of course, Ferrell isn’t necessarily saying that Bush didn’t understand the Enron situation… he is simply bringing out the idea of hypocrisy and stupidity in general.
Another idea that I found interesting was what he found American and what could not be considered American. He states that the economy isn’t “acting very well” and because of that, it’s un-American., and therefore, evil. He also mentions that the Axis of Evil (including the economy) “stands in the way” of what Americans value. By doing this, I believe that Ferrell is spoofing the fact that initially, people who didn’t support the War in Iraq were thought of as “communists”, “un-American”, or even “anti-American”. Again, Ferrell creates comedy though the use of exaggeration.
The last thing that really stuck out for me was how Bush was portrayed as a bully and a warmonger. He mentions that he doesn’t want to hear anything about Enron, unless it has to do with the American military “pounding it into submission”. This has to do with the idea that some people felt that Bush used too much military force, or even that he used war to “fix” things. Another instance of this is when he talks about France. After adding them to the Axis of Evil, he says, “How ya like them apples, France? Next time you’ll keep your mouth shut. Mess with Texas, and it’s straight to the Axis of Evil, got it?”. This, again, is poking fun at Bush’s military tactics. France did not support our War in Iraq, and therefore they were put on the “Axis of Evil”.
Ferrell does an awesome job of creating a parody of Bush, and I think that any other liberal-minded critic of the Bush administration would think so. While staying away from too directly poking fun at certain situations, he successfully creates replicas of reality when he makes up other situations (such as illustrating irrationality by adding Evil Kineval to the Axis of Evil, instead of talking about Osama Bin Laden, for example). He uses understatements along with overstatements and exaggerations to create humor effectively.