#i feel like it's funnier if i don't say what the software is. i wanna be mysterious so bad but i cannot shut the fuck up

[crescentfool]

never in my life did i think i need to makeout with a piece of software so badly but here we are i guess

[adultswim2021]

Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job #37: “Brothers Cinco” | April 6, 2009 - 12:30AM | S04E09

Tim and Eric’s “Chalet 2000”. Their “Ronny Horror Picture Show”. Their “Went With the Wind” (syndicated half-hour version only). Uh, their, uh actually SCTV has a few and I don’t wanna pick one. Anyway, I got some ’rrhea and spent about 40 minutes shidding before getting around to this write-up so hopefully losing all of my precious brown fluids doesn't give me brain fog. I hope I don’t have to do any more big brown squirts. 

This is a fairly special one. This is the first (and only?) episode to be just one single story. The Anniversary episode from season one and the Tairy Greene Machine episode from season five are the next closest ones I can think of, but they still contain sketches that you could enjoy without the context of the wraparound. This more-or-less feels like a pilot for Tim and Eric Bedtime Stories. It’s also a cinematic widescreen episode, but it’s only available in 4:3, letterboxed. 

The episode is about the titular Cinco brothers, played by Tim & Eric. These are the men behind Cinco, the company what makes all the funny stuff we’ve seen throughout the series. They’ve made quite a splash in the business world. Even Tom Leykis respects them. Tom Leykis is the radio DJ in the episode. He’s sorta famous for being a shock jock. He’s more-or-less a liberal but he also likes being a rude sexist. He is my hero. Anyway: the story is pretty simple: Cinco Bro Eric (I forget their fictional first names, so I’m just gonna call them Tim & Eric) is accused of murdering his own wife. Tim has big plans to use their new Cinco E-Trial software that proclaims to offer a legally binding trial through the magic of CD-ROM. 

The trial, of course, yields a guilty verdict, because Eric IS guilty. A bunch of cops bust through the Cinco Bros’ door and arrest him on the spot. In prison, Tim confesses to Eric that he set him up to fail. He overheard him plotting with his wife. Their plan? Eric tells his wife that he’s going to kill her, and while his brother is stricken with grief Eric will steal the company from him. His wife is completely nonplussed by this and agrees that it “sounds great, babe”, evilly laughing along with her husband.

This is such an aggressively stupid joke that I love it. Like, the idea of Eric killing his wife and her just going along with it is funny, and it’s at least a little satirical. The episode is meant to be, at least in part, a satire of movies about powerful/toxic men where women are disposable. Here they are so disposable, they just allow their husbands to kill them just to be supportive of their fella. But also; the non-specificness of how Eric will steal the company. They could've written it in a way that the plan at least makes sense and retain the satire, but they don't. Tim and Eric is truly comedy jazz, as it's about the jokes they don't play.

There is a sequence in this where the Cinco Boys are out partying at various stripper/drug-doing clubs, and Eric starts getting despondent, and as he spirals he just starts babbling about how he killed his wife. He and Tim happen to have a prostitute with them, and they unceremoniously murder her and then brashly yuck it up in a diner about how much of her blood is still on them. The diner scene is wonderful, their acting is weird and sorta good. They strike an impressive balance between being believable and absolutely not believable. It’s an uncanniness that most people can’t hang with. I think this is an essential component to being a Tim and Eric liker. 

Anyway, the party scene preceding the diner scene seems like it’s a first draft for the Billion Dollar Movie sequence, which is much funnier. I guess you can’t do a dick piercing on the Cartoon Network.

Keep an eye out for some Tim & Eric cameos in avatar form. When Eric picks his virtual jury, you’ll spot some regular faces. A nice nod to the fans (me!). Also, because this is the paragraph where I just say random things about the episode that don’t have to do with the story: the house Tim and Eric are in (with the car-themed loveseat) is a regular location used by David DeCoteau, one of the most prolific schlock makers out there. He went from making X-rated movies in the 80s (BOTH kinds, hubba hubba!) to sleazy “USA Up All Night” fare to now, where he trades off making not-even-softcore movies where beautiful young men wrestle around shirtless and children’s movies where the plot is an animal can talk and it’s voiced by Eric Roberts, who sounds like he’s recording his lines on his iPhone. Some friends and I spotted this room in A Talking Cat?!? And we struggled to remember where we saw it first. It was this! 

Anyway, I love this episode and think it’s great, even though Tim is doing a SICKENING anti-semitic character with a big prosthetic nose. HBO I implore you, pull this episode NOW. Jews are under attack now more than ever.  

MAIL BAG 

In reference to shake like me: WHEN DO THE SIMPSONS COME ON???

They're on right now. They're probably on the freakin' M*A*S*H Channel

touching tribute to the obviously racist episode shake like me

I swear to god, I meant to expound on the idea that in 2009 television writers (in mostly/all-white writers rooms) thought racism was officially solved because America got directed by Obama (who I guess died earlier today) for a couple seasons and went on rehashing actual racist jokes thinking they could now be passed off as absurdism. I'm not saying this as a defense, I just remember being a white dude and basically believing that same thing. It's the same reasons jokes about limousines were also suddenly okay.

Watching all these shitty Season 4 episodes really makes me appreciate stuff like Gravy Robbers again.

I genuinely think season four is at least as good as season two OKAY?? FUCK to you, pal

I usually put the EPHEMERA CORNER above the mail bag, but sometimes it accidentally causes stuff to get deleted, so I am putting it here:

EPHEMERA CORNER

POSSIBLE EPILEPSY WARNING?? MAYBE???