What makes something funny?
by itsnextlevel · 18 things on NewTwos
- Comedy is the organised pursuit of abnormality.
- Abnormality
- Things become funny when they depart from what is expected.
- When logic takes down a certain route, and we are suddenly detoured from that route.
- The jarring nature of this diversion produces laughter.
- Familiarity
- Here we laugh not because we did not see it coming, but because once it arrives, it is something we immediately recognise and this brings us both pleasure and relief.
- Physical Discomfort or Injury in others.
- We’ve all been hurt before and because we were not able to laugh at it during our own trauma, seeing it in someone else acted as a kind of sympathetic release value.
- “We’ve been there, buddy, and while we feel sorry for you, we also can’t help but be glad it’s not happening to us. Ha, Ha, Ha”
- Wit
- Wit, too can be funny, although wit usually boils down to little more than clever, but slightly annoying, observations.
- Shocking Things
- Shocking things can be funny, as can disgusting things, and sometimes things that aren’t funny can be funny because of the way in which they are not funny.
- Comedy is simply an elaborate defence mechanism, protecting us from dangers of emotional pain - Sigmund Freud
- Comedy should be based on truth. You take the truth and you put a little twist at the end.
- Comedy tells the truth about people
- Comedy is the art of telling the truth about what it’s like to be human.