Yesterday was the first episode of the new Larry Wilmore show that fills the time slot vacated by Stephen Colbert. It was promising, though a little rough in parts, but so were the The Daily Show and The Colbert Report at the beginning and it takes some time for shows like these to find their rhythm and figure out what works best for them.
It looks like each show will have a panel discussion and they dealt with some pretty serious issues. At the very least, this show will have the benefit of providing a platform for a much wider diversity of voices, and fresh viewpoints, on current issues than what we see on other panel shows, and that alone will make it distinctive.
The next show (tonight, available online tomorrow) will deal with the Bill Cosby rape allegations, so you cannot accuse Wilmore of ducking difficult topics.
Part 1 was a monologue by Wilmore.
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In part 2, there was an interesting panel discussion about the role of violence in generating change.
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In part 3, he asks each panelist a tough question and insists that they answer it honestly and lets the audience judge how truthful they were.
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(These clips aired on January 19, 2015. To get suggestions on how to view clips of The Daily Show and The Nightly Show outside the US, please see this earlier post. If the videos autoplay, please see here for a diagnosis and possible solutions.)
Weird. They auto-played in both IE and Firefox. Then I went looking for examples of previous videos that didn’t autoplay, like at http://freethoughtblogs.com/singham/2015/01/18/great-moments-in-news/, and when I came back here (clicking the URL), these no longer autoplayed in IE or Firefox.
I like that the background map has south at the top and is centered on the eastern hemisphere. A refreshing change from the usual N. America-centric view of the globe. I also noticed that the grid lines on the map are very slowly rotating.
Trickster,
I did not notice that. I must look next time. It makes for a nice metaphor fot how the show hopes to view the world.
I didn’t enjoy last night’s episode as a whole quite as much as the first, but I adored the opening: [quoting from memory] “Tonight we’ll talk about Bill Cosby. We’ll ask the question ‘Did he do it?’ The answer will be ‘Yes’.”
I think they devote too much time (2/3) to the panel discussion,* which they needn’t do since from what I’ve seen he can carry a monologue.
* (and last night to a guest comedian)
I love Wilmore’s humor. He makes me laugh while at the same time raising my consciousness and, occasionally, shaming me about my preconceptions. He has a way of showing that becoming a better person doesn’t have to hurt.