Back at it. Two more texts. Fully locked. Let's go.
I also on da bus to STN YAYYYY
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (2015-2019) — Created by Rachel Bloom and Aline Brosh McKenna
Okay, so bear with me on this one because Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is technically a musical romantic comedy, but it does something so specific with fourth wall awareness that I had to include it. Also, another rec from Quinn, so give it up, ladies and gents, for his taste in media.
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is an American romantic musical comedy-drama that premiered in 2015 and ran for four seasons. Created, written, and directed by Rachel Bloom and Aline Brosh McKenna, the show follows Rebecca Bunch, a lawyer who moves from New York City to West Covina, California, to pursue her ex-boyfriend from high school summer camp. That sentence alone should tell you what kind of show this is.
Where Fleabag breaks the fourth wall through direct camera address, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend does something different and arguably weirder. It breaks the fourth wall through the songs themselves. Rebecca's songs present moments of true spontaneous self-expression, but in these meta-moments, isn't the spontaneity highly constructed? Rebecca has to break into song to express herself; she cannot integrate self-expression into her everyday life. The songs are her fourth wall. When she can't say something true out loud, she sings it directly to us, in a production number that the other characters can't hear or see. It's the same mechanism as Fleabag looking at the camera, just with choreography.
The show has a long history of breaking the fourth wall and then having characters insert a ridiculous in-universe explanation for their odd word choices. The show is constantly aware of itself, constantly commenting on its own genre. In the finale, when Paula confronts Rebecca about her habit of spacing out, Rebecca says, "When I stare off into space, I'm imagining myself in a musical number. That's how I sometimes see big moments in my life, as musical numbers. And because I do that, so does the show." The character acknowledges that the show exists because she imagines it. That's as meta as it gets.
The series is a comedy at its core. But the levity comes through even in serious moments, including Rebecca's suicide attempt, because the show never loses its comedic footing even when it's dealing with genuinely heavy material. That balance, comedy as the container for darkness, not the escape from it, is exactly what we're going for.
Parasite (2019) — Directed by Bong Joon-ho
Parasite is a South Korean dark comedy thriller about a poor family, the Kims, who systematically infiltrate the household of a wealthy family by getting themselves hired as unrelated domestic staff. For a film that ultimately delivers such an outraged, sorrowful, and incisive message about class inequity, Parasite begins with surprising levity, with a twist on a classic heist.
The film's tone shifts wildly throughout, from focusing on the relatively comedic hijinks of the ambitious Kim family in the first half to the tense, unsettling introduction of a character who lives beneath the wealthy Park family's ornate mansion, ushering in the darker tone of the film's second half.
Much of Parasite's appeal is that Bong's humor keeps the class allegory from ever feeling self-important. He's making you laugh at the con, at the Parks' obliviousness, at the absurdity of class performance, and then the film reminds you what's actually at stake for everyone involved. Although the exposition and rising action are driven by dark humor, more sinister, threatening elements of horror and mystery dominate the film's second half. From celebratory to morbid, elated to appalling, the film's sudden shifts in tone effectively capture and hold the audience's attention by establishing a menacing mood.
The most defining trademark of Bong's films is their sudden tone shifts between drama, darkness, and black or slapstick humor. Bong himself claimed: "I'm never really conscious of the tone shifts or the comedy that I apply, I never think 'oh, the tone shifts at this point or it's funny at this point.'"
For our film, dark comedy isn't about making dark things funny. It's about using humor to get the audience somewhere they wouldn't go otherwise. And then pulling the rug. Parasite does this better than almost anything ever made. We should be so lucky.
Works Cited
Bloom, Rachel, and Aline Brosh McKenna, creators. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. The CW, 2015–2019.
Bong, Joon-ho, director. Parasite. Neon, 2019.
Framke, Caroline. "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend's Brilliant Use of the Musical Form." Vox, 22 Feb. 2017, www.vox.com/culture/2017/2/22/14691900/crazy-ex-girlfriend-musical-fourth-wall.
Lim, Dennis. "Parasite: Notes from the Underground." The Criterion Collection, 24 Nov. 2020, www.criterion.com/current/posts/7158-parasite-notes-from-the-underground.
Lee, Taila. "Bong Joon-ho Exposes Harsh Realities Through Humor and Horror in 'Parasite.'" The Paw Print, 14 Apr. 2020, woodsidepawprint.com/lifestyle/2020/04/14/bong-joon-ho-exposes-harsh-realities-through-humor-and-horror-in-parasite.
McDaniels, Emily. "Parasite: Genre Hybridity and Class Consciousness." University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, Fall 2023, www.uww.edu/documents/colleges/cls/Departments/Film%20Studies/RF%202024%20McDaniels.pdf.
