Comic relief is one of the most well-known tools in the storyteller’s toolbox. Frequently, I see it bemoaned more than anything else; I remember beloved Soluter Ploughman complaining once about how every children’s show seemed to have script doctors whose only job was to insert the word “Awkward!” into serious dialogue moments. One popular criticism of the MCU is that it injects comic relief as if embarrassed of its own premise; I have previously argued that this is an inaccurate oversimplification of the MCU itself, but it is a somewhat accurate response to blockbuster movies in general lately, where comic relief is less a small break in the tension and more of an enforced station of the cross we have to get past. There are times when you watch a movie and wonder if they just want to make a comedy.
But at its best, comic relief can serve a few different purposes. It’s usually good for helping us get to know and like a character, and to see them getting to know and like each other. One of my favourite jokes in a non-comedy film is in Zodiac, when Robert Graysmith and Paul Avery meet in a bar to discuss the case. The whole time, Robert is drinking something blue, and Paul eventually says (with a classic RDJ pause), “This… can no longer be ignored.” After Robert explains his drink, we hard cut to the duo surrounded by empty glasses. From a story perspective, this is the two growing more comfortably intimate with one another, but it’s also funny as hell.
There’s also the classic move of putting a comedy episode just before an arc gets really dark. Cowboy Bebop arguably ends with a three-parter, with the wacky comic relief Ed bowing out just before the brutal and bloody final two episodes. Just before that is one of the wackiest comedy episodes the show ever did, in which Spike is incensed by meeting a man who is his exact double aside from his cartoonish ridiculousness. It’s like the storytellers are giving us one last bit of really wacky fun before it all goes to shit and we have to say goodbye.
What are your favourite moments of wacky comic relief?
