Instead of working his muscles at open mics or in improv, Burnham uploaded joke songs to the platform in 2006. "This show is called 'what.,' and I hope there are some surprises for you," he says as he goes to set down the water bottle. So let's dive into "Inside" and take a closer look at nearly every song and sketch in Burnham's special. The scene cuts to black and we see Burnham waking up in his small pull-out couch bed, bookending the section of the special that started when him going to sleep. Not a comedy per se, but a masterpiece nonetheless. Its a stupid song, and, uh, it doesnt really mean anything. The video continues.
Bo Burnham HOLMES: So before he was this celebrated filmmaker, Bo Burnham was himself a YouTube star. Burnham's career as a young, white, male comedian has often felt distinct from his peers because of the amount of public self-reflection and acknowledgment of his own privileges that he does on stage and off screen. Well now the shots are reversed. I was not, you know, having these particular experiences. WebStuck in a passionless marriage, a journalist must choose between her distant but loving husband and a younger ex-boyfriend who has reentered her life. Its an instinct I have for all my work to have some deeper meaning or something. But by the end of the tune, his narrative changes into irreverence. How how successful do you think is "Inside" at addressing, describing kind of confronting the experience that a lot of people have had over the past year? . / Are you having fun? The crowd directions are no longer stock pop song lyrics; now, the audience understands them as direct orders to them from Burnham. But now Burnham is showing us the clutter of the room where "Inside" was filmed. Web9/10. ", He then pulls the same joke again, letting the song play after the audience's applause so it seems like a mistake. For fans who struggle with panic attacks (myself included) its a comfort to see yourself represented in an artist whose work you respect. He takes a break in the song to talk about how he was having panic attacks on stage while touring the "Make Happy" special, and so he decided to stop doing live shows. The Volcano, which touched on labor rights. He tries to talk into the microphone, giving his audience a one-year update. I feel very close and intimate with him in this version. Bo Burnham also uploaded Welcome to the Internet and White Womans Instagram on his YouTube channel. While sifting through fan reactions to Inside, the YouTube algorithm suggested I watch a fan-made video that pitch corrects All Eyes on Me to Burnhams actual voice. Released on May 30, 2021, Bo Burnham wrote, recorded, directed, and produced Inside while in lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. With electro-pop social commentary, bleak humour and sock-puppet debates, the comics lockdown creation is astonishing. In the song, Burnham specifically mentions looking up "derealization," a disorder that may "feel like you're living in a dream. Performing "Make Happy" was mentally taxing on Burnham.
Bo Burnham's Netflix Special, 'Inside For all the ways Burnham had been desperate to leave the confines of his studio, now that he's able to go back out into the world (and onto a real stage), he's terrified. Burnham brings back all the motifs from the earlier songs into his finale, revisiting all the stages of emotion he took us through for the last 90 minutes. Though it does have a twist. So we broke down each song and sketch and analyzed their meaning and context. An astronaut's return after a 30-year disappearance rekindles a lost love and sparks interest from a corporation determined to learn why he hasn't aged. While he's laying in bed, eyes about the close, the screen shows a flash of an open door. I mean, honestly, he's saying a lot right there. Burnham's earlier Netflix specials and comedy albums. Copyright 2021 NPR. If "All Eyes on Me" sounds disconcertingly comforting to you, it could be because you can recognize the mental symptoms of a mood disorder like depression. And like those specials, Inside implores fans to think about deeper themes as well as how we think about comedy as a genre. After more sung repetitions of get your fuckin hands up, Burnham says, Get up. "The world needs direction from a white guy like [you] who is healing the world with comedy. On the other two sides of that question ("no" and "not sure") the flowchart asks if it could be "interpreted" as mean (if so, then it's "not funny") or if it "punches down.". Thought modern humans have been around for much longer than 20,000 years, that's around how long ago people first migrated to North America. But the cultural standards of what is appropriate comedy and also the inner standards of my own mind have changed rapidly since I was 16. And the biggest risk Burnham takes in the show is letting his emotional side loose, but not before cracking a ton of jokes. There's no more time left to add to the camera's clock. Throughout "Inside," there's a huge variety of light and background set-ups used, so it seems unlikely that this particular cloud-scape was just randomly chosen twice. HOLMES: Thank you. And many of them discuss their personal connection to the show and their analysis of how Burnham must have been thinking and feeling when he made it. MARTIN: You know, about that, because it does move into a deeply serious place at some point. Still, its difficult not to be lulled back into, again, this absolute banger. At first hearing, this is a simple set of lyrics about the way kids deal with struggles throughout adolescence, particularly things like anxiety and depression. You can tell that he's watched a ton of livestream gamers, and picked up on their intros, the way the talk with people in the chat, the cadence of their commentary on the game, everything. The aesthetic telegraphs authenticity and vulnerability, but the specials stunning final shots reveal the misdirection at work, encouraging skepticism of the performativity of such realism. Burnham quickly shifts from the song to a reaction video of the song itself in the style of a YouTuber or Twitch streamer. ", The Mayo Clinic defines depersonalization-derealization disorder as occurring "when you persistently or repeatedly have the feeling that you're observing yourself from outside your body or you have a sense that things around you aren't real, or both. Bo Burnham, pictured here at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, wrote, directed and performed the entirety of his new Netflix special, Inside, by himself. In Inside, Burnham confronts parasocial relationships in his most direct way yet. "Truly, it's like, for a 16-year-old kid in 2006, it's not bad. During that taping, Burnham said his favorite comic at the time was Hans Teeuwen, a "Dutch absurdist," who has a routine with a sock puppet that eats a candy bar as Teeuwen sings. Bo Burnhams 2021 special, Inside. HOLMES: Yeah. Please enter a valid email and try again.
Burnham's creative background began with being a theater then he transitioned to musical-comedy. But then the music tells the audience that "he meant to play the track again" and that "art's still a lie, nothing's still real.". And its easier to relax when the video focuses on a separate take of Burnham singing from farther away, the frame now showing the entire room. The reason he started making this special, he explains in the show, is to distract himself from shooting himself in the head, the first of several mentions of suicide (including one in which he tells viewers to just dont). All Eyes on Me takes a different approach to rattling the viewer. The penultimate song, "All Eyes On Me," is the best in the whole special, in this writer's opinion. In his first Netflix special (2013's "what. Went out to look for a reason to hide again. Or DM a girl and groom her, do a Zoomer, find a tumor in her HOLMES: And this is what the chorus of that song sounds like. Burnhams 2013 special, what., culminates in Burnham, the performer, reacting to pre-recorded versions of himself playing people from his life reacting to his work and fame, trying to capitalize on their tenuous relationship with him. He brushes his teeth, eats a bowl of cereal, and begins editing his videos. It is set almost entirely within one room of his Los Angeles guest house, the same one shown in the closing song of the June 2016 Make Happy special, titled Are you happy?. [1] Created in the guest house of Burnham's Los Angeles home during the COVID-19 pandemic without a crew or audience, it was released on Netflix on May 30, 2021. Still terrified of that spotlight? But by using this meta-narrative throughout the whole special, Burnham messes with our ability to know when we're seeing a genuine struggle with artistic expression versus a meticulously staged fictional breakdown. And while its an ominous portrait of the isolation of the pandemic, theres hope in its existence: Written, designed and shot by Burnham over the last year inside a single room, it illustrates that theres no greater inspiration than limitations. LINDA HOLMES, BYLINE: Thank you, Michel. On May 30, 2022, Burnham uploaded the video Inside: The Outtakes, to his YouTube channel, marking a rare original upload, similar to how he used his YouTube channel when he was a teenager. The song's melody is oddly soothing, and the lyrics are a sly manifestation of the way depression convinces you to stay in its abyss ("It's almost over, it's just begun. So this is how it ends. In Unpaid Intern, Burnham sings about how deeply unethical the position is to the workers in a pastiche of other labor-focused blues. Next in his special, Burnham performs a sketch song about being an unpaid intern, and then says he's going to do a "reaction" video to the song in classic YouTube format. How does one know if the joke punches down? Burnhams online success and an awareness of what kind of his audiences perceived closeness made the comedian key to one of the most prominent discussions in a creator- and influencer-driven era of media: the idea of parasocial relationships. It's so good to hear your voice. Only he knows. Thematically, it deals with the events of 2020, rising wealth inequality, racial injustice, isolation, mental health, social media, and technologys role in our lives. To save you the time freeze-framing, here's the complete message: "No pressure by the way at any point we can stop i just want to make sure ur comfortable all this and please dont feel obligated to send anything you dont want to just cuz i want things doesnt mean i should get them and its sometimes confusing because i think you enjoy it when i beg and express how much i want you but i dont ever want that to turn into you feeling pressured into doing something you don't want or feeling like youre disappointing me this is just meant to be fun and if at any point its not fun for you we can stop and im sorry if me saying this is killing the mood i just like ". Now get inside.". (For example, the song "Straight, White, Male" from the "Make Happy" special). WebA Girl and an Astronaut. A weekly roundup of the best things from Polygon, By submitting your email, you agree to our, Bo Burnhams Inside begs for our parasocial awareness, Sign up for the WebBo Burnham: Inside is by far one of the riskiest and original comedy specials to come out in years. And many people will probably remember his 2018 movie, "Eighth Grade."
Bo Burnham: Inside Burnham spoofs a PewDiePie-like figure a YouTuber who narrates his playing of a video game with a dead-eyed smugness, as shown in an image at the bottom-right corner of the screen. When Burnham's character decides he doesn't want to actually hear criticism from Socko, he threatens to remove him, prompting Socko's subservience once again, because "that's how the world works.". And they're biting, but he's also very talented at these little catchy pop hooks. Carpool Karaoke, Steve Aoki, Logan Paul. It's like Burnham's special has swallowed you whole, bringing you fully into his mind at last.
Who Were We Running From? But look, I made you some content. And part of it is sometimes he's just in despair. So we broke down each song and sketch and analyzed their meaning and context.