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>If you set aside his long-running TV show “King of the Hill,” which is much too loving to be considered satire, Judge’s corpus of work cleaves neatly into two
by eplanit 10y ago
>If you set aside his long-running TV show “King of the Hill,” which is much too loving to be considered satire, Judge’s corpus of work cleaves neatly into two pieces.
Set it aside? Having grown up in that region of Texas it certainly is (wonderfully) satirical to me. It certainly isn't a hateful satire, but "too loving to be considered satire" misses it. In an otherwise very good article I'm also surprised by such a dismissal of a huge part of hit work.
- kenamarit 10y agoAgreed! I grew up outside Fort Worth, and a lot of the jokes, characters, and scenes in King of the Hill (like Silicon Valley) hit painfully close to home
- hawkice 10y ago> a huge part of hit work Freudian slip of the most correct kind. It really was a hit, very odd to ignore it (fellow Texan here).
- pavel_lishin 10y agoIt was too accurate. Growing up in Texas, I couldn't watch it for a long time because I didn't see where the humor was - it was just a show about people who were like my neighbors.
- tomsthumb 10y agoit's funny cause it's true
- hindsightbias 10y agoYeah, I don't know how it plays to out-of-staters, but there comes a point where a weekly KotH was too much. Sorta like it is hard to rewatch Office Space or Idiocracy. Have to be in the right mood, every 4 or 5 years. OS was filmed in my neighborhood and until the credits rolled I thought Stephen Root (Milton) was a former coworker (physical doppelgänger) where we literally had a TPS form. Going out for lunch with coworkers, "I hope Judge isn't sitting behind us" became a thing people would say. Freakish accuracy.
- hinkley 10y agoWhen I saw OS in the theater my jaw was in my lap the entire time, because I had worked with a slightly taller version of Peter. Disaffected guy who dressed the same, had the same haircut, talked constantly about leaving, took the wall off his cube to see out the window. Same lip curl when he was about to lose it.
- rotexo 10y agoI had the exact same experience, but now that I revisit it after a decade living in California, I find it hilarious.
- coolgeek 10y agoAs someone with no experience in that region, and as someone whose taste is much more toward the satirical (Seinfeld, Family Guy, Simpsons), I have a hard time trying to recall anything satirical in KotH. Instead, I consider KotH to be similar to the Cosby Show, Roseanne, or even All in the Family - a respectful look at the type of family that was not historically portrayed in TV or the movies.