'Grey's' Isn't Going Anywhere
'Red Widow' Gets The Axe
Did 'South Park' Rip Off College Humor?
by Ryan McKee, posted Oct 22nd 2010 5:20PM
Is it us or does it seem like comedy has run out of ideas? 'SNL' was accused of ripping off 'Tim and Eric, Awesome Show, Great Job!', '30 Rock' was accused of ripping off 'The Sarah Silverman Program.' And now 'South Park' is accused of lifting a concept from College Humor. On Wednesday night's episode, Trey Parker and Matt Stone spoofed the summer blockbuster 'Inception.' The characters tried to explain the dream level plot, yet only seem to further confuse things. It may seem familiar because we've seen dozens of 'Inception' spoofs and jokes since its release.
However, senior sketch writer at College Humor Dan Gurewitch argues the bit seems familiar because it was copied nearly line for line from his video.
He even writes a line-by-line comparison of the two scenes. Below is a sample. After that watch the two videos yourself and tell us what you think.
"That doesn't sound so hard. / That doesn't sound very difficult.
It is. / It is.
Why? / Why?
Aaarrgh! / Aaarrgh!
We don't have time for this! / We don't have time for this!
Okay, fine, so next we're going into Arthur's dream, and then what? / Okay, fine. So you're gonna take my son to a dream within the dream, then what?
Then we go into Fisher's dream. / Then we go into your husband's dream.
Okay got it / Okay...
But Fisher will think we're in Browning's dream / But your husband will think you're in Hasselback's dream.
Okay. Wait, who's Browning? / Okay wait, who's Hasselback?"
Update! Via Gurewitch's blog:
David and I just got off the phone with Matt Stone (coolest sentence I've ever written). He was extremely nice and apologetic. He explained that when they couldn't get a copy of an Inception screener, they used our sketch as source material. They thought that the lines in our sketch were taken directly from Inception (and the joke was that they were arranged in rapid succession), rather than original lines written by us.
All is well, and we're going to meet up with Matt and Trey when they're in New York.
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