Indecision 2000: Election Night - Choose and Lose (2000) (TV)

User Rating:

8.5/10   

Writer:

Daniel J. Goor (writer)

Release Date:

7 November 2000 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Documentary

Plot Keywords:

Character Name In Title

Awards:

1 win & 2 nominations

Cast

Steve Carell	...	Himself
Stephen Colbert	...	Himself
Vance DeGeneres	...	Himself
Chad Law	...	Concerned Sunshine State Voter
Mo Rocca	...	Himself
Jon Stewart	...	Himself

Country:

USA

Color:

Color

Movie Connections:

Edited from "The Daily Show" (1996)

Great Satire, but the Beginning of the End

I'm in the minority when I say "The Daily Show" stinks. Jon Stewart has made a poor move in transforming a goofy, wacky show that mocked average Joes who believed they were impregnated by aliens to a so-called satire that allows celebrities and world leaders to riff with Jon. To summarize, you went from Joe Bob Briggs's insults of tacky televangelist/hairdressers to Bill Gates smirking with a fawning Jon Stewart, who chides the Richest Man for not having invented jet packs for the masses. Face it: "The Daily Show" is now a part of the corporate media machine, rather than what it should be, a campy program that makes fun of said machine from the outside.

Still, in the transition from camp classic to liberal media cog, there was one bright shining moment in "The Daily Show's" history, "Indecision 2000." There were still vestiges of the goofy Kilborn era which, despite Stewart's efforts to extirpate them, added brilliantly to the mockery of the presidential hopefuls of 2000. The correspondents had loads of fun goofing with Bob Dole and John McCain, and these candidates good-heartedly played along with the game. For those who have forgotten, up until the controversial election, 2000 was one of the most boring presidential elections in U.S. history. "The Daily Show" did good in mocking the seriousness of this campaign. The "correspondents" were actually somewhat talented, and included the likes of Steve Carell, Stephen Colbert, Lewis Black, and Vance DeGeneres. I didn't like this intermediate generation compared to Brian Unger or A. Whitney Brown, but they were infinitely more talented than the current generation of unfunny hacks on "The Daily Show." They made the 2000 season pretty fun to watch. Also included were real-life goofballs, such as hapless presidential candidate Charles Doty and the late, great bedspread entrepreneur, Al Greenwood. In all, the 2000 campaign was a fun season to watch, but it also showed signs of Stewart's decision to change the guard, so to speak, and hence was the beginning of the end of what could have been a timeless classic of television comedy.