ebogjonson.com

« xmas radio | Main | so right, i'm wrong (chappelle, again) »

December 29, 2005

me and the chappelle theory (updated)

[uh, I was wrong. read below then go read this.]

So did I mention that I was right about The Chappelle Theory being some kind of ad? Just before the holidays Neal Brennan and Charlie Murphy come out of the conspiracy closet.

But seriously. Did I mention that I was right?

Not that I want to go on and on about being right, or to make a big to-do about how wrong asswipes like this need to eat pixellated crow, if not a proverbial dick, but, like, I was right.

(I won't take credit for the reveal, but did I say I was right before the "disclaimer" or the clips appeared on the site? Okay, you're right, I did.)

In hindsight there's something curious about how bulk of the largely wrong pre-reveal responses to the Chappelle Theory clustered. Setting aside the near univeral praise for the thing's humor, the vast majority of the deeper takes settled around two poles: earnest "could it be true?" speculation and dismissive "it's just a joke" eye-rolling. Both of those reactions seem defensive to me, and in my minds eye each has a coloring - "is it true?" being a black question, while "lighten up" is well, mighty light. (Both responses definitely share a gender, in that this felt from beginning to end like a lot of boys playing with meme toys.)

I say the reactions feel "defensive" because both camps seemed to have put their backs up against solid walls that they believe loom behind the fake conspiracy's false front - the defense of jokes for jokes sake for the eye-rollers (what the head shrinking types might call "pleasure"), or black-on-black generational conflict for the questioners. My (right!) bit about all this existing in the service of marketing was a third wall.

The commerce thing becomes increasingly of interest to me. I haven't seen the short yet, so standard disclaimers apply, but why does a short film by two of Chappelle's jilted collaborators need a viral marketing campaign? If I made a fake conspiracy movie about my last gig ("The AOL Black Voices Theory"?) I would just make it, you know. To make it and then create "buzz" for it via viral marketing and an ad agency suggests a rather cynical attempt to cash in on Dave's decision to jet while they still can.

All of this just goes to show, though, that a year into the dark times and people care about what happened to Dave. I heard somewhere he spent most of 2005 playing World of Warcraft. I'd think about him everytime I considered signing a month or two away by getting the game. I pictured meeting him in a cave somewhere and chopping things to bits and asking: why did you go, Dave? Where? What the fuck happened?

Posted by ebogjonson in screened, on December 29, 2005 10:41 PM

Comments

Posted by: jem at December 30, 2005 5:19 AM