No, I mean it. Stop me.
"Stop me if you've heard this one before." —Submitted by Matt as the worst possible caption for New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest #49 (rabbi, priest and minister walk into a bar), April 30.
"Stop me if you've heard this one before." —Selected by New Yorker editors as a finalist for best possible caption for Cartoon Caption Contest #49, May 15.
[Click here for an index to the New Yorker Cartoon Anti-Caption Contest.]
Comments
To be fair, I added "before," and as the infamous "Fusilli" caption demonstrates, one word can make all the comic difference in the world.
Posted by: Matt | May 15, 2006 11:11 AM
Oh, you're right. Somehow I thought they were exactly the same. The thing that kinda kills me is that one thing that makes this a good anti-caption ought to ruin it as a real one. Not the unfunniness -- that's a given -- but the fact that it makes NO SENSE for the bartender to be saying this to the person on the phone. It's a punchline that ignores a key part of the set-up.
Posted by: radosh | May 15, 2006 12:03 PM
My view is that it kinda of makes sense. Guy picks up the phone as these folks enter the bar, calling a friend. My view for what made it bad was the sheer boring and banal obviousness of it.
Posted by: Matt | May 15, 2006 2:14 PM