Pipeline to the Clouds - the 1st Season 13 Short

That would involve a lot of sketch writing for the interstitial bits.

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Or just a robot doing sassy intros for each one, as Tom did for the shorts when they did the first (?) anthology.

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I wouldn’t consider aspect ratio a restriction. I’ve seen shows change back and forth between 1.7:1 (aka 16:9) for dialog scenes and 1.85:1 (contemporary movie ratio) or 2.35:1 (widescreen cinema) for action scenes. You can do a transition where the letterbox or pillarbox eases in or out.

But also the shorts historically were a different segment, so you can just do the theater segments for shorts in 4:3 and transition back to 16:9 as you come back out to a host segment for the rest of the show. Or do the theater seats 16:9 with a pillarbox on the film.

Also not sure how much anyone would care if the short were B&W and the feature in color. I don’t think I’d even think about it, personally.

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The Mask 3D is B&W, their first since The Horrors of Spider Island late in the 10th season, I believe.

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I was very curious about this short, since a bit of the writer’s room for it was shown as a set visit.

Honestly, and it feels strange to say this, but I thought some of the riffs in the room were much funnier than the ones that made it into the show. We didn’t get any insight on how those final jokes were selected, but watching the same part of the short again, I felt underwhelmed at the riff choices made.

Ignorance is bliss, because I’m starting to go down a rabbit hole of “what other jokes were cut that would have been A+++ for me?” I’ll never know.

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Since they’ve promised to do 12 shorts in a 13-episode season, I think they may do some of them separately and maybe some before movies if they get ones with short run times. They’ve said that ~90 minutes is their sweet spot for programs, and not just because of the old network time-block requirements.

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I loved the short, but it was Pearl’s “Hope you guys like American Folk Music! I’m just kidding. I don’t care if you do.” that won the night for me.

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It’s that legendary Forrester concern for others!

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Things may have changed, but the announced plan since the end of the KS campaign has been to release the shorts in the 12 spaces between 13 episodes. Lesley has confirmed that a couple of times around here somewhere but I haven’t been able to track those comments down yet.

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Yeah to me, the schedule that makes sense is to continue alternating between a new feature film event, and a “new short + classic episode” live event every 2 weeks. That should take about 48 weeks, or the better part of a year.

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This has happened to me while riffing. You have a joke that would be perfect, but it just doesn’t fit the length of the space it really should take (meaning it would step on more important dialogue or action during the picture) or you have a joke coming before it or after it that wouldn’t leave room for your joke. You can’t get too precious about jokes when you write. It’s a volume business and you have to keep churning out possibilities.

Compounding it for me was the fact that I did a series of shows in the beforetimes in Philly doing live riffs. There you had to not step on actual laughs. And if those laughs went on long, then the time to make what would have been a very good joke had passed and you had to drop it and look for something new. You can’t be so precious about the one thing you love that you let if affect the work as a whole.

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It was great to see a new short after so many years. I loved it!

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So much so. It really had the feel and flavor of the classic era, and all three riffers made it work so well.

Also, welcome to the forums!

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I find these types of shorts to be very relaxing and enjoyable to watch.

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Yeah, they have a real laidback and comforting feel to them that’s conducive to relaxation.

It’s like when you’re watching either one of those MST3K 24/7 streaming channels at night, and you happen to catch an episode that has this very calming and easygoing aura to it. (Well, more so than usual, is what I mean. The show’s generally relaxing, with some installments more relaxing than the others.)

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That was one of my first thoughts after I watched it: It’s rather mellow and calming. I enjoyed it so much. And it’s just the first offering!

I know it inspired me to consume more Citizen Juice!

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It was good

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A mini-gauntlet of shorts from Kinga to test out her experiment in a more targeted way…

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This one was a real treat. It’s always great to see a short, and the riffs on “Pipeline to the Clouds” were hilarious. Hit after hit after hit. I’m watching the short again and I came to find this thread just to say how much that silly little Talking Heads riff makes me laugh each and every time that I watch this: “There is water at the bottom of the ocean!!” Outstanding.

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“It’s morning on Lake Erie, and Omar comin’.”

That killed me. I love how they’ve settled into a more natural flow with the jokes this time around, really feels like the good old days again.

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