As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Burnham reacts to his reaction to his reaction: Im so afraid that this criticism will be levied against me that I levy it against myself before anyone else can. The video keeps going. Burnham's creative background began with being a theater then he transitioned to musical-comedy. It's prison. Burnham was just 16 years old when he wrote a parody song ("My Whole Family") and filmed himself performing it in his bedroom. Because there's also a little bit Bo Burnham the character in this almost. You can stream "Inside" on Netflix now, and see our ranking of all 20 original songs from the special here. It also seems noteworthy that this is one of the only sketches in "Inside" that fades to black. Its horrific.". Come and watch the skinny kid with a / Steadily declining mental health, and laugh as he attempts / To give you what he cannot give himself. Like Struccis Fake Friends documentary, this song is highlighted in Anuska Dhars video essay, Bo Burnham and the Trap of Parasocial Self-Awareness. Burnhams work consistently addresses his relationship with his audience, the ways he navigates those parasocial relationships, and how easy they can be to exploit. newsletter, On Parasocial Relationships and the Boundaries of Celebrity, Bo Burnham and the Trap of Parasocial Self-Awareness.. MARTIN: Well, that being said, Lynda, like, what song do you want to go out on? Now, you heard me struggling to describe what this is, so help me out. Yes, Bo Burnham posted a trailer via Twitter on April 28, 2021. Burnham wrote out: "Does it target those who have been disenfranchised in a historical, political, social, economic and/or psychological context?". Other artists have made works on the wavelength of Repeat Stuff, but few creators with a platform as large as Burnhams return to the topic over and over, touching on it in almost all of their works. And she's with us now to tell us more about it. He has one where he's just sitting on a stool with an acoustic guitar describing our modern world. But then the video keeps playing, and so he winds up reacting to his own reaction, and then reacting yet again to that reaction. Like, what is it? Bo Burnham: INSIDE | Trailer - YouTube 0:00 / 2:09 The following content may contain suicide or self-harm topics. There's no more time left to add to the camera's clock. Using cinematic tools other comics overlook, the star (who is also the director, editor and cameraman) trains a glaring spotlight on internet life mid-pandemic. If we continue to look at it from the lens of a musical narrative, this is the point at which our protagonist realizes he's failed at his mission. An ethereal voice (which is really just Burnham's own voice with effects over it) responds to Burnham's question while a bright light suddenly shines on his face, as if he's receiving a message from God. So let's dive into "Inside" and take a closer look at nearly every song and sketch in Burnham's special. Its called INSIDE, and it will undoubtedly strike your hearts forevermore. The Volcano, which touched on labor rights. The clearest inspiration is Merle Traviss 16 Tons, a song about the unethical working conditions of coal miners also used in weird Tom Hanks film Joe vs. He says his goal had been to complete filming before his 30th birthday. Not only is this whiteboard a play on the classic comedy rule that "tragedy plus time equals comedy," but it's a callback to Burnham's older work. True, but it can deepen and clarify art. The piece also highlights Bos anxieties with becoming older and his legacy as a comedian. He uploaded it to YouTube, a then barely-known website that offered an easy way for people to share videos, so he could send it to his brother. He's self-evaluating his own visual creation in the same way people will often go back to look at their Instagram stories or posts to see how it looks after they've shared it. He was alone. Burnham's growth is admirable, but also revealing of how little we expect from men in the industry. He doesn't really bother with any kind of transitions. You can tell that he's watched a ton of livestream gamers, and picked up on their intros, the way the talk with people in the chat, the cadence of their commentary on the game, everything. The lead-in is Burnham thanking a nonexistent audience for being there with him for the last year. Bo Burnham: Inside review this is a claustrophobic masterpiece. Later in Inside, Burnham thanks the audience for their support while holding them at knifepoint. I feel very close and intimate with him in this version. The penultimate song "All Eyes on Me" makes for a particularly powerful moment. And it portends and casts doubt on a later scene when his mental health frays and Burnham cries in earnest. The song, written in 2006, is about how his whole family thinks he's gay, and the various conversations they're having trying to figure it out. And that can be a really - if you're not very good at it, that kind of thing, where there's a balance between sort of the sarcastic and ironic versus the very sincere can be really exhausting. BURNHAM: (Singing) Start a rumor, buy a broom or send a death threat to a Boomer. According to the special, Bo decided he was ready to begin doing stand-up again in January 2020, after dealing with panic attacks onstage during his previous tour, the Make Happy Tour of 2015-2016. In the song "That Funny Feeling," Burnham mentions these two year spans without further explanation, but it seems like he's referencing the "critical window for action to prevent the effects of global warming from becoming irreversible. Bo Burnham: Inside is a devastating portrait of the actor-director-singer-comedian's dysfunctional interiority and 2020's unyielding assault on mental and social health. But the cultural standards of what is appropriate comedy and also the inner standards of my own mind have changed rapidly since I was 16. All Eyes on Me takes a different approach to rattling the viewer. BURNHAM: (Singing) Does anybody want to joke when no one's laughing in the background? TikTok creator @TheWoodMother made a video about how Burnham's "Inside" is its own poioumenon thanks to the meta scenes of Burnham setting up lights and cameras, not to mention the musical numbers like "Content" and "Comedy" that all help to tell the story of Burnham making this new special. And then the funniest thing happened.". Just wanted to make sure everybody knew about Bo's comedy special transcripts on Scraps. It's wonderful to be with you. Disclosure: Mathias Dpfner, CEO of Business Insider's parent company, Axel Springer, is a Netflix board member. our ranking of all 20 original songs from the special here. MARTIN: And it's deep, too. And while its an ominous portrait of the isolation of the pandemic, theres hope in its existence: Written, designed and shot by Burnham over the last year inside a single room, it illustrates that theres no greater inspiration than limitations. The first half is dominated by sharp, silly satires of the moment, like a visually precise and hilarious song about social media vanity, White Womans Instagram, and a commercial for a woke brand consultant. Other than Fred Rogers, Bo Burnham is one of the most cited single individual creators when discussing parasocial relationships. A gift shop at the gun range, a mass shooting at the mall. MARTIN: This special is titled, appropriately enough, "Inside," and it is streaming on Netflix now. Good. "Oh Jesus, sorry," Burnham says, hurrying over to pick it up. "Truly, it's like, for a 16-year-old kid in 2006, it's not bad. MARTIN: So a lot of us, you know, artists, journalists have been trying to describe what this period has been like, what has it meant, what's been going on with us. "The poioumenon is calculated to offer opportunities to explore the boundaries of fiction and reality the limits of narrative truth," Fowler wrote in his book "A History of English Literature.". I'm sitting down, writing jokes, singing silly songs, I'm sorry I was gone. MARTIN: You know, about that, because it does move into a deeply serious place at some point. His virtuosic new special, Inside (on Netflix), pushes this trend further, so far that it feels as if he has created something entirely new and unlikely, both sweepingly cinematic and claustrophobically intimate, a Zeitgeist-chasing musical comedy made alone to an audience of no one. Let's take a closer look at just a few of those bubbles, shall we? "I didn't perform for five years," he says. Gross asked Burnham if people "misinterpreted" the song and thought it was homophobic. That YouTube commenter might be understood by Burnham if they were to meet him. that shows this exact meta style. The incentives of the web, those that reward outrage, excess and sentiment, are the villains of this show. The whole song ping pongs between Burnham's singing character describing a very surface-level, pleasant definition of the world functioning as a cohesive ecosystem and his puppet, Socko, saying that the truth is the world functions at a much darker level of power imbalance and oppression. And maybe the rest of us are ready, too. It moves kind of all over the place. The label of parasocial relationship is meant to be neutral, being as natural and normal and, frankly, inescapable as familial or platonic relationships. He takes a break in the song to talk about how he was having panic attacks on stage while touring the "Make Happy" special, and so he decided to stop doing live shows. I like this song, Burnham says, before pointing out the the lack of modern songs about labor exploitation. The hustle to be a working artist usually means delivering an unending churn of content curated specifically for the demands of an audience that can tell you directly why they are upset with you because they did not actually like the content you gave them, and then they can take away some of your revenue for it. The comedians lifetime online explains the heart of most of his new songs, I made you some content, comedian Bo Burnham sings in the opening moments of his new Netflix special, Inside. Theyre complicated. When he appeared on NPR's radio show "Fresh Air" with Terry Gross in 2018, the host played a clip of "My Whole Family" and Burnham took his headphones off so he didn't have to relisten to the song. Likewise. All rights reserved. Unpaid Intern isnt just about unpaid internships; when your livelihood as an artist depends on your perceived closeness with each individual fan, fetching a coffee becomes telling someone theyre valid when they vent to you like they would a friend (or a therapist). To save you the time freeze-framing, here's the complete message: "No pressure by the way at any point we can stop i just want to make sure ur comfortable all this and please dont feel obligated to send anything you dont want to just cuz i want things doesnt mean i should get them and its sometimes confusing because i think you enjoy it when i beg and express how much i want you but i dont ever want that to turn into you feeling pressured into doing something you don't want or feeling like youre disappointing me this is just meant to be fun and if at any point its not fun for you we can stop and im sorry if me saying this is killing the mood i just like ". Simply smiling at the irony of watching his own movie come to life while he's still inside? But the lyrics Burnham sings seem to imply that he wants to be held accountable for thoughtless and offensive jokes of his past: "Father please forgive me for I did not realize what I did, or that I'd live to regret it, times are changing and I'm getting old, are you gonna hold me accountable?". Under the movies section, there's a bubble that says "sequel to classic comedy that everyone watches and then pretends never happened" and "Thor's comebacks.". Anyone can read what you share. In this time-jumping dramedy, a workaholic who's always in a rush now wants life to slow down when he finds himself leaping ahead a year every few hours. It's a hint at the promised future; the possibility of once again being able to go outside and feel sunlight again. A series of eerie events thrusts an unlikely trio (John Boyega, Jamie Foxx and Teyonah Parris) onto the trail of a nefarious government conspiracy. I don't know exactly how it tracks his experience, Bo Burnham, the person, right? One comment stuck out to me: Theres something really powerful and painful about, hearing his actual voice singing and breaking at certain points. We're a long way from the days when he filmed "Comedy" and the contrast shows how fruitless this method of healing has been. The fun thing about this is he started writing it and recording it early on, so you get to see clips of him singing it both, you know, with the short hair and with the long hair - when he had just started this special and when he was finishing it. (SOUNDBITE OF COMEDY SPECIAL, "BO BURNHAM: INSIDE"). Trying to grant his dying father's wish, a son discovers an epic love story buried in his family's distant past. An existential dread creeps in, but Burnham's depression-voice tells us not to worry and sink into nihilism. "I was a kid who was stuck in his room, there isn't much more to say about it. WebBo Burnham's "Inside" special on Netflix is an incredibly detailed musical-comedy artwork. So we broke down each song and sketch and analyzed their meaning and context. He takes it, and Burnham cries robotically as a tinny version of the song about being stuck in the room plays. For fans who struggle with panic attacks (myself included) its a comfort to see yourself represented in an artist whose work you respect. But I described it to a couple of people as, you know, this looks like what the inside of my head felt like because of his sort of restlessness, his desire to create, create, create. Get the fuck up! Burnham walks towards the camera and grabs it like hes grabbing the viewer by the throat. But he knows how to do this. At first it seems to be just about life in the pandemic, but it becomes a reference to his past, when he made faces and jokes from his bedroom as a teenager and put that on the internet. Its a stupid song, and, uh, it doesnt really mean anything. The video continues. Like he's parodying white people who think that by crucifying themselves first they're somehow freed from the consequences of their actions. Still terrified of that spotlight? Each of the songs from the first half of the special are in line with Burnham's earlier Netflix specials and comedy albums. In Unpaid Intern, Burnham sings about how deeply unethical the position is to the workers in a pastiche of other labor-focused blues. Burnham achieved a similar uncanny sense of realism in his movie "Eighth Grade," the protagonist of which is a 13-year-old girl with extreme social anxiety who makes self-help YouTube videos. Netflix. Thematically, it deals with the events of 2020, rising wealth inequality, racial injustice, isolation, mental health, social media, and technologys role in our lives. Bo Burnhams 2021 special, Inside. But before that can register, Burnham's eyes have closed and the special transitions to the uncannily catchy song "S---," bopping about how he hasn't showered in nine days or done any laundry. Throughout "Inside," there's a huge variety of light and background set-ups used, so it seems unlikely that this particular cloud-scape was just randomly chosen twice. Is he content with its content? The special is set almost entirely in one cluttered room. Inside (2021) opens with Bo Burnham sitting alone in a room singing what will be the first of many musical comedy numbers, Content. In the song, Burnham expresses, Roberts been a little depressed ii. Self-awareness does not absolve anyone of anything, he says. Its an uncanny, dystopian view of Burnham as an instrument in the soulless game of social media. Or DM a girl and groom her, do a Zoomer, find a tumor in her HOLMES: And this is what the chorus of that song sounds like. But he's largely been given a pass by his fans, who praise his self-awareness and new approach. This sketch, like the "White Woman Instagram" song, shows one of Burnham's writing techniques of bringing a common Internet culture into a fictionalized bit. "Everything that once was sad is somehow funny now, the Holocaust and 9/11, that s---'s funny, 24-7, 'cause tragedy will be exclusively joked about, because my empathy iss bumming me out," he sang. The songs from the special were released on streaming platforms on June 10, 2021. Thank you so much for joining us. ", Right as Burnham is straightening up, music begins blaring over the speakers and Burnham's own voice sings: "He meant to knock the water over, yeah yeah yeah, but you all thought it was an accident. .] This is especially true for Patreon campaigns that give fans direct access to creators on platforms like Discord. Inside doesnt give clear answers like parasocial relationships good or parasocial relationships bad, because those answers do not, and cannot, exist. "Healing the world with comedy, the indescribable power of your comedy," the voice sings. The global pandemic and subsequent lockdown orders of March 2020 put a stop to these plans. But on the other hand, it is lyrically so playful. The special is hitting an emotional climax as Burnham shows us both intense anger and then immediately after, a deep and dark sadness. While this special is the product of evolution, Burnham is pointing out its also a regression. Still terrified of that spotlight? Throughout the song and its accompanying visuals, Burnham is highlighting the "girlboss" aesthetic of many white women's Instagram accounts. Doona! Web9/10. He's also giving us a visual representation of the way social media feeds can jarringly swing between shallow photos and emotional posts about trauma and loss. We see Burnham moving around in the daylight, a welcome contrast to the dark setting of "All Eyes on Me." But look, I made you some content. And it's important to remember, you know, this is a piece of theater. "All Eyes On Me" starts right after Burnham's outburst of anger and sadness. "That's a good start. See our full breakdown of every detail and reference you might have missed in "Inside" here. Accuracy and availability may vary. Viewer discretion is advised. But when reading songs like Dont Wanna Know and All Eyes On Me between the lines, Inside can help audiences better identify that funny feeling when they start feeling like a creator is their friend. It's not. This line comes full circle by the end of the special, so keep it in mind. Finally doing basic care tasks for yourself like eating breakfast and starting work in the morning. It is set almost entirely within one room of his Los Angeles guest house, the same one shown in the closing song of the June 2016 Make Happy special, titled Are you happy?. Burnham watching the end of his special on a projector also brings the poioumenon full circle the artist has finished their work and is showing you the end of the process it took to create it. "), Burnham sang a parody song called "Sad" about, well, all the sad stuff in the world. Tell us a little bit more about that. People experiencing depression often stop doing basic self-care tasks, like showering or laundry or brushing their teeth. On the other two sides of that question ("no" and "not sure") the flowchart asks if it could be "interpreted" as mean (if so, then it's "not funny") or if it "punches down.". Its a visual that signifies a man exposing himself, until you realize hes in a spotlight. MARTIN: So Bo Burnham has had a lot of different identities lately. The picturesque view of sun-soaked clouds was featured in "Comedy," during the section of the song when Burnham stood up and decided that the only thing he (or his character in the song) could do was "heal the world with comedy.". At the second level of the reaction video, Burnham says: "I'm being a little pretentious.