TVSquad

(S04E10) So today marks the "start" of the LCS season finale. Why is it just the start? Because, since the final two had to perform tonight, we have to see the results somehow, right? So, tomorrow, we'll get to watch -- get this -- a 90 minute selection show. Lovely. Sixty-six minutes of show for something that takes about 30 seconds to announce. Nothing says "unnecessary crap" like the phrase "reality selection show."

But more on that later. For the half-hour before we learned who was going home, we got to hear a stand-up set by Paul Rodriguez, the sets from the final two comics in the online competition and... some real, live comedy from Anthony Clark! Not that it was all that good, but at least he didn't look like he wanted to throw up, like he has for the entire series.

First, let's talk about the online finalists, Theo Von and Josh Wolf. Both were horrible. Josh spent the entire set talking about how his kids seem to always barge in on him and his wife as they have sex. The only thing I was thinking while watching his set was, "Doesn't the guy have a friggin' lock on his door?" As for Theo, well... his punch lines about having a 70-year-old dad were too easy and not all that funny. And his lines about a how dancer like Kevin Federline does in a bar fight were recycled from all the way back during the pre-house rounds. The guy's had at least four months to come up with better material and he couldn't. Does that tell you something?

Paul Rodriguez's act had the same theme he's always had: "Boy, there's a lot of us Mexicans around here, aren't there?" I've seen him be a lot funnier, but it looks like he decided to use the tamer side of his act tonight. Not a noteworthy line in the bunch. And, like I said, Clark's mini-set was OK... at least he seemed relatively relaxed while giving it, which is saying something given his performance all season. But his jokes about the Mexican terrorist "Osama Piñata" of "Al-Quesadilla" were painful.

So who got eliminated? Well, no surprise here: Chris Porter's set last week was a clunker, and he was the one to go. It was quite a comedown for Willy Wonka, no doubt; he was cruising for most of the contest, and his sets usually stood head and shoulders over the rest. But either he got cocky or just ran out of good material, and the viewers let him know. But he should be able to reap the benefits of this show for years, and of all the comics that made the final round, he has best potential to put together a strong headliner-length set.

And I'll tell you something... If Josh Blue wins, it's might be because he got the sympathy vote. You can tell he's been running out of material; both this week and last week, his set had a lot of pauses, a lot of LCS-centric gags, and a fairly slow pace. He didn't have a strong set this week; he did a lot of disability jokes again, but they're really starting to blend together for me. The bit about his crazy arm picking his own pocket was OK, but not executed well. His ending joke about him swinging punches using his crazy arm -- "One, you don't know where it's coming from. Two... neither do I" -- salvaged the set.

Ty Barnett, though... he's a sneaky one, I'll tell you that. Always lying low, he did very few sets during the house round. And when he did do material, all of his stuff was average, kind of "heh heh" jokes, but nothing really great. But in these final rounds, he has always been able to pull out fresh material, and he's always gotten a decent laugh at least once per set. For instance, his joke tonight about the "AR" -- "Assembly Required" -- girls he sees in L.A. was pretty damn funny. The only issue I had was the end of his set tonight; I'm guessing he didn't time his set correctly, because after he told his last new joke, he recycled a joke -- about parents having a bumper sticker for the achievement of their mediocre kids -- he told a couple of weeks ago. Then it seemed like he ran out of time and they cut his mike off. It was a very uncomfortable way for him to end his set and it may cost him with the viewers. I hope not, though... he deserves to win; he may have not been the best comic out there, but he has had the most comic "stamina", and in this case, stamina counts for more than quality.

But I guess we'll find out tomorrow. You can vote for either Josh or Ty here. As I mentioned last week, the finale will have performances by Jay Mohr and previous LCS winners Alonzo Bodden, John Heffron, and -- give me strength -- Dat Phan. Boy, he'd better have written better material. I'd better get a bucket ready, because if I hear him do his "I ripped this off from Margaret Cho" set from three years ago, I'm gonna puke