Giving Context To The Comedy Of The Vancouver Olympics

• “So I can’t say Olympics, or Vancouver, or winter or show geometric shapes of any size or color?” (Stephen Colbert 2/22/10)

When NBC paid $820 million for the rights to the Beijing and Vancouver Olympics, it paid for the exclusive rights in the United State of America, keeping them as the only network allowed to cover the Games. But leave it to Stephen Colbert to challenge the exclusivity rights. Colbert did a segment on copyright infringement with his brother that gave him the platform to get away with not talking about the Olympics by jokingly talking about the Olympics. He points out that he can’t reference any of the Olympic related terms or symbols, so he creates his own reference: The Colbert Report Exclusive Vancouverage of the 2010 Quadrennial Cold Weather Athletic Competition.

• “These are not sports, these are drunken dares. Hey go down that hill on a sled. Oh, now try it on two sticks. Now do it with a rifle. I mean, you’re over thinking it.” (John Hodgman, 2/24/10)

John Hodgman, better known as “the Mac Guy” in most of the English speaking world, dropped by The Daily Show this week to give his take on the Winter Games. Hodgman stated what most American viewers were presumably thinking over the last two weeks – What the hell am I watching? The Summer Olympics offer competition in the oldest and most basic sports known to the human race such as running, swimming, jumping, and wrestling. The Winter Olympics on the other side of the coin offer sports which seem to have been invented while extremely drunk and in all probability in a cold climate. There’s a sport called “Luge” in which you lay on your back and glide downhill on a sheet of ice at dangerously fast speeds. There’s another sport called “Skeleton” where you lay on your – wait for it – front and glide downhill on a sheet of ice at dangerously fast speeds. How exactly does a person come to the realization that they would be good at such a thing? There isn’t much room for trial and error here. There is also the always entertaining guilty pleasure they call Figure Skating, and it’s slow-witted cousin Ice Dancing. When you get to the short and skinny of it, the competition at the Winter Olympics simply can’t hold a candle to the Summer Olympics. Watching the fastest men in the world race on foot after years of training is almost poetic. Watching a curling match between people who were presumably middle school custodians no more than five years ago judging by the mopping skills is – well – boring.

• “NBC is not a victim. The ratings are tremendous. How are they losing money?” ( Jon Stewart: 2/24/10)

It seems like just yesterday NBC was raking in the money from the Summer Olympics. Viewership reached record numbers, and people couldn’t get enough of the competition and the personalities. Fast forward two years and NBC is just counting the seconds until these Winter Olympics come to a non-climactic end. Despite ratings, the Winter Olympics are always a financial letdown. Unfortunately for NBC, if you want to air the Summer games, the Winter ones come along with it. Their tape delays, attention to feel good segments as opposed to actual sporting events, and interruption of close hockey games to bring you Countdown with Keith Olbermann are all fair reason to criticize the network. Let’s face it, watching Bode Miller in a tight race for the gold medal at 9pm is simply not that interesting when the 5pm news already announced that he won it. Let’s get some “Spoiler Alerts” next time around NBC.

•“Folks, I love the Olympics. There is no finer way to prove who’s nation is best, and in this global confrontation America is kicking ass and mispronouncing names! USA! USA! USA!.” (Stephen Colbert: 2/23/10)

Since the debut of his show some five years ago, Stephen Colbert has painted himself as an American hero; a man of the people. Colbert’s faux coverage of the Olympic Games all week offer the perfect amount of news, information, and satire to make this sporting competition bearable. At the end of the day, whether you love the games or you hate them, those are our countrymen out there. They’ve worked hard, put in an immense amount of effort, are the absolute best at what they do, and the American people should be proud. Sure, the sports might be odd and confusing. But who cares, the USA is killing it! The country’s economy is in the toilet and the socio-political climate is in shambles. What better way to forget these hard times than watch Americans kick ass again?

•“American Idol last night beat the Winter Olympics in the ratings, in fact I think it doubled the Olympics’ ratings. We got the most highly trained athletes in the world competing on behalf of their countries. We’d still rather watch a bartender from Ft. Worth struggle through a Matchbox 20 song. That’s America!” (Jimmy Kimmel – 2/17/10)

Fox’s ratings powerhouse, American Idol, has decimated any and all competition in the ratings, even after nine seasons. However, last Wednesday, with the help of Lindssy Vonn’s dramatic victory on the slopes, all that changed. NBC’s Olympic coverage averaged 30.1 million total viewers during the 9pm hour. For the first time in six years, American Idol came in second place with a measley 18.4 million viewers. A sweet albeit brief victory for all those who prefer sports over singing contests. This week however, it was back to business as usual as Idol re-assumed control over the airwaves. As Jimmy Kimmel points out, America just can’t get enough of Idol with its nonstop parade of lovable losers, talented underdogs, and abject train wrecks. Last night, however, NBC once again topped FOX during the 8pm hour.

• “It’s all the excitement of shuffleboard plus household chores.” (David Letterman – 2/17/10)

There are irrelevant Olympic sports and then there’s curling…the granddaddy of them all. This “sport” is the butt of as many late night hosts’ jokes as Tiger Woods and Toyota combined. Nobody can seem to wrap their head around why this is an Olympic event. Curling, believed to have originated in late medieval Scotland, is a “sport” in which two teams of four players take turns to slide heavy, polished granite stones across a sheet of carefully prepared ice towards a target area. The purpose, if there even is one, is to end up with more stones closer to the centre of the target than the other team. For some reason, two sweepers with brooms accompany each stone as it gracefully glides down its path, using stopwatches and their best judgment to help direct the stones by sweeping. Also there is a lot of yelling. Also, Letterman devoted an entire “Top Ten” list to it this week. Also, one of the curlers on the Canadian women’s team is five months pregnant. For real.

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