To The Red, White and Black...Comedies...

If you're as observant as I am you'll notice a few things about the comedies that have been released in the past 12 years. Yes, some of them were hilarious, some of them mediocre, and most of them just downright horrible. Of course, the downright horrible ones you wouldn't really remember because you didn't watch them (or maybe you did and thought they were hilarious. For that, dear sir/lady or both, you suck hard). You'll notice that there's a very close relationship between the movie posters and how good or bad the movie actually is. Let's focus on the bad ones.

Now, look at the funny movies that have come out in the past 12 years. You see anything? There's something they all have in common. You see it yet? Well you're fuckin' blind then. Or maybe I should've clarified. Look at the movie posters. Now you see it? Good! You got it (actually you probably didn't because you weren't really looking at ALL the comedies in the past 12 years, you didn't even bother. Hence why you're reading this, to find out). From a designing perspective, all the posters are terrible! They share the same qualities! The background is predominately white and the big goofy sans serif font that they use is always, ALWAYS red. Maybe red with a stroke around it (you don't Photoshop, then you don't know what "stroke" is), but regardless, they're all the same. This type of movie poster alone should alert you to the very fact that these movies are shit. Chock full of mediocre jokes and horrible slapstick comedy. Basically, they're all comedies that insult your intelligence.

Here's another thing you might've noticed. Almost all of those movie posters (I'd say about 95%) are Black comedies. No, no, I'm not talking about "dark, funny" comedies (like Death to Smoochie; great movie). I'm talking about "tha brothas". Yeah, I said "brothas", so effing shoot me. I had to clarify for all you politically correct lame-o's. So if you see the correlation between these comedies, their posters and their cast, is it safe to come up with a few theses? Can we propose that Hollywood is racist by predetermining the success of these "Black" comedies by marketing it as another cheap-o movie with their crappy posters therefore targeting a certain audience? Or can we assume that the Black demographic has a horrible sense of humor and don't even look at the posters and just watch the movie and thinks it's funny because there's an all Black cast? It's almost kind of like posing the question "What came first? The chicken or the egg?" You don't believe me? Lemme go ahead and list a few movies for you. And you'll also find that all these movie posters belong to a certain celebrity who's stuck doing these comedies: Eddie Murphy.

- Meet Dave
- Norbit
- Daddy Day Care
- Dr. Dolittle (1st & 2nd)
- Nutty Professor (1st & 2nd)
- Life
- Bowfinger
- Holy Man
- Imagine That (this is the only exception because the font color is purple, but it still sucks)

*Now let's try some other movies without Eddie Murphy (but with a Black cast) and you tell me if they're bad.

- Beauty Shop
- Welcome Home, Roscoe Jenkins
- Big Momma's House (1st & 2nd)
- Are We Done Yet? (as well as Are We There Yet?)
- Scary Movie (Wayans Bros wrote and starred in it, that kinda counts)

Now you ask, "Whut abowt 'white people' and them their movies? Hmmm?" To that, I answer with this delectable selection:

- Malibu's Most Wanted
- Kickin' It Old School
- Meet The Spartans
- Epic Movie
- Date Movie
- Fun With Dick & Jane
- The Heartbreak Kid (although, this one was okay)

So, with all that said, what can we make of this marketing scheme? What is our answer? Maybe we can say that Hollywood knows a shitty movie when they see one and decides they're not going to spit out the cash to really spruce up the movie posters. Or maybe we can say that these movie posters are made for shitty actors that can't ever be taken seriously. Or maybe we can say that Eddie Murphy can't ever escape his family friendly comedies because he's made a deal with the Devil somewhere along the line to make horrible movies in exchange to give Mel B an illegitimate child and sleep with tranny hookers. Maybe there's something we don't know about these actors? Maybe they all sold their soul the Devil at one point. I mean, c'mon, Jamie Kennedy? His movies are shite. He might be a good writer, but not on his own movies. Queen Latifah? Get outta here with your sass. Martin Lawrence? He's on his way to Eddie Murphydom. Jim Carrey? Now, he's great, but he's had his time and he needs to stick with his indie flicks (I love you Eternal Sunshine) or jump on the Judd Apatow train (but that's such different comedy from his older flicks). And don't even get me started on those stupid movies mocking other movies. Date Movie and shit. Why does Hollywood greenglight that diarrhea?

Now let's take a brief look at why these movies are predominately Black. What is Tinseltown trying to do? Again, is it because the Black audience will only watch comedies that involve a Black cast and Hollywood producers knows this so they make the typical red and white posters? Or is it that Hollywood is cheapening these movies through their marketing scheme because they don't care about the Black audience, therefore influencing their (yeah, I said "their", get over it) perception of humor? I guess you'd have to go all the way back to 1996 when the first types of these posters were released. The Nutty Professor. Yeah, it was funny. It was great. Eddie Murphy's last hurrah as a legitimate comedian. Then after that there was an influx of such comedies with the same poster. The designs got more simple and simple as the years went on and eventually, it just simply contained white background and title with goofy font in red. That's it. But who's decision was it? I guess we'll never know what came first, the McChicken Sandwich or the Egg McMuffin.

Whatever the explanation is, you're not too far off. Overall, what we can safely conclude is that any movie that has a movie poster such as these attached to it, you can assume that movie will blow. Maybe a few slip by and they're actually good, but hey, that's the studio's fault for putting their movie in that category with their stupid posters. With all this said, I leave you with Eddie Murphy's catalogue of these god-awful posters and you'll finally see what I mean.