The Amanda Show reviews: Episode 5

Cold Open: Elevator

Amanda tries to reach the studio via the elevator, but it keeps making stops.

• A really good cold open, and always one of the first ones that comes to my mind.

• Nice twist at the end where Amanda realizes she forgot her purse and has to ride the elevator all the way down again.

TV Clips: A panning shot of trees, and a guy doing jumping jacks

Monologue

People keep interrupting Amanda to ask which floor they’re on. Andrew Keegan makes a cameo.

• I like how this is somewhat of a continuation of the cold open. 

• Is it me, or does Dan Schneider have something against Asian people? Most of the time, when they show up in his shows, they’re villains, or they have bad things happen to them. Any Asian that doesn’t fit these two categories is often a sumo, which is what we get here.

• After the sumo leaves, we get a cameo from teen heartthrob Andrew Keegan, who picks up Amanda and carries her away. Kind of a random ending, but, I’ll take it.

Commercial: Remote Control Underpants

The title says it all; they’re underpants that you can race.

• One of the more bizarre commercials on this show. 

• Despite the odd concept, this is one of my favorites. I love the hilariously bad acting (“This truck BITES!!!”) and the twist at the end where Amanda wins with a pair of pink underpants.

Hillbilly Moment: Witch Broom

Sketch: Mr. Gullible

The world’s most gullible substitute teacher (Kassir) gets tricked by his students into doing several unusual things that their regular teacher apparently does.

• One of my favorite recurring characters makes his debut. I absolutely love Johnny Kassir’s performance, which is based off of Jerry Lewis as Julius Kelp from The Nutty Professor.

• The gag where they make him slam his head against the chalkboard as he takes attendance is frickin’ genius. After one kid pretends to not hear him so he’ll hurt himself even more, he just gives up and assumes everyone else is in.

• The highlight of this is undeniably his dance on top of the table. Just seeing Kassir dance like a buffoon is comedy gold.

• Although this was a great introduction to the character, my favorite sketch of his is still yet to come...

Stop-Motion: Messy Bedroom

Amanda tries to clean her messy bedroom.

• First appearance of Amanda’s German-accented mother.

• A Blockblister sketch can be heard on Amanda’s TV at the beginning of this.

• I like how the posters in her room are all in the same stop-motion art style.

• Overall, another really bizarre short, but in a good way.

Hillbilly Moment: Beaver

Penelope Taynt

Penelope interrupts a sketch about pirates to plug her website.

• This is the first of several occasions where Penelope interrupts a sketch to try to meet Amanda. 

• The actual bit of the sketch we see before it gets interrupted is pretty funny (“Mom!! My room is full of pirates!!!!”). It makes me want to see a full version of this sketch without any interruptions.

• I like how Drake and Johnny try to stay in character at first when Penelope breaks onto the set (“We will ignore this person and continue stealing things!”). Then they threaten to make her walk the plank. (“Plank? I see no plank! Where’s Amanda?”)

• Penelope introduces the “Video Clip of The Week” part of her site. This week’s clip is a video of Amanda singing to a birdhouse.

• I believe this is the first instance of Penelope referring to Drake as “Blake”.

• Nice ending where Amanda arrives with a sword to fight the pirates, only to realize that they have already left.

Totally Kyle: Dead Bird

Kyle tells of the time he saw a dead bird on the sidewalk while walking to school.

• One of my favorite Kyle bits. This same situation happened to my brother once, so it has the added bonus of being relatable to us.

• They haven’t started using Amanda’s intro and outro for the sketch yet.

Scooper Dooper 

A visit to Doreen (Amanda) and her father’s (Kassir) ice cream shop, which sells bizarre and disgusting flavors.

• Ah, another one of my favorite recurring sketches makes its debut. 

• Surprisingly, they show restraint by not having a flavor themed after feet.

• The girl who eats “Chili Willy” is the same girl who plays Tammy in the Girls’ Room sketches. And then she tries a flavor called “Lobster Tackle” and gets tackled by a Dancing Lobster.

• The finale is nothing short of epic. Drake comes and orders “Spider Crunch”, which has actual spiders in it. He calls for a health inspector, who turns out to be of no help when he has no problem with Doreen pouring more spiders into the ice cream. After Drake runs away, they offer the inspector “Cookies and Dynamite”. As soon as he leaves the restaurant he BLOWS THE FUCK UP!!!! And, to top it all off, Doreen and her father don’t even care that a man just exploded.

Closing

Amanda presents awards to the audience.

• The fat kid who Amanda gives the “Best Laugher” award to doesn’t appear to be really laughing. It sounds like stock laughter sounds have been dubbed over him.

• Random but funny ending where she gives the “Audience Member From The Furthest Planet” award to an alien.

Final thoughts: And now the show finally hits its stride. With the debut of two of the show’s most iconic sketches, it seems things can only get better from here.