The Sarah Silverman Program: The Mongolian Beef
By fred | October 10, 2008
(S02E08) While it wasn’t really a season premiere, on Wednesday the show was still back after some long months, and it came back with a really funny episode. As I said then, it was also an “unusual” episode, because since she was high for the most part, Sarah wasn’t her usual self as we’ve come to know her so far. Last night however things were “back to normal”.
Meaning that Sarah was once again the center of the universe, that she didn’t care about anything or anyone else than herself, and decided to take things into her own hands and do something because no one else seemed to be willing to. Of course, that was probably because there was nothing to do in the first place, but you know her.
So after Laura revealed that when they were little, their father used to always tell them, right before kissing them goodnight, that “your Russian ancestors were raped by Mongolians“. After that and when Sarah found out that her rent was going up $15 and that her landlords were Mongolians, that was it, she couldn’t let them do that to her sister no more.
And so in a traditional Sarah Silverman move, she started putting up giant billboards with Laura’s face on it an a giant “RAPIST” underneath, and she ended up suing the Mongolians and demanding nothing but an apology. “And for them to change Mongolian beef to sexual predator beef. I also wouldn’t mind my face on their dollar.” This whole plot was the kind of thing you would expect from her and from this show, but I will have to say that I didn’t find it particularly inspired, or you know, funny.
The trial just like the “par-tay” after were simply not funny. As a matter of fact, I would say that the best part of this whole thing came from the other story of the episode, Steve becoming a filmmaker and making little videos in front of a green screen in his apartment. Now that thing was better, and at least it brought some laughs to the trial which, otherwise, was pretty lacking in that department.
All in all this wasn’t a bad episode, but the main structure of the episode was pretty classic for this show which therefore means you knew all along where this was going, and the problem is that it never actually break away. We expected things to go down the way they eventually did, so they should either have gone in a completely different situation as to surprise us and take us off guard, or it should simply had been funnier.
But on Wednesday the show proved that it could be nothing but hilarious, and there were still some pretty good lines along the way, here’s a couple of my favorites & other little tidbits about the episode:
- I like how the show, while still opening the same, uses completely different (and funnier) little stories than just introducing all characters and whatnot.
Landlord: He’s very cute.
Sarah: Yeah he can be, but most of the times he’s dead inside.
Sarah: Rape!!
Laura: Sarah! Are you okay?
Sarah: My landlords, they’re jacking up the rent, would you pay? And guess what nationality they are ? Mongolian! I’m not gonna let them do this to you, not again. It’s like A Wrinkle In Time but with rape.
Laura: Sarah you are being so silly.
Jay: Silly!? Silly?!! She’s running around screaming the word ‘rape’ with absolutely no concern for its connotations. You cannot run around so casually using that word, okay? ‘Rape’, is for special occasions.
Mongolian representative: Mongolia has many fine restaurants, and entertainment shows for the whole family. We have very much horse back riding, and no rape.
Jay: You guys get such a bad rep, it’s really unfair. People think of Germany, they think of Heidi Klum.
Lawyer: What’s 57 times 62 ? (Laura tries to calculate it… unsuccessfully) I rest my case!
- The entire “reenactment” of the rape was just great.
Brian: So, what’s it like being an homosexual in Mongolia ?
Guy: It’s pretty gay.
Sarah: I learned that for people who are called ‘nomads’ they can actually get pretty angry.
Posted in Reviews
Shows: The Sarah Silverman Program
