Examples Of Parody In The Daily Show

For this assignment, I will be discussing parody - and the example of parody I have chosen is The Colbert Report. The “Colbert Report” was a spin-off of “The Daily Show” on Comedy Central, but unlike “The Daily Show” - Stephen Colbert remained completely in a satirical persona, which was directly based off “O'Reilly Factor” host - Bill O'Reilly. O'Reilly's already rather outrageous existence provided the perfect springboard for a further outrageous presenter through Stephen Colbert’s patriotic, right-wing character. Colbert essentially tailors his show to mimic “The O'Reilly Factor”, but then takes it an nth degree in order to show the absurdity of the program of which it mimics. Furthermore, the usage of jingoism, patriotism, chauvinism, and

As noted above, Colbert parodies the essence of O’Reilly’s nightly program and does so through the art of imitation by employing various tactics and ideological standpoints of the program. Imitation usually brings to light the evident construction of idea - the essential main points are displayed do to the necessity of doing so through imitation, as the imitation requires that the bolder points of the idea be evident in order for the imitation to be sufficiently understood - so, it is necessary to understand the source idea of imitation in order to be able to mimic said idea. Parody is brilliant at presenting serious things and making them appear silly - just like the Colbert-O’Reilly example above, as Stephen Colbert’s persona tackles right-wing talking points - he shows the absurdity of some beliefs and ideals held by O’Reilly and those like him. Furthermore, one of the most brilliant references by Colbert to O’Reilly is by Colbert calling Bill O’Reily “Papa Bear” every time they meet and/or referenced on the show. Thus, parody is an excellent medium of making things that seem extremely serious and putting them in a more silly

Colbert’s understanding of O’Reilly allows him to build the persona of an ultra-right-wing Republican sycophant who would defend the ideals of Republicanism till the day he died. As well, Colbert takes certain talking points and bodily cues from O’Reilly, which allows him to further expand upon those acts in order to make the parody work even more in regards to mimicking. As such, you gain an interesting perspective into Bill O’Reilly through him being mimicked by Stephen Colbert. Which then brings me to my next point - since one gains insight into Bill O’Reilly through Colbert’s mimicking, it makes Bill O’Reilly seem ever the more absurd and silly. Colbert takes the ideological standpoints of O’Reilly and tears them apart through the facade of being on his side (though his persona really is on Bill O’Reilly’s side, but too incompetent to fashion arguments in a light which would assist their right-wing cause.) further establishing his parodical