I am a big Weird Al Yankovic fan, so I’m biased. Such a silly goofy comedy that I have a soft spot for already—if I saw this one when I was 11 or 12 I would have been outright obsessed with it. Weird Al turns into Rambo for a dream sequence and a mad scientist is revealed to be a space alien in the finale, and both somehow make sense. Much of the humor is slapstick and based in violence (Emo Phillips’ woodworking bit is almost as bloody as Monty Python’s Black Knight sequence, and I laughed at the bit where Michael Richards shoots fire hose water at the kid way more than I should have) but so good-natured in a way that Weird Al always pulled off, between this and his spoof songs. It’s refreshingly anti-corporate for a Reagan-Bush era studio comedy—it helps that Kevin McCarthy’s corporate network head is made to be as slimy as possible for us to root for the underdogs, the slobs over the snobs. David Ellison would hate this. I would also recommend reading Gene Siskel’s review: god rest his soul, but he acted like this silly Weird Al comedy killed his dog or something. The one thing preventing UHF from being outright great for me is Michael Richards—his whole “shouting is funny” schtick gets annoying after a while, although it’s far from the worst thing Michael Richards ever did…
I am a big Weird Al Yankovic fan, so I’m biased. Such a silly goofy comedy that I have a soft spot for already—if I saw this one when I was 11 or 12 I would have been outright obsessed with it. Weird Al turns into Rambo for a dream sequence and a mad scientist is revealed to be a space alien in the finale, and both somehow make sense. Much of the humor is slapstick and based in violence (Emo Phillips’ woodworking bit is almost as bloody as Monty Python’s Black Knight sequence, and I laughed at the bit where Michael Richards shoots fire hose water at the kid way more than I should have) but so good-natured in a way that Weird Al always pulled off, between this and his spoof songs. It’s refreshingly anti-corporate for a Reagan-Bush era studio comedy—it helps that Kevin McCarthy’s corporate network head is made to be as slimy as possible for us to root for the underdogs, the slobs over the snobs. David Ellison would hate this. I would also recommend reading Gene Siskel’s review: god rest his soul, but he acted like this silly Weird Al comedy killed his dog or something. The one thing preventing UHF from being outright great for me is Michael Richards—his whole “shouting is funny” schtick gets annoying after a while, although it’s far from the worst thing Michael Richards ever did…
