Last Comic Standing 2010 Finale: Filipe Esparza Wins $250,000

The winner of Last Comic Standing was crowned tonight... eventually. First viewers were forced to sit through two hours of what proved to be not-so-funny-comedy.

Having watched the entire season of Last Comic Standing, short as it was, I was ready for a funny finale. Maybe that was my mistake, but I don't think so. What I got instead was a two hour bore-fest of comedians, most of whom I did not know and will never look up now, and Kathy Griffin. Thank God for Kathy Griffin... a sentence I thought I would never type.

Not only were we subjected to three judges giving useless comments throughout this season of Last Comic Standing, but tonight we had to sit through three very un-funny sets from them. I'm almost personally angry with Greg Giraldo for making think he was the funny guy on the panel. Turns out none of the judges are good standup comedians.

Last Comic Standing: The Top 5 Comics

Tonight Last Comic Standing bid good-bye to Jonathan Thymius. I'm not sure if Thymius was sad, or just normal. He stood, looking like a stoned Archie Bunker, said a few slow words and wondered off stage. The final five comics to take the LCS stage were Roy Wood Jr., Myq Kaplan, Tommy Johnagin, Mike Destefano and Felipe Esparza.

All the comedians brought their funny tonight. It was the first time this season that I got a hard laugh from every single set. Of course, there were some standouts. My favorite three contenders all had memorably funny sets.
I still think the finals of LCS this season will be Roy Wood Jr., Myq Kaplan and Tommy Johnagin. Tommy Johnigan is really sneaking up as my favorite now (he's sneaky like that).

Mike Destefano had a really strong set tonight, he may be the spoiler this season. I think it will be Filipe Esparza that leaves us next week. He is hard to understand and was not nearly as funny as the rest tonight.

Ron White closed the show tonight with a guest appearance. This was the funniest that network TV is allowed to be in prime time. 

My favorite LCS joke of the night: the conversation Tommy Johnagin had with his girlfriend after hitting a deer at 70mph,  "Thank God we're all right!" "I'm not thanking God, a deer is one of his creatures and he just threw it at us."


Who are you hoping comes back next week? Leave me a comment!

Copyright @ 2008 TV Review

Last Comic Standing: Roy Wood Jr., Myq Kaplan and Tommy Johnagin Advance

Tonight only saw the exit of one comic on Last Comic Standing. I was sort of hoping another three would get the axe and we might see longer sets for the finals. Alas, there is too much time for NBC to fill up in the summer. I do think it's nice to have a pure comic show in prime time. Any publicity is good publicity.

Craig Robinson is getting on my nerves. There I said it. Let's get on with it.

Jonathan Thymius was the first comedian called to perform. Surely they were not being called out in order of votes... or votefortheworst.com is backing Jonathan heavily. I actually really liked his set the first time. Last week was just boring. This week was boring, then uncomfortable, then back to boring. I think Jonathan Thymius has peaked on this show. The comics did an intro clip tonight and even that was forgettable.

Last Comic Standing: The Top 10 Perform for America's Votes

The comedians seemed to be nervous tonight, Last Comic Standing did not get started on a stellar note. There was far more good than bad though and that's always a plus (especially in comedy). One of the best parts of the night was finding out there would be no judge comments, or judges for that matter. YES! Now the comics of Last Comic Standing are competing solely for your votes. Winner gets $250,000.

Craig Robinson seemed to be channeling Oprah Winfrey tonight as he sang out the names of each comic in the top ten. The audience seemed extremely coached during the first set too.

Laurie Kilmartin was up first. She had a rather over zealous audience to deal with that seemed to through her timing off. Kilmartin only gets an "Okay" from me for tonight's set.

Filipe Esparza is a funny guy. The problem is he is a little hard to understand and there is not much time on LCS. A hurried Esparza is even harder to understand. I still think he had a funny set tonight.

Roy Wood Jr. brought the theater alive with his rapid fire style of funny. Roy has been around for a while so the pressure was on him to show up. He did, and then some. My favorite line of the night came from Roy Wood Jr., "...we need failures in America. Chicken nuggets and lap dances are important services. We can't all be rich and famous."

Last Comic Standing: First Round of Semi-Finals

Time again for Last Comic Standing, the American Idol for stand up comics. This year the show has made more changes. Apparently we will no longer have endure the comics living together competing in silly competitions. No, this year the comics get to actually do all stand up, go figure!

The only problem with the show is that comedy is too subjective for a reality show. There I said it, again. Done.

The comedians are all very funny this year, as always. Last Comic Standing has decided to go American Idol though, and that's a problem. While there were always audition judges that slogged through the beginning of the show, this year they have decided to keep them around all season. Giving little jewels of wisdom like "very funny!" after every single set. This is bad and has to go. No one wants to see the comedian finish a set then be grilled by three people (two of whom are not funny at all, and one makes me want to punch my cat when she laughs).

Tonight we did get to see the first five comedians moving to the finals of Last Comic Standing.