Jordan Firstman Made The Most of The Pandemic

If you haven’t seen any of Jordan Firstman’s Instagram impressions, you’re missing out on what 800,000 of his followers already know: He’s really quite funny. Stuck at home like the rest of us, Firstman has clearly made the most of the pandemic, as many of us have tried to do, and built a strong following on social media that will surely lead to countless possibilities down the road. Not that he didn’t have those possibilities already, as Firstman is in fact a TV writer with credits for shows like Search Party and Big Mouth already under his belt. But Firstman has adapted to the realities of the modern world, and in doing so has grown his following by over three quarters of a million new fans.

“I think what I was trying to subtly do in my work is show people that inner worlds exist and you can have a really rich, deep, funny, fun inner world when the world is going to shit,” Firstman said in a Zoom interview with Katie Heaney of The Cut.

All this after Firstman’s year got off to a shaky start. He had broken up with his longtime boyfriend and creative partner, and had been informed that the show he spent four years developing would never see the light of day. His Instagram work is funny, yes, but also uplifting, and shows that good things may yet come from this pandemic.

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The Animaniacs Weren’t Just For Kids…

With a recently launched reboot under its belt, many recently found the motivation to re-watch old Animaniacs episodes from the 90s, and those who remember watching the show as kids were likely surprised but just how much humor was intended for them as adults.

“They’ll get it at 8 or they’ll get it at 38.” said Rob Paulsen, who voiced Yakko and Pinky, in an interview with The Ringer. “The edict from the top,” he said, “was ‘don’t condescend to the audience.’”  

Take, for example, a song from the whole episode: “‘Hix makes pix, but the flick needs fix,’ means someone made a movie that bombed,” Dot and Yakko sing in a call and response. “‘The veeps in charge are now at large’ means everyone involved is gone / ‘The plot conflicts, no beautiful chix,’ so it’s coming out on video soon / ‘They’re taking their licks, ’cause the critics say nix,’ and the editors are going to try to fix it in the mix.” Nonsensical to children, perhaps, but as adults we understand a whole lot more than we did over 25 years ago.

“It was the Warner Bros. mentality,” said writer Paul Rugg. “Disney wrote specifically for kids. ... The Warner Bros. way is: If you look at a family, you know, the dad laughs when they’re watching it, and the kids look up at the dad and go, ‘Why is that funny, Dad?’ And he goes, ‘Well, you have to understand...’”

Like many nostalgic fans we’re looking forward to more Animaniacs in the future, and you can bet we’ll be paying much closer attention to the jokes this time around.

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