Each month, many funny videos are posted to every corner of the internet — from Twitter and Instagram to Vimeo and sometimes other weird places we’ll have trouble embedding. Because you’re busy living your life, you might miss some of these funny videos and feel left out when others bring them up in conversation. Well, worry not! We’re here to make sure you’re not listening in on conversations but leading them … as long as those conversations are about funny internet videos. Here, our favorite comedy shorts of the month.
“David Bowie Songs,” by Peter Rugman
In this compilation, Peter Rugman responds to requests from his followers to create deadly accurate pastiches of David Bowie songs for increasingly specific sub-eras. They are insidious earworms, all of them. You will sing “He’s a snake with an overbite chewing some Brie” until you’ve Mandela effect–ed it into the Bowie canon itself, and no one will know the difference.
“Diversity and Inclusion War Crimes,” by Ryan Ken
“My role here today is to soothe any of the icky feelings that you might have about all those people dying over there,” says this character from Ryan Ken, apropos of nothing, “but I’m also here to reassure those of you who are under the impression that a Black person in a high-profile job means progress for all Black people.” It’s a typically savage and uncompromising take from Ken, who is excellent at taking some element of our morally abhorrent reality and recommunicating it in a way that helps expose it for what it actually is.
“George Washington at His Dollar Bill Photo Shoot,” by Jake Shane
Jake Shane’s an expert — in the subtleties of preoccupied celebrity greetings, hilariously banal commentary, and myopic overreaction to perceived social slights. He’s a child of reality-TV phenomena, as we all are, but he’s using it for a special kind of powerful, evil hilarity.
“Interviewing Natalie Palamides in a Moving Truck,” by Blake Rosier
Taking pages from Martin Short, Andy Kaufman, Zach Galifianakis, Eric André, and so many others who revel in the absurd comic madness they create, Blake Rosier is a wizard at low-fi awkwardness, and his new talk show, hosted in the back of a moving box truck, is pretty fun evidence of that.
“Now That the Strike Is Over I Can Finally Promote This,” by Skyler Higley
There’s no quicker way to this column’s heart than being a nine-second video that makes us burst out laughing for some reason other than someone taking a sudden tumble. Skyler Higley has accomplished this with his new project, which he can finally tell you all about in the wake of the Hollywood labor strikes, though it really speaks for itself.
“Parents in Structured Hats,” by Chris Fleming
Go to any brunch spot on Abbot Kinney in Venice, California, and you will know Mr. Fleming’s pain. Structured hats have become synonymous with bohemian malaise, trust-fund entitlement, and parenting that “takes a village” so long as said village doesn’t contain the child’s actual biological parents. Because they’re at Burning Man.
“The Quarry,” by Graham Mason
Two adorable rocks flaunt the anti-fraternization rules that stifle romance at the quarry where they work in this animated short from Graham Mason (director of the fantastic indie feature Inspector Ike). Matthew Maher, who recently added to his impressive repertoire of silver-screen outcasts in Air and Funny Pages, upends expectations here as an awkward co-worker with a lot of love to give and a real aptitude for big romantic gestures.
“Some of My Best Jokes of 2023! (So Far),” by Benny Feldman
Benny Feldman is often compared to Mitch Hedberg, the touchstone for all one-liner comedians, but he really has a style all his own, as evidenced in one of the compilation videos he releases semi-regularly. Feldman is a master at yanking you unexpectedly over to his side with a delivery that doubles down on his innate affability even as the circumstances of the joke get more bizarre, like when he claims, “I would sit down with Squidward and be the first person to just truly listen.”
“Thanksgiving Pregnancy Announcements Be Like,” by Missy Chanpaibool
Yes, it’s true that this is the next interaction of Key and Peele’s famous football names sketch. In part. But Missy Chanpaibool’s work is also its own exciting beast, complementing absurd baby names with equal parts graphic sexual metaphors, social-media-trend lambasting, and unabashed festivity!
“Tiny Chain Intervention,” by Dan Toomey, Nate Meeker, and Mack Hubbell
Featured in our pages before, Dan, Nate, and Mack have a kind of Please Don’t Destroy 2.0 thing going on — or perhaps it’s Good Neighbor 3.0, or Lonely Island 4.0. Not meaning to jump any sharks, of course, but the ease with which this trio banters about the intricacies of bullshit … is promising, to say the least.
Like what you saw? Want to be on this monthly roundup? Show us your stuff!
Luke Kelly-Clyne is a co-head of HartBeat Independent and a watcher of many web videos. Send him yours at @LKellyClyne.
Graham Techler has contributed writing to The New Yorker and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. Send him your videos at @gr8h8m_t3chl3r.
More From This Series
- The Best Comedy Shorts of December 2024
- The Best Comedy Shorts of August 2024
- The Best Comedy Shorts of July 2024