Dave Chappelle's "The Bird Revelation" is a 2017 Netflix Comedy Special, starring, of course, Dave Chappelle himself.
It is an intimate but unremarkable evening filled with unfounded innuendo and ambiguous accusations that is bound to baffle, bemuse and offend any truly perspicacious viewer.
The special is quite devoid of comedic elements, seeming to me Dave's attempt to satiate what he supposed to be his fan's long-standing question about why he give him his television show and moved to Africa 12 years ago. What he doesn't realise is no one except the most paranoid conspiracy theorist CARES after all this time!
So please, for your gratification and amusement, I present the Popcorn Lobotomy review of "The Bird Revelation".
In the modern age, comedy specials are somewhat of a cultural phenomenon, and Dave Chappelle's return, after a 12 year absence from the spotlight, has proven to be an almost irresistible novelty that has attracted the masses like a well-preserved 1995 Krug Clos d'Ambonnay attracts a particularly parched dilettante connoisseur after a long expedition in the Australian outback!
[chuckles heartily]
Anyhoo, I feel compelled to dissect this particular example of oratorical enlightenment, as it contains portions of outlandish and indecorous derision directed at the Hollywood entertainment industry, and the philanthropic benefactors of the arts who fund it.
Here's how Dave begins:
[1:15] "Well, the last show. And here we are in Los Angeles, the world capital of rape and dick breath!"
If it wasn't bad enough that that media feels compelled to report on such sordid unconfirmed details about people's private lives -- Dave's return to "comedy" is a rather bland, unremarkable diatribe directed at the so-called "sick" entertainment industry that provided him with opportunity, promulgation and the adoration of a mass audience.
If there's one thing that "gets my goat", so to speak, it's people from subordinate socio-economic groups who feel compelled to bite the hand that feeds -- it's a self-destructive tendency which I'm afraid I'll simply never be able to fathom. Is it unreasonable to expect, when altruistic individuals such as my myself reach down and raise up a working class miscreant who shows a glimmer of raw, unrefined potential, that said ameliorated individual might return the consideration with intrinsic approbation and allegiance?
Well, apparently the answer is no, if you happen to be a unappreciative ingrate such as Dave Chappelle! Apparently, if you're Dave CHAPPELLE, you're free to postulate vaguely abhorrent insinuations in such a way that it forms an almost insurmountable recrimination against which one can never defend.
It's a damned shame Chappelle decided to end his brief foray back into the limelight by peddling conspiracy theories and nonsense. Listen to this one section where he casually mentions cointelpro, as it it's a historical fact endorsed by the trustworthy mainstream establishment!
[12:44] "You know what this shit is like? It's like cointelpro, you know what that is? It's a program the FBI had under J Edgar Hoover. In this program one of the many things they did was they would track the sexual habits of anyone they considered an enemy of the state. That's why they have all these sex tapes of Martin Luther King fucking bitches. But lucky for us, he actually had a dream!"
To casually insert such spurious paranoia into a supposed comedy act, as established historical fact, is just going to give his already deluded audience the confirmation and reinforcement they crave.
Most egregious of all, Dave attempts to re-write history by deliberately neglecting to mention his inability to handle the pressure of a TV show and his unconstrained abuse of recreational pharmaceuticals.
"I remember that shit. Y'all remember when I quit my show? On the way out the door I said something's wrong with Hollywood. I believe they said I smoked crack. That's what I remember, I remember they called me crazy."
Instead, he re-frames his fall from grace in Hollywood as a heroic refusal to allow Hollywood to corrupt him and relates a self-serving, albeit completely unbelievable, tale of incorruptibility and self denial.
[17:30] "I was right once, remember that? Remember I had this really popular show and I quit? I walked away from 50 million dollars. A lot harder to walk away from that Louis' freckles dick."
The most infuriating botheration with Chappelle's slanderous allusions are that they are entirely unspecific and equivocal. He suggests some very unscrupulous and subversive misdeeds by parties unstated, but simultaneously says nothing substantial against which one could mount a suitable counter-argument.
[27:06] "Maybe there's something else going on. Maybe these rapes aren't even the worst of it, wouldn't that be something? Wouldn't that be something?"
Well, I apologise Mr Chappelle, could you please elaborate on what you believe is worse that rape? I would content that one would have to have quite the devious imagination to envision such a sordid presupposition. Of course he never elaborates.
Or at least, not in any specific way.
[32:06] "I know, I know, I'm terrible, I'm sorry. Wanna know what happened to me? Nah..."
Chappelle knows that's what his fans want to hear and he milks it for all it's worth -- but by the end of the act, the question remains frustratingly unanswered.
Instead, Chappelle resorts to vague parables and allegories when attempting to answer the question that such utterances would inevitably trigger in his inerudite, impressionable fans...
[37:10] "I'll tell you what happened, but I can't say it directly..." Dave recounts Icebreg Slim story from Pimp.
Well if you can make head or high tail out of that inane story, good luck to you, dear boy. I'm certainly left scratching my head.
Putting all of that aside, Chappelle appears to have forgotten to bring the "comedy" to this "comedy special"! Nothing he says is witty or funny, and it appears designed exclusively to placate the scores of misguided conspiracy theorists for whom he has become a heroic figure in the ensuing years following his fall from stardom.
In the end, it all amounts to very little. Like Corey Feldman's spurious accusations, without specificity and names, Chappelle ends up saying nothing at all, and presumably frustrating his fans even more.
In fact, Dave Chappelle only says one honest thing of note during this entire 50-minute "performance":
[32:07] "It's ok my career ended many years ago."
Indeed, Dave Chappelle. You'll find yourself well rehearsed for what happens next...