As I'm getting older, it’s harder for me to find shows I actually find funny. I scroll through hundreds of shows just for them to make me have the urge to go on my phone. Some jokes are immature and some are just straight up not funny. 

My loss of hope for finding a new show hung over my head like a cloud. I just wanted something I could genuinely enjoy. However, my loss of hope was soon returned when I marched downstairs to do my nightly ‘annoying my parents’ talk. Pictured on the TV was a grown man in front of a crowd of people. He had chubby cheeks, his voice was muffled ; he overall looked funny when doing what seemed to be explaining how to cook pasta. The crowd of people were trying to be polite and not laugh, however some couldn’t help it. 

My parents, who were initially watching the show, told me he had novocaine from the dentist in his mouth.. I knew I needed to ask what the show was called and that was the moment I found one of my favorite comedy shows, Impractical Jokers.  After that episode I knew that this show was going to keep getting better and better. Therefore I binged about 5 or 6 more episodes. 

Impractical Jokers is a hidden camera reality show  with elements of improvisation released in 2011. The four hosts , Joe Gatto, Sal Vulcano, James Murray, and Brian Quinn go around the public with embarrassing challenges and whoever backs down from that challenge gets a thumbs down. The guy with the most thumbs down at the end of the episode has to do the overall punishment of the night, which is usually one of the most humiliating things you could never imagine yourself doing. The reactions of bystanders and overall the reactions of the guys themselves make the show worthwhile.

 The average length of each Impractical Jokers episode is about 30 minutes. The show's runtime seems short however the different variety of challenges and pranks makes it seem longer. Each show can contain up to 3-5 challenges, it really is up to the creator of the show to decide. This adds good variety to the episodes. 

Now you may wonder why the jokers don’t just say ‘no’ to the big punishments of the night ; well they agreed if any of them ever refuse to do a punishment, then they’re kicked off the show. An example of when a joker nearly refused to do a punishment is when Joe was performing a prank at the New York City Field, home of the New York Mets. It was up to Joe to act as obnoxiously as possible, intercepting and stealing away the Mets pitcher Noah Syndergaard’s autographs to children. While Syndergaard was tossing the ball up to kids Joe went as far as to taunt them by saying “gotta be quicker than that” He nearly refused to do the punishment due to the fact that children were involved along with their parents and he’d be ruining a special moment. 

An example of one of the overall punishments of the show is when Sal unknowingly got an actual tattoo of Jaden Smith on his hip. But perhaps the most funny joke was when Q (Brian Quinn) posed as the instructor for a parent-child painting class. Q’s big punishment of the night was to go around the room painting red x’s on each canvas in the class.  This type of humor got me so engaged due to the fact that the mothers were in pure disbelief. The whole room had tension and the way Q was awkwardly grinning and the slow pace that Q went around the room added to the awkwardness of the punishment. 

Overall the show seems to have an endless amount of episodes and can keep you locked in for multiple hours. It’s one of the few comedy shows that have actual people’s reactions. From surprised reactions, to confused, the show really focuses on the setting and the joke especially to make it funny where it’s almost pushing it too far but not quite.