The sole extra on this DVD from Comedy Central and Paramount is “Carlos Mencia’s Guide to Getting Fit,” which runs for two minutes, and goes into detail about how he’s amazingly thin now.
If you subtract the times during New Territory in which Mencia preemptively defends himself over perceived controversial jokes, or waxes patriotic, or talks about why he performs this type of in-your-face comedy, or belittles his audience, the special would be only about 40 minutes. Mencia has to do all that because he doesn’t have anything else. He feels he has to hype himself to the audience, even though it would seem that he doesn’t have to because the audience is there at Pechanga Resort & Casino in Temecula, California, where this special was taped. And the audience has been there before, over three past specials that have been on DVD, and his series on Comedy Central. His schtick in which he takes mock offense at the reaction of audience members to some racially-tinged jokes or something else on that level has gotten old. Insult hecklers if you’ve got the ammo to disable them, and if you must fire at your audience, do it in moderation. He knows, though, that the audience he wants is one that knows to take it in stride, that he’s known for invoking such strong reactions, that those who don’t get it will drop away, and that’s fine, because he still has the others, cheering him on. It’s tiresome that he hasn’t moved on.
“Carlos Mencia’s Guide to Getting Fit” needs all of its two minutes. It’s funny in ways that the special isn’t. In his explanation and demonstration about how he’s gotten so fit, he’s “helped” by Juan, his workout buddy who eats a burger while Mencia does crunches, holds out the burger to him as he’s pulling himself up, and then pulls it away. Mencia is the straight man in this routine, which he normally does not like to be, but it works well here, because he’s genuine about what he’s done to become healthier. He makes it funny, especially the ending.
Mencia specializes in visceral jokes, acting them out, fishing for reactions by throwing bombs in the water. They’re not as effective as they used to be because his topics are always being talked about by others, exactly with those kinds of jokes, even though those who tell them among friends don’t have the stage that he does. He always deploys the easy applause lines, and he gets it every single time. Some of his jokes are oversimplified or they unjustly pick at what makes America unique, that we come from different cultures, different races, different backgrounds, and here we all are, all together. He goes after an Alabama congressman who said that he wishes those from other countries who come here would speak English without an accent, and says that even Mexicans are saying, “That’s not how you say ‘tornado,’” after mockingly stating that in Alabama, the congressman would likely say “ter-nader.” People speak differently. Some retain the dialect from their native state or country even after living in the United States for a few decades, like his brother who annoys him. It’s who they are.
The Carlos Mencia in “Carlos Mencia’s Guide to Getting Fit” will probably not be back. That is the same Carlos Mencia who created Mind of Mencia, which was funny because he had to fashion a structure in order to tell his jokes in sketches and audience participation. The jokes had to fit within an allotted time. He does have a structure for New Territory, but it’s what he’s always leaned on. Without those visceral jokes, he’d fall over. The Mind of Mencia Carlos Mencia was sharp, thinking up insights that should have become part of his latest act. He needs to get back into that mindset, and go beyond belittling and being condescending to his audience, beyond the easy jokes, because it’s time for him to leave what’s so easy, what will get the reaction that it always has. New Territory was likely easy money for him, and now that he’s gotten that out of the way, he should go for what worked better. That’s not to say that he’s better in shorter chunks of time. He can still be good in 80 minutes, but his act needs much more than the fumes it’s running on. He’s done it well before and certainly he can do it again. This isn’t it.
