Using the renowned We Love the ’80 / Best Week Ever format that VH1 has successfully implemented for many years, History of Swear Words addresses an expletive per episode, launching the word for comedians like Sarah Silverman, Jim Jeffries, DeRay Davis, Joel Kim Booster and Nikki Glaser, while lightly investigating the particular history and evolution of each desecration with lexicographers, cognitive scientists and various specialists in cultural ebbs and flows.
The series never reaches a full rhythm, although it is always engaging on a superficial level. When you start playing on a really interesting aspect or angle, an episode changes to something else and you don’t get the deep dive you expected. But there are a handful of interesting rumors to absorb along – how how cursing under duress can really help people tolerate more pain or how Jonah Hill, of all people, has screamed more bad words in films than any other actor. You are always learning, even if it is erratic.
Each episode has its own flavor to trigger and its own topics to discuss. The series is well finished by “F ** k” (the great one) and “Damn” (that almost nobody considers a bad word anymore). In that sense, you start with the indisputable king of swearing (which is also the most malleable) and end with a legal historical look at a word that runs through the “complete life cycle” of an unholy sentence. And in the middle, you have “S ** t” (which still mostly means excrement), “B * tch” (an insult that women are complaining about) and the coitus combination of “D ** k” and “P * * * y “(both refer to the genitalia). It’s a good variety of words that allows the program to touch on a variety of subjects, ranging from politics and censorship to the good old d ** k jokes.
Why yes what It’s the difference between being “an s ** t “and being”The s ** t? “Or between being called” ab * tch “and”This one b * tch? “Context is the key, as well as the notion of” semiotics “, which relates to the speaker’s intention and the listener’s reception, along with all the intermediate connotations and connotations. types of conversations, but quickly passes through them in the name of the general trick – which is a light and flexible series designed to get in and out quickly while Nic Cage has fun swearing a storm.
I will also award some bonus points here for the inclusion of actor Isiah Whitlock Jr., whose unique delivery of “s ** t” (which adds syllables and seconds) has entered the pop culture lexicon thanks to The Wire. Swearing history can only achieve cuteness on a superficial level, but it still knows where to find and exercise the right amount of fun at the right time.