The Greatest New Streaming Comedy Of 2025 Hates AI As A lot As You Do

This text accommodates spoilers for “The Studio” episode 7, “Casting.”

I attempt to keep away from hyperbolic sizzling takes, however the extra time goes on, the extra I am beginning to assume that Seth Rogen really is among the most good comedians to ever do it. He broke into the mainstream within the 2000s due to tasks like “Superbad” and “Knocked Up” (each movies I am keen on, for the document), however because the “Freaks and Geeks” alum has grown, his comedy has advanced to an incomparable degree. He at the moment govt produces and stars on Francesca Delbanco & Nicholas Stoller’s Apple TV+ collection “Platonic,” which very properly is likely to be the neatest present about catastrophe millennials failing to just accept the realities of their societal roles as adults. However his true masterpiece is the cringe-comedy Hollywood satire “The Studio” (additionally on Apple TV+), co-created with frequent collaborator Evan Goldberg together with Alex Gregory, Peter Huyck, and Frida Perez.

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We at /Movie have been loving “The Studio,” particularly how the present makes use of beloved Hollywood figures, like asking Martin Scorsese to pitch an concept for “The Kool-Support Film” and letting perennial good man Ron Howard completely lose it on Rogen’s studio govt character Matt Remick, to the purpose of cursing him out and throwing his trademark hat with a lot drive it knocks Rogen via a glass desk. Every episode tackles part of the movie-making course of, however reasonably than utterly biting the hand that feeds, it balances its office comedy insider information with Remick’s desperation as a respectable cinephile to make the most effective motion pictures attainable in a system rigged in opposition to itself.

It is also a present that hammers dwelling the significance of getting human beings with various views concerned within the artistic course of. No algorithm on the earth can ever change the ingenuity that comes from being an individual with ideas, emotions, hopes, desires, and experiences that form our views. Which is why season 1 episode 7, “Casting,” is the most effective episode but of 2025’s finest new streaming comedy.

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On the earth of “The Studio,” pre-production on “The Kool-Support Film” is properly underway. Nicholas Stoller has signed on to direct, two younger writers have crafted a script the studio loves, they usually’ve acquired Ice Dice signed on to voice the Kool-Support Man. Remick and his colleagues, govt Sal Saperstein (a career-best Ike Barinholtz) and advertising and marketing head Maya Mason (a genius Kathryn Hahn), stand in entrance of their casting board and panic … does it seem racist for The Kool-Support Man to be voiced by a Black actor? The remainder of the episode is an train in skewering white fragility as they desperately attempt to discover a casting mixture that’s as progressive and numerous as attainable with out seeming as in the event that they’re leaning into racist tropes that can get them lit up on social media. They do not truly care about not being racist, they simply do not wish to look racist.

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They think about recasting the complete Kool-Support CGI household with Black actors to ensure they are not disrespecting Black ladies if the Kool-Support Man’s spouse is not Black, after which panic as a result of it means all of the Black actors will likely be CGI. They awkwardly ask Maya’s Black workforce member Tyler (Dewayne Perkins) for recommendation, and Lil Rel Howery and Ziwe are introduced in to seek the advice of. It is debated whether or not or not they will make the white characters lesbians to “offset” their whiteness and provides them an adopted Asian little one so as to add extra range, however they finally resolve the most effective plan of action is to “Black Panther” it and have the complete forged be Black. One other nice little bit of satire is that they resolve the human couple ought to be performed by Don Cheadle and Keke Palmer, which might give them a virtually 30-year age hole as a pair, and this by no means crosses anybody’s thoughts as a priority. Genius.

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However their pleasure is minimize brief when the writers resolve that if the forged is all Black, they should not be writing the script as they’re not Black, they usually go away the mission. Remick even factors out, “In an try to not be racist, you are limiting the quantity of Black individuals you’ll be able to write for.” That is on the heart of how so many white executives truly assume, and why it is so arduous for marginalized individuals to get their tales greenlit. Stoller agrees to rewrite it himself, however notes that to avoid wasting money and time on the movie’s price range to do it … he’ll use the help of AI animation to get it finished. That is the place the present’s satire evolves from good to nice.

Remick finally straight up asks Ice Dice if it is racist for him to voice The Kool-Support Man, and he rightfully places Matt in his place. They’ll go to a Comedian-Con a number of days later to announce his casting, and everybody at Continental Studios appears like they’ve averted an enormous PR catastrophe. However in focusing a lot on whether or not or not they are going to be perceived as racist, they’ve utterly uncared for the precise drawback with “The Kool-Support Film,” and the attendees at their Comedian-Con panel gladly hand them their ass about it. 

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Throughout the Q&A, an indignant artist asks if the rumors are true and they will be utilizing AI animation, which takes away jobs from artists and utterly devalues the craft. Ice Dice begins a “F— AI!” chant earlier than leaving Remick alone on a stage to be booed into oblivion. Sal and Maya watch Matt get booed from the wings and are utterly unmoved, indicating that whereas accusations of racism terrify them, critiques of AI appear “fantastic.” I instantly thought in regards to the studio heads who greenlit brazenly racist movies like “Soul Man” and questioned in the event that they thought individuals having a problem with the blackface was “fantastic” then, too.

Each time some creatively bankrupt chode posts waxy gifs of “I requested the BleepBlorpSlop Machine to indicate me ‘Pulp Fiction’ if it had been made by Wes Anderson” and the outcomes goes viral, it looks like studio execs are solely seeing “Wow, this video acquired one million feedback.” They utterly neglect to take it simply one click on additional to see that 900,000 of these feedback are individuals speaking about how morally reprehensible the work is, as a result of the 100,000 they can see are paid-for-Bluecheck sycophants which have been prioritized by the algorithm.

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In lower than two minutes, “The Studio” was in a position to dissect the rampant conduct of white individuals fixating on public notion reasonably than truly bettering their understanding of race and level out how deluded studio executives are in regards to the critical menace of AI. Impartial journalist Kat Tenbarge of Spitfire Information lately put out a incredible piece about how the push to normalize AI is nothing greater than the second-coming of the “pivot to video” development that decimated the journalism and media publishing business. These in positions of energy are too afraid of probably being unsuitable later down the road regarding AI to see how unsuitable they’re proper this second.

Ice Dice is correct. “F— AI.”