Professor Popinjay's Compendium of Perspicacity

A Non-review by Professor Popinjay

THIS ARTICLE IS NOT FOR CHILDREN UNDER THE AGE OF 36.

WARNING! THIS NON-REVIEW IS WRITTEN BY A PROFESSIONAL AND SHOULD NOT BE ATTEMPTED AT HOME. JUST BECAUSE THE AUTHOR PRESENTS ASPECTS OF THESE FILMS IN A HUMOROUS WAY DOES NOT MEAN THE FILMS ARE ACTUALLY FUNNY. PLEASE READ WITH CAUTION.

This Non-Review envelopes the following (so-called) movies:

• Jackass: The Movie (2002)
• Jackass Number 2 (2006)
• Jackass 3D (2010)
• Jackass Forever (2018)

The previous list of “films” (I use the term “film” lightly here as I’m certain most of this was “filmed” on Johnny Knoxville’s phone) is a list of the titles I actually (and reluctantly) watched. When I say “watched”, I mean it flitted by my eyes at twice the speed while I did other more productive things.

I don’t want to get overly critical. These fellas seem like a fun group of guys that I probably would not want to hang out with for fear of being attacked by a bear or inadvertently ending up with my scrotum stapled to a ceiling fan.

I don’t want to be the uncool guy. I certainly felt that way back in 2002 when everyone was asking if I had seen the first installment or the TV show. After hearing what kind of things were on the show I decided I wasn’t interested.

I also don’t want to criticize the amount of money spent on making these films nor the amount spent to see them. I’m a patron of the arts and I create art myself. But is this ridiculous, obscene, idiotic sadistic, disgusting, cringe-worthy, inappropriate, dishonorable, unpalatable, vomit-inducing, drivel really art?

I guess that’s in the eye of the beerholder but it’s my opinion that there is nothing artistic about this, these guys are idiots, and the amount of money going to and fro because of these films is appalling and could have been used to buy me a huge mansion. You know, something useful that helps people.

Does that make me the uncool guy? I think in this case, I’m happy to be uncool. Not only do I not want snakes to bite me on my naughty bits, I really don’t want to watch it happen to someone else either. But, you know, if that’s your thing, I’m not gonna stop you. I do think the snake should be fully informed and consenting before being subjected to these kinds of things, but that’s an entirely different matter.

These guys are now rich idiots. Would I do what they did for a taste of that money? Certainly not everything they did. But maybe some things. And while I may have opinions about people who are entertained by this kind of thing, there were a few things I found funny.

I thought it was funny when they replaced Bam Margera’s dad with a look-alike in bed where his mom slept and then just waited until she noticed (they made one of their friends look like his dad). A little creepy but she was a sport about it as always. Honestly, Bam’s mom is the best part of these.

They clearly spent some money on the opening and closing of these films. The openings were mediocre at best but the finales were fantastic. If you can find just the finales on YouTube, those are pretty enjoyable and amazing and not overly disgusting like the rest of it.

The game of musical chairs they played where the loser gets unexpectedly blasted out of his seat by a high-powered hydraulic catapult; that was pretty amusing. Did these scenes make the films worth the price? No. And I got this set for free.

Do I think stuff like this should be censored? Maybe on TV where a young impressionable kid can be unexpectedly influenced by it. But I would argue the TV show gave AMPLE warning not to try and repeat these stunts. There have been many examples of moronic kids and adults alike doing stupid crap as seen in the show but morons have been doing stupid crap since the dawn of man. I would argue this show is a result of the human race’s inherent stupidity and Johnny Knoxville just capitalized on it.

In a theater or on a DVD, however, it’s my choice to watch it. It’s my choice to reenact it. The problem is, people in charge of censoring these kinds of things sometimes don’t know when to quit and it’s not long before a completely arbitrary set of rules and restrictions are established, based entirely on the fact that some idiot got themselves hurt doing this or someone was offended by that. Next thing you know, no one is allowed to do anything beyond staring at the wall.

I hated these movies. I want my money and time back. Well, it was free to me. I want fiduciary remuneration for enduring this garbage. Watching these was a chore and I deserve recompense. I think the money that went to these films could have been more wisely spent. I think the time that went into making and watching these could have also been more wisely spent. I think the film stock and DVDs these were printed on could have been more wisely used. The fact that these films made as much money as they did inspires in me serious misgivings about the human race as a whole… myself included. It may have been free, but I still willfully accepted it and watched it like a dumb dumb.

And yet I would defend these guys’ choice to make these. And I’d defend anyone’s choice to watch it except for my childrens’, who are strictly forbidden from watching these. When they’re adults, should they choose to watch these, I’ll not say a thing. If they come out enjoying it thoroughly and wanting more, I still won’t say a word. I’ll just be silently disappointed in them. That’s my choice. And freedom of choice is important.

In addition to the titles listed at the top, sadly there exists the following installments as well, many of which are just re-releases with added footage. When all you do is point a camera at yourself and play ping pong with your wang it’s not exactly hard to produce content:

• Jackass 2.5 (2007)
• Jackass Presents: Mat Hoffman’s Tribute to Evel Knievel (2008)
• Jackass 3.5 (2010)
• Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa (2013)
• Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa.5 (2014)
• Jackass 4.5 (2022)

There’s also a bunch of spinoffs and heir apparents that I shan’t mention here, as well as a video game on multiple platforms. I watched about 2.3 seconds of the gameplay. It looks like Grand Theft Auto 5 but with Johnny Knoxville’s constant laughter that borders on Lloyd Christmas’s “most annoying sound in the world” from Dumb and Dumber. One goal in the game is to throw yourself down a mountain side, which incidentally you can do in Grand Theft Auto V anyway. Okay, the street wake-boarding looked pretty fun actually. I don’t know. There’s worse games out there. The Nintendo DS version looks kind of fun too.

Whelp! I’ve already devoted way more time to this than I’ve wanted to, so I’m gonna just end this right here.

As for what to do with my DVD copy…