Catherine Davis \u201924 loves Mr. Meeseeks, a \u201clittle adorable creature that you can summon to achieve one task in life, and then he can vanish forever,\u201d explained the philosophy major.<\/p>\n
But in the universe of the animated sci-fi sitcom \u201cRick and Morty,\u201d the Meeseeks (all of whom are named Mr. Meeseeks) react quite badly when kept from achieving their tasks. It turns out that every moment of life is painful for Mr. Meeseeks, and he yearns to complete the chore so he can end the torture of existence. To that end, Mr. Meeseeks will destroy whoever stands in his way, including fellow Meeseeks or even the person who summoned him to perform the task in the first place.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s such a dark concept,\u201d said Davis. \u201cThe existential crisis is so dark and brooding, but you can\u2019t help but laugh at the little creatures as they are attacking each other and complaining about how awful life is.\u201d<\/p>\n
So why do \u201cRick and Morty\u201d fans laugh at Mr. Meeseek? And what about \u201cBoJack Horseman,\u201d another of Davis\u2019 favorite shows, whose main character is a self-loathing, cynical, alcoholic cartoon horse?<\/p>\n
\u201cI told my roommate I had watched \u2018BoJack Horseman\u2019 three times over the break,\u201d Davis said, \u201cand she just looked at me and said, \u2018How depressed are<\/em> you?\u2019 It made me wonder, \u2018Why do<\/em> I like that?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n That philosophical question interested Davis, an aspiring comedy writer, enough to spend her summer researching it, especially since she felt that dark humor does not seem to fall neatly within any of the philosophical theories that have traditionally defined comedy. She approached Darren Hick, assistant professor of philosophy, with the proposal for a Summer Research Fellowship<\/a> to attempt to categorize black comedy within the broad philosophical spectrum of humor.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re looking at shows and movies where you\u2019re laughing at really difficult topics,\u201d Davis said, \u201cand we want to figure out why you do that.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s a relatively novel topic, Hick said, in a field that is sometimes slow to catch up to the zeitgeist.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s really only been in the last half-century that there\u2019s been this burgeoning conversation about the major philosophical theories of comedy,\u201d he said, \u201cbut nobody\u2019s really talking about dark comedy in quite the way Catherine\u2019s talking about it \u2013 things like depression and cringe comedy that are wildly popular now. But philosophy has momentum issues and sometimes has trouble catching up on things.\u201d<\/p>\n Besides \u201cRick and Morty\u201d and \u201cBoJack Horseman,\u201d Davis is reviewing blackly comedic films such as \u201cFargo\u201d (in which Minnesota cheerfulness is juxtaposed with woodchipper-enhanced homicidal violence) and \u201cThe Death of Stalin\u201d (in which Stalin dies). She is also scanning guides on comedy writing and texts about the philosophy of humor.<\/p>\n