THE ARC'S TAKEThis episode argues that Airplane isn't a joke machine bolted onto a plot but a plot that never once stops being played straight — the "clothing line" every single joke hangs from — and that's precisely why deadpan dramatic actors, not comedians, were the only people who could have made it work. EPISODE SUMMARYIs Airplane! (1980) actually the funniest movie ever made — and does it hold up? In this episode, three hosts break down the disaster-parody classic joke by joke, arguing that its real genius isn't the gags (though by their count there's a new one every 20 seconds) but the fact that it plays a completely straight, lifted-from-a-real-drama plot dead serious underneath all of them. They also dig into which of its dated jokes still land and which ones don't. You don't need to have seen the film to follow along — though you'll probably want to watch it after. WHERE TO WATCHStreaming availability as of 2026-07-04. Paramount+ (subscription)MGM+ (subscription)Peacock (Premium tiers)Kanopy (free with library card)Tubi (free with ads)Pluto TV / fuboTV (free with ads)Rent or buy: Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, Fandango at Home, Google Play This one's not hiding from you — it's on basically every platform, free tier, paid tier, and rental storefront simultaneously, which feels appropriate for a movie built on the philosophy of throwing every joke technique at the wall at once. If you don't already have a library card for Kanopy, honestly, that's the real crime here — free is free, Shirley. CTANew episodes of The Arc arrive roughly once a week, but they are ephemeral beings that sometimes take longer — you're encouraged to start from the beginning because you do not have to have seen the film we're talking about to enjoy the episode — heck, sometimes some of us haven't even watched the film we're talking about. Spotify (link needed) Pocket Casts (link needed) RSS Start from Episode 01: The Princess Bride EDITORIAL OPENERAirplane! is the 1980 disaster-movie parody where a traumatized war pilot has to land a passenger jet after everyone in the cockpit gets food poisoning — and where, roughly every twenty seconds for eighty-eight minutes, someone tells a joke. It's the one with "Surely you can't be serious" / "I am serious, and don't call me Shirley." It's the one where the whole ridiculous machine works because the actors — Leslie Nielsen, Robert Stack, Lloyd Bridges, men who'd spent decades playing things dead straight — play it dead straight here too. The dramatic plot is real, and it never wobbles; the film just hangs joke after joke off it like a clothing line. Nearly every comedy that came after it, from Naked Gun to the Farrelly brothers to Family Guy, is standing on this movie's shoulders whether it knows it or not. We watched it three in a room, laughing harder than usual, and did not fully agree about it — which turned out to be the point. Robby grew up quoting it off a friend's Betamax; it's a foundational text for him. Jaclynn thinks it's a genuine comedy masterclass and also didn't especially like it, because she wants a movie to take her somewhere darker than "here is a joke, here is another joke." Cole spent the entire episode confidently insisting it was a 1976 Mel Brooks film and a sequel to Blazing Saddles, which it is none of — a bit he committed to so thoroughly that when his own landlord (an MIT-and-Wharton-educated woman) correctly told him three guys from Wisconsin actually wrote it, he decided she must be wrong. So somewhere between counting the jokes (a minimum of 264, we did the math), arguing about whether the film's uglier gags are punching at something or just punching, and Robby quoting himself quoting Seth Rogen on why comedy has to live a little outside of proper society, we ended up talking less about whether Airplane! is funny — it is — and more about what it actually takes to make something look this easy. Turns out it takes a lot, and turns out you can spend two hours finding that out and still keep looking at Dad for approval afterward. WHAT WE DISCUSS04:47 — Robby Actually Reviews The Film! Robby, Cole, and Jaclynn drift from talk about how Robby's friend and his tough Michigan girlfriend will react to the podcast into a long tangent about Jaclynn's road trip through Detroit and the Upper Peninsula, then troubleshoot mic/recording noise issues with jokes about head-mounted mic gear, before circling back to note that Robby (with his friend Sean) grew up watching and quoting this movie constantly. 13:34 — DID JACLYNN NOT LIKE AIRPLANE??? Cole, Robby, and Jaclynn get sidetracked joking about casting Allison Williams in a hypothetical remake before untangling a mixed-up back-and-forth over who's supposed to answer the question of what they knew going into Airplane, eventually landing on Robby's take that the film works because its jokes grow directly out of a genuinely earnest story (which is what influenced comedians like Seth MacFarlane and Adam McKay), while Jaclynn admits she thought she'd seen the movie before but realizes she'd only ever caught its most famous clips. 17:24 — Airplane! is a remake? A parody? No?!?! Jaclynn and Cole compare Airplane!'s serious plot to a "clothing line" that jokes hang on, estimate the film has at least 250 jokes (maybe closer to 480), and Jaclynn recalls specific gags she already knew before seeing the movie—like the inflatable autopilot and "don't call me Shirley"—which leads her into a tangent about how the nun/boy reading joke reminded her of the Australian comedy show Danger 5. 19:36 — It's a Dramatic Movie! Cole and Robby recommend other spoof comedies like Danger 5 and Inspector Ike as similar in style, then Jaclynn brings up how Airplane's influence shows up in later memes, describing the recurring gif of a woman being repeatedly slapped harder each year as a joke about escalating chaos. 23:30 — Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Also Makes Fun of Cole Robby, Cole, and Jaclynn go back and forth on their differing reactions to Airplane, with Jaclynn admitting she prefers darker, more emotionally complex stories over pure comedy while Robby and Cole push back and needle each other about it, before the three debate whether the film's uncomfortable jokes—especially a running pedophilia gag and moments of misogyny and racial humor—work as self-aware satire or just haven't aged well. 34:29 — Problematic? Not Sooo Much Cole tells a story about his highly educated landlord insisting Airplane was written by three people from her Wisconsin hometown, which Cole wrongly took as confirmation of his mistaken belief that it's a Mel Brooks movie, and Robby and Jaclynn tease him for not questioning his own error and for dismissing her correct expertise, while also comparing the film's influence to later comedies like Hot Shots and The Naked Gun. 43:11 — Dad Explains Post-Modernism Bit The three hosts riff on a shared bit of dialogue with lots of overlapping repetition, then veer into a tangent about Alex Jones and InfoWars being bought by The Onion, before settling into a discussion of whether each of them stayed awake through Airplane and how they personally rate it as a comedy versus a drama with jokes layered on top. 53:17 — The Meanest Joke Ever? Cole, Robby, and Jaclynn go back and forth on whether a joke in the film still lands today, joking about the characters' Jewish identity, and Jaclynn says her real complaint about the "Air Israel beard" joke isn't that it's offensive but that it was shot too cheaply to do the joke justice, a point Cole then repeats back word for word. CHAPTERS / TIMESTAMPS── CAPTIVATE FORMAT (MM:SS.mmm) ──────────────────────────── 00:23.857 Can a Movie Ruin a Friendship? 04:47.239 Robby Actually Reviews The Film! 09:30.653 FUNNIEST MOVIE EVER MADE 11:05.039 WHAT JACLYNN KNEW GOING IN 13:34.147 DID JACLYNN NOT LIKE AIRPLANE??? 17:24.752 Airplane! is a remake? A parody? No?!?! 19:36.759 It's a Dramatic Movie! 20:46.120 Unhinged Mel Brooks Bit 23:30.534 Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Also Makes Fun of Cole 29:00.364 Why Robby Loved The Film This Time Around 30:52.142 When Was Cole In or Out? 34:29.234 Problematic? Not Sooo Much 43:11.923 Dad Explains Post-Modernism Bit 53:17.277 The Meanest Joke Ever? 53:58.652 Jaclynn Flies a Plane ── YOUTUBE FORMAT ────────────────────────────────────────── 0:00 - Can a Movie Ruin a Friendship? (natural: 0:23) 4:47 - Robby Actually Reviews The Film! 9:30 - FUNNIEST MOVIE EVER MADE 11:05 - WHAT JACLYNN KNEW GOING IN 13:34 - DID JACLYNN NOT LIKE AIRPLANE??? 17:24 - Airplane! is a remake? A parody? No?!?! 19:36 - It's a Dramatic Movie! 20:46 - Unhinged Mel Brooks Bit 23:30 - Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Also Makes Fun of Cole 29:00 - Why Robby Loved The Film This Time Around 30:52 - When Was Cole In or Out? 34:29 - Problematic? Not Sooo Much 43:11 - Dad Explains Post-Modernism Bit 53:17 - The Meanest Joke Ever? 53:58 - Jaclynn Flies a Plane ── CAPTIVATE PASTE (clean, no labels) ────────────────────── 00:23.857 Can a Movie Ruin a...
