Here’s video number 10, made by a fledgling artist named Charlotte Young. It doesn’t really require an introduction, because it is an introduction.

It is often observed that the key to comedy is timing. Speaking as one who has both performed comedy and composed subtitles for web videos, I can attest that getting the right timing in either is no easy trick. Getting the right timing in both at once, well… that’s top-ten level skill.

So hear this: I have some favorite tweets — and damn it, attention must be paid. I am boldly risking my reputation by giving the following tweets the imprimatur of my favor. ¹ Lastly, I should mention that the embedding code for these tweets was generated by socialditto.com; I tweaked the CSS format a little to blend with the design of this blog.

They’re an army in the night, like Norman Mailer. Once again, that’s Riki “Garfunkel” Lindhome and Kate “Oates” Micucci, along with special appearances by Sarah Silverman, Tig Notaro and probably some others that I missed. G&O’s new album All Over Your Face is for sale on Amazon, iTunes, and probably lots of other places. Their website, as listed in my blogroll, is garfunkelandoates.com.

Yesterday, the trusty comedy filter The Onion produced what struck me as a perfectly timed all-purpose riposte, headlined “Republicans Vote to Repeal Obama-Backed Bill That Would Destroy Asteroid Headed for Earth.” Unfortunately, it turns out that even this wasn’t quite enough to address the day’s most egregious Obama-phobic extreme: the new GOP majority in the House, as part of their absurdly childish insistence on a do-over of the health care reform act, have declared it necessary to redefine the crime of rape.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I wondered. “Is this another satirical sendup of the ludicrous extremity of Republican obstructionism? Is rape the asteroid in this joke? …NO?!? Oh my God. Get me some comic cushioning, stat!”

A legitimate case is often made that there are certain things that cannot be joked about, and that rape is one of them, because rape is not funny. I agree — with the last clause. Rape, in and of itself, is no laughing matter. I respectfully disagree, however, with the statement as a whole. There are times when even things as terrible as rape must be joked about, lest we lose our humanity.

I didn’t even laugh at the above clip when I watched it, but I did find it funny. So funny, in fact, that it kept me from breaking down into unabated primal protest. Losing my shit, as it were. And that, I think, may be the very definition of “pretty goddamned funny.”

Apparently xtranormal.com has been live on the web since 2008, but I didn’t encounter it until 2010. It’s a site that enables users to create animated video clips with stock characters. The user’s script is “spoken” by the characters via text-to-speech technology; the user can further manipulate the product with a limited shot selection and range of character movements. Pixar it ain’t — but as the following video proves, the constraints of the Xtranormal toolset can provide a unique brand of deadpan comedy.

Like most any other actor I have ever known, I have on innumerable occasions been obliged to carry out the conversation depicted in this video with remarkably few variations. The video cracked me up in part because it is auto-spoken by robots, but in much larger part because it’s true. We laugh as an alternative to weeping.

Back me up, fellow show folk — and while you’re at it, got any amusing, painful, or amusingly painful permutations of the dreaded so-what-have-I-seen-you-in chat? Put ‘em in a comment, whydontcha!