The Dudesons and Raising the Roofs: How Low Can You Go?
Apparently the Depths Know No Bounds
Where do I begin when it comes to Spike TV’s recent Thursday-night comedy block comprised of The Dudesons and Raising the Roofs? When discussing programs like these, precedent dictates that one is supposed to throw around the titles of previous unscripted stunt and candid-camera style shows, such as Jackass, and perhaps even the tamer Punk’d. This is especially true given Spike TV’s status as a division of MTV Networks, the more well-known home of the earlier, highly successful series.
After watching several episodes of the newer programs, however, the first thing that comes to mind is “Dumb, Dumber, and Dumberer,” an amalgamation of the titles of those two quintessentially silly films, Dumb & Dumber and its sequel, Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd. Sadly or fortunately, depending on how you feel about senseless entertainment, such a reaction is probably exactly what Spike TV execs had in mind when they concocted the idea of pairing these lowest-common-denominator shows together for a one-two punch of utter abject ridiculousness.
In case you don’t know, the Dudesons are actually all the rage … in Finland, where they first started gaining extreme-stunt notoriety in 2000 as Extreme Duudsonit (a Finnish-English mixture meaning “Extreme Dudesons”). There, the four mid-20-something friends since childhood—Jukka Hildén, Jarno “Jarppi” Leppälä, Hannu-Pekka “HP” Parviainen, and Jarno Laasala—have enjoyed a five-year reign of popularity and fame due to their dumb, daring, and dangerous antics.
Always wanted to know what it’s like to have real darts hurled into your stomach, as if it were a gameboard on a barroom wall, but didn’t have the courage? Well, check out The Dudesons, dude, because Jarppi, the pudgy one, has the audacity to actually do it. Ditto if you’ve ever fantasized about driving a car into another one amid an explosion of flames, or slugging a guy in his nether regions with a baseball bat while he sleeps. Who needs future children or both thumbs (the latter of which Jarppi does not have as a result of his bear-wrestling escapades) when you can do stupid stuff on film and get noticed instead?
At least Raising the Roofs has a plot—barely—to help slightly soften the mind-boggling events that viewers are subjected to. Michael “Chicken” Roof Jr. is an under-working actor you most likely don’t recall by name from his small roles in such commercial films as the two xXx flicks and Black Hawk Down. What his Hollywood colleagues and pals may not have realized before the dawn of this reality series is that Roof hails from a tiny Southern community in Dunnellon, Florida, which some people might impolitely describe with words along the lines of “boondocks,” “backwoods,” and “Hicksville.”
Yet, those are nothing compared to the personal habits of Roof’s barrel-bellied, beer-swilling, constantly cussing father Michael Sr. and uncle Stevie, who journey to Tinsel Town with their pet pig, Babe Roof the Fifth, to pay the “famous” celebrity in the family a visit filled with all manner of rude bodily functions and noises. The premiere episode’s title, Home is Where the Fart Is, kids you not, and neither does the tagline for The Dudesons, Stupidity Has No Limits.
The ability to enjoy either of these offerings from Spike TV depends a great deal upon one’s capacity to appreciate alternatively, and sometimes simultaneously, revolting and extraordinarily juvenile humor. Each show has its high and low moments, the former usually sneaking up on viewers when a stunt, joke, or funny situation unfolds in an unexpected way, such as when the elder Roofs first arrive at Michael’s address in California, mistakenly go to the main house, and ask the woman who answers the door—the property’s owner—for Chicken because they don’t realize Michael lives in a studio apartment above her garage.
As in most comedy shows, however, many of these genuinely amusing scenarios are padded with ample meaningless fluff that only evokes weary shakes of the head, derisive smirks, and, eventually, an unmistakable feeling of “been there, done that, got anything else new before I change the channel?” If you can tolerate those disadvantages long enough to get to the limited good stuff, then either show might prove worthwhile entertainment in very small doses. Otherwise, proceed with caution, and don’t claim you haven’t been forewarned.
The Verdict: The Dudesons gets a C- for inspired lack of purpose (it’s just one long string of silly incidents for the sake of silliness, some hilarious, some not, most in between), while Raising the Roofs garners a C for at least having a minimal storyline among all the gaseous human sound effects.
The Dudesons was placed on hiatus after the sixth episode of its eight-episode debut season aired on August 10, 2006, and Raising the Roofs wrapped up its six-episode debut season the same night. Neither series has been renewed by Spike TV as of the date of this review.
The Dudesons and Raising the Roofs photos courtesy of Spike TV
