PATTON OSWALT: TRAGEDY PLUS COMEDY EQUALS TIME: A Review.

Patton Oswalt has been doing Stand-Up comedy since before I was born.  The 45-year-old comic first got most of the world's attention wit his recurring role on 'King of Queens', even though Stand-Up is his true career preference.  Now, he brings his fans one of the most hilarious Stand-Up specials to come out in the past five years.  'Tragedy Plus Comedy Equals Time' is a special that centers around the revelations of growing older and getting wiser.  It touches upon hilarious topics like examining who you are in your mid-20s as opposed to your mid-40s and what having kids does to a person.  Patton also isn't afraid to reveal some of his choices that more than likely changed his life forever and what an afternoon in a grocery store can do to a person.

I will admit I wasn't a die-hard fan of Patton.  It was never a disliking thing, it just so happened I never got into his stuff as much as I should have.  But now that I have I am so happy this was my first real exposure to this great man who will sure go down as a comedy legend.  It takes true talent to make someone who is my age to look at my thought process about 'selling-out' and its evils and say, "maybe I've got it all wrong."  In a bit Mr. Oswalt does about the groups Creed and Nickelback, he really does reveal some of the absurdity of hating people for something relatively harmless like singing about girls and fame.  At this age, it's just refreshing being able to see that you don't have to aggressively hate something all the time just because you don't like it and some people do.  It's pretty funny too that someone who is a pretty hardcore Dead Kennedys fan realize, "Hey, I can chill a bit.  I'm too old to hate all the time."

The only thing that is a real kicker to me not just in this special but in comedy all together is the talk of depression.  I believe that anybody can talk about whatever they want if they can make it funny, but from the Stand-Ups to people in my age group constantly labeling themselves as 'depressed' because they just had a bad day seems like a real sick way of analyzing yourself.  I still laugh at some of it but it does not make me feel comfortable nor does it feel like it's advancing the craft of Stand-Up in any way.  But, like I have said before, I am young and don't know too much about Stand-Up, these are just opinions.  But, I will say that the way Patton talks about a rather surprisingly, self induced morbid trip to the grocery store is quite a good laugh.  One that had me gasping for air the first time I heard it.  So like I said, it can be done, I just don't know if it needs to be done to be funny.

Buy 'Tragedy Plus Comedy Equals Time' Off Of iTunes Here

Lastly, I am always impressed nowadays when a comedian can make me laugh at the idea of having children.  I have never had a child, but when somebody like Patton or Louis CK talks about their life as a parent I know that 20-somethings and 40-somethings are both laughing very hard, even if it is directed towards different parts or ideas of the punchline.  It's pretty neat and thus never leaves a dull moment in the special.  There's no thought in my mind going, "Oh he's doing kid material.  Time to go to the bathroom."  Quite the contrary.  It's some the best stuff that Patton touches on in this comedy masterpiece.

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So you should buy this special and be part of comedy history as fan who owned it before it was cool.  Get a taste of what adulthood will be like and what having children will do to a person.  You won't be disappointed.