Triumph the Insult Comic Dog Election Special: Dogging All the Candidates
Who knew that what this election season needed was Triumph the Insult Comic Dog? The Conan O’Brien veteran created by Robert Smigel has a new Hulu production, Triumph’s Election Special 2016, and the heroically vulgar canine attends Democratic and Republican events in states including New Hampshire and Iowa, getting reactions (and offended non-reactions) from candidates including Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, Martin O’Malley, and Mike Huckabee. The latter is interviewed at what Triumph terms “an indoor shooting-range, or as mass murderers call it, ‘the gym.’”
In an effort to demonstrate the grasp the average voter has on the issues, Triumph, voiced and manipulated by Smigel, dispatches what he calls “multiple robotic blonde women posing as Fox News reporters” to ask fake questions and elicit reactions to assertions such as “Obama wants to pass an amendment to allow a baby to choose their gender at birth: How do you feel about that?” and “Ted Cruz once shoved a child into a swimming pool.” Ordinary citizens, interviewed by the fake-Fox reporters at various political rallies, express grave outrage at these claims until Triumph tells them, “We’re from a new show called People Are Incredibly Gullible and Shouldn’t Be Allowed to Vote.”
By far the most sporting of the candidates is Mike Huckabee (who has since suspended his campaign; I’m sure there’s no connection). Huckabee displays a winning sense of humor, playing along with Triumph, who advises him to be more insulting to the other candidates — “that’s the wave of the future,” counsels Triumph, “that’s what Trump is doing.” Huckabee proves willing to read aloud Smigel-written digs such as “I’ve got food in my colon that’s older than Marco Rubio.”
Obviously you have to have a fondness for Triumph’s brand of vulgarity, but he’s certainly an equal-opportunity offender: About the only joke I can quote about Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders is Triumph’s multiple variations on the notion that Sanders, as an older person, passes a lot of gas.
At over an hour, the Hulu special can seem a bit long in spots, but be sure to stick around for a hilariously squirmy session with University of New Hampshire students on the subjects of “safe spaces” and “gender identification” (“What do you identify as, besides ‘pretentious’?” he asks one young fellow). Oh, and the segment in which SNL’s Tim Meadows successfully passes himself off as Dr. Ben Carson in an Iowa diner, shaking hands and asking, “Is there a real doctor in the house?”
Like I said, if you’re on Triumph’s wavelength, Smigel’s special is invigorating stuff.
Watch Triumph’s recent visit to Conan:
Triumph’s Election Special 2016 is streaming now on Hulu.
