The Josh Innes Show - The Shane Gillis SNL Monologue Review

Episode Date: October 12, 2026

Shane Gillis is getting blasted by people, mostly liberals, who are outraged by his some of the content in his SNL Monologue. Let's break this thing down. Let's look at the reality of the situation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All righty. Let's see here. People are all pissed off about Shane Gillis. And by people, I just mean angry weirdos on social media are all pissed off. Like, is it possible to just think that someone's not funny and then, you know, like get enraged over it, right? Like, I'm not a huge Shane Gillis guy. I think tires is fine. But I'm not really a big fan of the whole like group of people that are in this comedy world. Like I don't find Kill Tony to be funny. I don't find Joe Rogelie. stand up to be funny. I like the Joe Rogan podcast. Sometimes. I haven't listened to it in a long time, but it's one of those things that I'll get into it, and I'll see a couple episodes with people I'd be interested in. And then I go down the wormhole for, you know,

two weeks, then I stopped listening for two months, you know. But I'm not really into the people who are in the Rogan sphere of comedy. I don't, like, I think Shane Gillis has a charming quality about them, and I like tires a little bit. I just don't find Shane Gillis to be over. overly funny. I think that he and Joe Rogan and a lot of these guys benefit from the same things Sophie Cunningham benefits from and that's that they're considered political and they're considered to be one side of the spectrum of the political spectrum. So if you're on that side of the

spectrum, you have to say that these people are the funniest fucking or the hottest fucking people ever because like do you think they're on your team? And that's what bothers me about the world at this point now. What bothers me about the world is that we can't just look at someone and go, hey, Are they funny or not? We have to base whether or not they're funny or hot or talented on what they believe politically. Back in my day, you just watched some shit. You'd say, I think this guy is funny. I don't think this guy is funny, right?

And, like, I think I saw somebody compare Shane Gillis to basically being a modern-day Larry the cable guy. I, where I saw that, somebody said that. And I'm like, I don't buy that necessarily. I don't think that's true. but I just don't find him to be all that funny. And part of it is, well, first of all, let's play some commercials and we'll continue. Part of the reason why I don't find him funny

is because I think there are times that he could have a more, not nuanced, but could have a better reference or something in the joke that makes the joke funnier, right? Certain words can make a joke funnier, right? Like the big thing people are all, pissed off about in the S&L monologue from the other night is that he said the joke about women being whores at the gym. He's like, well, well, since when did women start being whores at the gym? And I feel like you could have found a better way to deliver the line and not

just be horse. Now, part of, maybe it was part of his plan to say whores. He knew it would be controversial. It knew would get a lot of attention. And he knew that, you know, a bunch of white dudes would write in on their steeds and defend him and a bunch of maga people would defend him and a bunch of liberal people would hate him and maybe that was part of his plan um i just don't think it's a funny delivery of the joke and look i'm not a comedian right but you know i i watch a lot of it so i like i know what i think is funny and what i think works and i just think that that joke right like the setup for the joke was you know you go to the gym and what you know i haven't been to the gym in forever and what is like women at the gym now, apparently they just dress like whores.

Like, I feel like you could have delivered that line better and with a little less bite with the whores part of it and it would have been funnier and would have seemed smarter. It just seemed like you were being kind of a dick and lazy with the horse part of it. You know, like, I'm listening to that and I'm like, I just don't, I don't think it's funny. I don't, I don't, it's not that I don't get it. I get the joke. It's just a lot of the comedy with guys like him relies on the fact that you're saying the things that nobody else will say and you're trying to be canceled and it's cancel culture this and

all this shit. It's like, I don't know, man. Like I watched this Stavros, the latest Stavros stand up and I laughed at some of it. Like, but what's funny is he's different. Like his is more of the liberal leaning type humor. And I'm watching that last night. And I'm like, maybe people just aren't really all that fucking funny anymore. Maybe this is like a dying art of being funny.

Like, I think he had some funny stuff. But like, I'm watching that. It's a Netflix special. And I've told you guys this. The funniest Netflix special. The funniest special I have watched in a long time was John Mullaney, baby Jay. It was unbelievably good. But it was a lot of storytelling and shit.

But it was fantastic. Usually when I watch stand-up shit, I just don't find it to be funny. And again, this kind of goes back to there goes Josh being old guy, an old man yells at Cloud and Josh, you know, saying things were better back when. But there's nothing. And look, I'm comparing, look, Shane Gillis is considered one of the biggest stand-ups in the world right now. So I don't think it's unfair to compare him to a Richard Pryor or a George Carlin or a dice clay in his prime or Sam Kenison, who had a short moment in time, relatively speaking, but was fantastic.

When you think about guys like that that were rock star comedians, I'm talking rock star legend comedians and we're filling up arenas, which is what dice. Clay did he filled up Madison Square Garden, Sam Kennison did it. They all did it. Chris Rock in his prime. I'm talking all-star, rock star, blow your fucking socks off comedians that are just considered the all-time greats. Even guys like a Bill Hicks, who I thought was.

great. Like all these guys. The, like, so you want to compare, like, the guys who are the top dogs of different generations, and he's clearly one of the top dogs. Like, I don't feel like he even comes close to those guys. Like, like, even guys who were doing kind of dumb humor, which I'm not against the idea of dumb humor, do dumb humor, you know, I mean, the key is to make people laugh and not everybody's, you know, Arrested Development made it three years and nobody ever watched it. I thought Arrested Development was a brilliant show.

there are a lot of shows that make it 7, 8, 9, 10 years, and are terrible. But, you know, according to me. But that's the thing. Like, it's okay to do dumb shit. It's okay to do surface level shit. Jay Leno dominated the ratings in late night over David Letterman for most of their head-to-head time against each other for like the last 15, 20 years of it, okay? He was doing far less cerebral shit.

Letterman was more kind of, you know, the underground type of shit. So I get all that. And I'm not against the concept of it. My problem is, I think too many of these guys do too much surface level shit, and it's done because they know the audience is there, because the audience will like it or dislike it just based on what they perceive his politics to be. And now he's the edgy guy. He's the edgy right wing leaning maga type guy, and he's making the jokes that nobody else is going to make. I just think a lot of the jokes a lot of times are lazy. And I understand this is not like you're doing stand-up.

This is doing five minutes on S&L instead of doing like, quote-unquote, monologue. You do a stand-up bit. But some of the topics were just like, like, did you just like go to the handbook? Like the lazy talking point handbook? You know, you're supposed to be one of the top two or three best comedians in the world right now, at least biggest comedians, a guy that can fill up an arena, a guy that can fill up a stadium. Like, that's who you are right now. I need a little bit more than, hey, gay guys at the gym, am I right?

And like, hey, the hot pants that chicks wear. I mean, dude, chicks have been dressing like horses at the gym for 10, 15 years. Who cares? Like, that was more of what I was bothered by by it than, you know, the content. Like, it's comedy, right? Bro, I sit here and I see some of the shit that people get away with saying about, like, killing Trump and shit and stand-ups. And I'm like, you're not offended by that?

Who's the red-haired fuck that was in the, the, what is his name? The red-haired guy that's like, just has the most punchable fucking face on the planet. He was in the Little Dickie show. Just a very unlikable fucking guy. What is his goddamn name? I hate this guy.

And he basically made a joke in one of the stand-ups about, you know, how has Trump not been assassinated yet type of thing? And I'm not offended by it. I'm not some Trump-humper anyway. I don't give a shit, right? Like, I don't defend, I don't care. So that's not what this is. and like that's okay and stavros was making jokes about in his most recent one basically kind of

defended this man gioni for shooting this health care guy and those are all okay and no one's offended by that and we just kind of go about our days and it's like okay fine but then you make a joke about chicks dressing skanky at the gym and it's like oh my god this is awful let's all do think pieces on this and do instagram and TikTok videos about how offensive this is and Every frumpy woman on the planet, every homely woman on the planet has to come out and do some sort of fucking video about it to let you know that it's offensive and terrible. And women have been fighting against all this shit forever. They ignore the fact that women shit on each other more than any group out there. I guarantee there are women at the gym shitting on other women for dressing fucking hot.

It means this, it's in every line of work. There are women who hate other women. Yet a guy makes a joke about women dressing skanky at the gym and it's the worst fucking thing you've ever heard. and it's a sign that we have made no progress in the world. It's all fucking stupid. But I'm not offended by that. What I'm more so offended by is the fact that I just don't think the shit's that funny. And again, maybe it's old school dude and maybe I give too much credit to people of a bygone generation.

And maybe that's the truth. And I've been ripped for that before, whether it be about music or play-by-play announcers or whatever. But I don't think that Joe Rogan and I don't think that Shane Gillis, And I don't think that, God, fucking Theo Vaughn, who I think's the fucking worst. I don't think any of these people, Burt Kreischer, Pat McAfee, like, they all kind of fit into the same fucking category for me. And I'm not against being a bro. And I'm not against chugging beers and doing dumb shit, okay? I've been doing dumb shit like that before those guys were doing dumb shit like that.

Okay. So, like, I was doing that dumb shit on the radio 15, 16 years ago. It's not like I'm against it, and I'm not. My problem is there's a laziness to it where, and it's not even so much the comedian's fault as it is the fault of the audience who's more so looking for affirmation as opposed to looking to laugh at something. And what comedians used to be were people who looked at the absurdities in life and called out the absurdities of life. Comedians are not supposed to be politically biased people. Now, you can have your political beliefs. George Carlin had major political beliefs.

That's when he turned the corner, mid to late 80s, late 80s, early 90s. He turned a corner and became a guy that had pointed fucking thoughts on things. And, you know, how I know that there was some balance in it is I'll see videos posted by right-wing people that are like, look, George Carlin got it back then. I'll see videos posted by left-wing people that say, George Carlin spoke the truth back then. So he was a balanced person. but the problem is now what we've done with comedy is we've turned it into partisan type of shit. So, like, is Shane Gillis legitimately funny

or does he just have a giant audience of people who believe that he is in line with them politically, therefore they're going to like anything he does? It's like Swifties. Taylor Swift could fart into a fucking megaphone and put it on 10 different versions of a CD at Target and on vinyl at Target, and her people would buy every one of them.

Like if you're Taylor Swift, how do you know if the shit you're making is good? And how do you know if it's just, hey, my fans will gobble up any piece of shit I put out there? Like, you've got to have some sort of quality control. And sometimes I wonder if these comedians have that. Like, remember how hyped it was when Joe Rogan put out this stand-up? It was the one where he's wearing like the yellow button-up shirt.

It was this big deal. And I remember watching it, wanting it to be like this true cutting edge. like, oh, yeah. And then I watched it, and I'm like, I don't think this is that funny. I think it's fine. I'm not offended by it. I'm not bothered by it.

My world's not going to end because of it. But I'm watching this, and I'm just like, eh. You know, like, I don't get it. Like, I think it's fine. But then you read, like, you go to, like, Clay Travis, and Clay Travis will be like, this is the funniest shit ever. Take that fucking woke pussies. And then the woke pussies come back and say,

this is problematic toxic masculinity shit and let's also say there's also some realities out there that people don't want to dive into like part of the fact is this is white guy that gets associated with Trump and MAGA stuff like so the I what I love about people is we've created a world where the only misogynist and the only homophobes and the only narrow-minded people are straight white men right like that's the idea straight white men are the only ones who are truly the problems. Let me tell you something, brother. There are plenty of Mexican dudes.

There are plenty of black dudes. There are Indian fucking dudes. There are dudes in those religions where, like, they make their ladies cover up their whole fucking bodies and shit. Like, there are plenty of people that are not straight white men who have beliefs that you would consider problematic or toxic. But the only ones that catch the shit for it are the straight white guys. Because it's easy.

It's low-hanging fruit. It's the easiest shit. But instead of bitching about this shit, ignore it. Like Shane Gillis making jokes about chicks being hot at the gym is not going to end the fucking world. And oh, by the way, he made another joke in there about checking chicks out at the gym. And actually, I think the funniest line he delivered.

I think the funniest joke in the whole thing was actually the joke about ending up in the background on TikTok videos of like checking out chicks at the gym. Like, to me, that was the funny, that was funny. Like, it worked. And, like, I just, I enjoyed that joke. But I just love the idea that only men objectify people. Do you, like, we talk about this all the time.

There are women that reached up on stage and grabbed Tim McGrath's hog in front of his fucking wife. There are women that go to baseball games just because the dudes wear tight fucking pants. Do you think that all these women liked new kids on the block because the music was amazing. Do you think they all liked in sync and backstreet boys because the music was amazing? Do you think they had Justin Timberlake posters on the wall just because they thought it was amazing? They objectified these people and thought they were fucking hot. But it's only men who get called out for that and particularly straight white men. Apparently black men, Asian men, Mexican men, anybody that's a minority can say offensive shit. No one's offended by it. It's

okay. They've earned that right. They've dealt with enough so they can objectify women. But you know, white guy from Philadelphia area, he's not allowed to do that. trust me there are plenty of fucking people ladies doing jokes about dudes and how good they look and everything else but this is strictly comes down to a racial thing and a political thing i just wish it was funnier shit like that's my biggest hold up and my biggest issue when it comes to these guys is i wish they did funnier shit because i feel like i'm supposed to like this shit and then i watch it and i'm like i i just i'm fine with it but I don't love it.

It's fine. Like if I had tickets to go see Shane Gillis today, would I go see Shane Gillis? Sure. Like he seems like a legitimately kind of likable guy. Like he's kind of got this oafish quality about him that I like. Like he seems like a cool dude. I like him. But then I would go.

If someone said, hey, I got a couple tickets to Shane Gill. Same thing I did with Bert Kreisher. I ended up with good seats to go to the Fox in Detroit to see Bert Kreisher. And I'm watching this. And I think there's funny parts of it. But I'm like, I don't really like. this guy, you know, but I went. I'm not offended by these guys. I'm just kind of like, yeah. But there's also not a lot of comedians I feel that way about. Like, there's no one if they came

through town. I'll tell you someone I did feel that way about back in the day was Dane Cook. So vicious circle was one of my favorite. I loved that stand-up, right? And I get that it's not the most cerebral shit ever. And I get the people hated Dane Cook. By the way, you should watch the Dane Cook documentary about how his brother took all of his money. Fascinating. I think it's called Funny Money. Fascinating documentary. But the vicious circle thing happens and Dane's pumping out movies, you know, he's in like employee of the month. He's in my best friend's girl. He was in Mr. Brooks with Kevin Costner. He was in that one with Steve Carell where he plays his brother. That was a Dan in real life. That was a decent, you know, you know, dromedy type

movie, you know. None of these Dane Cook movies were giant hits. Good luck Chuck would have been another one. And they weren't terrible movies. They were fine. They were passable mid-2000s entertainment, right? And by about 08, he was doing a tour, and he comes to the U.N.O. Lakefront Arena in New Orleans, and I'm like, well, shit, I got

to fucking go, man. So I saw Dane Cook and concert in an arena. He was still filling up an arena. It wasn't like an 18,000 seat arena. It was like an 8,000 seat arena. Fucker filled it up, you know, like, but um,