By Maia Venuti
Staff Writer
On Nov. 15, stand-up comedian Matt Rife released his first special with Netflix, titled “Matt Rife: Natural Selection.” It was met with a 16% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, which is one of the lowest scores I have ever personally seen for a standup special.
Looking at this special’s abysmal scores honestly made me laugh harder than any of the “jokes” in Rife’s special, because there is nobody more deserving of this flop of a comedic debut than him. There are a lot of reasons this special flopped, but in my opinion it comes down to one thing: Matt Rife isn’t funny.
Matt Rife built his audience through TikTok and his primary audience has been women for a while. This is mainly because many women find Rife attractive, and he has used this to his advantage to build his comedic career and his reputation. However, it is clear that Rife does not like the fact that his audience is primarily women who find him attractive, so he combats this by saying that “this special is way more for the guys” in an interview by Variety.
He has a deep insecurity with the fact that his humor is secondary to the real reason people like him, and that nobody really cares what he has to say, just that he looks good with that chin implant surgery. Rife has also made it very clear that he is unafraid of offending people, and is a huge fan of “dark humor,” stating in the same Variety interview that he thinks there is nothing off limits for joking about if done in the right way.
The first joke of Matt Rife’s special was a domestic abuse joke. He told a story how he was at a restaurant with his friend, and the hostess had a black eye, to which his friend asked why she wasn’t in the back. Rife’s response was that she probably has a black eye because she can’t cook. This joke is absolutely appalling, especially considering that he followed this by saying he was “just testing the waters” to see if the audience was “going to be fun or not,” knowing that this is a bad distasteful, unfunny joke to make.
When watching this special, I had to actually pause it and walk away until the next day because of just how unfunny and how awful of a “joke” this was. What really blew my mind was that Rife said this special is more targeted towards the guys. So, he chose to pander to his minority male audience by making a mockery of domestic violence, and laughing at women who are survivors of abuse. This leads me to the conclusion that Matt Rife thinks that the best way to acquire a male audience is by being misogynistic.
Matt Rife’s pathetic excuse that he is just a fan of “dark comedy” is not acceptable, because what he is doing with that joke is not dark humor. Rife does not talk about a dark subject in the right way, which he thinks he does. What makes dark humor dark humor is experience. Rife was not making a joke that is based on his own experience as a victim of domestic violence. He was making this joke because he finds women being beaten by their partners to be funny.
What I love the most about this whole situation is that nobody likes Rife’s special. The men he tried to pander to did not like his special, and the women who made him famous are appalled. He failed to become more than just a pretty face, because he has absolutely nothing of note to say.
His special made no commentary on anything, and I left without laughing once, I couldn’t even let out a pity laugh. Matt Rife’s biggest fear is coming to fruition right now, that he is just another attractive, unfunny guy who is only famous because of how he looks, not because of the blabbering he does on stage. This special was horrendous, and I recommend to everyone to watch an actual comedian if you are in the mood for standup, and not waste your time on whatever this monstrosity is.
