Russell Brand’s ‘Brand X’ Premiere: Too Much Talk

Is it possible to rewind time back to last night? If so, I would like to make the conscious decision to go to sleep at my regular time and avoid wasting 30 minutes of my life. Unfortunately, I don’t have Doc Brown’s DeLorean-enhanced skills, and even more unfortunately, I did decide to stay up and watch Russell Brand‘s new late night show, Brand X. Let’s just say it was as forgettable as, well, Sarah Marshall. Or, I should say, as forgettable as Sarah Marshall after Mila Kunis steps into the room. 

Don’t be fooled: This was no ordinary talk show, as much as it would have benefitted the show if it were one. Instead of celebrity visits and sit-down chats about hot Hollywood topics, viewers saw the equivalent of a half-hour Russell Brand comedy special. For 30 minutes (minus the commercial breaks), Brand mostly rambled on about his obsession with the Dalai Lama — that is, when he wasn’t looking at his cue cards. It didn’t help that between his rapid-paced joke-telling and twisted accent, it was almost impossible to follow what the guy was saying.

There were, however, a few jokes that I did catch — unfortunately, most of them involved obvious (not to mention dated) targets like Tim Tebow, Kim Kardashian, Charlie Sheen, and (of course) Mel Gibson. Add to that Brand’s patented — but still unappealing — styling and the comedian’s bizarre tendency to feel himself up on-air, and it’s easy to strike an X through Brand X on your DVR schedule.