If you haven't seen Adult Swim's Joe Pera Takes You on a Fall Drive, drop everything and spend the 11 minutes to watch it, because it's about to expire on August 31st.
Trust me on this one. It became an instant Halloween classic for me, and I hope you love it too. It's poignant and beautiful, especially if you're a fellow jack-o-lantern-holic.
If you're not familiar with Joe Pera, he's a comedian whose best known work is probably Joe Pera Talks With You, his series on Adult Swim. I first became aware of him a few months ago when a friend of mine and YouTube both recommended him on pretty much the same day. I had no idea what to expect, and yet somehow his work was nothing like I thought it would be -- for one thing, I didn't expect to be so thoroughly captivated by something so damn wholesome.
The first episode I watched was Relaxing Old Footage With Joe Pera, a 22-minute long, plot-less video with imagery as mundane as pretty-but-dull stock photography: footage of fish tanks, waterfalls, baseball fields, forests. Joe Pera narrates in his calm, grandfatherly-sounding voice, chatting as if he's speaking directly to the you about everyday topics like lunches and getting to bed on time.
The premise seems almost too ridiculous to work -- like flipping through a stranger's old photo books or small-town postcard collection: images of people you don't know and places you've never heard of, yawn yawn -- but somehow, it is absolute magic. Pera has found a way to transform the mundane, kitschy, awkward, boring, too-wholesome, back-ground noise parts of everyday life into a sublime, comforting, nostalgic experience. It's pure fucking alchemy.
Once I watched one video, I felt compelled to keep watching; the soothing Joe Pera Talks You Back to Sleep (which is great when you're having anxiety and need an adult to calm you down even though you are an adult yourself) is also excellent. It was late May or so, when the isolating surreality of the pandemic was really starting to wear me down. Relaxing Old Footage felt reminiscent of chatting with a kindly relative or neighbor, a familiar someone whose gentle presence is reassuring. And, damn, did I need comforting. At that point I hadn't seen virtually anyone -- any human being -- in person except for my partner & a couple of store clerks in passing, for nearly 2 whole months. I felt an intense longing for Home, back east where I grew up, where I'd had just been visiting in March but had to cut it short & anxiously fly home on a nearly empty plane, to become quarantined in the west, home but not quite Home, not knowing when I'd be able to go back Home again. In late August I still don't really know the answer to that, but I digress.
Which is why I felt the need to watch this again recently: Joe Pera Takes You on a Fall Drive.
While I love the others, this one is the absolute shining gem among them. And I might be biased because I love Halloween, but then again if you're reading this, chances are you're a Halloween freak also and might just agree with me.
I don't want to give too much away by describing it in detail or posting a ton of screenshots, but I will say that it's beautifully poignant and you might never see your jack o'lanterns in quite the same way ever again. Make sure you watch it ASAP before it expires from Adult Swim's website on 31st August! (** keep watching after the credits **)
Additional: Joe Pera's also got a tomato-themed Instagram account which is, I promise you, even more amazing than it sounds - check it out immediately. After you watch Joe Pera Takes You on a Fall Drive, I mean.
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