Worst To Best: Every I Think You Should Leave Sketch Part Two

65. Wig to Toupee

The gorilla stuff is perhaps just a bit too broad. The representation of office popularity being gained through performing Three Stooges routines, is excellent.

Best line: “Was that a toupee you piece of shit?”

64. Garfield House

If this ranking was only to take into account the production design, then this sketch is easily number one. The Garfield House set is impeccable. It’s a shame that the actual premise - holding an intervention at said Garfield House, doesn’t fully take advantage of the potential of this set. I also don’t like the reveal that the scared man asking for his treasure chest at the start of the episode is related to the Garfield House. I would have much preferred if that strange old man had forever gone unexplained.

Best line: (whispered) “All Garfield”.

63. Little Buff Boys

A spiritual successor to Baby of the Year, Sam Richardson is back to introduce some new age-inappropriate competitors. Baby of the Year works so well due to how it’s able to advance the central concept through multiple stages, and also due to how everyone in the room is fully invested in the universe. Little Buff Boys does the opposite, playing off the awkward uncertainty of an audience who don’t want to be forced into judging the buff boys who are obviously dressed in turkey suits. Because this sketch is not able to advance beyond it’s initial reveal, it unfortunately fizzles out.

Best line: “Handsome faces, bodies of men”.

62. Claire’s Ear Piercings

The final sketch of season 2 provides another meditative experience with another strange-looking elderly man. Despite an entertaining premise, and a genuinely emotional central performance, the pacing of this sketch just feels a little bit off. And once you’ve gotten used to the rhythm of the sketch, it’s not able to subvert itself enough to truly surprise.

Best line: “Sometimes I put my dad in JibJab videos so he’s alive again”.

61. The Night Scrooge Saved Christmas

Another sketch with a hilarious premise that features low because it feels like it’s from a slightly different sketch show. Most ITYSL sketches take place in our real world. At parties, restaurants, and offices. The broad comedy and antics of the characters work well when placed within mundane locations. When the show attempts to do a bigger, more genre-inspired piece, such as this, it doesn’t feel like that same comedic balance is reached. The silliness feels too expected.

Best line: “Now go ahead and eat that goop, Scrooge. It will give you the Bonie’s sense of humour”

60. Danny Green’s Photo Wall of Metal: Metal Motto Search

One of the great recurring joys of ITYSL is watching oblivious characters desperately trying to communicate the particulars of their complex worldview. Here, we have Sam Richardson as Danny Green, desperately trying to explain how his patented metal man eats the ground but also that the metal is like his ground. The long animated sequence painstakingly repeating the concept of the show followed immediately by the slow, slow movement of the real life counterpart is brilliant. Why isn’t this sketch higher then? Through no fault of its own, ITYSL has nearly 100 sketches and due to Robinson’s very particular comedic style, repetition starts to creep in and familiarity starts to spoil what are otherwise great sketches. Strip away the fun visuals of this sketch and you are more or less replaying the beats of the phenomenal season one sketch “Chunky”. It’s the inevitable course for most sketch shows but the fact that ITYSL can still make a familiar sketch so funny is testament to its strength.

Best Line: “Right. Okay, so the way, the way I pictured it... See, this wall is his ground. So is there any way we can make it look like this wall is your ground?”

59. Space Themed Bar

The difference between season 1 and 2 of the show can probably be best described in how the characters are closer to a chaotic good alignment, than chaotic evil, and this is probably best demonstrated in the two character’s Tim Heidecker plays across the show. His character in this sketch is genuinely impressed with the space-themed bar he finds himself in and not only does he seem actively interested in the life of his date, he goes very far to defend her when the alien insult comic targets their table. He’s still an asshole that likes to write Yelp reviews about finding lego bricks in his food to get back at restaurants, but his motives feel more pure. This is a long way away from his season 1 character: Howie. The talk of drinking puke for stationary is classic ITYSL absurdity, but the rest of the sketch just drifts by inoffensively.

Best line: “Just to get school supplies her mum had to drink puke for a local morning radio show”.

58. Johnny Carson Impersonator

It’s several old men hitting people as Robinson exasperatingly explains whether or not they should be allowed to. All the slaps are perfectly timed slapstick, and Robinson’s fervent energy, constantly changing targets from the party-goers to his own employees is hilarious. Also is it really a good neighbourhood if there are no cute cafes nearby?

Best line: Every time Robinson has to yell out “It’s fine!” right after one of the Carson slaps.

57. The Driving Crooner

This will definitely be my most controversial ranking from season three and because of that, I will not elaborate on why I don’t like it as much as everybody else. A lot of the love for this sketch comes from the aforementioned reveal becoming viral trend on social media apps, like TikTok. Similarly to how songs go viral on this app, you end up getting that specific 20 second snippet snuck in your head for months but when you go and listen to the entire song, you find that the other 2 and a half minutes don’t quite match up the one part you’re familiar with. I’m not a hater though and I definitely don’t want the driving crooner to die!

Best line: “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! They're trying to make it look fake!”

56. Pacific Proposal Park

Nobody writes sketches like this other than the ITYSL team. The logical leap from “what if there was a park with deliberately spongey grass” to “well of course wrestlers would practice on it” to “and those same wrestlers will probably bite the proposing couples” is brilliant insanity. This is also one of the first sketches on this list where the writers get to flex their incredible naming skills. From Toilet Truck to Baby Duff, the wrestling monikers on display are some incredible combinations of words. The only let-down is that I can’t help but shake the feeling that Sam Richardson isn’t at his best in season three and his monologue here about the wrestlers isn’t quite as amusing as the 55 other upcoming tirades on this list.

Best line: “The worst is Toilet Truck and Baby Duff. I hope Toilet Truck dies. I honestly hope he dies. I hope Toilet Truck dies. I hope Baby Duff dies. I hope somebody finds them and kills them”.

55. Street Sets

Fred Armisen, who is in EVERYTHING, finally appears in an ITYSL sketch. And it’s a… fine one? Really, the star of the sketch is the incredible stunt man who appears in the street sets video imitating a small child, who’s physical performance is able to elevate this otherwise average sketch.

Best line: “We shouldn’t have danced in the kitchen when you had all your stuff on the marble island”

54. Randall

I feel like I need to make it clear again here that so GREAT is the quality of this show, that even the 54th best sketch, is still a really good sketch. It makes my job really hard when a sketch like this, with Robinson’s character getting carried away with naming things as other things when a co-worker pays him a compliment, is still over-shadowed by more than half of the sketches in this show. So, how do I justify this placing? Simple: Randall is a good sketch but it’s not a GREAT sketch, even if Robinson’s open-mouth white-eyed stare is a hilarious ending.

Best line: “I thought it was a little pimp, walking all around”

53. Piece of Shit

One of many slower and more experimental sketches featured in season 2, that again, paint a more compassionate picture of humanity in Robinson’s world than in the first season. The first part of the sketch takes a while to get going, but it’s all worthwhile when we get to see how sloppy those steaks truly were.

Best line: “That baby thinks that people can’t change”.

52. The Man on the Plane

Will Forte is inspired casting for this tale of revenge. The moment that he begins his intense line of questioning, until the end where his comically weak wails are drowned out by the airplane’s engines, is as good a morality tale as The Count of Monte Cristo. For some reason however, on subsequent rewatches this sketch doesn’t hit as hard as it did the very first time. Maybe it’s unfair to judge it on that, but in a show like ITYSL where the best sketches are endlessly repeatable, THAT MATTERS!

Best Line: Not a specific line, but the moment that Will Forte starts doing his weird old man crying is great.

51. Replacement Organ

Another inspired piece of casting that has the late great Fred Willard joyously smashing plates and honking horns. It is quite simply, delightful.

Best line: Nothing quite beats the first reveal of Willard with his organ, solemnly providing his condolences.