Mid Vid Skit

• Main
• All Subpages
• Create New

The Mid Vid Skit is kind of the MTV version of those annoying comedy sketches that hip-hop albums have between some tracks, but worse because they turn up in the middle of the video.

They don't have to be funny, but they usually are in order to justify interrupting the audience's entertainment. Of course, they're not usually funny after the second or third time - and considering how often videos are replayed, that means they get old very, very quickly indeed.

Sometimes these are put in as a deliberate pause or fake ending first and a piece of entertainment second, in which case they work similarly to Stop and Go or a Fake-Out Fade-Out.

Compare Talky Bookends, which open and/or close the video instead of interrupting it.

Examples of Mid Vid Skit include:

• P Diddy's "Bad Boy for Life" video features a short skit midway through in which neighbour Ben Stiller visits and unsucessfully tries to intimidate him. This despite Mr Diddy's first name being "Puff".
• Any hip-hop video with a cameo by John Witherspoon (Willy Jones from Friday, Grandad from The Boondocks) is pretty much guaranteed to include one of these.
• The Beastie Boys's "Triple Trouble" opens with a Talky Bookend where the group insults Sasquatch, whom had held them captive for a year. Sasquatch, enraged, looks up their location on Google Maps and runs to their location. After the first two verses, there's a skit wherein Sasquatch attacks and reabducts the band.
• New Order's "Bizarre Love Triangle" interrupts the music for the following odd exchange: "I don't believe in reincarnation because I refuse to come back as a bug or as a rabbit!" "You know, you're a real 'up' person." In the middle of a video with no narrative. This might be someone's idea of a "bizarre love triangle" (there's another woman in the scene), or it might just be the avant-garde director being weird for the hell of it.
• In the middle of Madonna's "Music", driver Ali G turns down the radio and tries to audition for her next single. Fortunately, she cuts him off, ensuring that the skit lasts less than ten seconds.
• Weezer's famous Concept Video for "Buddy Holly" presents the band as playing a gig in Arnold's from Happy Days, opening with Talky Bookends from the show. At the end of the second chorus, the music stops and cuts to the show's "Happy Days with be back in a minute" bumper, then almost immediately the music starts again. Fortunately, it's just long enough to make the viewer wonder if the video's over.
• Fall Out Boy's 'I Don't Care' features a still picture of a cat for a few seconds in the middle of the video. The clip falls silent while the picture is on the screen.
  • Most of Fall Out Boy's videos are like this, except with skits, usually (off the top of my head: "This Ain't A Scene, It's An Arms Race," "Dance, Dance," and "A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More Touch Me")
• The video for Chunky Chunky Air Guitar by The Whitlams is a mockumentary about the 9th Annual Air Guitar World Championships. The Mid Vid Skit is a promo for a contestant's instructional video, "How To Air Guitar Like A Pro."
• From Lady Gaga's "Telephone" video: "Let's make a sandwich!"
• Jack Johnson's video for "Taylor" has this with Ben Stiller.
• The video for Metallica's song "One" contains several clips from a film version of Johnny Got His Gun in the middle of the singing. This is justified, since the song is based on the book.