Topic: The "ja danketies" joke

[Howj Begg]

Sometimes I think this is the perfect joke. But actually at least half the reason is the performance, because it sounds terrible on paper.

I think it took me two years to get the joke. How long did it take you?

[Here Comes Mongo]

I've always found it funny but I'm still not sure I get it.

[Howj Begg]

I've always found it funny but I'm still not sure I get it.

Why do you say that? What do you think you don't get?

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

At first I thought it was some kind of patois. Same as below, must have seen it ten times before realising.

It's not really a joke, it's just an example of the intensely different writing that went into Brass Eye, and how every line of dialogue was mined for potential subversion/creativity.

[Here Comes Mongo]

Why do you say that? What do you think you don't get?

'Ja danke' means 'yes thanks' in German. Is there any more to it than that?

[Howj Begg]

At first I thought it was some kind of patois. Same as below, must have seen it ten times before realising.

It's not really a joke, it's just an example of the intensely different writing that went into Brass Eye, and how every line of dialogue was mined for potential subversion/creativity.

Well it's a play on words with a set-up and punchline, so I think it's a joke, just a pretty unique one, as you say, cos of the writing. I'd be interested if any of the comedy historians on this board can trace a lineage for the influences on this joke.

The crucial thing though, is that it's a play on words in another language than English, so it expects some knowledge and understanding from the viewer. Even then we have to work a bit to get it. Morris has form on this of course, there's whole sections in French on his radio shows.

But what else comes close to this gag in Brass Eye, for single line compression and ingeniousness?

[BlodwynPig]

I've never thought about it...and had to read the thread from 2009 to partly get it

nineties (nein-ties)

ja-danketies (yes-thanks ties)...but wherein the joke. I can't remember the context of the line.

[Howj Begg]

Not so much the nein-ties, as the ja danke-ties. It's referencing the 'just say no' campaign for drugs.

[Utter Shit]

I only got it once I saw it written down on here. In fact I'm pretty sure only one person ever got it the first time around, posted the explanation on here and that's how everyone else gets it now.

[Serge]

At first I thought it was some kind of patois.

Yeah, same here! I thought there must be some kind of tortuous reference to Yardies that I wasn't getting. I don't think I got it until I read about it on here either.

[Howj Begg]

I got it a couple of years after it aired, before I found this site, you bastards.

[Absorb the anus burn]

Yeah, it took me ages to get that as well.....

[BlodwynPig]

ok, still confused and all you bastards unwilling to spell it out.

Just say no?

ja danke

just say yes, thank you?

i.e. everyone wanting drugs rather than heeding a anti-drugs campaign from the decade before?

[Howj Begg]

ok, still confused and all you bastards unwilling to spell it out.

Just say no?

ja danke

just say yes, thank you?

i.e. everyone wanting drugs rather than heeding a anti-drugs campaign from the decade before?

Not so much the nein-ties (just say no) as the ja danke-ties (instead people are saying yes to drugs, rather than no) (in the decade called the nineties ('90s), as implicitly opposed to the '80s, when the just say no campaign came out)

So yeah your last sentence is correct.

[Here Comes Mongo]

Not so much the nein-ties, as the ja danke-ties. It's referencing the 'just say no' campaign for drugs.

Oh yeah, cheers, I never thought about that! So no, it turns out I didn't properly get it after all.

[Hangthebuggers]

Aaah just got this now. Very clever.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

It also makes sense delivered in the context of the scene Morris walks through which is a tableaux of liberal excess, for which German post-reunification was particularly noted for and therefore quite a mid-90s kind of reference.

[TheManOne]

At first I thought it was some kind of patois. Same as below, must have seen it ten times before realising.

Ctrl+C Ctrl+V

[TheManOne]

I always wondered if there was more to what I hear as "Later we'll be microtomiter candy hell"

[Kane Jones]

None of you will believe me but I got it straight away and explained it to my friend who I was watching it with.

[Pepotamo1985]

nineties (nein-ties)

I got what Chris was actually saying long before I twigged the above. Because I'm a twat.

[Here Comes Mongo]

Speaking of that particular scene, the bloke asks Chris Morris if he has any smack, to which CM responds "Sorry, I don't use the horse". Is 'the horse' an actual term for heroin use or is it some weird phrase coined by Morris?

[TheManOne]

For me it was a word which appeared ONLY to be used to refer to heroin in a leaflet which was distributed in schools with "Slang names for drugs" on it. HORSE always stood out after SMACK, H, GEAR etc.
I always wondered if one of the writers remembered it too.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Precisely. The most ridiculous sounding one was ideal for the Chris Morris anchor persona to stagily perform. Also I suspect because it was an animal name and yer man Morris love dem animals. I particularly enjoy when he wraps his tongue around 'heroin' in the line 'the amount of heroin i inject is harmless', the sense of class status from that alone elevates it.

On the same subject the term "gear" was perfect for Alan Partridge where in I, Partridge he describes "a rush of adrenalin as strong as an intravenous drug like smack, heroin or geeeeear" where it's faintly believable he wouldn't think they were all the same.

[Smeraldina Rima]

Speaking of that particular scene, the bloke asks Chris Morris if he has any smack, to which CM responds "Sorry, I don't use the horse". Is 'the horse' an actual term for heroin use or is it some weird phrase coined by Morris?

There's a Libertines lyric that goes: "It's a horror show, you should come on round/ Horror show, the horse is brown'. I think people normally say 'horse' rather than 'the horse'.

[blue reel]

I think white horse is a fairly common slang term for herioin in the U.S.

The Danes wrote a song with a rather dubious message, recommending the 'white pony' instead:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwATF5dnfq4

Rode the white pony to #1 on the US Billboard Hot Dance Play Charts in 1983. 

[Dr Rock]

In September my cousin tried reefer for the very first time
Now he's doing horse, it's June

Prince, Sign O' The Times

Pretty sure nobody says 'the horse' so that's Morris making it sound sillier.

[Dr Rock]

See also Chestnut Mare by The Byrds. All about chasing a brown horse. Could be a coincidence.

[Replies From View]

None of you will believe me but I got it straight away and explained it to my friend who I was watching it with.

I bet your friend didn't need to have it explained though.

I got it straightaway and assumed everyone else did as well.  So there.

[Howj Begg]

See also Chestnut Mare by The Byrds. All about chasing a brown horse. Could be a coincidence.

I have always assumed this is about Roger McGuinn's sexual attraction to a horse.

In September my cousin tried reefer for the very first time
Now he's doing horse, it's June

Much as I love Prince, that song, and the album, that couplet is unintentionally hilarious.