Bo Burnham is an American comedian, musician, and actor. He began posting comedy videos on YouTube at age 16, gaining millions of views. While some criticized his rise to fame through YouTube, Burnham's comedy is unique in that it challenges social norms through politically incorrect lyrics and twisted takes on popular media. His fans support him for his genuinely funny and creative comedy rather than just his appearance.

1. We think we know Bo!
I don’t know about you, but after the finale for Mr.
Burnham’s, What. I was left speechless and covered in
goose bumps – although it was a very clear message
to his fans, it’s caused somewhat of a supportive
uproar amongst the fan base – it’s a question, a
statement – however you want to view it, and that is:
we think we know Bo. So for new and old fans, lets get
to know the comedic genius that is Bo Burnham.
Robert Pickering Burnham was born on August 21st,
1990 to Scott and Patricia Burnham; he’s the youngest
of three – his elder siblings are Pete and Samm
Burnham who are currently in their second years of university and law school.
Bo graduated from St. John’s Preparatory School in 2008, during his time
there he was involved in theatre and the campus ministry program; according
to sources, nobody at St. John’s is surprised at Bo’s creativity and the fact
that he’s pursuing his dream – which is to make a name for himself, which he
definitely has done, Bo Burnham has been appointed the title, ‘the future of
comedy’ by fans and journalists alike.
At the tender age of sixteen, Bo put his first video up on YouTube, entitled,
‘My Whole Family thinks I’m Gay’ – it was meant as a humorous message to
one of his elder siblings, however, it ended up going viral and Burnham was
receiving millions of hits and views in just a few days.
During an interview with a journalist for the Telegraph, he mentions that his
‘first impulse to create comedy came from him seeing it as a way to get girls,
be liked and to deflect his own self-consciousness’ – this starts off pretty
shallow for the genius behind lyrics such as, ‘My drugs attention, I am addict,
but I get paid to indulge in my habit…’ – which seems pretty honest for
someone whose only in it for the popularity, and then there’s the last bit,
‘deflect his own self-consciousness’ this is where we start to see the other
side of Bo, or, one of the many.
Burnham applied for several universities/colleges – according to an interview,
he said, ‘I worked eight hours a day so I could get into the college of my
dreams (Harvard) and say that I got in – and I never went.’ Bo chose to
pursue his comedy career instead – even though he has done impeccably
well in this area, I wonder if that’s something that he often regrets? He sort of
answered that question in an interview for The Guardian, he mentions that
during the first year he felt like ending his life due to the various posts made
by friends who were in college and on social networking sites, such as
Facebook – not only that, other comics looked down on him as they found
YouTube to be an, ‘illegitimate route to stand up’ and the only reason for his
fame was the abundance of ‘prepubescent’ (young) female viewers who
‘didn’t understand comedy’ and only seemed to be attracted to Bo’s typical

2. YouTube boy style, (with the floppy hair and the attractive, nerdy look) he then
goes on to say, ‘no one hates me more than I do, no ones more self-conscious
about me than I am.’
This definitely pulls at my heart strings a little bit, Bo’s comedy is unique in
comparison to a lot of stand up comedians – this is because he is
accompanied by various instruments and he uses music to make people
laugh rather than make jokes at no one in particular for 60 minutes.
I think what makes Bo Burnham’s comedy unique is that it’s very challenging
to the form – it goes against moral standards and dares to question things that
others wouldn’t, (during Binary Reality he questions the location of ‘sour patch
parents’ and if Goofy is keeping a mentally handicapped person as a pet,
seems as all the other animals can talk, except Pluto) it’s very risky business
– for example: during his show, Words Words Words, during a bit entitled,
‘Binary Reality’ he twists the meaning of innocent Disney films to seem
corrupt and non child friendly, ‘I think Disney teaches girls, young girls such
important lessons - in princess fairy tales, like, Cinderella! It doesn’t matter
where you come from or how poor you are, you know, as long as you’re
incredibly hot…’ and, ‘snow white, which encourage children to give midgets
nicknames…’
Another example would be, during his show, What. Bo performs a piece
called, ‘Andy the frog’ the idea was to make it seem like a children’s bedtime
story, mixed with a selection of long, convoluted similes but he puts a bit of a
dark twist on to the entire thing with lyrics such as, ‘So Andy followed the
beautiful frogs footsteps in to the forest. He then came across a turtle.
“You can’t pass!” said the turtle.
“Please?” said Andy.
“NO.” said the turtle.
(And uh, this is the first long, convoluted simile.) Then, there was a rustling in
the bushes, and like a man who had been shot in the chest with a rifle, the
turtle was shot in the chest with a rifle.’ The only problem with some of his
lyrics is that they are so extreme or are just below the boundary of ‘not okay’ it
feels almost bad to laugh at them – and I think that’s genius!
Most of his lyrics are created as politically incorrect slurs at things such as:
media, pop stars and love songs – these issues are especially highlighted
during his performance of the song, Repeat Stuff with lyrics such as, ‘But
more than all of that I love the fact that you are dumb enough, to not realize
everything I’ve said has been said before, in a thousand ways in a thousand
songs, some with the same four chords…’ and, ‘just to make sure that they
spread it like the plague, so I describe my dream girl as really, really vague…’
however, during a particular show, Justin Bieber was in the crowd and as the
song was mostly aimed at young pop stars such as Biebs, and although there
was no particular banter about the whole thing, Bo assumes that Bieber took
a little offence – or he felt bad that this teenager sneaks in to a theatre to
watch a comedy show and gets slammed on for a good five minutes and to
make matters worse, he was with his now ex girlfriend, Selena Gomez.

3. In my personal opinion, Bo Burnham is a genius – a legend, a true asset to
stand up comedy, his lyrics never fail to make me laugh – I can always turn to
him when I’m sad or in need of a good chuckle and though I am a young girl
and one of the many that follow him, my reason is that his comedy is golden,
it’s genius, his looks are a bonus but it’s not particularly what I focus on and it
hurts a little bit for him to say that he’d like a wider variety of fans – not that I
don’t want him to succeed but I find it a little unfair when most of his fans,
especially young girls, follow him because they actually understand his
comedy and find it amazing and wonderful and cant help falling in love with
him and the way he operates – he’s an absolute legend and I hope he
seriously knows the majority of his fans aren’t just there for the looks or to
boost his ego, they’re there because they genuinely enjoy the comedy he
creates – he must realize that somewhere because he thanks his fans for
supporting him and he continues to create music and do shows – if he was
truly unhappy with the fan base, he’d stop.