After the last Weird YouTube story I wrote, I felt I had sufficiently plumbed the depths of the site to have found all of the best, most absurd videos.
Boy, was I wrong.
Weird YouTube videos are just like the heads of Hydra: watch one of them, and three more emerge without warning. No matter where you turn, YouTube is bound to pop up with the creepiest, wackiest and most head-scratching videos imaginable. There’s no promising when the gravy train of weird but hilarious YouTube clips will end, so enjoy five more of these while they last.
Chinese War Sword
Cold Steel is a U.S.-based weapons manufacturer, making various forms of bladed weapons. While they would likely be nothing but a blip in most people’s radars otherwise, their YouTube channel has brought them wider notice. This extra attention is well-deserved: Videos like “Chinese War Sword” are some of the most disorienting, frightful clips in the nether regions of everyone’s favorite video site.
“Chinese War Sword” has everything that makes Cold Steel videos great. It features Cold Steel’s spokesman, whose vigorous attacks send his sword gracefully through pieces of bamboo and rope. The beauty lies in the slow-motion replays, as well as his overly enthusiastic description of the sword, which he calls a “bat outta hell.”
But wait, there’s more! No Cold Steel video would be complete without a man with a dead eye swinging the sword like a demented baseball player. Then, you have the baffling decision for one demonstration to include a cowboy boot full of meat. Last but not least, there’s the slow-motion destruction of trash cans full of Mountain Dew. All of these combine to create surreal greatness, making “Chinese War Sword” the most convincing reason to blow thousands on a replica sword.
Sponge Bob Go Bad
If SpongeBob SquarePants holds a cherished place in your heart, this video might be too much to handle. However, if you grew up watching the beloved children’s show but haven’t thought about it in years, “Sponge Bob Go Bad” may just be the perfectly tragic reintroduction to the show you didn’t know you’ve been longing for.
In this bizarro alternate reality, Spongebob and friends are static Microsoft Paint figures. Sporting hulking muscles, gold chains and more anger than the real Spongebob could ever muster over hundreds of episodes, Spongebob cuts a deal with Plankton for the secret Krabby Patty recipe. The rest of the tale includes an uncomfortably-sexualized Sandy Cheeks, multiple drive-by shootings and more deceit than a Martin Scorsese film. It’s the tragically grown-up SpongeBob tale the world never needed, and may forever change how you view your favorite childhood anthropomorphic sea creature.
Hank of the Hill
As a kid, I never got the chance to get into King of the Hill. For whatever reason, I think my parents felt it was slightly crasser than The Simpsons, and therefore my innocent childhood brain was preserved from its middle-America skewering humor. That made “Hank of the Hill” my first real introduction to the show, in the most troubling way possible.
The video seems to follow the plot of an actual episode of the show, condensing a twenty-minute episode into just over six minutes. Of course, it’s not that simple (or else it wouldn’t be Weird YouTube). The video fixates itself on little moments of the episode, taking words or phrases and looping them until they take on an almost disturbing edge. Before this video, I never thought I’d hear the word “Boggle” looped until it sounded like a threat, but that’s just what this video does.
I can’t tell if this video has made me curious enough to finally check out the show or if I’m sufficiently frightened to never watch another minute, but rest assured that “Hank of the Hill” delivers in taking a fairly normal TV sitcom into Twilight Zone-esque depths of madness.
Potato Knishes
I don’t even know where to begin describing this video. While the rest of the clips seem to be aiming for some sort of humor, I genuinely can’t tell what the point of “Potato Knishes” is. There’s a lot to deconstruct in the minute-plus clip, and your best guess is just as good as mine (even after watching this video about a dozen times).
In short, this video features some sort of unidentifiable creature extolling the greatness of potato knishes. It’s that simple. If you can come up with a way of describing this character, let me know, because I’m currently at a loss. It’s also very unclear why he’s in love with his potato knishes, or why he’s making little black squash balls, as the video shows. The result is a heartfelt yet inexplicable song to the joys of potato pancakes by an unidentifiable alien creature. My best interpretation is that this alien being is seeking some sort of human connection, and for whatever reason their only hope is to find another who also loves potato knishes. It may be one of the least comprehensible efforts to make a connection, but you can't deny how hartfelt the song's emotions are.
#1 Monopoly MONTAGE
In a similar vein to “Farming Simulator No Skill,” “Extreme Monopoly” makes the mundane game of Monopoly confusingly magical. Perhaps I’ve been playing the game wrong this whole time, because it seems whoever made this video has a lot more fun doing it.
Apparently, the game is all about dubstep music, remembering 2Pac’s death and “making it raine” with Monopoly money. Not only that, but the Monopoly equivalent of "thug life" seems to be landing in prison, which actually makes sense if you don't think about it too much. Most importantly, viewers are reminded of Monopoly’s complete dominance of Risk, a game that’s “Fake Ass Shit” in comparison to everyone’s favorite money-hoarding game. If you haven’t been enjoying the board game with these wonderful features, this video may be just what you need to know what Monopoly can be all about. If nothing else, its a reminder that obnoxious music and glaring typos can make any video 20 times better.