Stream It Or Skip It: ‘So Dumb It’s Criminal Hosted by Snoop Dogg’ on Peacock, Where The Rapper And His Guests Riff On Bad Behavior Video Clips  

The hook for Peacock’s So Dumb It’s Criminal Hosted by Snoop Dogg is simple: get Snoop, a man who has made a mint off his persona of being a jester that’s generally understood to be crime-adjacent, to host a clip show featuring crimes of the hard fail, chemically imbalanced, or comically absurd variety, and let him riff alongside guests from the comedy and entertainment worlds like Loni Love, Ron Funches, Jay Pharoah, and Moshe Kasher. In the first of eight half-hour episodes, “Bringing Down the (Waffle) House,” Jim Jeffries and Diallo Riddle join Snoop and his “clipstress,” comedian Tacarra Williams. 

SO DUMB IT’S CRIMINAL HOSTED BY SNOOP DOGG: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: “Welcome to So Dumb It’s Criminal,” Snoop Dogg says to the camera, as laughter is heard from an unseen studio audience. “The show that’ll make you wanna kiss your mama for raising you right.”

The Gist: As Snoop Dogg greets the viewers and introduces his “police lineup” of guests – for the first installment, comic Jim Jeffries and writer Diallo Riddle stop by – he tosses to “the lady who brings gravity to all depravity” and “clarity to all vulgarity,” comedian Tacarra Williams, who acts as the puller on the clip targets that Snoop and his guests will shoot down. (In keeping with the host’s hip-hop aesthetic, Williams “plays” each clip off of a DJ rig.) First up is security cam footage of a guy crashing his car through the front of a liquor store and reaching through the destruction to grab some refreshment. Host, “clip keeper,” and guests toss off a few bits and asides with no filter for bad or blue language.

It’s standard operating procedure for clip shows to replay respective bits of content forward and backward, squeezing as much juice as possible from a few seconds of blurry, jumpy, ancient or otherwise context-less video, and So Dumb It’s Criminal keeps that tradition alive, occasionally using graphics to isolate whatever section is getting the riff treatment. Criminal also highlights the infraction on display and its attendant penalties in an onscreen box – “Destruction of public property: $10,000 fine and one year in jail” – which feels like an awkward compromise made for legal or actuarial purposes, the equivalent of the disclaimers attached to episodes of Jackass! and the like.

One segment of So Dumb It’s Criminal that does break the clip show mold is all about additional context. After running through a few examples of outrageous TV ads for lawyers – the “Texas law hawk” with his “talons of justice” is a highlight –  they hit on a spot made by attorney Adam Reposa, who screams his dual catchphrases “I am a lawyer!” and “This is my truck!” in equal measure. But instead of just logging a few laughs and moving on, Snoop turns to the video screen and introduces the actual Adam Reposa, who appears via Zoom from an office that inexplicably features a mural of Tupac Shakur. When Snoop asks Reposa about his typical client, he says he represents “the gangster constituency.”

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? If you’ve paused on MTV for even two seconds over the last three or four years, then you’ve definitely seen Ridiculousness, where Rob Dyrdek and his sidekicks offer their takes on viral web content. (Seriously, just two seconds. It’s ridiculous how often MTV airs Ridiculousness.) The pratfall-ish, Darwin Awards-type vibe of So Dumb It’s Criminal also aligns it with Atmosphere TV, the subscription-based streamer that assembles those clip packages that run at sports bars during commercial breaks. Some of the clips shown here, like the guy falling through the roof of a Waffle House, have certainly been shown there.

Our Take: What the world needs now is not another clip show, but the conceit behind it is so natural – Snoop Dogg busts bits about dumbass criminal behavior – and the vibe it emits is so simple – Snoop, guests, clips, jokes, cut – that it’d probably be criminal not to expand the already crowded clip show accordion folder by just a little bit. Why should The Chive have a monopoly on highlighting idiotic, inebriated, or comically violent behavior? For So Dumb It’s Criminal, Snoop often seems to be emulating the imagined posture of his viewers, with his long limbs draped across the padded arms of a lounge chair. He drops in a few laconic takes, often with a perfectly-placed curse word or two – “This is definitely in Amsterdam or Norway or some shit, those little-ass tables and baby benches…” – and each miniature segment is capped with some kicky banter from the guests. (“Of course it’s gonna fall like that,” Jim Jeffries says after watching the ceiling collapse around guy at Waffle House. “It’s made out of waffles.”) The only real surprise about the physical setup for Criminal is that nobody’s enjoying an adult beverage or cannabis product right out on the set. At least not actively. Because other than that allowance for media decorum, this is basically like if Snoop and his friends were sitting in your living room grazing on basic cable and other media detritus. If a pizza was delivered mid-episode, nobody would bat an eye.

Sex and Skin: Nothing beyond two video clips in the space of thirty minutes that revolve around men behaving badly with their urine.

Parting Shot: “This is a dumbass criminal,” Snoop says of a guy whose flagrant attempt at arson quickly goes awry. “First of all, you pull your car up to the scene of the crime. You jump out and commit arson, and then commit arson on your dumbass self.”

Sleeper Star: As the setup person for the clips, Tacarra Williams is a fine foil for Snoop Dogg and a solid episode generalist – she functions as everything from hype woman, to den mother, to background researcher, to the bartender on Watch What Happens Live.

Most Pilot-y Line: Snoop drops a bit of his signature wordplay into his new show’s introduction. “On this special episode of So Dumb It’s Criminal, pea-brained perpetrators meet their moronic match, while others let anger take the wheel and drive them straight to jail. You won’t even wanna take a bathroom break!”

Our Call: STREAM IT. Snoop Dogg could host So Dumb It’s Criminal on autopilot and the takes, bits, and foul-mouthed riffs would likely still land. This is low-stakes viewing, primed for half-engaged grazing, or fodder for glances from between bong hits.

Johnny Loftus is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift. Follow him on Twitter: @glennganges