It's the Sound of Young America. I'm Jesse Thorne. Once a month or so, we like to check

in with our good friends in Chicago at the AV Club to find out what's worth finding out

about in the world of popular culture. This month, we are joined by head writer Nathan

Rabin and editor-in-chief Josh Modell, gentlemen. Welcome back to the Sound of Young America.

Pleasure to be here. Thank you very much.

So let's talk about things worth talking about. Nathan, one of your picks is Louis, which

stars multiple times, Sound of Young America guest, Louis CK, and in fact is also written

and directed, and I think also edited by Louis CK. It's a very dark episodic sitcom on

the FX Network, in which Louis CK plays a comic version of himself, sort of sad dad type

figure. In this clip, Louis and his brother are at a diner shortly after Louis has signed

his divorce papers. You know, I'm trying to see the positive in this thing. I'm single now.

I can be with anybody I want. You know what's really sad? What? What's sad? You have to

hold to get anybody else. You signed a paper that guarantees you're going to die alone

in a room with a thin blanket of you and the nurse comes in and just shuts the machine

off. Dude! Oh, picture that. So Nathan, I think some people have been attracted to this

show's really dark sense of humor and see it as a kind of a lovely character study. Some

people have wondered why it's so dark and why as a character study, it doesn't really

seem to have other recurring characters or, you know, an overarching narrative arc.

Right. Well, I mean, you do it as a sitcom, and I don't think that is applicable because

it is a comedy, but kind of the cast changes every week. The tone changes every week.

I mean, basically the deal for Louis CK was he was given complete freedom. You know,

they basically just said, you're $250,000 an episode, like send it to us when you're finished,

...