How does humor work?

Have you ever wondered about what makes things funny? I have been thinking about it all afternoon. Why do I laugh when something is funny? Why don't I cry? My body probably doesn't know the difference so what makes it do one instead of the other?

I will tell you. The key to making things funny is by changing expectations from what you think to something else you wouldn't guess. That is the formula.

You need examples to support a formula plan like this one so I am going to use a favorite show of mine FAMILY GUY for examples. I am going to provide a few examples.

Example 1, The title FAMILY GUY.
The title being a funny title is realy key to setting up the show being funny (although in truth it sometimes gets serious). In this case there are many jokes at play. First the show is about a guy named PETER (which is funny to me because it is my name too) who is always screwing things up for his family. So he is not really a family guy! Another way of looking at it is that the baby Stewie is the guy who runs the family. And that's funny because babys never run families!

Example 2, Talking dog BRIAN.
I think one of the more classic jokes (commonly called "meta") is the classic talking animal. When an animal is in life it makes animal sounds and sometimes understands human commands. Having a talking animal like a dog in this case is one of those things that just changes expectations! And even better in FAMILY GUY is that the family can talk back and in some cases he is another example of a guy for the title joke.

Example 3, Historical inaccurates
Every now and then in the show there are quick flash-back scenes that show the family in different situations but the key here is that the scenes are from other movies or history that the family was not involved with. So this is the kind of humorous arrangment that keeps the show on its feet and keep the audience guessing!

So as you can see as I showed you for FAMILY GUY, we find things funny when we expect one thing and get another that is a clever twist on what we expected. I bet you hadnt thought about that!

I have many more examples from FAMILY GUY but I want you to share your own thoughts and examples below!