A reality TV series trails Tracy, which Liz tries to exploit for her own gain. Jack does his own exploiting: He attempts to make a fast buck off natural-disaster telethons. And Lutz sets out to increase his worth in the event of an apocalypse.
Military-chaos absurdism sustains 70 jokes across 41 minutes despite middling impact ratings.
Directed by Beth McCarthy-Miller · Written by Robert Carlock
WAR
149.2
Wins Above Replacement
“Operation Righteous Cowboy Lightning” ranks #15 of 138 30 Rock episodes on the Humor Index, scoring 100.0 — Elite. The episode packs 80 scored jokes at 3.3 per minute, averaging 7.9 on craft and 7.8 on impact, with Liz Lemon landing the most laughs. Every joke is ranked below with its individual craft and impact scores.
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Top Jokes
Tracy Jordan: I'm like Stout Cortez! He's my gardener. He's easily amazed.
Tracy Jordan Callback Character Comedy Misdirection ★ Rewatch Callback Bob Costas: When the birds first started attacking us, we all thought it was pretty funny and made Hitchcock jokes. But we're not laughing now, because our laughter excites the birds sexually.
Celebrity Benefit Show Narrator: Every dollar you give to help... Mel Gibson... will go towards rebuilding... his sex jacuzzi.
Tracy Jordan: No, I wasn't gonna buy two blimps and crash them into each other to see what sound they made.
Tracy Jordan: I want to get it perfect, because perfection is my middle name... 'Unclaimed Perfection Baby Boy.'
All Jokes — 80 analyzed
Show all ↓ Hide ↑ Liz Lemon: It doesn't matter how long you've lived in New York, it's still fun to look up and pretend all the buildings are giant severed robot penises.
Jack Donaghy: Be quiet, Lemon. It's happening.
Liz Lemon: It seems like one of us should sing The Circle of Life right now.
Jack Donaghy: I'm like Keats' 'Stout Cortez,' staring at the Pacific with a wild surmise and daring to imagine what new planets might swim into my ken.
Kenneth: I was holding in a 'snart,' and then right when she took the photo... Don't you want to know what a 'snart' is?
Kenneth Character Comedy Wordplay/Pun Jack Donaghy: I can tell you now. It's 10:00. 10:00 in the morning.
Liz Lemon · Tracy Jordan: FYI, Tracy's phoning it in today. What else is new? No, mother, literally.
Tracy Jordan: Are you also staying at this hotel? Line.
Liz Lemon · Tracy Jordan: After I win a bunch of awards for my movie, it's not gonna get better. I don't see how it could get any worse. Good question, Liz Lemon. When you win an Oscar, it opens up an elite level of actor craziness — throwing telephones at hotel employees, speaking to the U.N. about some messed-up crap in Africa, and I'm definitely getting a private island.
Tracy Jordan: Every crazy A-lister owns an island... Nicholas Cage, Celine Dion, Charles Widmore.
Tracy Jordan: I'm like Stout Cortez! He's my gardener. He's easily amazed.
Tracy Jordan Callback Character Comedy Misdirection ★ Rewatch Callback Tracy Jordan: Thank you. Oh, I'm sorry. That was misleading. I'm not gonna rehearse. I'm gonna get a sandwich and then eat it on the toilet.
Kenneth: I've never been on TV before. I hope I photograph okay, because when I look into a mirror, there's just a white haze.
Kenneth Character Comedy Absurdist ★ Rewatch Kenneth: I couldn't put the memo in your mailbox, 'cause it's full of unread adoption materials.
Kenneth Character Comedy Deadpan/Understatement ★ Rewatch Liz Lemon · Lutz: Oh, God, Lutz, why? What? I don't want tush lines.
Lutz: Lutz wearing bike shorts with visible 'tush lines' in hopes of appearing on camera
Lutz Visual Gag Character Comedy Jack Donaghy: 'Sullivan Psychiatric... You'll drool over our crazy prices.'
Jack Donaghy: A woman with 'hundruplets,' a live execution, the real transvestite hoarders of Orange County Penitentiary.
Liz Lemon: Ugh, that show is upsetting. Why does the warden let Lady Extravaganza have so many spoons?
Liz Lemon Character Comedy Absurdist ★ Rewatch Callback Liz Lemon: That is bad karma, Jack. I mean, this morning, I stole a cab from a pregnant lady on crutches, and I am just waiting...
Jenna Maroney: I'll do it! But I hate my dress.
Frank · Liz Lemon: Well, I just finished a screenplay where a tidal wave destroys Washington. Someone write down tidal wave. Shut him up.
Pete: What about a tornado that hits a handgun factory, and it's just spinning around shooting handguns?
Pete Absurdist Dark/Subversive ★ Rewatch Writer / Ensemble: What happens when the second flood comes, and you aren't allowed on reverend Gary's ark? Especially since reverend Gary made it clear the ark is just for teenage boys.
Liz Lemon: It destroyed two vintage-t-shirt stores and a banjo.
Liz Lemon: If we don't [have a plan], I will freak out and start karate-kicking people.
Writer / Ensemble: For instance, right before the ark leaves, I'm supposed to castrate reverend Gary.
Tracy Jordan: Let's laugh together, friend.
Grizz / Dot Com: That island he wants to buy is filled with scorpions.
Tracy Jordan: I want to get it perfect, because perfection is my middle name... 'Unclaimed Perfection Baby Boy.'
Jenna Maroney: I'm good at archery and kind of want to die.
Liz Lemon: Toofer can get us through black, gay, and nerd-controlled neighborhoods.
Liz Lemon: Cerie will be some sort of queen in the new society.
Liz Lemon Character Comedy Deadpan/Understatement Jenna Maroney: I will do sex with cannibals as needed.
Kenneth: I can talk to animals. Well, not talk to 'em... I can take commands from 'em.
Kenneth Character Comedy Misdirection ★ Rewatch Ensemble · Lutz: Well, he's slow and a coward. / I'm not useless. I mean, I've got a car.
Lutz: It's like a reality show where you guys get to compete for a seat in my car by proving how much you like me.
Lutz Meta/Self-Referential Character Comedy ★ Rewatch Tracy Jordan: No, I wasn't gonna buy two blimps and crash them into each other to see what sound they made.
Angie Jordan: An argument that culminates in a racial slur would be lovely.
Tracy Jordan: I'm as happy as a clam that wants to kill some woman.
Bob Costas: But I'm so identified with New York, you bloody tosser!
Bob Costas: When the birds first started attacking us, we all thought it was pretty funny and made Hitchcock jokes. But we're not laughing now, because our laughter excites the birds sexually.
Bob Costas: This wonderful flood that put out that devastating wildfire.
Bob Costas Deadpan/Understatement Absurdist ★ Rewatch Bob Costas: These super-intelligent sharks.
Bob Costas Absurdist Deadpan/Understatement ★ Rewatch Angie Jordan: That's Billy Joel's. Anything you sing to that tune, uh... I can't use on the show.
Jenna Maroney: Jenna's benefit song: 'The thing that happened / was so sad / we can't believe it got so bad / when the stuff we know occurred / went down...' / 'help the people the thing that happened happened to.'
Jack Donaghy: Fantastic, Jenna. You really brought the songwriting computer's words to life.
Liz Lemon: Because we're not two adults, Jack. One of us is an actor, and actors are not people.
Tracy Jordan: Someone get a P.A. to feed me baby food, or I will drop a 'd' in the green room!
Lutz: Look at all of you trying to impress me. I feel like the Bachelor. But, uh, whom shall I give my rose?
Lutz Character Comedy Meta/Self-Referential Callback Frank · Toofer · Jenna: Writers competing to impress Lutz — 'Lutz is the best. / Nice feet, Lutz. / I like Lutz the most.'
Lutz: I don't really have a car.
Lutz Misdirection Character Comedy ★ Rewatch Callback Tracy Jordan: I'm going to shoot garden gnomes with a handgun at Tupac's house. Yeah, Tupac is alive. I bet you'd like to have that on your show.
Tracy Jordan: The flashback sequence of Tracy's alternate career: 'This honky grandma be trippin' / over Surfmaster's mid-range jet skis!' / 'Now, Jerry, in rehearsal, it's okay to play with yourself. But when we do the show...' / 'Hey, dummy, you got to drive me to paintball...'
Jonathan: Was it in Indian Kashmir? May Durga's trident pierce them from the skies!
Jonathan Character Comedy Dark/Subversive ★ Rewatch Jack Donaghy: Heavy structural damage, no fatalities... Sad, but not too sad. We'll get footage of beautiful Polynesian people, proud and topless, maybe a pelican near some diapers. I don't know.
Jack Donaghy: Heavy structural damage, no fatalities... Sad, but not too sad. We'll get footage of beautiful Polynesian people, proud and topless, maybe a pelican near some diapers. I don't know.
Jack Donaghy: Haven't we? Operation Righteous Cowboy Lightning is a go.
Jenna Maroney: Okay, first of all, I look weird there because I'm 'snarting.'
Liz Lemon · Jenna Maroney: First of all, I look weird there because I'm 'snarting.' / You 'snarted' in my dressing room?
Angie Jordan: We call it staging it or lying.
Tracy Jordan · Liz Lemon: And I have no reason to hug her, other than my love of having boobs pressed against me. / If I hugged you, I would angle it so that you got no boob. / And I would anticipate your angling, and I would get there. I would get there.
Writer · Lutz: Hey, buddy, I made you an apocalypse road trip mix. / I hope your car has a CD player. / It has two. And it has flames on the side.
Writer Lutz Running Gag Character Comedy ★ Rewatch Callback Writers · Lutz: Wait. It's in New Jersey? / How are we getting to New Jersey? / You're going to drive us, obviously. / What am I gonna do?
Jack Donaghy: I don't have to, Jonathan. I know what's on it... The poor people of Mago Island and their brave shorts-wearing police force.
NBC News Anchor: We are receiving reports of extensive damage to the main house, as well as the house for Gibson's cars. No word yet on the fate of Gibson's collection of anti-semitic and misogynistic literature.
Jack Donaghy: No! No, this is not a prank. This is Jack Donaghy. And I'm calling about Operation Righteous Cowboy Lightning.
Oskar Gibson: G'day. First off, the holocaust never happened.
NBC Anchor: We go now to NBC's exclusive primetime benefit for the victims of the devastation in Mago, specifically Mel Gibson and his houseguest, Jon Gosselin.
Celebrity Benefit Show: Why do bad things happen to good people? We'll never know. But look at these pictures...
Celebrity Benefit Show Narrator: Every dollar you give to help... Mel Gibson... will go towards rebuilding... his sex jacuzzi.
Writer / Frank: Dude, did you just buy that car? There's a dealer sticker in the window, you got no plates, and you made these flames out of magic marker and tape!
Writer / Ensemble: I'd rather die than ride with him.
Lutz: But now I do have a car, so everything's like it was before. It's all like it was before!
Lutz Character Comedy Irony/Sarcasm ★ Rewatch Callback NBC: The final benefit show moment — the show cuts from NBC's charity broadcast to 'Queen of Jordan' — 'Mm, we now return to Queen of Jordan.'
NBC Irony/Sarcasm Meta/Self-Referential ★ Rewatch Callback Liz Lemon: Let's never fight again. No, never, Tracy. I know it's fake, but... Damn it, I miss him.
Liz Lemon Character Comedy Irony/Sarcasm ★ Rewatch Tracy Jordan · Liz Lemon: I knew I'd get that boob squish. / I'm angling. I'm angling.
Jack Donaghy: It was our highest rating since that episode of SVU where the detectives watched American Idol.
Jack Donaghy: It was our highest rating since that episode of SVU where the detectives watched American Idol.
Liz Lemon: You know, some people actually craft stories. And when the story doesn't have an ending, you don't just create one out of thin air by playing music or having people give each other meaningful looks. Sure, that might manipulate the audience into thinking they're feeling something, but it sucks.
Liz Lemon Meta/Self-Referential Irony/Sarcasm ★ Rewatch 