Most comedy shows tell jokes with a beginning, middle, and end. Monty Python threw all of that away. When *Monty Python's Flying Circus* first aired on October 5, 1969, viewers saw something completely unexpected. Sketches ended without punch lines. A cartoon foot squashed things for no reason. A man sat at a desk and said, "And now for something completely different," before the show jumped to a totally unrelated scene. The six members of Monty Python were all British comedians who met at universities. They combined clever wordplay with absurd physical comedy. One famous sketch features a man trying to return a dead parrot to a pet shop. The shopkeeper keeps insisting the parrot is alive, even though it is clearly not. The humor comes from how far the shopkeeper will go to deny the obvious. The show ran for four seasons on the BBC. It then became popular in the United States. The group went on to make hit movies, including *Monty Python and the Holy Grail*, a comedy about knights that is still beloved today. Monty Python proved that comedy does not need to follow rules.