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Deemed 'Too Fat to Fly,' Kevin Smith Takes to Twitter, Epic Rant Ensues

by Amar Toor on February 15, 2010 at 12:40 PM

Just in case 'Jersey Girl' left you convinced that Kevin Smith had lost his comedic mojo, Silent Bob has proved once again that he's still one of the most caustically funny people on the planet.

After being barred from a recent Southwest Airlines flight for being "too fat to fly," the director-actor began venting his angst on Saturday, via Twitter. Smith originally bought two seats on a flight from Oakland to Burbank, as he apparently (and sort of tragically) always does. When he decided to get on an earlier flight, though, only one seat was available. Southwest officials decided (after he was already seated) that the plus-sized star posed a significant safety risk, and put him on a later flight. But the gauntlet was thrown, and the live-tweet hate began to flow.

It started out tamely, with Smith's simple query: "Dear @SouthwestAir - I know I'm fat, but was Captain Leysath really justified in throwing me off a flight for which I was already seated?" Pretty soon, though, things got pretty heated -- and hilarious. Ranging from the self-deprecatory ("Thank God I don't..embarrass easily (bless you, JERSEY GIRL training)"), to the defensive ("I'm way fat... But I'm not THERE just yet."), to the downright threatening ("@SouthwestAir? You f***ed with the wrong sedentary processed-foods eater!"), Smith's tweakout was legendarily epic. Forget 'Clerks.' This was Kevin Smith's masterpiece.

Southwest eventually got around to responding in a blog post snarkily titled 'Not so Silent Bob.' Predictably enough, the airline apologized for the inconvenience, but defended its decision, using mid-sentence capitalization to reiterate that Southwest pilots "are responsible for the Safety and comfort of all Customers on the aircraft."

True, it was Smith's decision to pursue standby seating and run the risk of squeezing into a seat. But if the airline knew that he always buys two seats in advance, why would they let him board with one, and then tell him to get off? We'd like to know more about how this exactly went down; if Smith insisted upon boarding against the advice of airline officials, that's one story. If they let him board without qualification, that's quite another. And, as Gawker points out, Southwest should've at least taken the time to think about which tree they were barking up. Anyone could've seen this kind of PR storm coming, especially considering Smith's legions of fans and followers. Will his tweakout change anything? Probably not. But did it totally make our week? Definitely. [From: Gawker]

Tags: airlines, funny, kevin smith, KevinSmith, socialnetworking, southwest airlines, SouthwestAirlines, top, twitter, viral

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