snailchimera:

Proposal: Mettaton’s performances are primarily surreal comedy.

We can take Mettaton’s interactions with Frisk as a reasonable sample of what Mettaton’s shows are normally like, because 1. monsters who talk about having watched these segments don’t comment on anything being out of the ordinary with them, and 2. we encounter monsters who describe the same peculiar behavior as a regular part of Mettaton’s show (eg heel-turning villains in a cooking show). Monsters don’t seem to have a significantly different concept of narrative structure from humans, as evidenced by other monster-told stories (particularly the Waterfall signs and the story of Chara and Asriel).

If you took Mettaton’s and Frisk’s different on-air interactions, strung them together, and played them on TV, the result would very closely resemble a sketch comedy show ala “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” or
“A Bit of Fry & Laurie”, with a series of short skits in which seemingly ordinary situations become increasingly surreal and outlandish for comedic effect (although Mettaton likely keeps things more PG, as he seems to be very concerned with appealing to as broad an audience as monsterly possible and in some essay replies specifically says his show is family friendly.) A minor bit of supporting evidence is also that the MTT-owned and run restaurant is clearly meant to be very classy, but appears to book a fair number of comedy acts; this could indicate a particular fondness for, desire to cultivate, or desire to collaborate with comedians.

Surreal humor is also particularly popular in times of cynicism or hopelessness, which gels well with the Underground as a whole. It would have mass appeal, and it would serve an important purpose as a form of entertainment that helped monsters cope with their somewhat grim reality. This especially would have made sense to Mettaton because Mettaton indulges heavily in escapism and prefers to avoid problems rather than deal with them (see the King Mettaton ending and his reaction in battle to being shown the Mystery Key).

However, over time Mettaton may have felt boxed in (ba-dum tssh) by his now well-established role as a comedian and the immense pressure of being the number one entertainer in the Underground. It certainly seems like he has a monopoly on the television audience at least, and I suspect his comments on double digit numbers of viewers slowly dropping in the news segment was more a sarcastic criticism of Alphys’ script. This is not to say that he was as much of a household name as human celebrities are, as luxury household good type technology seems to be definitely present but a bit sparse in the Underground and televisions may not be an exceptionally common thing, but it would still be a huge leap in potential audience size if even a fifth or so of the monster population could tune in from a distance. The responsibility of lifting that many spirits may have been too much for him, while humans, who don’t have the same ubiquitously desperate need for a laugh and limited sources to find one, looked like a comparatively less stressful audience who as a bonus would have been completely unfamiliar with his past work.

The allure of a chance to reinvent himself combined with his tried and true strategy of running away from(/pouring glitter on) his problems until they cease to be visible could have led Mettaton to his attempt to reach the surface by himself. This may also be why the callers at the end of the Mettaton fight have such a profound impact on him; it’s not that Mettaton didn’t know he was important to so many monsters, but that he did know and didn’t want to think too hard about it.