About

Carlos Greaves is an Afro-Latino electrical engineer turned comedy writer — a career move that haunts his parents to this day. He’s a former Onion contributor and Second City instructor who coaches at Hillside Writing and runs the humor newsletter Shades of Greaves. He is also the topical satire columnist for the humor site McSweeney’s.

His writing has been featured in The New Yorker, The Borowitz Report, and NPR. In 2023, he was a writer on the Peacock special, Back That Year Up, hosted by Kevin Hart and Kenan Thompson. He is currently developing an animated series, Above Average Heroes, about an undocumented Latina with superpowers.

He is the author of Spoilers: Essays That Might Ruin Your Favorite Hollywood Movies and co-author of the forthcoming book, Obey in Advance: How to Survive and Thrive Under Authoritarianism.


Writing

Shades of Greaves

How to Find Joy After Last Week’s Election

This Newsletter is Now Sponsored by Raytheon

The Borowitz Report

The Art of War by Donald J. Trump

NPR

Even I, Satan, Am Appalled by the State of the Republican Party

A Visit From the Tune Squad

The New Yorker

Excerpts From a Sitcom Set in New York City by Writers Who Are Clearly from California

Script of Every Movie Set in Boston

Work E-Mails During an Apocalypse

Plots of Nineteen-Eighties Movies if Their Protagonists Had Been People of Color

McSweeney’s

An Oral History of the US Government’s Attempts to Fake the 1969 Moon Landing

Congrats, Dipshit, You’re a Dad Now

A Typical Episode of Sesame Street as Imagined by Conservatives

Are You Allowed to Criticize Simone Biles?: A Decision Tree

Schedule of Speakers for the 2020 Republican National Convention

Sure, the Velociraptors Are Still On the Loose, But That’s No Reason Not to Reopen Jurassic Park

As a 28-Year-Old Latino, I’m Shocked My New Novel, Memoirs of a Middle Aged White Lady, Has Been so Poorly Received

Film and Television

Pilots

Above Average Heroes (originally titled Fuerza) – half-hour, animated sitcom script

Logline: Esperanza Fierro wants to become America’s greatest superhero. But when her immigration status gets in the way of being hired by the country’s top teams, she is forced to take a job with the only crew that will hire her, The Amazings, who are anything but.

2024 Yes, And Laughter Lab Fellowship
2025 Hollyshorts Film Festival Screenwriting Competition – Semifinalist
2025 Stage32 New Voices in Animation Screenwriting Contest – Finalist
2026 Cinequest Screenwriting Competition – Finalist


Check out my pitch for the show here:


Television

Back That Year Up (2023) – Writer


Commercial

FlutterFlow for PS5 – April Fool’s Video (2022)

TikTok:

@shadesofgreaves What other moments would be in the remake? #sketchcomedy #humor #funnyvideos ♬ original sound – Carlos Greaves

Books

Spoilers

Book cover for Spoilers depicting well-known movie characters waiting at the DMV

Highlighted in Vulture’s Best Comedy Books of 2023

Do you enjoy movies? Sharp satire? Laughter in general? If so, this book was written for you.

Spoilers is a collection of satirical stories that poke fun at thirty of Hollywood’s most famous films and franchises. The Little Mermaid writes a not-so-happily-ever-after, tell-all memoir about marrying into the royal family, Princess Leia wonders why the Jedi are always the underdogs against the Dark Side, whose political views ought to be way less popular, and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover slowly loses his mind as he investigates a troublemaker who keeps popping up everywhere named Forrest Gump.

A hilarious debut from frequent New Yorker and McSweeney’s contributor Carlos Greaves, Spoilers will leave you laughing at hitherto unexamined plot points of your favorite films, at the sorry state of the world we live in, and definitely at whoever’s idea it was to open a theme park full of people-eating dinosaurs.

Spoilers is available wherever you get your books! (But if I had to pick a place, I’d prefer you bought it from your local independent bookstore)