Sketch comedy show revolves around the Upright Citizens Brigade, an underground organization "with no government ties and unlimited resources" dedicated to creating and monitoring chaos from their secure underground base. The show's sketches depict chaotic or bizarre events in the world, events which are often directly engineered by the UCB. Another defining feature of the show is a series of real-world pranks, which tied in with the show's theme. Usually run at the end of each episode, these hidden-camera pranks feature the cast (as either the central UCB characters or other characters from that day's episode) interacting with real strangers.