Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week.

Now available on free, ad-supported streaming service Roku Channel, “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story” lives up to the first word in its title. But the suggestion in those last four words? Not so much.

Yankovic wrote the “Weird” script with director Eric Appel (“Die Hart”), and while the movie begins like it could plausibly be a heightened version of Yankovic’s early life — his parents (Julianne Nicholson, Toby Huss) disapprove of his interest in writing song parodies, with his mother saying, “We had a long talk and agreed it would be best if you stop being who you are and doing what you love” — it gets weirder as it goes, becoming obviously fictional as Yankovic makes love to Madonna (Evan Rachel Wood) and confronts drug kingpin Pablo Escobar (Arturo Castro), a Weird Al fan.

The joke is that Yankovic in reality is pretty even-keeled, so to make his story fit the expected contours of a music superstar bio-pic — think “Bohemian Rhapsody,” “Rocketman” — “Weird” has to invent a fictional narrative.

Another way to look at “Weird,” as co-star Rainn Wilson told me in a recent interview: “As ‘Airplane!’ was a send-up for disaster movies, ‘Weird’ is a send-up for bio-pics.”

Credit “Weird” for doing that initially in a somewhat subtle way with scenes that feel like they could (but probably didn’t) happen, including when Dr. Demento (Rainn Wilson) hosts a party and introduces Yankovic to Wolfman Jack (Jack Black), Pee Wee Herman (Jorma Taccone), Tiny Tim (Demetri Martin), Gallagher (Paul F. Tomkins), Divine (Nina West), Salvador Dali (Emo Phillips) and Pittsburgh native Andy Warhol (Conan O’Brien).

Later in the movie, “Weird” — inspired by a 2010 Funny or Die short that laid the character, plot and even dialogue groundwork for this film — tosses any and all subtlety aside in favor of gonzo plot turns and an oh-shoot-we’ve-gotta-wrap-this-up conclusion.

A game Daniel Radcliffe (the “Harry Potter” movies) stars as Yankovic, who announces as a teenager that he wants to be the “most famous accordion player in an extremely specific genre of music.”

“Weird,” which includes the real Yankovic playing a record executive, is a must-see for Weird Al fans who haven’t been treated to significant Weird Al-style comedy in a movie since 1989’s “UHF.” Fans of absurdity and parodies also might enjoy it, but the 2010 Funny or Die short serves up a lot of the same comedic beats in a time-saving format.

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