Robot Chicken flies high

In the season six premiere of Adult Swim's Robot Chicken, the show honors the DC Comic Universe, much in the way it has previously done for Star Wars. It's an interesting choice, given how DC's competitor, Marvel, is dominating the theaters right now. Perhaps it was hard to get the rights to Marvel, or maybe the Robot Chicken guys just saw more potential in characters that haven't been played with on screen as much lately. Or perhaps they thought that honoring DC in this way might drum up more interest in DC movies. Whatever the reason, the result is a very funny half hour using many familiar heroes and villains from the comic book pages.

The main group parodied are the Justice League, including Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, and their counterparts, The Legion of Doom, which is led by Lex Luthor. Neither side is presented as very intelligent or successful, in true Robot Chicken fashion. The good guys act like jerks, and the bad guys are sympathetic, more complex characters. They do battle with each other, but other than the big confrontation at the climax, the best parts are just when the characters hang out among their own, ripping on each other. It makes them relatable, like old friends.

Some of the chosen targets are pretty easy. Aquaman has long been lampooned, and rather than take a different approach, Robot Chicken goes after him with aplomb, making him central to the larger arc in the episode. However, they do it in a way that still feels fresh, rather than using the same stale stuff (mostly). Watching him jump onto an "invisible jet," only to realize he is being tricked by his friends, is very amusing.

Another running gag is Batman getting his back broken by Darkseid. Many might show the bit three times, following the general rule of humor. Robot Chicken takes it the unexpected step further and does it a fourth. What sells this rule breaking is then the characters acknowledge that they are straying from the accepted path. Somehow, that makes the fourth go-round even better than the first three!

Much of the DC episode has a central story, unlike most Robot Chicken episodes, which thrives in the small bits. This may provide less laughs overall, but when going for a full half hour, it seems necessary and right that scenes go on for more than twenty seconds. In this, the show makes the wise choice.

The stars turned up in spades to lend their voices to this episode. Many of them have guest starred on the series before, but it's cool to hear them all together, and many lend some geek cred. There's Nathan Fillion (Castle, Firefly), Alex Borstein (Family Guy), Neil Patrick Harris (How I Met Your Mother), Megan Fox (Transformers), Alfred Molina (Spiderman II), Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad), Paul Reubens (Pee-wee Herman himself), and Steven Tyler of Aerosmith lends some vocals.

But besides the big names and big characters the episode is playing off of, Robot Chicken also stays true to itself by tossing its own recurring characters into the mix, like the humping robot, and using may of the regular voice actors like Abraham Benrubi, Tom Root, Breckin Meyer (Franklin & Bash), and the creative team of Seth Green, Matthew Senreich, Zeb Wells, and Kevin Shinick. Green even tosses a bit to his wife, Clare Grant. This shows the heart and dedication of those making the show.

All in all, while maybe not as memorable as the Star Wars tributes, Robot Chicken does a good job with the DC universe. Who might they target next?

If you like my reviews, please follow me on Twitter! Check out my website, JeromeWetzel.com! First posted on TheTVKing

Warren the Ape monkeys around

     MTV has revived an old character and given him his own show.  Warren the Ape, aka Warren DeMontague (Dan Milano, Robot Chicken), is trying to 'put his life back together' after screwing it up with drugs, sex, and alcohol.  Except that he's not trying, really.  In the series, called appropriately Warren the Ape, he still drinks and sleeps around.  But he meets with Dr. Drew Pinsky (himself, Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew) and goes through the motions, as he is making a reality show.  Of course, the joke is that we don't live with puppets, so it's not really a reality show, but I argue it's at least as real as most of the other reality shows that MTV and similar networks put on.

     Warren doesn't look much like an ape.  He's more of a nearly shapeless pile of brown fabric with a white helmet.  But he certainly is a character.  In this week's episode, "Amends", he looked at the 12 Step Alcoholics' Recovery Program, and decided he wanted to skip straight to Step 9: Amends.  Never mind that he continues to ingest as much booze as he wants throughout the episode.  Most of the people he apologized to took it well enough, but Seth Green, his former Greg the Bunny co-star, proved difficult.  Turns out, Warren forgot that he had slept with Seth's girlfriend, and by the end of the half hour, had slept with Seth's current wife, fiance for the episode's purpose.  (It was probably filmed before the wedding, but the two were wed in real life in early May 2010).

     It's hard to tell sometimes what the show considers fantasy and what it considers reality.  Was Greg the Bunny a show they made, or did they work for the kids' show chronicled on Greg?  But the show obviously has crass taste.  The best gag so far was when Warren took a busload of school children to a strip club.  The ape frequently visits the strip club in the series, and the strippers all know him.  It's not a new twist to see a washed up actor hanging out at such establishments, imbibing copious amounts of booze, and behaving obnoxiously.  However, since this time it's a puppet, it's more entertaining than sad.  And it's always nice to see some form of Greg's legacy live on.

     The show also stars Josh Sussman (Glee) as Warren's timid assistant, who goes along with any scheme, no matter how crazy.  I'm sure it's hard to act with puppets, but Josh pulls it off seemingly easily, with none of the cheesiness inherent in the practice.

     Warren the Ape airs Monday nights at 10:30pm on MTV.

Family Guy something something Star Wars

     Fox's Family Guy ended their eighth season with the television premiere of a DVD they released late last year.  The episode was called "Something, Something, Something, Dark Side", and it was a spoof of the movie Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.  It was a follow up to their previous effort based on the first Star Wars movie, and there will surely by a third to complete the trilogy soon.

     Was it really a true Family Guy episode?  No.  I enjoy their Star Wars parodies, though I wish they would do the far superior Star Trek films instead.  Yes, I am definitely on the Star Trek side of the age-old debate, but I'm not a Star Wars hater, and did enjoy the movies, especially the original three.  Anyway, Seth MacFarlane, the creator of the show, does Star Wars pretty well.  There was enough of the original story to follow along, but it was much shorter, as was appropriate for a goof like this.  It was funny, and none of the jokes ran too long.  Fans of both franchises could enjoy the episode.

     Family Guy does three types of jokes particularly well: sight gags, racism, and references.  The best of the first category in this episode was probably Peter's (voiced by MacFarlane) nemesis, the Giant Chicken (Danny Smith) as Boba Fett.  It's always fun to see those to go after each other, and with Peter filling in for Han Solo, it made a good pairing.  The best racism gag was when Peter / Han commented that Lando was probably the only black guy in the universe, and Brian / Chewbacca (MacFarlane) said that he hoped so.  All of the other characters were appropriate offended, lest you think the series out to put down any minorities, which it doesn't do more than it puts down everyone else.  The last category was the best, though, as Peter and Chris (voiced by Seth Green) argued over whether Robot Chicken, a Cartoon Network series created by Seth Green, was still relevant.  Robot Chicken has also done Star Wars parodies lately, although theirs are short bits, rather than an entire plot.  Both series have been funny about it, but with two different approaches.

   So, the episode wasn't really an end to this past season of Family Guy.  If anything, that happened last week, although the show doesn't traditionally do big season-enders.  But it was a pleasant diversion for an hour.