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Released by: Fox
Released on: April 17, 2012.
Director: Various
Cast: H. Jon Benjamin, Dan Mintz, Eugene Mirman, Kirsten Schaal,
Year: 2011
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The Movie:
The greatest addition to Fox's Sunday night 'Animation Domination' line up in many a year has got to be Bob's Burgers, the unlikely series about a man who runs a burger shop and his eccentric family. Created by Loren Bouchard, the same mind that gave us Dr. Katz and Home Movies, the series, not so surprisingly, follows Bob Belcher (H. Jon Benjamin) as he tries to keep his business afloat and deal with the day to day insanity brought on by his wife, Linda (John Roberts), and their three kids - Louise (Kristen Schaal), Tina (Dan Mintz) and Gene (Eugene Mirman).
Bob's kids are a handful. Louise is the dangerous one, and while she might look cute in her pink bunny hat, she's conniving and devious. Tina has got emotional problems. When she's not dreaming about slow dancing and tongue kissing zombies, she's lusting after Jimmy Jr. (H. Jon Benjamin again), the son of Bob's chief rival, Jimmy Pesto (Jay Johnston), the man who runs the successful Italian eatery across the street. Gene is… just a weird kid. He loves to entertain and so will take every opportunity to bust out his Casio style keyboard and play samples of dogs barking or serenade anyone within earshot with a lively triangle solo (da-ding ding, da-ding ding!). Linda means well, but can be a bit of a nag sometimes and while Bob obviously loves her and his kids very much (this is made very clear over and over again), sometimes he just wants to cook burgers and relax - something he's rarely able to do.
Bob does have a couple of regulars who hang out at his restaurant to help keep him afloat, however. Mort (Andy Kindler), the mortician who runs the funeral home next door, is always hanging around as is a dopey but well meaning contractor named Teddy (Larry Murphy). Outside forces always seems to conspire against Bob, however. If he's not running into issues with a health inspector named Hugo who once carried a torch for his wife, he's pooping his pants at the dojo where Tina learns Brazilian martial arts or being hassled by a documentary filmmaker intent on making Bob stop serving meat in his burgers.
The series doesn't break any new ground with its family model, but it does offer up some refreshingly creative storytelling. An episode in which Bob introduces his kids to a Django like Spaghetti Western series called Banjo stands out, as Gene becomes obsessed and decides to model his social life after what he sees in the movies - which results in he and his father being chased by a rival (and shirtless) father/son bully team through the town. In typical sitcom fashion, Bob wants nothing to do with his in-laws when they show up to stay for a few nights, so when he finds a hidden crawlspace behind the walls of the restaurant he decides to pretend he's stuck in there so he doesn't have to deal with them. This results in Louise telling her friends, who can hear Bob through the walls, that her dad is dead and haunting the restaurant, while Gene decides to record the sounds of his grandparents having sex and playing them back as samples for his class the next morning. Linda, rarely all that content with helping to run a burger joint, turns the house upstairs into a Bed And Breakfast with deliriously bizarre results and then later tries to incorporate some dinner theater into the restaurant - of course, that's not going to go too well either.
Some of the scenarios are predictable but how they play out rarely are, which gives the series a fairly fresh feeling, never feeling like a rehash of The Simpsons as so many animated shows about family life and based on the sitcom format sometimes do. The animation styles make take some getting used to - the characters are all rather ugly, drawn in fairly simple lines and looking almost rudimentary. It only takes a couple of episodes to get used to it, however, and once you do you wouldn't want to see the series looking any other way. Like the characters and the humor in the show, the visual style will grow on you quickly.
Some fun guest stars provide voice acting talents to the series. Kevin Kline has a recurring role as Mr. Fischoeder, the landlord, while Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim both pop up, as does Sarah Silverman, Brian Posehn and MadTV's David Herman has a recurring spot as the school guidance counselor who takes a far too involved role in the lives of the Belcher kids. The core group of voice actors who play the Belcher family generally steal the show, however.
Underneath all the absurdity that gives the show its sense of humor though is a fairly sweet sense of family. The Belchers are there to support one another no matter what and stick by each other no matter how stupid things get for them. It's never overpowering and never once takes away from the series' comedic style, rather it just makes it a little more relatable to anyone who has grown up with weird parents or even weirder siblings - and that's probably most of us out there.
The thirteen episodes that make up the first season are:
Human Flesh / Crawl Space / Sacred Cow / Sexy Dance Fighting / Hamburger Dinner Theater / Sheesh! Cab, Bob? / Bed & Breakfast / Art Crawl / Spaghetti Western And Meatballs / Burger War / Weekend At Mort's / Lobsterfest / Torpedo
Video/Audio/Extras:
The episodes look good in 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen. The show is broadcast in high definition and so would look noticeably better on Blu-ray but that didn't happen, this is a DVD only release. Regardless, colors are nice, lines are well definite and there are no issues with compression. The image is consistently clean, clear and colorful. No issues here.
The English language Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound mixes won't be your go to demo discs anytime soon but they definitely sound quite good. The opening theme has some nice bounce to it while directional effects are frequently used quite well, even if things are a little front heavy. Dialogue is always well positioned and easy to understand. Optional subtitles are provided in English SDH, French and Spanish.
The main extras on this release are the commentary tracks that have been recorded for each of the episodes that make up the collection. This adds a lot to the set and the tracks are generally as funny as they are informative. The voice actors do most of the work here but we also get input from writers and other behind the scenes types and creative personal. The Art Crawl and Lobsterfest episodes actually have multiple commentary tracks, so you wind up with fifteen commentaries for thirteen episodes. These serve to give us some insight into what goes into writing an episode, the animation style, and the trials and tribulations of a voice actor.
Aside from the commentary tracks, the first disc also includes a music video for the song Lifting Up The Skirt Of The Night and some audio outtakes for the Sexy Dance Fighting and Bed And Breakfast episodes. The second disc includes the original Bob's Burgers demo cartoon that was used to pitch the show to Fox for series development. We also get a test episode done with a different animation style and some different characters, giving us a behind the scenes look at the evolution of the show from how it was conceptualized to how it looks on broadcast TV. Wrapping up the extras is a moderately amusing segment in which Louise makes burger related jokes about her family members by using the chalkboard that's seen in each episode of the show. Animated menus are included on each disc and you can watch each episode on its own or by way of a 'play all' feature.
The Final Word:
Bob's Burgers takes a little while to get used to. It's a strange looking show with a very skewed sense of humor - but once you start to get a feel for it, you soon realize it's one of the best animated shows on network television these days and the funniest thing that Fox has put in their Sunday night line up in a long, long time. The DVD set looks and sounds very good and includes a great collection of commentary tracks to compliment a few other fun features as well but it's the episodes that matter most here. Great stuff!
