Tweet
Released by: Cartoon Network/Warner Bros.
Released on: 10/8/2013
Director: Zeb Wells
Cast: Seth Green, Matthew Senreich, Breckin Meyer, Dana a Milano, Tom Root, and a ton of others.
Year: 2012-2013
Purchase at Amazon
The Movie:
One of the longer-lasting shows in Cartoon Network's “Adult Swim†catalog, Robot Chicken carries on their tradition of taking the many beloved toys of childhood and running them through a fucked up blender. Each ten-minute episode is a series of one joke after another sketches in the form of quick animated sequences, sometimes lasting a mere 2 seconds, sometimes 2 minutes. Pop culture personalities and characters are the target of some incredibly violent and crude treatments, and chock full of profanities and even some full frontal doll nudity, but in the form of action figures animated through old-fashioned stop-motion.
In season six, the addition of female writers brought in to the fold brings some ideas and characters not explored before, such as Polly Pocket for example. And according to a featurette in the extras, the women are more crude and nasty than the male writers. Now you may not know much, (if anything) about Polly Pocket, but you don't have to know all the people and characters they spoof in order to appreciate the jokes. It does help in many cases though, such as the in one episode where it is revealed why B.A. Baracus doesn't like to fly on planes. You don't really have to know who that is to find the humor in the joke, but it makes it that much funnier if you do. And it's not all 70s and 80s icons that get lampooned. They bash contemporary subject matter as well. Example: there's a Scooby Doo sketch where Velma is out of commission so they get a replacement: the chick from The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.
The writers and animators go after anyone and anything pop culture related: Star Trek, Thundercats, Smurfs, Hello Kitty, Dune, Legos, even their own show. If you ever felt the need to see one of those flying spider things from Sectaurs jerk off to completion, you'll get what you've always dreamed of in this season. No one is safe from ridicule and some celebrities participate by lending their voices to the doomed characters even when they themselves are the ones meeting an untimely and horrible demise. Listen for folks like Henry Winkler, Stan Lee, Seth McFarland, Billy Zane, Sam Elliot, Joss Whedon, J.B. Smoove, and Liev Schreiber, among a myriad of others. And many of those celebrities also join in on commentaries, of which there is one for every episode.
If your idea of funny includes a new born baby fighting his father to the death, the Incredible Hulk having a catheter removed, or Jason Voorhees and Michael Meyers high fiving while slaughtering teens together, then this may well be a show for you. It's quick, it's funny, and it's awesome to watch toys we loved as kids get the same abuse we gave to them back when, only worse.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Season six on Blu-ray looks fantastic, with plenty of vibrant colors and rich textures to be taken in by the eyeballs. The 1080p image brings out all the fine detail the figures, props, and backgrounds have to offer and the black levels are nice and deep. No digital noise to be seen and no imperfections were noticed. The mayhem and carnage comes across the screen looking its best. The audio is a 5.1 Dolby TrueHD and like the video quality, the sound is great. Tons of explosions, gunfire, and screams fill the room, delivering a very satisfying companion to the ultra-violent doll deaths. Les Claypool's music over the opening credits has remained untouched over the life of the show a gives the subwoofer a good rogering.
They've got a whole bunch of extras to check out (2 hours worth), ranging from making of featurettes to schematics to cutting room floor material. Commentaries for every episode by a host of commentators run on all 20 episodes. They're as fun as you would expect, without anything real deep. Twelve featurettes include a making of, outtakes, a short on the new (and first on the show) female writers and how they changed the landscape of the program. There's also a piece on the making of a short they did in a The Road Warrior homage concerning the forgotten holidays after World War III's devastation. Next menu item is “Deleted Channel Flips†are features storyboards for jokes that were never animated, but were voiced. It lasts about 13 minutes. “Chicken Nuggets†takes three episodes and provides in screen sketch video commentary; there are five deleted scenes; there are deleted schematics, which runs about 55 minutes of you play all. And look for two easter eggs too boot. Yeah, remember those? On the main menu, highlight “Play All†and then push the up button. The eyeball lights up. Another one is also on the main menu: highlight “Episodes†and push up. The list of episodes pops up, push up from the top of the list until the eye again highlights.
The Final Word:
Still funny after six seasons, Robot Chicken is clever and highly entertaining, even for those outside the short-attention span stoner audience the show seems to cater too.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
