Providing yet another hit of stop-motion hilarity for the drug-addled ADHD set, Cartoon Network's shining star, the Emmy award-winning show Robot Chicken, has nursed its third season to fruition on DVD.
As standard with all releases, the DVD comes complete with the 20 latest episodes (complete third season) of Robot Chicken. Now that the show is 60 episodes in and on their third multi-disc release, creators Seth Green and Matthew Senreich have gone out of their way to make the price of the set worth your while.
Obviously paramount to the selling point of the disc are the episodes themselves. Third season highlights like "Boo Cocky," "Losin the Wobble" and "Ban on the Fun" exemplify the show's hilarity and obscurely referenced wit.
As always, found within the noted episodes are wildly eclectic skits involving everyone's favorite characters from yesteryear. One bit involving Louis, Gilbert, Booger and Lamar from Revenge of The Nerds and how, in reality, they'd end up beaten, ravaged and in prison for their revenge-fueled shenanigans is worth mention not only for its nostalgic flair, but its logical analysis as well.
Another memorable skit shows the members of Saved By The Bell trapped in Jigsaw's warped game ala the Saw franchise, showing just how little they care about Dustin Diamond and getting Screeched. Later, building on a funny Family Guy segment, a series of skits involving the Kool-Aid Man and how summoning him at the wrong place and wrong time is a horrible idea will lodge themselves into your memory bank and warrant laughter and views down the road.
Attached to each episode is the option of viewing it with commentary. Alongside production insight by Green and Senreich, most episodes tote a special guest commentator, some of which include Mark Hammil, Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Rachel Lee Cook, Breckin Meyer, Joel McHale, Billy Dee Williams and even Stan Lee himself.
The tidbits, stories, and banter between the Robot staff and their celebrity friends is nearly as entertaining as the show itself and in some cases, may draw your attention solely to the audio.
Further adding depth to the release are extras including alternate audio for certain segments, deleted animations, deleted scenes, a studio tour and even a series of video blogs.
The eight deleted scenes and two alternate audio takes are amusing, but lack in length. Then again, with a show that's at most 12 minutes per episode, this isn't all that surprising.
Where those extras don't provide all that much extra, the studio tour and video blogs more than make up for them. The studio tour is fascinating and shows all the aspects of the Robot Laboratory, ranging from Green and Senreich's office to production design, to where they record the show and track it's sound.
For such a harmless little cartoon, the sets, production and work that goes into each episode is unbelievably vast. Did you know that it takes about an hour of work to film just one second of stop-motion action?
All of this being said, there is perhaps nothing more interesting and unique to the release than the 11 video blogs. With blogs showing and describing the animation, direction, lighting and puppet design, fans and new viewers alike have the opportunity to look deep inside the core of the show and watch how it starts as an idea in the writers' room and evolves into this absurdly huge production.
Highlighting the blogging is the official Robot Chicken "toy wrangler" Hugh Sterbakov. Watching Sterbakov buy the figurines that we've become so familiar with and explain his routine, while telling fun stories on his experiences, is an absolute pleasure.
The new information to be uncovered in these blogs is priceless. Remember Harp Pekin, the winner of MTV's short-lived joke-jockin' show Yo Mamma? He may just appear in the writers' room in its accompanying blog...twang!
Though short in length, each episode of Robot Chicken is hearty in laughs and production. The DVD release brings back each episode in uninterrupted glory and offers far more insight and bonus material than you'd expect from the Green-Senreich concoction. Instead of trying to find more reason to do so, go pick up the third season of Robot Chicken and see for yourself.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
