Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...

Awesome.

This is one of those times where I ignored everyone’s recommendations to see this show. I tried to watch five minutes towards the end of an episode, and it just irritated me. I never gave it another chance until I got back from my trip recently and found this at the top of a fairly formidable stack of waiting DVDs. That cover... that great iconic skull image... finally tipped me over and I had to check it out. I told myself I’d watch one episode, start to finish, and see what I really thought of it. And that one episode... well, that’s all it took.

This show is crack. I could watch another five seasons of it tomorrow if the DVDs were available. I’ve actually watched the full 13 episode run twice now. Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer (great names for both of those guys, eh?) are the creators of this crazy, beautiful series. It looks like this was originally designed to be a parody of JONNY QUEST and little else, but sometimes, things take on a life of their own, and this show evolved over the course of that first season into something much richer than a simple goof on another series. It’s got a rhythm and a style all its own, and a cast of characters that are so fucking bizarre that I would watch them do pretty much anything.

The Venture Brothers are Hank and Dean, but they’re hardly the stars of the show. I’d say their father, Dr. Rusty Venture, is more important to the series than they are. He was raised by his world-famous scientist father, and he spends every day trying to live up to his father’s reputation. All the pills he pops probably don’t help, and he can barely stomach his own sons as a result of his self-loathing. He’s more richly written than most live-action characters, to be frank.

And it can’t help that he spends all his time with Brock Samson, his bodyguard, who is like the most hyper-masculine exaggeration of macho I’ve ever seen. Voiced by Patrick Warburton, Brock Samson is one of the greatest comic characters in recent memory. In fact, overall I’d say this is the best Adult Swim show since the creation of AQUA TEEN HUNGER FORCE, and I think it’s actually a bit better as a show. ATHF makes me laugh like a crazy person, but THE VENTURE BROS. works better as a show for me. I like the universe they’re creating, the characters that fill out the edges of the world. I think The Monarch is a great arch-enemy, and Dr. Girlfriend cracks me up. I love Baron Underbheit. I love the way the JONNY QUEST cross-over was handled. I love Dr. Orpheus and his Hot Topic-addicted daughter Triana. I think it’s brilliant the way they fold in pop culture to this show, subtle in a way that Seth McFarlane can only dream of. What other show on TV would have an episode in which The Six Million Dollar Man and Sasquatch are on the run together, gay lovers marked for destruction by a government that doesn’t understand their love?

Warner Home Video has put a fair amount of extras on the disc, including some commentaries, deleted scenes, the original pilot, the Christmas special, and more. The reason to buy the disc, though, especially if you haven’t already seen the show, is for these episodes. Just check out the titles, which totally convey the pulpy feel of the show: DIA DE LOS DANGEROUS!, EENY, MEENY, MINEY... MAGIC!, RETURN TO SPIDER-SKULL ISLAND. Great stuff.

My one question is about the ending of the final episode from season one. Makes it hard to do a season two, doesn’t it? Still, we’re about a week away from the premiere of the second season, so I guess we’ll see how they handle it then.

MOVIE: Must-own

DISC CONTENT: Very good

DISC QUALITY: Very good