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STUDIO: Cartoon Network
MSRP: $19.98
RATED: Unrated
RUNNING TIME: 123 minutes
SPECIAL FEATURES:
- Deleted scenes
- Tribute to Richard Dunn
- Blooper reel
- Karaoke videos
The Pitch
It’s Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim and their insane and horrific brand of sketch comedy.
The Humans
Tim Heidecker, Eric Wareheim
"I'm not the 'sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeitttttttt' guy, cracker!"
The Nutshell
If you enjoy eccentric and often uncomfortable humor, you’ll know what to expect from this show.
The Lowdown
It will probably do me no favors with any of you to admit that I’ve seen more of this show than I have of Tom Goes to the Mayor, which I’m sure everyone considers superior to this. Then again, my finger may not be on the pulse of the internet like I think it is and I could be dead wrong. This self-proclaimed “nightmare version of television” delivers the goods in its 5th and final (?) season.
"Hi, I'm TV's Patrick Duffy reminding you that the Dallas revival might suck the lips clear off of your face."
Comedy perpetuated by a vague sense of horror and disgust with intentionally low production values in some spots, this show has always brought out the dread that most of us found to be inherent in low-budget public access television and infomercials during the ’80s and ’90s. The show has always been fueled creatively by stuff like that. The show relies on it fairly heavily, but it’s not a bad thing at all. Not that the show really merits serious critical analysis, but Tim and Eric really know what makes people uncomfortable. People have described the show as one giant acid trip, and while I cannot tell you if that’s true or not (some of you might have a handle on that kind of info) I’d imagine it’s pretty damn close. One thing is for certain- this season is DARK, even when compared to previous seasons. There are eyes being pecked out by crows, limbs falling off, stabbings and decapitations. In other words, it’s everything you look for in television!
John C. Reilly continues to make appearances as the uncomfortable Steve Brule with “Brule’s Rules”, saying something that makes absolutely no sense (“In 1971 Bill Grates invented Michaelsoft. Wouldn’t it be cool if I could remember my dingus password for my e-mail? “) but is generally hilarious. Bob Odenkirk shows up every once in awhile, Rainn Wilson, Paul Rudd, Patrick Duffy, Will Ferrell, and Zach Galifianakis (as recurring character Tairy Greene) show up, and Tim and Eric’s usual cadre of eccentric nobodies (guys like David Liebe Hart, James Quall, and Richard Dunn who unfortunately passed away a year ago) are all there, most of them dancing around and singing ridiculously.
NSFW, unless your place of work is a forest.
Characters this season are old and new. A weird band of characters, no doubt, and probably the weirdest that television has to offer. There’s the resurrected Casey Tatum, being put back together by his brother with peanut butter after a little girl finds his remains in the woods. His remains are delivered to his brother by a detective (Wendell Pierce, hilariously enough) and he is then reassembled. There’s the aforementioned David Liebe Hart, who you always wish is a character and not a real performer. The guy might be more insane than Tim and Eric themselves, with his bordering-on-frightening puppets and his awkward-looking smile. He’s completely serious with his act on and off the show and if I lived near the guy I might be genuinely scared. His puberty song this season is pretty damn ridiculous and creepy. Morning Meditations is a new sketch featured starting with this season, and it consists of folks making strange grunting noises and such in an exercise sitting. Totally hilarious in every way. My favorite sketch might have been the one involving The Tairy Greene Machine, which runs on tap water and plays scenes from Tairy Greene’s films, in this case a trailer for Little Dancing Man and a music video for the theme song sung by Richard Marx. LeVar Burton (from “The Star Trek”, as the show refers to it) is in the film, too, as Tairy’s inspirational dance coach. Even better, though, is the other film that it leads into– Little Danson Man, starring a shrunken Ted Danson and with a theme song sung by Peter Cetera. The randomness in a show that’s primarily about randomness is just at an all-time high and it’s wonderful. Paul Rudd sitting down to a computer terminal and loading up sexual dancing alter-egos, one of them named Celery Man who has nothing at all to do with celery, is another highlight for me. And folks, if you wanna feel sick and uncomfortable at the same time, feast your eyes on the Christmas episode with Tim and Eric bottling their man-milk (from their swollen nipples) to give to their friends as Christmas gifts. Looks like egg nog….oh, dear.
The show is just so insane at every turn. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea, and some people vehemently hate it (my girlfriend despises it, and me for watching and laughing my ass off), and I totally get that, but holy geez I love it. The ’80s/’90s instructional video-ish music, the random disgusting sound effects, the floating cat heads in the end title sequence. Everything about this show satisfies me. I generally hate that it’s only 15 minutes long per episode but the more I think about it, the more I realize that more than 15 minutes might be hard to watch on a physical and mental level. And that’s a wonderful thing. For me and my sensibilities (which are generally all over the place) as a lover of things, other than the fact that there is only 2 hours of show here I can’t level a complaint. There’s a film coming in 2012, and maybe the occasional special every now and then but even though this show is essentially off the air, it left a disturbed mark on me for good.
Justin Bieber has a future after all!
The Package
45 minutes of special features, including deleted scenes, extended scenes, a tribute to Richard Dunn, blooper reel, and in an interesting twist, a bunch of karaoke videos for the various song performances in the season. The outtakes for the nipple scenes are hilarious, and reveal that even those guys thought it was gross. Even more surprising is how easily they fall apart during scenes. You get the sense while watching the show that they are just so in control and in their own little world that nothing would faze them. Or maybe that’s just me. There’s a deleted scene featuring Tommy Wiseau (of The Room fame) and it’s a segment called America’s Scariest Nightmares. It isn’t funny and easy to see why it got cut, but the fact that it featured Wiseau makes it a bit curious that they decided to omit it.
Rating: 
Out of a Possible 5 Stars