Dispatches from the Fifth Circle

Seth Green, better known as Dr. Evil’s estranged son Scott from the Austin Powers movies was on Fresh Air the other morning, in part plugging his stop motion short series, Robot Chicken, on Cartoon Network’s usually excellent Adult Swim block.

Robot Chicken is the sort of late night stoner fare that a “children of the 80s” flavor Gen-Xers (figure 27 to 32 year olds) should technically enjoy but will more likely pass on.

Visually the stop motion animation is excellent – as fine as anything broadcast television has produced recently. The flaw with the 15-minute show lies squarely on the completely formulaic and bland writing.

Don’t get me wrong. There is great potential for clever gen-x writers to take all of the elements of children’s 80s television - be it the form Transformers, Diff’rent Strokes, the A-Team or what have you - and expand upon it in both subversive and entertaining manners. The problem with Robot Chicken is that it is neither subversive nor entertaining.

A lengthy and well animated Transformers segment ultimately ends as a public service announcement for prostate exams… something that probably doesn’t resonate with the 20-something audience. On some level the idea of Optimus Prime submitting to a prostate exam probably seems funny… but, in practice on the screen it just seems like an incredible waste of expensive stop motion footage.

Greater notions could be borrowed from the rest of Adult Swim and Williams Street’s folder of sublime gen-x subversion. Consider the Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law episode where Race Bannon takes Dr. Quest to court for custody of Johnny Quest and Hadji. It’s a perfect scenario… throughout the run of the original 1960s series Quest and Bannon were always together – never was there any mention of Johnny’s or Hadji’s mothers – the stage was set for homosexual-inference. That 1980s shows couldn’t present equally creative and entertaining conundrums just seems impossible. Indeed, that Green and his cohorts can’t come up with anything other than sophomoric plots is very telling of his own lack of depth.

Instead of giving us some awkward and vapid segment where Philip Drummond is spanking Arnold Jackson off camera… Green could have shown us some sort of behind the scenes false reality where the aging widow Drummond is… hell; I dunno… constantly bringing home Manhattan coke whores or something.

Toward the end of its premier episode Robot Chicken degrades into some sort of weird, made up BattleStar Galactica blooper reel… where you pretty much see stop motion models tripping over themselves and falling down.

At the very end of the show the doll host – a sort of generic TV anchor personality – hangs himself via his own noose. It’s a parting shot that is perhaps accidentally fitting for a show that technically has so much potential yet lacks any true thought.

In the interview with Terry Gross, Green admits not going on to college after high school – something seemingly endemic of child actors – but as an excuse explains that he “went to a used book store” and bought a lot of books so that the could buck-up on metaphysics. What’s lacking sadly from his repertoire is any meaningful understanding of comedy or wit or… well, simply good writing. Green still has it within him to make a meaningful mark, but only after lengthy study.