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Breakthrough announces Picnicface as “in keeping with the great tradition of Canadian sketch comedy shows like SCTV or Kids in the Hall.” While I’m not sold on Breakthrough’s hype, Picnicface have gained their own measure of notoriety.
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Seeing a new Puppets Who Kill DVD set in 2010 is almost like stepping into the past, as far as I’m concerned. Puppets Who Kill hasn’t aired new episodes on The Comedy Network since 2006. The last DVD set was in 2005.
I’m not sure who will actually buy Puppets Who Kill: The Best of Season 3 and 4. This PWK set would have sold better in the period when the show was still on the air. Given how fractured the Canadian TV-on-DVD market is, one can’t afford to be picky.
Each episode of Puppets Who Kill focuses on Dan Barlow (Dan Redican), a social worker who takes care of the four residents of a halfway house. Cuddles the comfort doll (Bob Martin) will do anything to help others, even if it means gunning at people from a high perch.
Buttons (James Rankin) is a teddy bear with an insatiable sexual appetite. Rocko (Bruce Hunter) is a misanthropic dog puppet/ex-children’s entertainer. Bill (Gord Robertson) is the psychotic ventriloquist’s dummy/serial killer, who has lost fifty-six of his partners in “accidents.”
Watching Puppets Who Kill‘s third and fourth seasons, I get the sense that PWK was actively improving itself with each season. Not every show on The Comedy Network makes references to Shakespeare, The Manchurian Candidate, The Maltese Falcon and the Lee Harvey Oswald assassination. Hell, most TCN shows don’t even try.
Puppets Who Kill contains surprisingly understated writing, even for a show where Buttons dry-humps any broad he can. Given the show’s subject matter and overall premise, PWK is much more interested in film and style parodies, as well as jabs at Canadian sacred cows.
“The CBC is Killing Again,” for instance, is the episode with the Oswald assassination reference. Don’t ask me how said reference works in the context of a CBC-centric episode. It shouldn’t, but it does.
The guest casting is decent, especially for Canadian television. Familiar Canadian actors – Colin Fox, Gordon Pinsent, Fabrizio Filippo, Tom McCamus, Stephen McHattie and Peter Outerbridge, to name a few – appear on the show from time to time. More obscure names are the norm for PWK, including an excellent turn in “Joyride” by football-player-turned-actor Gene Mack.
There are six commentary tracks total, one on the Season 3 disc and five on the Season 4 disc. On the Season 4 disc, “Dan and the Garden Shears” has two commentaries, while “Joyride” has three. All feature show creator/puppeteer John Pattison with a PWK employee, most often director/producer Shawn Alex Thompson.
Judging from the commentaries, Puppets Who Kill employees were serious about making the show a success. They describe in detail how the shows were made, which is exactly what I want from a commentary track.
Picture quality is a bit soft and grainy, but nothing out of the ordinary for Canadian television. The Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack is legible and well-mixed. All episodes are shown in anamorphic 16:9 ratio. Puppets Who Kill: The Best of Season 3 and 4 lacks closed captioning and subtitles, which will piss off the deaf and hard-of-hearing.
Puppets Who Kill is underrated, and my opinion hasn’t changed with this set. While I would have liked to see more extras, I’m surprised PWK is still on VSC’s radar after a five-year absence. The alternative business plans would be to abandon the set, or have PWK Productions license future sets to a “budget” outfit like Mill Creek Entertainment.
Even now, Puppets Who Kill: The Best of Season 3 and 4 is less than $20 at amazon.ca. The set isn’t perfect, but it’s a good deal for the moderate price. I hope there are still fans of the show, considering how long PWK has been out of public consciousness. In Canada, that’s almost tantamount to being dead.
Canadian Comedy Shorts (The Comedy Network: twelfth season premiered Sunday, July 11, 2010, 10:30 PM ET/PT) is another of those series that I think CTVglobemedia is burning off, not that CTVgm will admit to this.
The copyright date for the new shorts compilation says 2009. It’s summer, you know? Unsold pilots bloom. Reality television is in season. Programs are dumped onto schedules seemingly at random. At least CCS isn’t as bad as Upload Yours, which is like saying rectal itch is better than a coma.
Cogswell (Diane) | Cogswell (Diane) is a filmed version of a one-person monologue by Stephanie Domet. I have no idea what it’s doing on a show called Canadian Comedy Shorts. Cogswell (Diane) is a decent monologue, but there’s nothing but dry humour in a piece where a woman talks about living in a low-rent neighbourhood. This piece belongs on Bravo! or CBC.
Cogswell (Diane) kicks off an odd trend for Canadian Comedy Shorts this year. I’m not sure if CCS has aired reruns its past few years, but Cogswell (Diane) is from 2006. Wouldn’t a better idea be to debut clips for a season premiere? Maybe it’s me.
The Woodsmen: “Potato Cult” | CTV publicist Sara McLaren tells me this season of Canadian Comedy Shorts features a mix of acquired shorts, all-new items and reruns. ”Potato Cult” is a rerun from 2006.
The Woodsmen is a very [adult swim] sketch. Random things happen. The production values are almost nil. Hell, The Woodsmen uses Syncro-Vox-esque moving mouths over largely static “animation.”
Frankly, this series tries too hard for an Aqua Teen Hunger Force/Sealab 2021 vibe. I’m turned off by it. Even [adult swim] deviates from the absurdist formula with The Venture Bros., The Boondocks and Squidbillies.
I know I’m referencing Squidbillies, by the way. That show’s about southern American rednecks. What is The Woodsmen about? Wasting money? Potatoes? Help me out here.
Holy War Dance Party | This is a two-and-a-half-minute song about…well, the title gives it away. Here’s the Youtube link and the link to the Holy War Dance Party site.
The HWDP Youtube link has earned around 45,000 views over three years. It’s caught on somewhat, though HWDP is nowhere near the level of Powerthirst. Dancing for peace is nowhere near as fun as having gratuitous amounts of energy. Holy War Dance Party should have been made with real lightening.
From the Desk of Ron Sparks: “CN Tower” | From 2004. Why does The Comedy Network need to air something from more than half a decade ago? I like Ron Sparks, but I hate rehashes of material this old. At least Video on Trial, Ed the Sock and Life’s a Zoo.tv have kept Sparks in blow.
From the Desk of Ron Sparks‘ concept is simple. Sparks writes fake letters to real addresses. Here, Sparks wants to jump off the CN Tower in a superhero costume. The piece is slight but entertaining. I’ve seen better and worse from Ron Sparks.
Check Up | Nathan Fielder saves this CCS episode with his awkward comedy. Fielder goes to the doctor for a checkup. Everything is fine until the doctor wants to check his prostate.
The sketch idea isn’t new, but Fielder sells fear very well. No sane man wants a male doctor to touch his meat and two veg. It’s one of the few evergreen societal taboos. In lesser hands, Check Up would be cheap comedy. In Fielder’s hands, mundane awkwardness is made an art form.
Nathan Fielder now writes for Important Things with Demetri Martin. I wish Canada would find a use for Fielder beyond nailing him to the side of This Hour Has 22 Minutes. The Comedy Network has given him an hour-long special, which isn’t enough.
Yikes. Four segments from 2007 or earlier? Seriously, how does The Comedy Network swing that? ZeD showed its share of older clips, but at least it had the good sense to air quality shorts like Flying Saucer Rock’n'Roll. That was ZeD‘s thing. It was free-form television. Canadian Comedy Shorts isn’t.
Maybe I don’t understand CCS‘ format, having watched it for the first time in 2010. It’s just lazy to build a program over one newish clip and four older ones. Two or three new clips an episode, fine. A clip from 2004? That’s like Teletoon airing Quads! in 2009.
I hope CCS’ next episode improves from the season premiere. I’d like to see more than one new short per episode. I don’t even care if one-or-two-year-old shorts are shown. I just don’t like when CCS shorts are used as blatant filler. I don’t know who would.
John Pattison claims that Laffstock.com will distribute the discs. Kerry Kupecz, executive director of sales and marketing for VSC, hasn’t confirmed this. In fact, she wasn’t even aware of this release until I mentioned it to her on June 24, 2010. VSC owns Laffstock.com.
Pattison mentions in a June 25 e-mail that PWK Productions hadn’t yet directly spoken to Kupecz, but that Laffstock.com is the distributor. Pattison has been mentioning the possibility of a new PWK set since March 31, 2010, going so far as to list the thirteen episodes included on the third/fourth-season compilation.
In any case, PWK Productions will be self-releasing this set. Release dates for the compilation are subject to change.
I’m surprised it’s taken until 2010 for a new Puppets Who Kill DVD release. I would carp at the idea of a compilation, except that the TV-on-DVD climate isn’t what it was five years ago. Puppets Who Kill hasn’t aired new episodes on The Comedy Network since 2006, which doesn’t help.
I guess Puppets Who Kill is trying for a comeback, with a movie version “in development.” I hate to quote “in development,” but I’d like to see more proof that this film could exist in the future.
Granted, Ed the Sock and Warren the Ape came back this year. Foul-mouthed puppets have a surprisingly long shelf life. Sid the rabbit recently debuted on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, and he’s an instant classic. You just know Sid’s going to have a long run with dialogue like this:
Addendum (July 8, 2010) | VSC has set the street date for the new Puppets Who Kill compilation. September 21, 2010 is when the title will hit stores and online outlets.
Special features include commentary tracks from John Pattison, director Shawn Alex Thompson, and puppeteers Jim Rankin, Bruce Hunter and Bob Martin. The customary “and MORE…” is also featured.
Point of clarification: Laffstock.com is not the distributor of PWK DVDs. VSC is the distributor. Laffstock.com is an online store which sells comedy titles released/distributed by VSC.
Amazon.ca doesn’t have a listing for the new Puppets Who Kill compilation yet. I’ll update this post when it does.
Comedy Gold will focus on sitcoms from the 1970s to the 1990s…which somehow includes SCTV. Don’t ask me to figure that one out. Comedy Gold’s inaugural lineup also includes The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, The Bob Newhart Show, Newhart, Murphy Brown and Night Court.
I can understand TV Land Canada’s rebranding to Comedy Gold. Originally a Craig Media entity, TV Land Canada was absorbed by both CHUM Limited and CTVglobemedia. It serves little purpose as part of the CTVgm stable, considering it’s a digital cable channel set up to air reruns. Why license the TV Land name from MTV Networks? It’s easier and cheaper to refit the channel as a Comedy Network spinoff.
Fitting Canadian content onto this channel is going to be tough. Canada has shit all in the way of “classic sitcoms.” There’s King of Kensington, The Newsroom and…what, exactly? Hangin’ In? Twitch City? Maniac Mansion? Flappers?!
I hope Comedy Gold includes a few Canadian sketch comedy shows. You Can’t Do That on Television and Whatever Turns You On deserve a reairing. Kids in the Hall and CODCO haven’t been on The Comedy Network in a while. I also hope Comedy Gold airs the 30/90/45-minute SCTVs in full, instead of the thirty-minute cutdowns TCN strip-aired to death back in the late 1990s-early 2000s.
Comedy Gold could be good if CTVglobemedia gives the channel some attention. The channel could be The Comedy Network’s non-trashy little brother. Having said that, I expect Royal Canadian Air Farce reruns within a year.
Why does Comedy Inc. continue to be renewed when there is such passionate hatred for it? Its cheapness doesn’t explain a five-season run. History Bites is similarly cheap, and attracts its fair share of hate. History Bites also has fans, since that show doesn’t talk down to its audience.
Comedy Inc. can make decent comedians like Winston Spear and Gavin Stephens look like they’re shit. This isn’t very hard to do, as the show is made up of stand-up comedians performing sketch comedy. Why is the show formatted this way when the format has never worked? Even after five seasons, Comedy Inc. suffers from terrible timing.
The fifth-season premiere of Comedy Inc. is more of the same from this show. The sketches are all obvious and/or rely on shock humour. The comics overplay their roles. Three sketches are the exact same “psychiatrist talks to animals” gag, with no variation.
The laugh track is pasted on, making the sketches seem even worse than they already are. If you’ve seen Comedy Inc., you know how this show plays on television, and I feel for you.
Also, what is with that overbearing laugh track?! It’s used on both Comedy Inc. and Comedy Now! A 2010 show shouldn’t look and sound like a second-generation dupe of Royal Canadian Air Farce circa 1995.
I blame Sandra Faire for this show. She’s the executive producer of both this and Comedy Now! Ivan Fecan is president and CEO of CTVglobemedia. Faire and Fecan are married. It doesn’t take a genius to see the conflict of interest. Even if Fecan and Faire keep business and personal relations separate, Faire doesn’t improve the quality of her shows.
The premiere episode of Comedy Inc.‘s fifth season has a 2008 copyright. That’s never a good sign. I guess CTV wants shot of Comedy Inc. once and for all. Why even air the season, in that case? Burn it off on Star! or something. Don’t air Comedy Inc. on CTV, where people will watch it.
Comedy Inc. is the closest thing to welfare Canadian television offers. I honestly hope this is the show’s final season. If Comedy Inc. makes it to a sixth season, then there is no hope for the industry.
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