Apollo Gauntlet Season 1 Episode 1: “Origins”
Directed by Greg Franklin
Written by Myles Langlois
Created by Myles Langlois
Starring Myles Langlois, Tom Kenny, Betsy Sodaro, Mark Proksch, Kelsy Abbott, James Urbaniak Adult Swim
Air Date: Monday, July 10th, 2017, 12:30am
Early in the AM hours, Apollo Gauntlet joined the parade of lunacy that is Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim. Adult Swim started back in 2001 and quickly became a cult hit with its briskly paced, sarcastic, and crude series like Home Movies, Harvey Birdman, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force. Apollo Gauntlet, created by Myles Langlois, is a perfect fit for Adult Swim with its old fashioned style of animation and nearly unending stream of consciousness style puns, one-liners, and pop culture references.
The Venture Brothers Blu-ray | DVD
Created by Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer
Starring James Urbaniak, Patrick Warburton
Warner Bros Home Video
Release date: March 22, 2011
It’s time once again for another review of a Venture Brothers DVD set, this time with Season 4, Volume 2. I’ve gone on before about my love for this show, but I think this time I’m going to say exactly why I love this show so much. If you’re looking to see whether you should buy this DVD or not, yes, you should buy it. There are 8 great episodes on here that are well worth the money. If you’ve got a Blu-ray player, then definitely pick up the complete Season 4 Blu-ray, also on sale March 22, 2011. It’s very easy for me to recommend this show to anyone who likes comic books, action, old cartoons, new cartoons, and anything that makes you laugh.
I grew up watching Johnny Quest, and the whole show started as a parody of that show. The premise for Venture Bros. is essentially “What if Johnny Quest really existed, grew up, and turned out to be a failure in life.” It’s this central premise that drew me in at first, but it is the expansion of that premise that has kept me watching.
The Venture Brothers Season 4 Volume 1 DVD/Blu-ray
Created by: Doc Hammer and Jackson Publick
Staring: Patrick Warburton, James Urbaniak, Christopher McCulloch
Cartoon Network/Warner Brothers
Release Date: October 26, 2010
I’ll get the easy part out of the way up front; Yes, The Venture Brothers Season 4, Volume 1 is another great set of episodes from my favorite show on TV, so yes, I’m going to give this a guarded recommendation (I’ll explain the guarded part later). The eight episodes on this disc comprise the first half of season four, and while they may not be the best of the series, they are still very funny, and fans of the show are going to want to pick this up. If you haven’t seen the show before I would recommend starting at the beginning, because these episodes are built on a lot of things that have gone on in the show before.
I don’t know if I love the episodes on this disc as much as some of the other seasons. Certainly the absence of Brock Samson (voiced by Patrick Warburton) is a big reason why I don’t enjoy these as much. There are still a number of good episodes, particularly “Hansom Ransom” which features Kevin Conroy (Batman: The Animated Series) playing a very different kind of super-hero. Other standout episodes include “The Revenge Society” which features the return of Phantom Limb and which may be my favorite episode of the season, and “Self-Medication” which has Doc Venture joining a boy adventurer support group and has guest voices by Seth Green, John Hodgeman, and Patton Oswalt. There are good episodes just not as many as in previous seasons.
I already covered the news coming out of the Adult Swim side of this panel here, but the bulk of this panel was taken up with news and questions regarding the Venture Brothers. There were a lot of great cosplayers in the crowd, including at least a dozen Dr. Girlfriends, so you could tell that a lot of people were fired up for it.
The biggest thing that the crowd saw was the preview for the new season, which premiers in October. The biggest thing in the preview was the look we got at how Hank and Dean are growing up, especially now that all their clones were destroyed at the end of Season 3. Dr. Venture will be getting a new bodyguard, although it wasn’t shown who that would be. As to be expected there were a lot of funny moments to look forward to.
Some information that has already been announced, but which I will repeat here, is that Season Four will be broken up into two 8-episode sections, with the first 8 in October, and the rest airing next year. Creators Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer confirmed that there will be a lot of characters showing up who have been mentioned before, but never seen, including Monstroso and Captain Sunshine. Viewers will also get to see who the members of the Council of 13 actually are.
The Venture Brothers Season 3 — Blu-ray Edition
Created by Jackson Publick
Starring James Urbaniak, Patrick Warburton, Christopher McCulloch, Doc Hammer
Warner Bros. Home Entertainment
Release date: March 24, 2009
It’s easy for me to write about the things that I love. If I’m really passionate about something, I can go on and on about them for some length of time. Well, I love The Venture Brothers. The show is hands down the funniest show currently on TV, and I have never been happier to receive an assignment from my masters of Doom than this one. I have been watching this disc more or less non-stop for the last week, and I don’t see myself stopping anytime soon. If you read this sight, if you like comics, or sci-fi movies, or music, or old cartoons, or laughing in general, you should be watching this show.
To give a basic premise of the show is to do it discredit, since they do a lot of different things with each episode, but the basic plot is this: Dr. Thaddeus “Rusty” Venture has two sons named Dean and Hank, and a bodyguard named Brock Samson, and they go around having adventures, mostly involving Dr. Ventures arch enemy, the Monarch. However, every family has problems, and this family is no different: Dr. Venture is a pill-popping failure, Hank and Dean have an annoying habit of dying all the time which doesn’t agree with their lifestyle, and Brock hasn’t met anyone he wouldn’t like to kill. The easiest way to describe the show is to imagine if Jonny Quest was mixed with Marvel Comics, and a few drops of G.I. Joe, drop them in a blender, add some cocaine, smash the blender with a hammer, and throw the results against the wall to see what sticks. That’s the best way that I can describe it, and that doesn’t really begin to scratch the surface.
Season 3 of the Venture Brothers is different from the first two in that it really goes into the histories of many of the characters, yet still introduces us to new and hilarious characters. Let’s do an episode by episode breakdown. That sounds like fun.
Students of the Unusual™ comic cover used with permission of 3BoysProductions
The Mercuri Bros.™ comic cover used with permission of Prodigal Son Press