The Brak Show Volume 2

Anyone familiar with Adult Swim knows that if their moniker is attached, whatever you’re watching is: a) wildly imaginative and b) damn funny. This second collection of The Brak Show contains the show’s remaining 14 episodes, which began in the middle of season two. In typical AS form, there is little plot development, as a plot isn’t necessary. That doesn’t mean the ideas are lacking — it’s quite the opposite. Brak is a high-strung, teenaged man-cat who hangs out with an oversized, diabolical Praying Mantis (Zorak), breaks into song at the drop of a hat and speaks with the sweetest lisp. He’s also at the centre of a flurry of unfathomable activity. Within one 15-minute episode this former Space Ghost foe is subjected to more inane concepts than anyone can truly grasp. One minute ex-NFL QBs Ron Jaworski and Jim Plunkett appear out of thin air as the Quarterback Justice Team to solve Brak’s nagging problem (i.e., newcomer Clarence), the next robotic doom-seeker Thundercleese will be rapping about his fondness for war. Throw in the fact that Brak’s father is a four-foot tall Cuban, while his mother is a giant June Cleaver-esque cat (who oddly changes accents to a British one for this volume) and you can understand why Brak is a little… deranged. Easily digestible and highly entertaining — for those who can channel their inner child, that is — it’s easy to sit through all 14 episodes at once. Where else could you see a series of events as zany as Brak and his dad visiting a strange zoo of glowing, animal freaks (to which Brak classically mutters, "Yuck, smells like Europe in here”), including a putrid camel that bites Dad, thus sending him into a well where he’s attacked by bats, which turns him into a freakish crime-fighting superhero known as the Hump? Or how about the one where Brak’s folks run into the inimitable Zorak, turn him into a puppet, eat and disguise his flesh as "chicken,” use his foot bones as shoes for Brak and somehow compel Thundercleese to holler "France rules!”? It’s Leave It To Beaver for ADD peyote users and I wouldn’t want it any other way. (Warner)