Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

If there could be too much of a good thing The Brak Show would be it – solid wall-to-wall Brak for hours on end. But too much it is not. In fact, the more I watch the more I can’t wait for the next volume.

If you don’t know who Brak is, well, I’ll tell you, ‘cause that’s just the kind of guy I am. Remember those old Space Ghost cartoons? Even you young whippersnappers might remember since Cartoon Network, or maybe one of their offshoots now, plays them from time to time. He’s an intergalactic super hero with nothing to actually do with the Brak Show… Wait, hold on there, before you moan and quit reading… HE doesn’t have anything to do with it, but his VILLAINS do! Brak was a space pirate, looting and pillaging. He had vaguely feline features the most prominent of which was a huge set of fangs. After drifting into some Piranhamite he disappeared until resurfacing years later as co-host of Cartoon Planet. So what about those lost years? That’s what The Brak Show reveals…. well, sort of. There’s some debate over the actual time line of the various shows.

Parodying the classic sit-com, The B.S. is all about Brak and his family living day to day. Mom is the consummate traditional sit-com lady: sweet and loving and on top of all that is happening in the family. Voiced in this season by Marsha Crenshaw she is syrupy sweet yet strong.

Dad reminds me of Ricky Ricardo after maybe dipping into the cough syrup a little too much. Voiced by the talented George Lowe (also the voice of Space Ghost) Dad often has the funniest lines.

Also in the mix are Brak’s best pal Zorak (a giant, evil mantis that you may remember as Space Ghost’s band leader voiced by C. Martin Croker) and next-door neighbor Thundercleese (a huge doomsday robot with anime-style attacks).

Classic Brak yells a lot, which could easily become too annoying to watch if you don’t find it funny, but new Brak is toned down somewhat except that he breaks into song at the drop of a hat. He’s quite the lovable guy. Zorak is out and out nasty and offensive… in a funny way. He’d give your car keys to a shark just for the amusement of watching you try to get them back. They are still in high school and have to face some of the same challenges as regular kids such as homework and bullies, though they also have to face things like Brak’s mom being cocooned by a 4-tentacled blob with horns.

The songs and stories are consistently nonsensical: the Carnival of Feet, feeding hams to a goldfish after singing about not doing that, playing “steal the mail.” It’s all insanely crazy which will make you say either, “What kind of warped human being would find that funny?” or “You must unlearn what you have learned,” oh, wait, I meant to say, “I laughed so hard I threw up.” I’m of the latter persuasion.

The style of the show is odd. The characters are 2-D animated. They are stiff in a style that harkens back to Cartoon Planet, but not to that extreme. They have much more precise mouth movements, more animation, and more mobility.

What is really strange, though, is the background style. The sets are real, I mean they are mostly doll furniture and other miniatures, but however they were created, the important point is that they are a very different style than the character animation. The props and sets look like composites of images, kind of like a stage set where some of the props might be real and others are painted on a partition. It creates kind of a puppet show feel just with cartoons rather than puppets.  Despite being twisted and full of strange creatures, the sets carry a bright, even cheery, mood.

Each show opens with a fitting sit-com style theme, and usually an establishing shot of the exterior of Brak’s house. After the story plays through the closing credits are unique and usually relate to some element in the episode.

Like most Adult Swim offerings seem to be, this is a highly unusual show, and, like any other, the best way to find out if you like it is to catch a few episodes on TV. I would be willing to bet, though, that if you like the other Brak stuff, you’ll love this. If you don’t know Brak but like strange comedies, particularly other Adult Swim titles, you should give it a try. Think of the Brak Show doing for sit-coms what Space Ghosts Coast To Coast has done for talk shows, Harvey Birdman has done for legal dramas, Sealab has done for sci-fi adventure, etc. Incidentally, this is my favorite Adult Swim title beating out Space Ghost for the spot.

CONTENT:
I would say this is the least controversial of the Adult Swim shows with the possible exception of Space Ghost (particularly the earlier ones that actually bleeped out even the mildest bad language). This does have some language, pretty bad in some episodes, light or even absent in others. The violence is of the type that leaves no one permanently injured. Most of the early episodes are clean enough to be kid friendly except for a little language (excluding "War Next Door" which has probably the most language of any episode). Some of the later episodes have more adult content mostly in the way of less veiled sexual innuendo: Brak’s granddad wants him to grab a girl’s butt to get her to like him, Zorak dresses up like a pimp, Dad wants to go to the mall because of an ad that says something to the effect of “all women’s clothes half-off” only to be disappointed when Mom tells him that means the clothes are on sale. It’s still fairly mild but maybe unsuitable for young viewers.

DVD:
I love this DVD! If any of Cartoon Network’s DVD’s have done their shows justice this one has. We’ll start from the outside. It’s your standard cardboard folder in a box with a couple of DVD trays and an episode list. The art scheme is a paint by numbers picture. The outer box is a partially painted scene. The back of the folder is a completely blank and funny image. The episode list is the colors you would use (paintbrush not included!) Just out of curiosity I scanned the picture and the colors into the computer and painted part of the scene. It comes out looking pretty goofy, colorful, though. So that’s all fun.

I kind of wish the painting theme had carried over to the menus. Maybe they were afraid it would wear too thin. The visual presentation of the menus is nothing spectacular. There are some original graphics but no animation. The main menu is the front of the house with Zorak and Thundercleese. The episode selection is pictures on the walls of the house, the extras menu is Brak’s corkboard, and the languages menu is the back yard. What makes the menus great, though, is that Brak sings the contents of each page! I kid you not, he names off all the episodes on the page, calls out the Easter eggs, even announces Zorak and Thundercleese’s presence on the main menu. Not since Futurama and UHF has character hosting of a DVD been done so well. I found myself going to each menu specifically hear the song. And when I say every menu I mean even the subtitles selection. I don’t believe Futurama or UHF went to those lengths!

There is very little mess to put up with before the episodes, no disclaimer about how the comments expressed by Brak aren’t necessarily the views of the company, its owners, their dogs, or the store clerk that rang up your purchase. And did anybody care that we weren’t expressedly told Brak didn’t speak for the rest of the world in his commentary? NO!!

Moving on…. The audio is a nice 2.0 stereo with a clean full-frame picture. You’re not going to get a better look and sound.

EXTRAS:
As usual I’ll tell you about each and every episode, but I’ll talk about the extras first. I have 3 disappointments with this set. 2 of them are about the features, 1 is major, the other one is slight. The major disappointment is Brak Presents The Brak Show Starring Brak. I expected at least one full episode. I rather thought they would have one of them on this set and one on the next set (there are 2 episodes total). While both of them are included here it is only a few clips from each (4 to be exact, of varying lengths), and not even the parts I was most excited to get to see. The only guest appearance included is Freddie Prinze Jr. While it’s a funny clip I would much rather have had Jo Dee Messina (“I’m not like you/ And you’re not like me”) or Diamond Dallas Page (“Evil is only skin deep”).

The minor disappointment is with the Cartoon Planet clips. CP was made up of short segments that were only used to introduce and fill in between other cartoons meaning that there will likely never be a DVD set because there aren’t any episodes per say. If you don’t know what I meant by the stiff animation I mentioned earlier, here is your chance to get a taste. This is not the first, or even the second, incarnation of Brak, but it is the one that most of us fell in love with. It boosted him up to be a fan favorite. So it is fitting to have them on a set devoted to Brak. As far as content, they did a much better job than Brak Presents… These clips cover virtually every one of the best moments I can recall. It totals close to half an hour of nothing but CP craziness including one of the opening sequences and the best closing. That much is nothing but awesome! However, there are two 15-minute segments, 1 chapter apiece. I would love to have had each clip divided and put in an index like the Brak Presents… clips are. Instead you have to search for any favorite segment you may have. Still, it’s a minor complaint since I’m happy to have such a collection at all.

I’ve seen several questions posted around the net pertaining to which CP segments are included so here’s a quick list.
Group 1: Brak is Hot, Minky Boodle, Don’t Touch Me, Zorak’s Pet, Brak’s Poem, Scat Sandwich, Fluffy, Toe Spread, Puppy Poem, Pants, Brak Rocks.
Group 2: Cartoon Planet Story, What, Scorpio Horror Scope, What Day Is It, Never Trust A Monkey, Mashed Potatoes, Brak’s Story, Lunchtime, Italian Lesson #4, Coffee, I Love Beans, Bad Jokes.

There are 5 Adult Swim News segments about a minute apiece. I had never seen these and am not terribly impressed. They aren’t as funny as the show or the other segments. Brak cusses more in these segments than anything else I’ve heard him do.

A radio play that was never released is included. I think it was supposed to be the pilot but never made it past the audio stages. I really don’t know what the story is behind it. A look at the history of the show would have been an excellent additional feature to have. To find it activate the episode Bawkbagawk and activate the commentary. The episode will play through but with the different audio. This is a strange way to have it play because the audio has nothing whatsoever to do with the video.

A short clip of Andy Merrill in a recording session is hidden on the disc 1 Languages menu. He’s reading a lunch menu in his usual funny way. It’s poorly lit and the camera angle is bad, but it’s still enjoyable.

Both discs have a Play All function so you don’t have to return to the menu between episodes. You can’t listen to any of the commentaries this way.

EPISODES:
Now for the episodes! There are 14 episodes from just over 11 minutes to just under 12 minutes long apiece. I don’t know how the playlist was generated since it doesn’t seem to match any airing schedule I’ve seen. I’m guessing it matches the production schedule, but I’m not sure. I read that Bawkbagawk was supposed to be the pilot, but according to this set it’s not. Also if the next set follows suit there will be 2 volumes where there is supposedly 3 seasons. I guess that’s why this is called “Volume 1” rather than “Season 1.” At any rate, this is the list as it’s presented on the DVD.

1) Goldfish (AKA Leave It To Brak): Brak wants to go to the Carnival of Feet but has to feed Thundercleese’s goldfish first. He kills the fish and doesn’t know what to do. Thundercleese will kill him if he finds out.
Matt Maiellaro from Aqua Teen Hunger Force appears as Mr. Tickles.
This one has 2 commentaries. One is by Brak. It’s kind of funny at times, but contains no information and does get old. The other is by Brak and Kim McFarlane (spelling?) who is, I think, the president of a Brak fan club in or near Atlanta. It’s better than the other one with some actual info and intelligent (semi-intelligent maybe) dialogue. Only about half of it deals with the episode, though, the other half (or maybe more than that) deals with Brak in general. Andy does a good job staying in character though he can’t help but crack up a few times.

2) War Next Door (AKA Gimme A Brak): Thundercleese is being attacked by cloneborgs. Zorak takes a hit while watching and coughs up Carmine, a strange little creature that has been serving as his voice. Zorak’s real voice is marvelously pleasant and even better when he sings. Even though he sings vile songs the crowds love him. Carmine becomes his manager but stiffs him out of his money. Zorak quits and plots to get his voice back.
Features Jason Bowen as Zorak’s singing voice and Jim Fortier as Notorious Fluffy G.
This one has a commentary by Jim Fortier, Pete Smith, and Andy Merrill. It’s informative and enjoyable except for the phone that keeps ringing, terribly annoying.

3) Time Machine (AKA Diff’rent Braks): Brak & Zorak didn’t do their homework so they go back in time to make their old selves do it, except they all 4 get caught up in playing video games (Head Kicker) instead and have to go back again and again. With an army of themselves standing behind them the mischievous pair decide it’s time for a new plan, destroy homework itself!

4) Hippo (AKA The Braks Of Life): Zorak catches Brak talking to his stuffed lobster & convinces him to give up his friend. Mom gives the heartbroken Brak a new toy, but Dr. Grumbles has a secret.

5) Bawkbagawk (AKA B.J. & the Brak): Zorak & Brak steal the rival high school’s mascot, a chicken. It becomes Brak’s best friend until he is forced to return it. Heartbroken, he laments their parting in song.
This is said by some web sites to be the original pilot, which I can believe because it is very different from the other episodes. It has more of a feel of being filmed before a "live studio audience," and the entrances of the characters seem designed to introduce them for the first time. It features canned laughter to simulate the audience, music from Cartoon Planet, several sets I don’t recall seeing in any other episode, a different corkboard in Brak’s room (this one with his underwear collection rather than the autographs of the 2 Stupid Dogs, the painfully tacked sheep, and the drawings), and a more standard closing credits sequence. It’s as if this episode was filmed then the elements of the show changed and standardized. It actually would have worked better as episode 1 on the collection rather than in the middle.
There is a deleted scene for it (a different version of the fight song they sing) “hidden” on disc 1 Episode Selection Menu 1. The Easter egg is obvious. While there appears to be a commentary, it’s actually the radio play. See my description above for more information.

6) Mobab (AKA Laverne & Brak): Mom and Dad are fighting. In steps Mobab, Zorak’s acquaintance from his new gentleman’s club, who woos Mom at just the right time. She goes with Mobab to make Dad jealous but ends up kidnapped instead. Now it’s up to Brak and Dad to go save her.

7) Expiration Day (AKA Brak’s My Momma): Thundercleese is considered obsolete on his birthday. His weapons systems are disabled by his creator, and life becomes unlivable for him. Brak and Dad appeal to his creator, Slappy, to reinstate him so that he can save the planet from an oncoming asteroid. Slappy believes one of his new, compact models will do a better job, but comes to realize that nothing can match the power of Thundercleese!
If I can be geeky for a moment, this eposide aired on my birthday suggesting Thundercleese and I share it.

8) Psychoklahoma (AKA Father Knows Brak): Dad and Brak love the show Senor Science, though for different reasons. Brak wants to buy a special science product from the show but doesn’t have the money. He decides to put on a play to raise the cash enlisting all his friends and family. The play is a musical combination of Oklahoma and Psycho.
This is sure to be a classic episode. Be sure to go through the Senor Science credits frame by frame, there’s some funny stuff including a Star Wars reference. Incidentally they misspelled Megadeth.
There is a deleted scene if you go to the disc 1 Episode Selection menu page 2. Once again, the Easter egg is obvious. It’s an alternate version of Zorak’s Psycho song. It’s extremely funny but the metronome is annoying.

9) The Eye (AKA Petticoat Brak): Dad, it turns out, is a champion at staring contests. Brak wants to learn to be as good, but he falls victim to Dad’s trickery. Zorak tries his luck but ends up in the hospital. Then Dad’s nemesis shows up for a challenge.

10) Poppy: Brak’s dead grandfather narrates this tale of Brak trying to get a woman. Having no luck he turns to Zorak then Dad. His parents give him an item his grandfather left for him before dying. Then the spirit of Poppy begins coaching the still clueless Brak. Brak is just too innocent to go after the girls like everyone wants him to.
This is perhaps one of the most nonsensical episodes so far which is not to say it isn’t funny. It is also the first one to not have a title card that parodies another famous title. I don’t know why they quit doing that, I loved it. If anyone knows for sure exactly which voice(s) Khaki Jones does in this episode, please let me know. I’m sure it’s one of the girls Brak hits on, but I don’t know which one.

11) Bully: Zorak sets up a bully booth for beatings and easy lunch money depositing, but he’s overthrown by Roy “Butch” Toughington. He’s so afraid of Butch that he moves into Brak’s room – takes over it is more like it. Mom wants Zorak out of her house so she sets out to rid the schoolyard of Butch.

12) Mother Did You Move My Chair: Dad is upset because someone has moved his chair. It’s barely noticeable, but you would think it’s been bolted to the floor 10 feet away. Brak, meanwhile, doesn’t want to dissect a clam in Biology class. He appeals to the stars above to help him escape the dilemma, but the clam, Luther, proves to be resourceful on his own.
Jon Kohler appears as Wunderburd.

13) President Dad: Dad is tired of the Neighborhood Association pushing him around, making him do such heinous things as wearing pants outside! Dad decides to overthrow the regime by running for president but resorts to slander to win. Brak gets worried when he learns the current president is a viscous monster that will likely devour the planet if he loses the election.

14) Pepper: An alien ship is coming to choose a “lucky one.” Dad is certain they will pick him and make him king. Zorak, meanwhile, falls for an unusual alien with an interesting secret.
There is a rumor that this episode was originally voiced by Mom replacement Joanna Daniel and was redone by Crenshaw. If it sounds different to you that may be why.

FINAL THOUGHTS:
My third complaint about the set is that the price is a bit high for such short episodes. It cost me the same as the Simpsons Season 1, which has 13 half-hour episodes, each with its own commentary, and a bevy of features itself. That’s a good bit more content. Sill, I obviously thought it ultimately worth the price since I did buy it. The Cartoon Planet clips helped justify the cost, but so did Brak Presents... which did not deliver what I expected. Ultimately it’s the quality of the show that makes me feel like I made a worthy purchase. This is something that I will watch many times, probably more than any other cartoon series I have except Futurama. You really need to figure out if you like the show first since it is unusual. Unless you just LOVE Cartoon Planet or are absolutely convinced from what I’ve said in my review I don’t suggest a blind purchase. However, if you have seen the show and would like to see all of them and multiple times, this is a worthy collection. From box to menus to the show itself it’s a thoroughly entertaining package. I would like to have seen more commentaries and behind the scenes features letting us know about the creation and history of the show and voice actors. I would also have liked even more Cartoon Planet segments and the entire Brak Presents... episodes. If I didn’t love the show so much the misleading Brak Presents... content would have dropped the rating, but Brak singing the menus, if nothing else, helped keep the rating at 5*.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Better than Watching TV
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older