Browsing Adult Swim for new shows in the 2000s was a lot of fun, you never knew what they could come up with and eventually I ran across something called Robot Chicken. A show about toys from cartoons and movies parodying different stuff? It seemed like those Toyfare Magazine comics as a tv show. I was sold. I’m guessing because of the stop-motion animation it was difficult to get many episodes out so at first they were very special since you wouldn’t get new episodes very often. And I guess it’s always been the case but with a catalog of over 10 seasons there’s plenty of Robot Chicken to go along now. Hell, they even showup in unintended places like the E3 Nintendo Direct. So here’s a rundown of what makes this show so great.
Crazy to thinkt he show is still getting new seasons; Binging it now is relatively easy since each episdoe is 10 minutes for the most part and each season only 20 episodes. They use figures in a way but they’re these weird plastic versions of them, I’m guessing because of movement they have to modify them, though perhaps it could be a copyright restriction as well. The Scientist and the Robo Chicken are in the intro but rarely do they appear in the actual show, when they do it’s definitely special. It’s more likely you’ll see the show’s creators & Seth Green to show up.
There’s pretty much a special edition episode around the end of each season, and sometimes you have Christmas specials, Star wars or even DC related ones. These are usually just as fun as normal episodes. Sometimes they are 20 minutes but the extra length doesn’t hurt them. It’s nice to see a compilation of only one theme worth of parodies. In fact I wish streaming platforms also allowed you to watch a specific show’s parodies, as that would be the best way to do repeat watches.
A huge benefit of the show is that the segments are only a couple of minutes long, so if you dont like a specific one, most likely it’ll be over in 3 minutes or less. That makes it easy to watch as it mimics the idea of channel browsing in the old live television days. Not all parodies are great, some are dumb or just boring but they’re gone fast which is good. I do think there’s a nice balance of mostly good parodies which is why the show works. Season 8 is not as good.
I don’t think the movie parodies are as funny, especially since they mostly rely on 80s stuff or earlier which is not that entertaining and has been parodied to death by pretty much everyone in every other show. I think the show shines when it parodies stuff from toys or just cartoons since those are not usually parodied as much and makes it all feel fresh. Video game parodies are definitely some of their stronger points even if they don’t do them too much. All the 90s and 00s stuff is also better than the 80s and before decades when it comes to parodies as mentioned earlier.
I do like that despite being all about parodies that it has its cast of original characters like the robot chicken, scientist, nerd guy, unicorn, humping robot etc. And they are all great. My personal favorite is Composite Santa. The Show could be so much more than what it is, jokes and parodies could be much funnier but I guess as long as it’s not terrible the show can continue without me complaining. I think there’s plenty of missed opportunities with the show, especially on the parodies that rely on shock value when a franchise can offer plenty of parodying.