Robot Chicken Season 2: Uncensored   Starring (voice): Seth Green, Breckin Meyer, Chad Morgan and Tom Root Revolver Entertainment RRP: £19.99 REVD2236 Certificate: 15 Available 28 September 2009

Robot Chicken is back and this time it’s personal. Season 2 of the toy murderin’, attention-span shatterin’ TV series is a no-holds-barred assault on popular culture featuring celebrity abuse and doll-on-doll violence. Using stop-motion animation Robot Chicken season 2 is 20 fifteen minute episodes of quick-paced sketches. This series no celebrity is safe from the Robot Chicken treatment...

For those unfamiliar with Robot Chicken, it's the brain child / love child of Seth Green and Matthew Senreich. I say "love child" only because between them the two do so much on the show (including writing, producing, directing and acting) that it really is a creation born from their mutual love of pop culture and '80s toys - something which Green openly admits to having an encyclopedic knowledge about.

The second season was originally broadcast on Cartoon Network's [adult swim] in 2006. This DVD includes 20 episodes, each running for 15 minutes. Highlights (and there are so many to choose from) include:

A look at what arcade joysticks are really made from; a Flinstones claymation spoof; Hungry Hungry Hippos movie trailer; the classic Star Wars Emperor/Vader phone conversation; 'There Can Be Only One Lohan' Highlander spoof; Dicks with Time Machines; Corey Feldmen and Cory Haim save the world; Bruce Wayne's cleaner accidentally discovering the Batcave; The Neverending Story spoof 'Neverending Party'; Apocalypse Ponies; Golden Girls in the City (The Golden Girls / Sex in the City spoof); Final Fantasy game set in a fast food restaurant; Young Indiana Jones; Hulk Hogan's Heroes; Lil' Hitler; Police Academy students recruited into the X-Men; Inspector Gadget / Terminator spoof; Calvin and Hobbes spoof; Mario Kart / Grand Theft Auto spoof; and the Robot Chicken Telethon.

While some of the sketches may leave you wondering what the gag was, I'm assuming that this is due to them being based on cultural elements that are exclusive to American audiences. However, the majority of these are explained if you listen to the audio commentary.

Extras on disc one include audio commentaries (at least one on every episode); Deleted Scenes (with intro); Adult Swim Promos; The Making of a Sketch (12 min, 52 sec look at the Inspector Gadget / Terminator sketch); Christmas Special (the first part of which was included in another episode on the disc); and Deleted Audio (various audio takes that were not used).

Extras on disc two include audio commentaries for each episode; Animation Meeting (5 min, 57 sec which shows Seth Green acting out a scene for the animators to get the idea of how he wants it to play out); PS3 Contest (1 min, 17 sec commercial for the Robot Chicken win a PS3 competition); Deleted Animatics (31 min, 04 sec); Slide Show (2 min 14 sec of images from a project that never came to anything); Video Blogs (32 min, 40 sec worth of behind the scenes video); and Freedom Rock (1 min 47 sec spoof ad for a Robot Chicken music CD).

The second season builds well on what the creators threw at us in the first season. This is one of those shows that you're either going to love or hate, so if you didn't appreciate the show's first season you won't enjoy this new outing.

8

Darren Rea