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The first season was new and fresh, the second kinda funny, but by the third, there just isn’t enough new territory.

Robot Chicken’s formula is well known by now: snippets of stop motion animated cartoons that mock pop culture mixed with fart and retard jokes. This season opens with co-creaters Matt Senreich and Seth Green becoming zombies and doing the Thriller dance. From there on out, for twenty fifteen minutes episodes, we get a mish mash of jokes that last for a painfully long time or lengthy uncomfortable silences. Sometimes we see President Bush playing irresponsibly with a mogwai (and the resulting gremlins), and sometimes we get Doctor Sues with hookers and mass murder. Of course, mass murder – or just graphically violent murder – is a strong theme with Robot Chicken. 

And in a show where nothing is safe, naturally religion presents a big neon target. From sketches like “Everybody Hates Christ” where wacky hijinks happen around the crucifixion to “33 Year Old Virgin”, where the disciples try to get Christ laid (which, oddly, was narrarated by Stan Lee). Celebrities – or, as they are more frequently called on the show, celebutards – are, obviously, a source of constant mockery. Paris Hilton shows up frequently (but don’t have sex with her – her vagina is so diseased it melts men). Likewise, 300 is often mocked for its overly dramatic style.

One such episode, “Moesha Poppins”, is my favorite on the two disc set.  Robot Chicken does what it does best in this here, and that’s playing with Star Wars. Han, Chewie and Leia have dinner with Vadar and Boba Fett, causing a shoot the finger contest between Boba and Han, while Vadar re-enacts the destruction of Alderan for Leia. The episode ends up with a gag that, while funny, was also annoying for me personally – Michael Moore hosts a documentary about the forgotten toys of girls (because, as he puts it, girls don’t care for their toys like boys do. Hey, Robot Chicken staff writers, I’ve got an original Millenium Falcon you can screw yourselves with). Though I have to say I loved Strawberry Shortcake offing the Purple Pieman because, as she says, she always warned him she would bury him. “And that’s not some fruit-related speech impediment,” she says. “B-U-R-Y, like in the f**king ground.”

Like your Robot Chicken with the cursing? This set is for you. Like hypnotic looking discs? Buy it. Want bonus features, like alternate audio tracks, deleted animatics, studio tours and a video blog, as well as commentary for all twenty episodes and a gag reel? Buy the thing. Otherwise, just watch Adult Swim at any point in time. They always rerun.

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