Review – Bob’s Burgers
Bob’s Burgers – FOX – 8:30/7:30pm Sunday – USA
The last time FOX attempted a comedy that wasn’t part of the Seth MacFarlane empire it ended up with the flop Sit Down, Shut Up. Thankfully, their latest venture Bob’s Burgers is a lot better than that painful misfire. Created by Loren Bouchard, Bob’s Burgers revolves around Bob and his family and their misadventures running a crappy burger joint. There are no gay aliens, or German fish, or talking dogs, or a family of bears that live next door, there’s just a family of weirdos and a lot of laughs.
Bob is voiced by H. Jon Benjamin who also voices the title character on Archer. While Archer wasn’t really my thing, Bob’s Burgers is obviously right up my alley as I laughed frequently during the first episode. I’d go so far as to say I haven’t laughed this much at a FOX animated comedy in a few years, and that’s not just a dig at Family Guy, American Dad and The Cleveland Show, that’s also including The Simpsons. The voice acting is amusing enough even without the jokes; how can something featuring Kristen Schaal as a twisted kid who tells her school class her dad’s burgers are made from dead bodies not be great?
The rest of the cast includes two guys cast as women – John Roberts as Bob’s wife Linda and Dan Mintz as their 13 year old oddball Tina, who scratches herself a bit too much. Eugene Mirman is their chubby son Gene, and Andy Kindler pops up as the restaurant’s neighbour Mort the Mortician. The idea of an everyday slob and his wacky family is as old as animation itself, but the reason for that is because it works. It allows the creators to keep all of its main characters in the one location, in Bob’s case it’s a restaurant rather than another two-story house in the ‘burbs, whilst also allowing for the characters to branch out on their own. You can say the same about a workplace comedy, but there isn’t a real bond keeping a workplace together; a family will stick with each other for 21 seasons, but an often teased co-worker really should have gotten another job by episode three.
Usually animation isn’t my cup of tea but I enjoyed Bob’s Burgers immensely. Despite my undying love for The Simpsons the last couple of seasons have been fairly lacklustre as the show just flies further and further into the stratosphere (this week Homer & Grandpa will go to Ireland!! … for no reason whatsoever) so it was good to have a show that was able to rein all that back in with minimal locations and simple storytelling. Bob’s Burgers didn’t lean on the Family Guy crutch of continuously flashing to random pop culture gags, and when Bob did do the ‘cutaway’ bit it earned genuine laughs.
Bob’s Burgers was surprisingly good, and I say ‘surprisingly’ because I was bracing myself for another Cleveland Show. Thankfully that wasn’t the case and I was left literally L O Ling. I enjoyed Bob’s Burgers so much that if it stays this good in subsequent episodes than the rest of the Mid-Season’s new shows are going to have a hard time topping it. This isn’t going to be for everybody as I’m not sure whether a restaurateur coming out in support of cannibalism isn’t going to make others laugh as much as me. I was already going to give Bob’s Burgers a thumbs up simply because it wasn’t made by Seth MacFarlane, but because it’s also genuinely funny I’m going to give it two thumbs up.
Good, Alright, Bad Or Ugly?
Good
