Review – Unsupervised

Unsupervised – FX – 10:30pm Thursday – USA

Before we get to FX’s latest animated comedy offering Unsupervised I want to talk about their other animated comedy Archer; more specifically I want to talk about why it is that I don’t enjoy Archer. A lot of people whom I like and admire, from critics to actual humans I’ve met in the real world, have expressed how wonderful Archer is. As a result I’ve given the series a couple of chances but keep coming back to the same conclusion – this show isn’t for me. It’s not because I think Archer is bad or anything, it’s just not my thing because I find Archer himself to be an unredeemable asshole and that makes it hard to enjoy the show. Now, I’ve enjoyed shows centred on unredeemable assholes before (Eastbound & Down springs to mind) but there’s nothing in Archer that leaves me wanting to watch more of the show simply because I find it a deeply unpleasant experience.

This brings us to Unsupervised an animated comedy produced by the It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia guys about a pair of dumbass teenagers with high self-esteem but low luck with the ladies; it’s like a more articulate Beavis & Butt-Head. Unsupervised stars the voices of Justin Long as Gary, the more level-headed of the pair, and David Hornsby as the excitable Joel. Joel and Gary are best friends who have a reputation around their school for being the ‘dirty’ kids in part because they like to spend their spare time building lightning rods on the roof of their house. Their best friends at school are the prudish Megan (Kristen Bell) and the overweight Darius (Romany Malco). Joel & Gary are frustrated that everybody else in the school seem to be “69ing” left and right and they haven’t even made out with a member of the opposite sex yet.

What works best about Unsupervised is that the show seems to have a good understanding on who exactly Joel and Gary are. While Justin Long’s voice work as Gary isn’t particularly inspiring, David Hornsby is hilarious as Joel, who sometimes can’t control his excitement over the stupidest of things. The show doesn’t have as solid a grasp on the rest of the cast with the exception of their weird friend Russ who creepily sniffs his cast and who the guys need to separate themselves from if they have any chance of scoring.. Other characters are either sketchily drawn or so out of place they feel like they’ve been dropped in from a Seth MacFarlane series; most notable in that department is the boys’ Australian neighbour Russ who is completely ridiculous and not in a funny way.

Russ brandishes a big knife like he’s a broad 80s caricature of Australians and he tells stories about how he once went undercover as a kangaroo and fell in love with another kangaroo. This stuff is only half amusing but is so completely detached from the world Joel and Gary inhabit that it’s hard to see what the point of it is. Despite the strange inclusion of a character like Russ Unsupervised manages to separate itself from something like Good Vibes, another series about a pair of unlucky-in-lust teenagers, by making sure the humour comes from the characters and not from a random spattering of cheap pop-culture references.

Oddly, despite the fact I laughed more during the few episodes of Archer I’ve seen, I enjoyed Unsupervised more because it’s two leads weren’t unrepentant dicks, they were likeable dopes. Unsupervised’s animation is certainly far worse than Archer; at times Unsupervised is a pretty ugly show to look at. Archer also has a far better handle on its own universe but the difference is that while Archer may be the better show it’s not a show I enjoy spending time with. Unsupervised is pretty rough around the edges at this early stage but its grubby little world doesn’t leave me feeling grubby just for visiting it.

Good, Alright, Bad Or Ugly?
Alright