CHRIS' QUARANTINE RECOMMENDATION OF THE DAY (5/7/20): SMILING FRIENDS

CHRIS' QUARANTINE RECOMMENDATION OF THE DAY (5/7/20):

SMILING FRIENDS

By Chris La Vigna (@Chris_LaVigna)

ARE YA SMILING YET?!


Okay, I know I give [adult swim] a lot of free advertising on this blog of mine. What can I say? I've pretty much grown up alongside the programming block and watched it grow from this weird little thing that only stoners (and my insomnia-ridden-ten-year-old-self) knew about, into a massive force in experimental media, often imitated but never truly duplicated (not that people haven't tried). But y'know what? I say screw it! They make a lot of cool stuff that I like & you've probably never heard of, and let's not pretend that you don't just watch whatever overhyped piece of crap Netflix drops in front of you anyway, so go to Hell, today I'm telling you to watch SMILING FRIENDS.

Created by Australian animator Michael Cusack (the brilliant bastard behind the Rick & Morty Bushworld special that [as] aired on April Fool's Day 2019) & Zach Hadel (another super funny and talented animator/YouTube personality better known as psychicpebbles), SMILING FRIENDS is about work buddies Pim (Cusack) and Charlie (Hadel) who are employed by the Smiling Friends Agency,  a company that specializes in making people smile (allegedly)! 

When the duo is dispatched by their breastfeeding boss to help a woman cheer up her son, they're shocked to find that what they thought was a sad little child is actually a suicidally depressed middle-aged man named Desmond (Mike Stoklasa from Red Letter Media, lending the voice of his character Mr. Plinkett) holding a gun to his head and ready to pull the trigger. Pim is determined to get Desmond to see the bright side of life, so he and Charlie try their best to get him to crack a smile by taking him to a variety of places, such as Pim's childhood home, a house party filled hip young cool people, and a theme park called Dave Land, where you can ride a bunch of Dave-themed rides, and even meet Dave himself ("Who's Dave?" "I dunno...he's Dave!")!

From left: Alan, Pim, & Charlie. Hanging in the break room. Watching a totally normal TV show.


Pim, who starts out the show so bright and full of love, becomes increasingly sad and despondent as each new scenario not only fails to make Desmond smile, but causes him to reflect on how flawed his life is. His trip back to see his family shows how horrible and dysfunctional they are, the house party is a disaster that ends with Pim getting taunted for being too old, and Dave Land fails to make Desmond even a little bit happier, even if he does pick up a cool new t-shirt by the end of their visit.

Meanwhile, back at the Agency, Pim & Charlie's co-worker Alan is dealing with an infestation of these weird little violent purple men called blibblies, who keep stealing his cheese from the office fridge. These two plots eventually come together in a surprising and explosive way that throws us right into the pilot's tonally discordant ending.

The show is the kind of dark humor that [adult swim] has become famous for, and that sick sons of bitches like me continue to tune in for. It's a showcase for some truly talented voice actors and animators, and though all we have right now is this pilot, I hope it gets picked up for a series. The  buzz about it online seems to only be getting bigger and bigger since it aired on [as] for April Fool's Day, along with a slew of other new show pilots and season premieres (hosted by Post Malone no less), so I don't think it's too crazy to hope for a full series, if only because I want to see little Pim's faith in life restored.  Check it out and let me know what you think! Maybe it'll make you smile!
The 'Smiling Friends' Cast on Adult Swim Has Some Familiar Voices
Hang in there Pim! It gets better!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

TRACK REVIEW: PET WIFE - BAD WAY

Image
 TRACK REVIEW: PET WIFE - BAD WAY by Chris La Vigna ( @chrislavigna.bsky.social) Once again I am dusting off the blog to conjure up some words about some cool music that I feel that you need to check out.  Life has been an absolute chaotic psychic minefield as of late, and if you're like me, you're grasping for any piece of art to get you through the day, let alone the next four years or so. With that in mind: folks, it is my supreme pleasure to report to you that Brooklyn's PET Wife is back at it again with some more electro-pop realness. As if releasing their excellent album foam set this past spring wasn’t enough for us, their latest single, “ BAD WAY ” dropped in early October, and it has come to work its way to the top of all of your future Halloween/ Year-round Darksynth playlists, especially if you’re trying to organize your own D.I.Y. version of the blood rave sequence in Blade . It's a dark and dirty song, fast and ferocious, clocking in at one minute and fifty...
Read more

TRACK REVIEW: MAINTENANCE - "LOW LIFE"

Image
TRACK REVIEW:  MAINTENANCE - "LOW LIFE" by Chris La Vigna ( @instant_insanity_productions ) "Alright, who's been putting 'shrooms in the dog food again?"                           It's been quite some time since I've felt compelled to post anything on this blog. Life comes at you fast, y'know? I suspect the fellas in Maintenance, who in my opinion are one of the most consistently interesting bands in the 914 music scene, would agree with that particular truism.  Though the band has been playing plenty of gigs over the last year or so, they have been largely quiet when it comes to dropping new music.  It's more than understandable when you consider just how deep of an impact the Covid-19 pandemic has had on not only the local music scene, but musicians and venues across the country. We've all had to adjust, re-organize, and re-prioritize what we've been doing with ourselves in some way or another. A...
Read more

You Should Be Watching YOUR PRETTY FACE IS GOING TO HELL

Image
You Should Be Watching YOUR PRETTY FACE IS GOING TO HELL By Chris La Vigna ( @Chris_LaVigna) Slacker demon Gary Bunda (Henry Zebrowski) and his co-worker Ben (Ben Bladon) are doin' a Party Hole thang. You wouldn't understand. Life is Hell, right? That’s a sentiment we can all generally get behind, especially when it comes to our jobs, which seem to consume the majority of our existence on Earth. Well, what if the afterlife proved to be just as monotonous, mind-numbing, and (literally) soul crushing as your office job, with all those co-workers you hate and that supervisor that pisses all over you? That’s the premise of the Adult Swim show YOUR PRETTY FACE IS GOING TO HELL, a workplace comedy about demons working in the pits of Hades, taking Satan’s orders to get more souls. The show wrapped its fourth season in early 2019, and in the interest of promoting it to get it some more eyeballs and possibly help secure a fifth season, allow me to dive into all the...
Read more