Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
:: Invader Zim Volume 2: Progressive Stupidity ::
by William the Bloody
And now, for your enjoyment, Volume 2 of the Invader Zim animated series! This collections contains episodes 10 through 18, as we follow Zim's attempted conquest of earth with only his malfunctioning and somewhat insane robot sidekick GIR for assistance. The 8 episodes have 16 individual cartoons.
The Good: As even the packaging touts: "Now with 100% more Dirge!" Finally, they got Roman Dirge (writer of episodes and creator of the comic book Lenore) to participate in the commentaries!! This is really good for this 2 disc set in particular as it contains some of his best episodes, Games Slave 2 and Megadoomer. The 13 other people who contribute to the commentaries include show creator Jhonen Vasquez and many other of the talented folks involved in the show, from voice actors to writers to the music composer. I find it outstanding for such a little show, which lasted for only a short time, that so many of its creators are willing to come in and contribute to the special features and stand behind it. This set has some of my personal favorite episodes: Bolognius Maximus, Game Slave 2, Halloween Spectacular of Spooky Doom, and Megadoomer. As always, this show stands out among other animated series with its unique styling and occasionally dark subject matter. These episodes also have some more wonderful quotables: "It's got chicken legs!" "You're not a freak; you're just stupid!" "Taste me; I'm delicious!" "I'm sane you know." "Headless clown!!"
The Bad: Most of the commentaries this time around offered even LESS behind the scenes tidbits than the first set. Sadly besides the commentaries, there is very little else by way of special features. There is a writer interview and animatics, and that's it. And of course, if your collecting an entire series, you have to get the bad along with the good. This collection also has some of my least favorite eps: Bloaty's Pizza Hog, Mysterious Mysteries, Lice, Abducted, and the Sad, Sad Tale of Chickenfoot. But, that's just my opinion on those.
Overall, that makes 4 outstanding cartoons, 6 that are still fun to watch, one so-so and 5 that are pretty bad. I wouldn't recommend this show for the kiddies, but its great for the older, more twisted sense of humor crowd. The commentaries are not very informative, but can still be found to be generally entertaining as they make fun of each other.
B+
