The kid-friendly apocalypse returns with Keith David, Bruce Campbell, and Mark Hamill.
SUMMARY (Spoilers for Book 1)
It was a normal day, up until a bunch of portals to other dimensions opened up and allowed a number of nightmarish horrors onto the Earth… or at least around Wakefield, Indiana. Zombies, mutant insects, giant eldritch abominations, you name it, it’s destroying the town. Many people escaped, many more were turned into zombies, but four kids were trapped in the town: Video gamer and natural leader Jack Sullivan (Nick Wolfhard), bully and strongman Dirk Savage (Charles Demers), action girl June Del Toro (Montserrat Hernandez), and tech nerd Quint Baker (Garland Whitt). Together with their pet mega-dog Rover, they managed to defeat the giant alpha monster Blarg.
Now, the four have to deal with the fact that there are a number of humanoid and sentient monsters who have come here from other dimensions who are trying to find their way home. They’re led by the warrior Thrull (Keith David) and include such members as the Chef (Bruce Campbell), the gruff Bardle (Mark Hamill “Applause”), and the deadly Skaelka (Catherine O’Hara). Unfortunately, it seems that an evil being called Rezzoch (Rosario Dawson), is also trying to find her way to Earth.
END SUMMARY
I have to give the show credit for completely changing the structure of the show during the second season. First off, the show is now made up of episodes rather than just a single film. This gives the show more time to do subplots and b-plots which help when you have a cast of this size, particularly now that there are other characters they can interact with. Second, rather than just being a survival story in the dystopia, now the characters have a set of goals involved in preventing the arrival of Rezzoch.
The four person group dynamic is an old one and it plays out well here. They map roughly onto the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles model, with the leader (Jack), the “does machines” guy (Quint), the cool but rude (June), and the idiot (Dirk). I also appreciate that they have a lot of moments where they each step outside of their expected model. They also do play up some more of the realities of being teenagers who are now living in the apocalypse, even though they are still handling it better than most people would.
Overall, it’s a pretty solid show… also, it has Keith David, Mark Hamill, and Bruce Campbell.
If you want to check out some more by the Joker on the Sofa, check out the 100 Greatest TV Episodes of All Time, Collection of TV Episodes, Collection of Movie Reviews, or the Joker on the Sofa Reviews.
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