The Good: Consistently funny, Concept, Speed of jokes, Sparks and Quinn
The Bad: One or two executional duds, Lack of continuity
The Basics: Set below the sea, Sealab 2021 follows the kooky adventures of sea explorers in short episodes that are consistently funny.
I do not have cable as I refuse to pay for television, especially when it has commercials. I had seen one or two episodes of Cartoon Network's Adult Swim, the Friday night collection of animated comedy geared toward teen-agers and twenty-something adults. It never truly grabbed me, so it seemed unlikely that I would find much to enjoy in the Season 1 DVD set of Sealab 2021.
I was wrong.
Sealab 2021 follows the comic exploits of a group of undersea explorers in the Sealab complex. The underwater facility is commanded by a lunatic Captain Hank Murphy, maintained by Marco and the ever-seated sarcastic Sparks. Dr. Quinn explores and does much of the legwork with Debbie DuPree, the perky blonde scientist.
The short of it is that Sealab 2021 is funny. Typical endeavors of the Sealab crew include: Captain Murphy losing his HappyCake oven and risking everyone's life to find it, Murphy being caught under a soda machine for a year while the rest of the crew is off on tour with M.C. Chris and he is forced to survive on soda and scorpion venom, and Quinn continually being thrown back in time as a result of an accident and meeting different versions of himself.
This is a somewhat ridiculous premise that comes together as something better that any one of its parts. The concept of Sealab 2021 was to take an old '70s animated show, cut it up, redub the show with new lines and make it into something funny. While later seasons depart from that formula, they maintain the style of the original show and the first season of Sealab 2021 has a retro feel with a very modern sense of humor.
The multiethnic crew of Sealab also make for ample opportunities to poke fun at a lot of aspects of social interaction that are often neglected, especially in live-action series. It's clear from the beginning that Quinn is the smartest member of the team and his continual saving of Sealab is fun and funny to watch. Conversely, the over-the-top Sparks is a megalomaniacal white guy bent on world domination. Quinn and Sparks basically move much of the stories and make it worth watching.
Sealab 2021 is definitely a show for young adults and not for children. Debbie flashes a few people (it is censored out, of course) in the course of the series, but more than that, the dialogue often focuses on more adult issues. For example, in "Chickmate," Debbie engages the crew in a lot of talk about babies while the b-plot deals with multiethnic relations with humor that is vivid and funny, but not appropriate for younger audiences unable to discriminate between humor and reality.
The 13 episode, two disc set contains a decent amount of extras, including deleted scenes and extended or uncensored versions of key episodes. This is material designed for people with an offbeat sense of humor who want something edgier than "The Simpsons" but less institutionalized than "South Park." Sealab 2021 fits nicely the Mountain Dew-drinking generation that doesn't dig network family comedies and wants something stimulating. I doubt many people over thirty would enjoy it, but I've been known to be wrong before.
If you've never seen Sealab 2021, why would you want to buy this? The truth is, it's a tough sell. It's funny, very consistently so. In fact, out of the 13 episodes, only "Lost In Time" strikes me as a dud and that is because the concept wears thin rapidly. As Quinn meets other versions of himself, the episode takes on a very repetitive feeling. Conversely, "All That Jazz," where Captain Murphy is trapped under the soda machine, takes a seemingly lame concept and explodes it into something that is sidesplittingly funny over and over again. This is a great way to learn about the youth culture of our country especially those who feel disfranchised about their options and surroundings. Finally, the geeks have a voice that speaks to them without trying to be mainstream. The success of this set, I suppose, illustrates how many of us live outside the mainstream.
As I write this, I realize the real appeal of Sealab 2021 for the young adults of the country. Each episode averages 11 minutes long and that's a wonderful boon for the attention spans of young people. But as adults, it makes for a very accessible program because we do not need to commit a lot of time to it. Sealab 2021 offers us a quick laugh before bed and something that can make us smile without eating up all of our time. And while I dislike how there is no continuity in the series (Sealab is destroyed several times), it makes each episode completely stand apart and the variations in "feel" to each episode wonderfully non-repetitive.
For other animated comedies, be sure to check out my reviews of:
Aqua Teen Hunger Force - Volume 1
Family Guy - “It’s A Trap!”
Clerks: The Animated Series
7/10
For other television reviews, be sure to check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!
© 2012, 2004 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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