A British creature jumps over the pond (Creature Comforts - Series 3 - In The USA (DVD))

Member Name: magenta23

Product:	Creature Comforts - Series 3 - In The USA (DVD)
Date:	15/02/09 (71 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great characters, very and charming

Disadvantages: Some of the old characters have be recycled and doesn't work

I think most people we be familiar with Creature Comforts, if not for the recent series but for the electric adverts a little while ago. For those of you not familar, the concept is this... the Creature Comforts idea is that of Aardman Animation's Nick Park (Creator of Wallace and Gromit). The public are interviewed on all sorts of topics from love to going to the doctor, then their interviews are used as the voice to an animal or creature and the results are hilarious.

The first and second series of Creature Comforts it was the British public speaking. These 10 minutes episodes were shown on television and subsequently released on DVD. The first two series were brilliant and the imagination and creativity of the creators to pair the speaker to it's 'creature' was perfect and proved very funny, however as with most Aardman, particulary Nick Park, creations, the emphasis is on British humour. This third series which was shown in the states first and has been released first on DVD over here, takes the concept and uses the American public as the stars. Being a fan of the programmes so far, I was sceptical if this was going to work as well.

If I'm honest, no as a Brit watching it, I didn't warm to the characters as much as I did in the first two series. However, it is still a good watch and I would urge fans to still give it a go. The DVD features 7 20 minutes episodes on the following topics -
Pets at the Vet
Self Image
Winter
Fears & Phobias
feeding Time
Working
Love, Animal Style

In addition to these themes, they often go off speaking about a completely different subject. I guess letting the public loose speaking without a script this is going to happen but is part of charm of the show.

As far as the animation goes, it's typical Aardman and flawless. The characters are all excellent, and there are many new characters. However, there are some familar faces from the first two series, but using a different voice. This for me was a mistake. For example, my favourite character from series one and two was a ditsy guide dog. The voice of the girl used for the character was perfect and made her. She appears again in series three, but with an Amercian member of the public as the voice. I guess they wanted some consistency as with the first two series with using the same characters but, for me it didn't work. I think taking it to America, all the characters should have been new.

As far as the new characters go, however there are some brilliant ones. My favourites are the gecko who tells bad jokes and his 'dinner' gives him a round of applause for them to avoid the inevitable. Also, the dogs who speak like wine tasters when smelling the rear of a new friend!

As you can gather, this may be animated but it's not kids stuff really. Visually, they'll love it. It's colourful and the characters are funny to watch. As far as the spoken content goes however, it's a little smutty in places and subject matter probably wouldn't interest kids. This DVD has been given a 12 rating. It doesn't contain anything bad enough to warrant a 12 I don't think but it does show this this is more meant for adults, as from the cover for those not in the know it could look like a kids show so for that reason I think the rating is fair enough.

Overall a great DVD, not as good as the first two series but worth a watch all the same. Some of the new characters are not to be missed.

Summary: A great DVD overall, a must see.