Posted Monday, October 9, 2017 by RODNEY HO/rho@ajc.com on his AJC Radio & TV Talk blog
With cooperation from the creators of "The Walking Dead" in celebration for its 100 episode October 22, Adult Swim's "Robot Chicken" Sunday night featured a series of spoof sketches using its signature stop-motion animation.
I'm not sure anyone who has not seen "The Walking Dead" would get most of the jokes, but fans will enjoy the use of classic set pieces going back to the beginning in 2010.
Many of the actors who play the actual voices participated as well, including Andrew Lincoln, Danai Gurira, Sarah Wayne Callies, Jon Bernthal, Steven Yeun, Lennie James, Michael Rooker, Josh McDermitt, Scott Wilson and Jeffrey Dean Morgan.
Rick, Carl and Negan get the most airtime, while the more laconic Michonne and Daryl get relatively modest amounts of sketch humor thrown at them.
It's nice, though, to see Merle, Dale, Shane, Lori and Hershel again.
It opens at a Walking Dead museum set many years in the future after the virus was cured with an annoyingly chipper museum host/fake walker with a prop sword on his head. The actual "facts" of what happened with "Rick and the Gang" are twisted.
For instance, Carl is known as Carla, which has everything to do with his long hair. Then an aged Carl shows up and corals one of the guests to tell him the "real" story of what happened. This allows them to do sketches, more or less in chronological order but with twists.
We find out how the zombie apocalypse really began, courtesy of the CDC. (It's always the monkeys!) Rick insults Morgan's zombie wife before he realizes she's his wife. Shane's effort to hone in on Rick's wife Lori after he thought Rick was dead is given a little more, um, context. Merle, stuck on the rooftop, sings a plaintiff ballad about his racist ways. Rick rides into Atlanta on a horny unicorn.
Rick tries to disguise a log as Sophia to trick Carol. It doesn't work. Carol asks many folks to "look at the flowers," including Lenny from "Of Mice and Men." Hershel punches a kangaroo. One of the funnier bits: musical theater at Terminus where the residents insist they aren't going to eat you. There's an amusing bit from the perspective of a walker. And Glenn's final line "I'll find you" becomes a punchline.
Later, Negan has issues during a song-and-dance routine. And he steals Snoopy's scarf. Plus, he uses Carl's open socket for putting practice. And Lucille gets her very own Superman-like sketch!
One shocking revelation: Shiva is not an actual tiger but a Shakespearean-trained actor!
The series, which premiered 12 years ago, did a similar 2007 special focused on "Star Wars" that won an Emmy.
Given that the Emmy folks more or less ignore "The Walking Dead," don't expect the same love for this episode.
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