Short-Lived Shows: Welcome to Eltingville

There are varying degrees of "geek" it would seem. There are people like myself whose brain is packed with some of the most useless, trivial knowledge of comic strips and pre-WW II era animation, and then there are those who surpass my meager geek knowledge by leaps and bounds. Welcome to Eltingville was an animated series that celebrated the uber-geek, and it was damn funny. It's just too bad the show only lasted one episode when it aired as part of Adult Swim. I guess that means the word "series" doesn't really apply, but let's move on.

The single pilot episode, "Bring Me the Head of Boba Fett," aired in 2002, but the "Eltingville Club" began almost a decade earlier in Dark Horse's Instant Piano Anthology. Later, creator Evan Dorkin would bring the four geeks to his comic book, Dork. The best part of the episode came toward the end when two geeks pitted themselves against one another in a kind of "geek off" to win an expensive Boba Fett action figure. Tossing out questions and showing a breadth of knowledge that would make even the most diehard movie/comic/role playing doofus' head spin, the characters of Josh and Bill tried to best the other to win the coveted action figure. I wish I could recall every question they posed to one another, but alas, it's been too long. I do remember The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed Up Zombies being referenced, however.

It's hard to judge a show based on just one episode, but this homage (and gentle mockery) of geek culture really drew me in upon seeing it, and I remember wishing I could have seen more.