weird

First it was Perfect Hair Forever and The Brak Show, and now Adult Swim is also bringing back 12 Oz Mouse with exclusive Web-only episodes, according to this interview with creator Matt Maiellaro. The new episodes are set to begin production next month. Maiellaro also mentioned a future DVD release, so there's plenty for 12 Oz Mouse fans to be thrilled about.

From the very beginning with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Adult Swim has provided folks like myself with the kind of goofy surrealist comedy we crave. What's particularly intriguing about 12 Oz Mouse is that it manages to be a weird show even in contrast to the weird shows that surround it. It doesn't provide the eleven-minute comedy pummeling of other Williams Street fare, but instead unravels slowly, revealing a little bit more of what's underneath the surface while also piling on more and more questions. It is the most simplistically drawn of all the Adult Swim shows, and yet the most complex in terms of story. It's that paradox that kept me engrossed in the series right up to the last televised episode.

[via Toon Zone Forums]

After months of teasing and speculation, we finally learned that, yes, there would indeed be an Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie. Now Variety is reporting that the movie is slated for a March release, opening in over 800 theaters. The movie will center on the origin of the anthropomorphic trio of Meatwad, Frylock and Master Shake, a team of talking food who fight crime and solve mysteries, except they really do neither of those things. Trust me, if the concept alone confuses you, you're probably not even reading this anyway. Oh yeah, and the antagonist in the movie is an evil piece of exercise equipment. Fans of Bruce "Don't Call Me Ash" Campbell can look forward to hearing their hero's voice in the upcoming film, along with Rush drummer Neil Peart.

[via Toon Zone]

Before we knew him as a correspondent on The Daily Show, Mr. Noblet on Strangers with Candy, and later the star of his own faux news analyst program, The Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert was just another sketch player on shows like Exit 57 and the Dana Carvey Show. Colbert starred on the short-lived Exit 57 with Amy Sedaris and Paul Dinello, who would later re-team with him for Strangers with Candy. After the jump, see a younger Colbert and his future Daily Show co-worker Steve Carell playing waiters made sick by the mere mention of food on the Dany Carvey Show, and then watch a clip from Exit 57 with Colbert, Dinello and Sedaris that I can't really describe, except to say you get to see Colbert and Dinello makeout with one another. Mmmm, that's tasty.

Check out the vids after the jump.

. . . eleven Adult Swim moments.

Gather around the fireplace, kids, and let us reminisce about all the joy Adult Swim has brought us in the past year:

It is indeed a sad day, fellow fans of Wonder Showzen. In an interview with Radar, show creators Vernon Chatman and John Lee have said that MTV2 has still given no official word on whether their subversive, blood-soaked, drug-addled tribute to children's shows will return for a third season. Currently, Lee says the answer is about "ninety percent 'no'" as to whether or not the show will return.

As is the case with most shows that includes kids dressed up as a dead Pope, dozens of scenes segmented on the screen and played simultaneously, a dog pulling a baby from a pregnant woman's womb while she's being killed in an electric chair and puppets dry humping the Bible, Wonder Showzen had a devoted fanbase but never got the ratings that would make a network want to keep it around. It's not much consolation, but the second season does come out on DVD today, so you can always pop it into the ol' DVD player and remember the good times. Also, the brains at Adult Swim have expressed their love for Wonder Showzen, so maybe there's still a small glimmer of hope for the show after all. Keep the faith, brothers and sisters.

The Sci Fi Channel has renewed Stan Lee's quirky reality series Who Wants to Be a Superhero? for a second season, ordering ten new hour-long episodes set to air next summer. Lee says the new season will be even more insane than the last, and I'll have to take his word for it because I didn't watch the first season. I must say, however, that just the idea of a reality series about people pretending to be someone they're not exposes the fundamental flaw in all reality programming, which is that once the cameras are on, reality ceases to exist. At any rate, if you're a fan of the show, consider this good news.

I've said it here many times, and I'll say it again. I would much rather have Adult Swim offer a variety of choices even if that means some of the shows don't turn me on personally, as opposed to only offering programs I enjoy. Furthermore, Adult Swim does what many networks don't do, which is allow shows time to find an audience. Sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn't, but the end result is more choices, and that's never a bad thing.

Who happy?

Me happy.

Cartoon Planet, a personal favorite of mine, is being re-aired during Adult Swim. The series was a spin-off of Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and was geared towards a younger crowd but still maintained the surreality and goofiness of the original. Space Ghost hosted the show with his sidekicks/enemies Zorak and Brak. Of course, the show airs at 5:30 a.m., but hey, that's why God invented the DVR*, right? Cartoons from Bugs Bunny and Popeye and the like would be shown between segments featuring songs, poems, and other assorted nonsense from Space Ghost and his pals.

*Matthew 13:5: "And so it was in the town of Bethlehem the Angel Gabriel did descend from heaven with DVRs for all the people, for they had crops to tend to, but none could stand to miss the Lakers game, and were low of spirit."

When people talk about great animation, Canada rarely gets mentioned, which is a shame, because some truly wonderful and wonderfully odd animation has come from our pals up north. The National Film Board of Canada is celebrating its 65th year, and they've placed a whole bunch of animated shorts here for your viewing pleasure. One of my favorites, "The Big Snit" can be watched by clicking here. If memory serves, a lot of these shorts were played on The Movie Channel back when that channel still existed, and I believe more than a few of these were also part of Cartoon Network's short-lived O Canada, a tribute to Canadian animation.

[via Cartoon Brew]

(S02E05) Last night's episode of Wonder Showzen was incredibly surreal, even for Wonder Showzen. The show began with a science fair in which Sthugar reveals a propeller beanie powered by sadness, and Wordsworth creates a television which shows his dreams. Unfortunately, Wordsworth's deepest fears manifest themselves into an actual monster who escapes the TV and wreaks havoc on the town. Chauncey demands Wordsworth face his fear, but Wordsworth is too afraid. Therefore, Chauncey and Him use Him's shrink ray (which doesn't actually shrink an object but instead makes everything else bigger, giving the illusion of shrinkage) and journey into Wordsworth's brain in order to bypass his free will and make him fight the giant monster. The segments inside Wordsworth's brain included some great meta moments, especially when they find themselves inside his short term memory center and they become sensory echoes themselves, multiplying and repeating into infinity.

The New York Times has an interesting piece on the phenomenon of celebrities bestowing weird and unique names upon their children. My stance for the longest time was that giving your child names like "Pilot Inspektor" (Jason Lee's kid) or "Moxie CrimeFighter" (that's magician Penn Jillette's little girl) was essentially like turning your child into a walking billboard to advertise your own fertile imagination. However, I've had to lighten up on that stance recently, since this has become the new rule for baby naming these days, including my own family. Besides, I can't help but admit that "Moxie CrimeFighter" is a pretty awesome name.

Also, perhaps it's jealousy. My name is Adam, which I like just fine, but it lacks that certain je ne sais quoi. That's why I've teamed up with NASA scientists to devise a method of coming up with a suitable "Hollywood" name for yourself or your children, if you have any. Here's what to do: