Since it first debuted in 1990, Spike & Mike's Sick & Twisted Festival of Animation has been a showcase for cutting edge animation. This traveling film festival that plays in 50 cities a year has previously showcased the works of such talented creators as Tim Burton, John Lasseter, Nick Park, and Bill Plympton. The festival was also the birthplace of Beavis and Butthead and it premiered Spirit of Christmas, the original South Park short by Matt Stone and Trey Parker. With their latest DVD release, Spike and Mike present 18 more adult cartoons. Some are funny, some are just gross, but they all are shorts that you won't see anyplace else.

The 18 shorts on this disc run a total of just under an hour. They are all really brief with the longest of them running 8 or 9 minutes, and in some of the shortest the credits were longer than the actual cartoon.

Like any compilation, this was a mixed batch. All of the shorts were trying to be funny, but only a few actually brought forth any laughs. I kept on thinking that these were aimed at drunk teenagers more than anything else. There were a lot of low-brow jokes, which I usually don't mind, but these just didn't tickle my funny bone.

Some of the cartoons were not funny and just seemed pointless: The little girl beating a monkey and causing its death in Stinky Monkey is a good example. Several had juvenile jokes that just weren't funny, like Love that Pussy, where an old lady talks about petting her cat. "I love petting my nice warm pussy." It's an okay joke, but they just repeat that same gag over and over.

There were some truly funny short in this compilation. Refrigerator Art: My Family, was a hysterical look at a dysfunctional family through the eyes of their young son. I also loved the Schoolhouse Rock inspired My First Boner, complete with a catchy song.

I also really like the stop motion animation in Le Trésor Du Têtard Salé, a French short about a pirate searching for sunken treasure, and having to deal with a rather large shark. Another fun show was the Itchy and Scratchy inspired Happy Tree Friends: Milkin' It where two racoons steal a cow with very bloody results.

The highlight of the show was the concluding short, Here Comes Dr. Tran. This comic masterpiece is a trailer for the newest Dr. Tran movie, but the narrator of the trailer and the star of the movie don't see eye to eye. "Dr. Tran: with a Ph.D. in kicking your ass."

The following shorts are included in this volume:

Spike & Mike Intro - Mighty Fudge
Refrigerator Art: My Family - Michael Dougherty
Quack Off – Justin Wright
Hippie Juice - Chris Crossland & Ryan Reznick
The Legend of Raggot - Sean Scott
Grimm's Humpty Dumpty - Ryan MontrucchioBeat The Brat - Mad Dog Films
Rip Wack - Josh Prikeyl
Stinky Monkey - David Lipson
Pornoless - Martin Georgiev
Proper Urinal Etiquette - Kurt Nellis
Schindler's Fist - Robert Clark & Dave Zbringer
Love That Pussy - DNA Studio
Le Trésor Du Têtard Salé (Treasure of the Salted Tadpole) - La Poudrière
Happy Tree Friends: Milkin' It - Mondo Media
Boris The Dog - Mad Dog Films
My First Boner - Patrick C. Mallek/Might Fudge Studios
Rez-erection - Peter Kim
Here Comes Dr. Tran - Breehn Burns
Spike & Mike Exit - Mighty Fudge

Audio:

The stereo soundtrack varied a little from short to short, but generally sounded alright. Ironically, the intro was the worst sounding animation in the lot. It was 'boomy' sounding and distorted a little. Most of the shorts were a little on the tinny side, but not irritatingly so. There are no subtitles.

Video:

The full frame video varied in quality. Some of the animations were clearly budget operations and the quality suffered on those through no fault of the publisher. Rez-erection was trying to go for an old movie look, but it had an annoying amount of aliasing, which may have been intentional. Overall the shorts looked acceptable.

Extras:

There is a 13 minute documentary on the making of Here Comes Dr. Tran which is interesting, but a little too long. It seems really padded.

Final Thoughts:

This was really a mixed bag. A few of the shorts were really funny, but the were outnumbered by the lame and stupid shows. The disc also doesn't have a lot of replay value in my book. While I can't recommend running out and buying it, it would make a nice rental, especially for Here Comes Dr. Tran.