The Series:

For those who haven't caught the first two seasons of this fantastic Adult Swim show, The Venture Brothers is a twisted and completely subversive take off on old adventure cartoons like Johnny Quest and boys mystery novels like The Hardy Boys with a dash of James Bond thrown in for good measure. The series revolves around one Dr. Thaddius 'Rusty' Venture, a middle aged man with two twin sons, Hank and Dean, who are socially rather inept and awkward teenagers. Venture has to live in the shadow of his father, who was a massively successful scientist and adventurer in his own right. Since his father has passed on, Rusty, being his only son, is the head honcho of Venture Industries and he now spends most of his time trying to come up with new inventions and adventures to get some recognition of his own, most of which tend to fail rather dismally.

Hank and Dean are nice enough kids but they're not the sharpest tools in the shed. More often than not they prove to be a thorn in their father's side as they're extremely naïve and very lacking in the common sense department. Good thing for Dr. Venture that his body guard, Brock Samson, is around to help keep the boys in line. Brock is a massive hulk of a man, a golden mullet sits atop his head and a knife is always at his side. He's far more likely to stab first and ask questions later as he seems to truly enjoy solving his problems with violence. In Dr. Venture's line of work, Brock is a handy guy to have around, especially since he's constantly plagued by his arch-enemy The Monarch, an obsessive super villain who dresses like a giant butterfly and who controls an army of dim-witted henchmen. Working alongside The Monarch is his former assistant and now wife, Dr. Girlfriend, a foxy woman with a low husky voice, who seems to put up with him more than she actually covets him.

Each episode finds the Venture team in some sort of peril, be it super villain related or otherwise, and the cast of supporting characters (including the Venture's neighbor Dr. Orpheus and his hot but underage goth girl daughter, Triana, and Venture allies like the gay albino Pete White or the midget with a giant head and a lisp named Dr. Billy Quizboy), keep things interesting. The show has a real knack for pushing the envelope in terms of content and it's not uncommon to see Brock covered in blood or in bed with a woman and going at it like a jackhammer - this isn't kids stuff even if it might look like it on the outside.

This third season expands on the lives of the characters we meet in the first two seasons quite nicely. This time around we learn the origins of the Monarch, how he wound up with Dr. Girlfriend and the truth behind her past with The Phantom Limb. We learn how the Limb got his powers, how Billy Quizboy ties into his origin, and we meet one of Rusty's childhood friends, an epileptic lesbian scientist named Dr. Quymn. When the season starts, The Monarch and his crew are inducted into the Guild of Calamitous Intent and given fully sanctioned super villain status. There's only one catch, The Monarch has promised that he'll stop 'arching' Dr. Venture as he's obviously unhealthily obsessed with the man. Much to Dr. Girlfriend's delight, she and the Monarch move into the suburbs and take residence in a lovely ranch style home with plenty of room for the giant flying cocoon out in the backyard. Life is good - or so it seems.

Venture's new arch is Sgt. Hatred, a burly ex-military type with a flying tank and a court order preventing him from getting within a hundred feet of any minor. He's not found of the Monarch at all and to get to him, he plays nicely with Venture, calling ahead and scheduling his attacks and making sure not to hurt anyone. When he shows up to attack during Dr. Venture's first ever day camp for boys, he's careful not to hurt any of the kids even though Brock slaughters a few of his men. Later on in the season, Hank makes friends with a tough kid named Dermott who may or may not be Brock Sampson's illegitimate son and both he and brother Dean meet up with a pair of identical twin girls while dad's off trying to rekindle things with Dr. Quymn in the middle of the jungle while a Wereodile runs rampant and causes trouble.

Towards the end of the season, Rusty's half brother, Jonas (or JJ), who bases himself out of the ultra cool Spiderskull Island, opens 'Jonas Venture Jr.'s Museum of Jonas Venture' and invites all of his dad's old teammates and enemies to the island for the grand opening party. Hilarity ensues and the season, like the ones that came before it, ends with a bang.

The thirteen episodes on that make up this third season are as follows:

Shadowman 9: In the Cradle of Destiny
The Doctor is Sin
The Invisible Hand of Fate
Home Is Where the Hate Is
The Buddy System Dr. Quymn, Medicine Woman
What Goes Down, Must Come Up
Murder O'Clock
Now Museum, Now You Don't
The Lepidopterists
Orb
The Family That Stays Together...Part 1
The Family That Stays Together...Part 2

It's pretty amazing how many pop culture parodies and references this show manages to pack into any given episode. This season the show pays tribute to Hunter S. Thompson, Jim Sterenko era Nick Fury comics, Ant Man, the homoeroticism of G.I. Joe, Prodigy videos, Tomb Raider, Blade, Blackula, Doctor Strange, Sean Connery era James Bond movies, William S. Burroughs, The Fantastic Four, The Defenders, Pirates of the Caribbean, Johnny Quest, Nancy Drew, and many others. The humor in the show is multi-layered and not always obvious, making it hard to explain to those who haven't seen it but the heavier your knowledge of old cartoons and comic books the more you'll likely get out of it. That said, there's plenty here to appeal to those less pop culturally inclined as well, including some hilarious sight gags, and clever situational comedy. It's all wrapped up in a fantastic animated style that pays tribute to the cartoons of the sixties but simultaneously carves out its own visual niche.

A lot more attention this season is paid to some of the supporting characters as well. Various members of the Guild are fleshed out nicely, as are Quizboy and Pete. The Monarch and Dr. Girlfriend are given nicely rounded out back stories that put more meat on their bones and we even get to know some of the henchmen a little better. If this season has one flaw, it's that it's not the most accessible batch of cartoons. Those who haven't seen the seasons prior may find themselves lost and wondering what's going on or why this material is funny. While that makes it a little harder to get into for the uninitiated, on the flip side it makes the series far more rewarding for those who have been paying attention since 2004 as the in-jokes really start to pay off this time around.

Those who have only seen these episodes in their broadcast versions my be surprised to notice that the content in this set is presented completely uncut, with F-bombs and full frontal male nudity galore.

The Video:

Team Venture and its rogues gallery have never looked better than they do on this 50GB Blu-ray disc, presented for your enjoyment in 1080p VC-1 encoded 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen. The biggest difference you'll notice between this set and the SD release is in the colors, which are much bolder and more pronounced here. Black levels are rich and inky, never breaking up, while detail is as good as it can really get given the show's animation style. There are a few scenes where the fine line art looks a little stair-stepped but no problems with noticeable edge enhancement or heavy compression artifacts even if some minor ones do pop up in a couple of scenes. That's a minor complaint, however, as generally the image quality on this release is nice and strong.

The Audio:

English language Dolby TrueHD 5.1 and Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound options are supplied with optional subtitles available in English SDH only. Where you'll notice the difference between the two tracks is in the clarity of the score and the music used throughout the episodes. The TrueHD track has stronger and richer bass and better defined directional effects. Regardless, both tracks sound very good here, with nicely balanced levels, clear dialogue, and not a single problem with even a trace of hiss or distortion. It is worth noting that the Dolby Digital 5.1 track came up by default when this disc started playing. You can access the TrueHD track via the setup menu or simply switching tracks using the audio button on your remote control.

The Extras:

The biggest and best of the supplements for this release is the batch of thirteen commentary tracks, one for each episode in the set, recorded by the series' two prime creative forces, Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer. These commentary tracks are great because, like the show, they're quick witted and all over the place. The pair talk about various influences on the show, little pop culture oddities that worked their way into the series, the score, the voice work and the animation but they also tend to get sidetracked pretty easily and go off on various tangents. This would be a problem if their tangents were dull, but they're not, so listening to the pair as they discuss politics winds up being genuinely enjoyable. There's as much humor in these tracks as there is in the series itself, and fans of the show really owe it to themselves to give these a spin.

There's also a wealth of deleted scenes included here, all of which are presented in rough form, they're basically storyboards with dialogue, not proper finished animation. Most of the twelve excised bits in this assortment are inconsequential, though rather funny and worth checking out.

If that weren't enough, there's also a bonus CD contained inside the awesome retro video game packaging entitled The Music Of JG Thirwell that contains the following tracks:

Brock Graveside / Tuff / Tenssacts / 13 BigMan / Boys As Transformers / Node Wrestling / Thunder-Bro / Damion / Assclamp! / Mississippi Noir / Spag / Bolly / Gawker / Descension / Warped Carousel / Sexy Sultry / In A Spaceage Mood / X1 Krashi / Woozy / Warped Span / Fumblestealth / VB Theme

Overall:

Great audio and video quality and a rock solid selection of extra features and a bonus soundtrack CD make a great thing even better. The Venture Bros. might not be comedy for the masses but those who get it truly appreciate it if and if you fall into that group, then you need this. Those who aren't familiar with the series will want to start with the earlier seasons to avoid continuity lags, but this set really is great and comes highly recommended.

Ian lives in NYC with his wife where he writes for DVD Talk, runs Rock! Shock! Pop!. He likes NYC a lot, even if it is expensive and loud.