Robot Chicken

Infobox Television
show_name = Robot Chicken


caption = The opening title for Robot Chicken.
format = Stop motion animation/Comedy
runtime = approx 11 minutes, approx.
23 minutes ("Star Wars" special)
creator = Seth Green Matthew Senreich
voices = Seth Green
Breckin Meyer
Chad Morgan
Tom Root
Dan Milano
Seth McFarlane
music = Les Claypool
country = USA
network = Adult Swim
first_aired = February 20 2005
last_aired = present
num_seasons = 3
num_episodes = 60
list_episodes = List of Robot Chicken episodes
imdb_id = 0437745
tv_com_id = 33630

"Robot Chicken" is an Emmy-Award Winning American stop motion animated television series created by Seth Green and Matthew Senreich, who are the executive producers. They are also on the writing team, and have directed some episodes. Green provides many voices for the show.

The program is a sketch comedy that parodies a number of pop culture conventions using stop motion animation of toys, action figures, dolls, and claymation (usually for special effects) and various other objects, such as tongue depressors and The Game of Life pegs. The show's name was inspired by a dish on the menu at a West Hollywood Chinese restaurant, Kung Pao Bistro, where Green and Senreich had dined, although the series originally was intended to be titled "Junk in the Trunk". [ [http://www.g4tv.com/screensavers/episodes/3902/Robot_Chicken_Constantine_Dark_Tip.html G4 - The Screen Savers - Robot Chicken, Constantine, Dark Tip ] ]

The show is produced by Stoopid Monkey, ShadowMachine Films, Williams Street, and Sony Pictures Digital, and currently airs in the US as a part of Cartoon Network's Adult Swim block, in the United Kingdom and Ireland as part of Bravo's Adult Swim block, in Canada on Teletoon's Detour block, in Australia on The Comedy Channel's Adult Swim block and in Latin America on the Cartoon Network's Adult Swim block. It premiered on Sunday, February 20, 2005.

The series was renewed for a 20-episode third season, which started on August 12, 2007 The season ended on September 28, 2008. It has been renewed for a forth season in 2009.

After an eight month hiatus, the show returned on August 31, 2008 to air the remaining 5 season three episodes beginning with Tubba-Bubba's Now Hubba-Hubba, which also aired as an April Fool's Day prank.

Inspirations

One recurring segment is "Hilarious Bloopers", a parody of the Bob Saget era of "America's Funniest Home Videos" featuring the host constantly moving around in various exaggerated, disjointed motions. Unlike that show, this skit ends with the host using various household methods of suicide.

The show tends to avoid political issues, instead mocking pop culture, referencing toys, films, television, and popular fads. When political figures are depicted on the program, the focus of their appearance is usually only tangentially-related to recent news, a parody of their personal foibles, or their positions in world affairs (such as Fidel Castro's "Dance Dance Counter-Revolucíon" video game competition from Season Two and President George W. Bush fantasizing about being a Jedi). One particular motive often involves the idea of fantastical characters being placed in a more realistic world or situation (such as Stretch Armstrong requiring a corn syrup transplant after losing his abilities due to aging, Optimus Prime performing a prostate cancer PSA, and Godzilla having problems in the bedroom). The program even had a 30 minute episode dedicated to "Star Wars" which premiered June 17, 2007 in the US featuring the voices of Star Wars notables George Lucas, Mark Hamill (from a previous episode), Billy Dee Williams, and Ahmed Best. (The Star Wars episode was nominated for a 2008 Emmy Award: Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour).)

The show's theme song was composed and performed by Les Claypool of Primus, and he sings the song's only lyrics, "It's alive!", in typical Frankenstein fashion. The ending theme of the show is actually not from Muzak but from a cut from a Capitol Hi-'Q' production music album entitled "The Gonk" (famously used in George A. Romero's 1978 horror film "Dawn of the Dead") clucked by a chorus of chickens, which are actually the crew members.

"Robot Chicken" is currently the highest rated original show on Adult Swim and the second highest on the network (second to "Family Guy"). [ [http://news.toonzone.net/article.php?ID=20353 Toon Zone - Your Source for Toon News! ] ]

Opening sequence

The opening sequence, which is the only part of the show that includes a robot chicken (with the exceptions of "The Black Cherry," the Christmas Special, and "Book of Corrine"), opens with a mad scientist finding a road-killed chicken. He takes it back to his laboratory and refashions it into a cyborg resembling Locutus of Borg, although Matt Senreich denies that this allusion was deliberate. The mad scientist then straps it into a chair, uses specula to hold its eyes open, and forces it to watch a bank of television monitors (an allusion to "A Clockwork Orange"); this scene segues into the body of the show. In the episode "1987", Michael Ian Black claims that this sequence tells the viewer that they are the Robot Chicken being forced to watch the skits (some viewers misheard it as the word shit).

In the "Star Wars Special", the opening is changed to mimic Anakin Skywalker's transformation into Darth Vader as depicted in "", with the mad scientist in the role of Darth Sidious and the chicken as Anakin/Vader.

Episodes

Cast

Out of Seth Green voicing himself and many of the characters for the show, major recurring actors/writers are:

* Alex Borstein
* Donald Faison
* Sarah Michelle Gellar
* Ginnifer Goodwin
* Jamie Kaler
* Mila Kunis
* Seth MacFarlane
* Breckin Meyer
* Dan Milano
* Chad Morgan
* Tom Root
* Adam Talbot
* Victor Yerrid

Celebrity guest stars

Among those celebrities that contributed to this show are:

* Candace Bailey * Robin Bain * Lance Bass * Abraham Benrubi * Ahmed Best * Wayne Brady * Michael Ian Black * Eugene Byrd * Bruce Campbell * Dean Cain * Robert Carradine * Linda Cardellini * Emma Caulfield * Michael Chiklis * Erika Christensen * Rachael Leigh Cook * Dave Coulier * Robert Culp * Macaulay Culkin * Alan Cumming * Dom DeLuise * Dustin Diamond * Phyllis Diller * Snoop Dogg * Dr. Drew * Clark Duke * Eden Espinosa * Chris Evans * Joey Fatone * Corey Feldman * Nathan Fillion * Peter Gallagher * Danny Goldman * Zachary Gordon * Mark-Paul Gosselaar * Topher Grace * Cee-Lo Green * Melanie Griffith * Corey Haim * Mark Hamill * Melissa Joan Hart * Dennis Haskins

* Ethan Hawke * David Hasselhoff * Jon Heder * Hugh Hefner * Mike Henry * Hulk Hogan * Michael Hogan * Kelly Hu * Gregory Itzin * Scarlett Johansson * Jimmy Kimmel * Don Knotts * Mila Kunis * Ashton Kutcher * Jordan Ladd * Phil LaMarr * Stan Lee * Matthew Lillard * Mario Lopez * George Lucas * Ludacris * Danny Masterson * Ming-Na * William Mapother * Malcolm McDowell * John C. McGinley * Joel McHale * Julian McMahon * Shane McRae * Sir Mix-a-Lot * Pat Morita * Conan O'Brien * Pat O'Brien * Masi Oka * Master P * Hayden Panettiere * Katelin Peterson * Roddy Piper * Freddie Prinze, Jr. * Zachary Quinto * Efren Ramirez * Marion Ramsey

* Burt Reynolds * Paul Rudd * Debra Jo Rupp * Katee Sackhoff * Ricky Schroeder * Ryan Seacrest * Dax Shepard * Kevin Shinick * Sarah Silverman * Gene Simmons * Nick Simmons * Amy Smart * Jean Smart * Robert Smigel * Danny Smith * Kurtwood Smith * Hal Sparks * Charlize Theron * Rory Thost * Stuart Townsend * Michelle Trachtenberg * Robin Tunney * Wilmer Valderrama * James Van Der Beek * Lark Voorhies * Patrick Warburton * Joss Whedon * Billy Dee Williams * Michael Winslow * Elijah Wood * Matthew Wood * "Weird Al" Yankovic

Many of these are people that Seth Green has worked with in the past on other projects or that he knows personally.Fact|date=August 2007 Williams Street executives Mike Lazzo and Keith Crofford have also lent their voices to the show on occasions revolving around season premieres.

Non-celebrity voice acting

Besides the celebrities above, many famous voice actors work on this series, including:
* Michael Benyaer
* Bob Bergen
* Jeannie Elias
* Bill Farmer
* Keith Ferguson
* Quinton Flynn
* Tom Kane
* George Lowe
* Roger L. Jackson
* Patrick Pinney
* Bill Ratner
* Susan Silo
* Dana Snyder
* Stephen Stanton
* Cree Summer
* Fred Tatasciore
* Frank Welker

Writing staff

Head writers

* Doug Goldstein
* Tom Root

Writers

*Hugh Davidson
*Jordan Allen-Dutton
*Mike Fasolo
*Seth Green
*Charles Horn
*Breckin Meyer
*Dan Milano
*Pat McCallum
*Harp Pekin
*Ben Schwartz
*Matthew Senreich
*Kevin Shinick
*Erik Weiner
*Zeb Wells

Stop-motion animators

*Melissa Goodwin *Joshua A. Jennings *Pete Levin *Ethan Marak *Kelly Mazurowski *Sarah E. Meyer *Michael Wolf *Cameron Baity *John Harvatine IV *Liz Harvatine *Martin Jimenez *Jeff Riley *Gabe Sprenger

*Matt Manning *Misha Klein *Eileen K. Kohlhepp *Joe Mello *Sihanouk Mariona *Thomas Smith *Alex Kamer *Scott Kravitz *Suzanne Twining *Musa Brooker *Thomas Truax *Vice McMahon

Awards

The show won an Emmy for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Animation in 2006 and 2007 and was a nominee for the 2007 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour) for the episode Lust for Puppets.

This is referenced in the episode "Slaughterhouse on the Prairie", when Seth Green claims that the episode was a minute short and spun the "Wheel of Ideas" to determine the ending of the show. The wheel's choices were "farts", "retards", "balls", and "ironic satire with clever subtext", and although it landed on the latter, the last minute consisted of "farting retards getting kicked in the balls". After this sequence, an intertitle identified the show as "Emmy award winning", while admitting that "The Emmy wasn't for writing". [ [http://tv.ign.com/articles/834/834424p1.html IGN: Slaughterhouse on the Prairie Review ] ]

The show was again nominated for Outstanding Animated Program in 2008 for the .

DVD releases

Outside references

On an episode of "Family Guy" entitled "Blue Harvest," at the end of the story Chris Griffin (not coincidentally voiced by "Robot Chicken" creator Seth Green) accused Peter (not coincidentally voiced by "Family Guy" creator Seth MacFarlane) of stealing the Star Wars special idea from the Robot Chicken Star Wars special. This sparks a discussion in which Peter himself denigrates and insults "Robot Chicken", and Chris calls him "a real jerk!" and runs out of the room quickly.

ee Also

*Sweet j presents

References

External links

* [http://www.adultswim.com/shows/robotchicken/index.html Robot Chicken Page on adultswim.com]
* [http://www.adultswim.com/video/index.html?section=Comedy&collectionID=8a25c3920ef15683010ef20fc9d2015d "Robot Chicken" collection on Adult Swim Video]
* [http://www.adultswim.co.uk/ AdultSwim.co.uk] - Adult Swim UK website.
* [http://www.robotchicken.org The "Robot Chicken" Wiki]
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* [http://www.dkworldwide.com/techlife/archives/2007/06/20/star-wars-robot-chicken-with-producer-commentary-extras-now-on-techlife-tv/trackback/ Chicago Newspaper review of Robot Chicken Star Wars including links to the Commentary Extras]
* [http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117933920.html?categoryid=32&cs=1 Robot Chicken - Star Wars Review] at "Variety.com"
* [http://www.kpbistro.com/menu.html LA Restaurant Kung Pao Bistro still features Robot Chicken on the menu.]