Since its invention, television led to a lot of surprises. People watched Lee Harvey Oswald get murdered by Jack Ruby live on TV. Then, they saw the Challenger space shuttle explode with confusion and shock. The infamous Max Headroom signal hacking happened on Chicago stations WGN and WTTW in 1987 and there’s still no idea of who or what group was behind it.
I watched Michael Jackson pretty much rub his crotch a lot as he smashed a car at the end of his “Black or White” music video aired on Fox in 1991. Then, I saw President Bill Clinton’s famous, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” statement which came on as I was watching The Price is Right my first year in college. There was the second plane hitting the second tower of the World Trade Center that most people watching will never forget.
But as streaming and DVR became more and more prominent, it was getting harder to surprise people. I was watching a CSI: Miami on a Sunday night when President Barack Obama had said Osama bin Laden had been killed. Of course, I was watching it as I had recorded it an hour earlier. So, I was just looked at my social media when I saw the news.
Yes, we learn more from social media than actual media, which is both good and very, very bad. So, it left people to wonder exactly what was going on at 4 a.m. Eastern Standard Time on Oct. 28, 2014 when Too Many Cooks aired during Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim Infomericals block.
The short which clocks in at 11 minutes and 12 seconds with credits is intended as a parody of opening title sequences of TV shows from the latter quarter of the 20th Century. Then, it suddenly turns into a slasher as a killer played by character actor William Tokarsky begins killing random people with a machete.
Then, it moves into the absurd as we see an animatronic cat puppet named Smarf battle the killer. Smarf looks similar to Cap’n O.G. Readmore, who would host the Saturday morning anthology series ABC Weekend Specials. I’m sure it wasn’t a coincidence. The entire short seems to have elements of opening sequences from family sitcoms like Full House, Roseanne and Family Matters as well as cop dramas like T.J. Hooker and prime time soap operas Dallas, Dynasty and Falcon Crest.
It’s outrageous. Casper Kelly conceived the idea, wrote (along with Jim Fortier and Nick Gibbons) and directed it over three days in October of 2013 in the Atlanta metro area filming it. It took about an year in post-production to be completed. All of the actors featured used their real names. Katie Adkins who plays one of the killer’s victims said there wasn’t really a script as they were directed by Kelly on what to do. Aside from the variations of the title song, “Too Many Cooks,” playing on the soundtrack, there’s not much dialogue.
The short would become a viral sensation that for the week of Nov. 11, 2014, it was rebroadcasted at midnight each night. Seeing it for the first time, I wondered what the hell it was. I saw it online so I already knew long it was. But I wondered what people watch it for the first time in the early morning hours felt.
Adult Swim has always catered to the viewers who like cartoons but also have a more mature mindset, even though a lot of programming, such as Robot Chicken and Rick and Morty, seemed to offer sophomoric irreverent humor. Adult Swim did help revive Family Guy in the early 2000s after it was canceled by Fox after three seasons.
What people fail to realize is that the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shows which have aired on Cartoon Network were intended with jokes toward adults mostly in their parodies of celebrities of the era. And they were often breaking the fourth wall before Mel Brooks made it so popular.
Too Many Cooks would have a number of celebrities (Simon Pegg, Penn Jillette and Zack Braff) praising it on social media. Filmmaker Rian Johnson suggested it should be nominated for an Oscar in the Best Live Action Short Film category, even though it would be ineligible since it aired on TV. The Primetime Emmys didn’t bother to recognize it with a nomination.
But it remains popular today with the catching tune and its postmodern, metafictional feel. However, most of the 67 actors who are in the short with the exception of Lars Von Trier as a pie, have yet to find much mainstream success even though they imdb.com lists they have numerous credits. Tokarsky has probably been the most famous one as he was in Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle and Brothers.
Still, if you’re known for one popular body of work, you’ve achieved more than others.
What do you think? Please comment.
Zane Says 