DVD Wishlist: TV Funhouse

Robert Smigel is a crazy, filthy-minded, genius. He first made his mark as a writer on Saturday Night Live in 1985, and remained there until becoming the first head writer on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. While on Conan, he performed in a few comedy bits frequently, as the voice behind Syncro-Voxed celebrities, but most notably as Triumph the Insult Comic Dog. He later returned to SNL, creating short cartoons under the title TV Funhouse. The success of those shorts lead Comedy Central to greenlight an original half hour series for Smigel, also called TV Funhouse, which would combine live action pieces, animated shorts, and Triumph-style animal puppets. The series was insane, vulgar, and absolutely hilarious.

The show was centered around the idea of a fake children's show. Each episode had a theme (Caveman Day, Hawaiian Day), and Doug, the host, would arrive an an appropriate costume, excited to have a fun show with his friends, the AniPals. But the AniPals, a group of Triumph-like animal puppets, had very adult interests (gambling, cock fights, sex) which always resulted in them ditching Doug's show for something more fun. Each episode bounced around between Doug parodying children's show activities, introducing cartoons, pieces mocking educational films, and the AniPals' adventures.

Despite being given a prime timeslot after South Park, the show lasted only eight episodes. Cable ratings are hard to come by, so I'm not sure if it was poor ratings or the show's more controversial elements (a sketch called "Porn for Kids" got them into some trouble, though it was not nearly as offensive as the title makes it sound) that lead to the cancellation, but I'd like to see it on DVD, and I'm sure I'm not alone. Though Saturday Night Live has released a DVD of their TV Funhouse shorts, to my knowledge there are no plans of any kind for the Comedy Central series.

Click below for a whole bunch of TV Funhouse clips:

Wonderman 1:


Wonderman 2:


Sted-man!:


A new Scooby-Doo cartoon:


Mnemonics: