Review: SuperMansion ‘A Shop in the Dark’

 

Spoilers Below:

In a flashback, American Ranger broke out of Nazi custody with some help from his sidekick, Kid Victory.

In the present day, Titanium Rex informed Ranger that Kid Victory was just appointed Secretary of Defense, which could be a big help when it comes to the League’s budget. Ranger invited Victory over to the house, and he agreed to come the same night, alarming Rex, who suddenly had to throw together a dinner party. He tasked the League with getting supplies at the grocery store.

Complicating things, the traditional Ranger was put off by the fact that his former sidekick had come out as gay, Cooch was having an identity crisis, JewBot took a job at the store, Brad spent all the money to pay off a tiny bit of his gambling debts, and Black Saturn pointlessly pursued a now-reformed former rival of his.

In the end, Ranger accepted Victory for who he is, Cooch came through for Brad (with whom she had recently broken up), JewBot quit when he realized his wages & benefits were shit, and Saturn got his nemesis arrested – even though he didn’t do anything wrong. Or as Black Saturn put it: “I got my man, Brad’s out of debt, JewBot, Cooch, blah, blah, blah…”

However, they failed the grocery shopping part. Thankfully, the mobsters who came after Brad knew some people, and the dinner worked out just fine. Secretary Victory even promised funding to Rex, under the stipulation that he stops banging Ranger’s wife.

In Case You Missed It:

1) Of course Seth Green would voice Hitler.

2) Cooch: “$50 for wine? Why do you need 50 bottles of wine?” I’d like to know where these $1 bottles of wine are sold.

3) After not being allowed in the store, Cooch sadly pawed at the glass door.

4) Brad’s debt to the Italian mobsters totaled $50,000. At least.

5) Secretary Victory said using the jail’s bathroom was “the scariest dump I’ve taken since that party at Bryan Singer’s house.” Bryan Singer is the director accused multiple times of rape and sexual assault of minors. (It’s worth noting that all cases against him have since been dismissed.)

6) They’re really pushing the Mike’s Harder Lemonade. (Mike’s Harder Lemondade: Please pay me for this mention and the photo above.)

I mentioned last week (and got confirmation in my interview with the producers) that the jokes about Titanium Rex being old will soon get old themselves, and is not a sustainable source of humor. However, I didn’t mention anything about American Ranger, who is also stuck in the past, albeit because of a different situation. Ranger has made comments in the past that showed his ignorance of the current world – which were almost always funny – but the question is, could they do a whole episode using this trope?

They attempted it, and it was called “A Shop in the Dark.”

The short answer is no, this topic isn’t especially lucrative – and upon realizing the whole basis of the latest episode revolved around American Ranger’s discomfort with gays, I was slightly concerned. Thankfully, there was a B-story, which ended up fracturing off into several even smaller stories. Instead of being about Rex & Ranger trying to impress the current Secretary of Defense while the rest of the gang went shopping, we got some background on Brad, some direction with Cooch, some well-meaning but flawed plan of JewBot’s, and some not-so-well meaning and even more flawed plan of Black Saturn. Clearly the side plots weren’t very significant (see Saturn’s comment above), but they played a role and played it nicely.

In the end though, the installment had a bit too much happening at once, culminating with the Secretary letting Rex know that he’s aware of the ongoing affair with Ranger’s wife. I feel like only Ranger’s past & present relationship with Kid Victory got enough screen time, and as I mentioned before, that was the one story that could have stood to be briefer. In fact, the dinner party itself only occurred for a minute at the end, and even that was kind of thrown together.

Not to say that this was a bad episode, but it was easily the weakest thus far.

I will say, that if this is the worst SuperMansion can do, it will be one of the best current series in no time.