English Dub Review: Red Ketchup Season One Part One

The long-awaited animated incarnation of Canadian comic classic Red Ketchup has just completed its first onslaught of episodes, and those that survived all the way through the blood buffet are already hungry for another unsavoury serving of Red’s particular brand of no-holds-barred justice.

Red Ketchup is the second excellent offering we’ve received from Adult Swim Canada (ASC) this year. The northern offshoot of America’s favourited purveyor of adult animation may have lurked in the shadows for a spell before producing any original programming, but 2023’s impressive dual debut of fiery fringe-freak procedural Psi Cops paired with the zesty throwback brutality of Cold War kill-fest Red Ketchup shows us that sometimes ultra-violence really is a dish best served cold.

Set during the final days of the Cold War, Red Ketchup follows the saga of eponymous anti-hero Steve ‘Red’ Ketchup, an FBI agent with a rare strain of albinism. This lack of pigmentation makes Red Ketchup the second character on Adult Swim’s list of sharp dressed men with albinism who found their greatest professional success in the 1980s. We see you, Pete White.

Depending on how you look at it, Ketchup has either gone rogue in a world attempting to regain its sanity, or is the last true soldier in the war against Communism. He’s an agent with the self-assurance of Sterling Archer, the berserker strength of a naked Brock Sampson, and a drug addiction to rival Bojack Horseman, but make no mistake – Red Ketchup may bear similarities to some of adult animation’s finest anti-heroes, but this savage secret agent’s pill-fuelled antics pre-date all of those characters by two full decades. Created in 1983 by legendary comic duo Pierre Fournier and Réal Godbout as a foil for their character Michel Risqué, Red Ketchup quickly became a smash hit in the underground comics scene in Quebec, though, until now, he has remained almost entirely unknown in English-speaking Canada. Fournier and Godbout both consulted on the show, although Fournier passed away before the show began to air.

Brought to glorious two-dimensional life by Quebec’s Martin Villeneuve (director of the excellent film Mars et Avril) and the team at Sphere Animation, the show lets it’s roots in 80s alt-comics shine through, as obviously as the thickly inked hairlines of the principle cast. Even an uninitiated channel surfer in the midst of an aimless flip fest laying eyes on Red Ketchup for the first time would pick up on the show’s reverence for the era and aesthetics of its source material. The show also sticks pretty close to the source material, only toning it down when necessary (I don’t recall an episode where a corrupt drug lord bathes in a tub of teenage boy urine, but this show moves pretty fast, I may have missed it.)

We first meet our pale-skinned, red-eyed hero as he bludgeons a group of northern ninjas/bush plane pilots to death with a wrench. We know he’s one of the good guys because he flashes an FBI badge as he does it. Ketchup is declared dead after being blown-up during this altercation, but, as his ever-sceptical sister Sally insists, Red is never dead until he’s dead, and his funeral serves only to mark the beginning of his redoubled efforts to single-handedly stop Communism. And Nazis. And penguins. And the Pope. And he doesn’t care if he has to nuke the whole damn world in the process. He even battles a Nazi-led army of blue-eyed Red clones to stop the rise of the Fourth Reich, proving that blood may be thicker than water, but Ketchup is way thicker than blood. Equally red, though. Ketchup and the clone crew are perfectly voiced by Canadian Michael Kash, who nails Red’s gravelly tone and adds nuance to all the variant clones, from Pope Clone to kind-hearted lab aberration Willy.

To keep Ketchup safely out of the FBI’s way, they team him up with quasi-closeted, Canadian exchange spy Peter Plywood, a milquetoast human shield from the straight and narrow school of meddling. Plywood also serves to illustrate the negative effect drugs can have – taking just one of the pills Red gobbles by the fistful makes him vomit and pass out. Those pills are only good for genetically-altered ubermensch agents like Red, you hear?

Sass-mouthed sister Sally has seen it all, but still knows her way around the bedroom. She does her best to capture all the craziness on her camcorder for a documentary, while rival journalist/love interest Bill Bélisle rounds out their motley crew. While Ketchup remains fairly static in his pursuit of a more just world, his supporting cast go through romantic strife, professional development, and existential dread. Even the Russian spy who considers Red to be her romantic partner (he does not) is more than just a stereotype – she is more than willing to go all the way in her role as femme fatale (putting in a valiant sexual effort while Red just lies there), she takes great offence to her commanding officers recording the encounter without getting her express permission, a violation of trust that leads to her resignation as a Soviet spy.

While he may be singular in his goals, Red Ketchup is not an emotionless man acting without motivation. In its first episode, the show makes it clear that Ketchup is in no way the stereotypical “evil albino” seen in countless films, from The Eiger Sanction to The DaVinci Code. Through flashbacks, we learn that, as a child, Red’s albinism makes him the target of his brutally abusive father, the trauma of which he carries with him everywhere. As a teen runaway, Red enlisted in the Vietnam War, where he was an elite soldier that became a Nazi test subject. Returning home with a brain full of PTSD led to a job at the FBI breaking up drug cartels – hence the substance abuse issues. Whatever atrocities we watch Ketchup commit throughout the first half of the season, we know that we didn’t start with a communist sniffing psycho killer – we started with a normal little boy trying to keep life’s bullies from harming those who can’t defend themselves. He’s a product of a series of institutions approved of by society, and it is the defence of those institutions and society that are always top of mind for Red. Somewhere inside him is a savage integrity, twisted though it may be.

So if you’re a fan of crispy characters and intentionally cheesy curds of dialogue doused in the steaming gravy of satirical violence, give Red Ketchup a try before it returns for the back half of its bloody, state-sanctioned rampage of a first season. It’s a tasty combination worth burning your mouth over. And remember: Red Ketchup ne rate jamais son homme!