Review: The Cyanide& Happiness Show “Yo-Ho-Ho and a Nautical Bum”

OVERVIEW

The complicated history between The Captain and The Buttshark is finally revealed.

OUR TAKE

Cyanide & Happiness returns from a two year break for its first full season funded by VRV and this is the first of the ones I’ve seen so far that focused on a single storyline for an entire episode, since the others would jump around multiple plots based around a connecting theme. And, likely to its benefit, the show begins its new season by revisiting a recurring character. The Captain and Buttshark sketches are not this show’s best, but it’s interesting that we’re exploring these two characters develop their relationship from being bitter rivals to fast friends, including introducing a foil to The Captain in the form of The Admiral to show how far he’s come. And it doesn’t hurt that The Admiral is voiced by legendary anime voice actor Chris Sabat, I don’t think I’ve heard in much western stuff besides RWBY. Also for the longest time I thought The Captain was voiced by Travis Willingham, but it turns out that’s not the case.

I wonder if this single story format will be the new style for this show’s proper tenure under VRV. I wouldn’t necessarily mind that, but I probably enjoyed it more when there were other plots overlapping that came together at the end. My biggest issue with the first season was that simple jokes ended up going on way too long, and while this doesn’t seem to be repeating that quite yet, it does feel almost a bit too involved with the story and not the comedy. Then again, comedy is probably the most subjective thing in the world, and it all comes down to whether a joke landed for someone or it didn’t. For this first episode, I would say this worked fine, but we’ll see how I feel moving forward with the remaining nine episodes.