Venture Bros: Eenie, Meeney, Miney…Magic!

Ah, yes.  The appearance of Dr. Orpheus.  My first time seeing this.

As someone who has worked closely with Mr. Steven Rattazzi over a few million shows, Dr. Orpheus is especially funny, as his declamatory style is only a slight exaggeration of what Steven is capable of once he gets a good heat under him.  But without the spittle.

Dr. Orpheus makes a terrific counterpart to Rusty, in that they are both single parents stuck between a real and an imaginary world, but that Orpheus has somehow figured out a way to live the dream (much to his daughter’s mortification) and Rusty just feels tied down and constricted by his parental duties (which he tends to utterly ignore).

I love Hank and Dean’s pajamas, for two reasons.

1. Hank is nominally the more “grown up” twin, but he’s the one in the Aquaman jammies, whereas Dean gets the way-cooler Spider-Man jammies (which exactly match a set that my 5-year-old son has).

2. They don’t change out of them until way past noon.

In a way, the whole show is about this clash between the real world and the imaginary world we were promised as children by these fantasy shows.  Every ten-year-old boy wants to be James Bond at some point, thinking that that’s what a “real man” must be like, and we continue to carry these fantasies around our in heads at some level even as adults, but Venture Bros. actually addresses the question of “well, what if James Bond (or Johnny Quest, or what have you) really existed?”

There was one single, solitary moment in Goldeneye that addressed this, and for a brief instant James Bond became an interesting person.  Somebody says to Bond, in effect, “Look at you, you’re a miserable human being.  You kill people for a living and you can’t sustain a relationship.  The only things you know how to do is destroy things and fuck,” and you realize that Bond really is the sick fantasy of an adolescent mind.  He feels no love and no compassion.  He’s a monster.  Whereas the most indelible moments of The Venture Bros. are those when real emotions and responsibilities intrude on the absurd adventures, whether it’s Brock Samson taking time to help Hank with his coin-catching game or Dr. Orpheus leaving a message for his daughter to not eat more than one pudding cup.  The Bond fantasy of constant movement and no responsibilities (I can’t think of a better example of “no responsibilities” than a literal “license to kill”) butts up against the common, everyday ties to those we care about.