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David Lynch is one of the great directors currently operating, as at home with mind-bending headf**ks like Eraserhead and Mulholland Dr. as he is with more family friendly fare like The Straight Story.  When not working on feature films, he spends a lot of time on projects for his website which he updates frequently.

Like Rabbits (which was used in Inland Empire) this is also an 8-part series that, like much of Lynch’s surreal work, mocks the absurdity of suburbia.  Dumbland revolves around the life of a foul-mouthed boor of a man, his uptight screaming wife and excruciatingly irritating child, an androgynous creation that resembles an alien stereotype.   

The man, Randy, is a violent and short-tempered person who doesn’t think twice about punching someone or doing them extreme harm.  He is surrounded by idiots and immensely strange and annoying individuals who only seem to exist to antagonise him.  During the eight episodes, he confronts his next door neighbour who confesses to being a “one-armed duckf**ker”, declares war on his wife’s treadmill, is examined by a doctor, is visited by a friend (who turns out to be very odd), encounters another neighbour who has a stick stuck in his mouth, has problems with bleeding teeth, is driven to distraction when Uncle Bob comes to visit and is hit with an infestation of ants.   

Episode list:
1. The Neighbor
2. The Treadmill
3. The Doctor
4. A Friend Visits
5. Get The Stick
6. My Teeth Are Bleeding
7. Uncle Bob
8. Ants 

Being a David Lynch project, this is very dark, very weird and only funny if you have a warped sense of humour.  He describes it as "a crude, stupid, violent and absurd series" and he’s absolutely spot-on!  I watched it in one sitting and it started to get on my nerves near the end but perhaps that’s the point – I really should have taken a break half-way through and watched the rest the next day but I was oddly drawn in!  

It’s not the most accomplished on animated series and only runs for 35 minutes so only devoted David Lynch fans should check it out.

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The Disc

The Picture
This has the same style as Lynch’s comic strip ‘The Angriest Dog In The World’ as it is very crudely drawn and with limited animation – some scenes are just still but with the lines moving slightly to illustrate tension or anger so it is basically a flash animation.  The character designs are perfect as they show their personalities without them having to utter a word.  

The Sound
This only has a DD Mono soundtrack which is fine for the dialogue but tends to be a bit busy in the more violent and heavily scored scenes.   It conveys the violence and irritants in Randy’s world perfectly.  

 

Final Thoughts
This isn’t a perfect animation series and is only going to be for the most ardent of Lynch fans; I count myself as a fan of his work but didn’t think that this was the best thing he had ever done.  I enjoyed it, laughed and thought it fits in well with his other material which looks at the dark side of suburbia (Blue Velvet being the obvious example) and will undoubtedly watch it again. Though it delves behind the white picket fence, it just isn’t as funny as it should be and the wonderfully bleak and dark BBC late night animated show Monkey Dust did the job better.   

It had been released in the US and makes its UK debut on DVD here.  Scanbox Entertainment have been a bit ambitious with the RRP, £15.99 for a vanilla disc containing only 35 minutes of material seems steep to say the least.  Unless you’ve already seen this and can’t wait to own it, a rental is the way to go.

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