Whyboy Spotlights… Munroe (Season 1)

Have you ever wanted a much cheaper looking version of Archer? Congrats, Shut Up! Cartoons has you covered with Munroe. Munroe is the tale of the oddly skin color changing secret agent Munroe and his never-ending fight against the evil Shadow Snake, using everything in his arsenal to save the day, including monotone acting, guns and his generally jerky attitude. But let’s get down to business with my thoughts on the show, Munroe is what I would call a “high show.” In the same stream as 12 Oz. Mouse and arguably Squidbillies, Munroe’s writings comes off as calm yet surreal making watching it almost like you’re on the most calming high ever.

The characters also give off this vibe, as each character from Munroe to Suicide Watch stay at a monotone level of acting, only emphasizing when the plot or the surreal humor calls for it. Again this monotone style helps strengthen the calming nature of the show and made the joke and delivery very funny. While I didn’t find the show to be laugh out loud hilarious, it was enjoyable enough to watch the entire 10-episode season in one sitting.

The most interesting part of Munroe is its animation. The creator of the show is Brian Wysol and you can check out his channel here, but a long story short Munroe is based on his 2007 short. In fact the short was remade and became episode one of the series. His style of comedy and animation (featured on his youtube channel) has been that same brand of surrealist humor coupled with very stiff animation that is spotlighted in Munroe and it really works. In any other show I would say the animation looked completely cheap but the stiff animation in Munroe, with it’s bright colors, awkward motions, coupled with the humor and atmosphere, makes the animation very interesting to watch. And in some instances makes me think I just dropped acid.

And despite the show being a “high show” it actually does follow a serial narrative structure, and while it does so to poke fun at the cliches of spy movies the story is actually very intriguing to e and makes me want to see what happens next. With Season 1 here and gone I can say I am looking forward to a season 2 if one comes around. I don’t want to say I’d recommend this to everyone because these “high shows” have a very specific taste to them. For me it’s a solid enough show with surreal humour and animation and I’ll be waiting to see if Munroe will come back to save the day in Season 2.