A Much Weaker Version of the Radio Show
Click and Clack are two guys that love humor, and love to laugh; you’ll figure that out very quickly if you listen to their radio show or watch this cartoon. However, it’s not like most morning weekday talk shows that are really irritating, where two or more people get together and laugh about all kinds of stupid stuff. With Cartalk, there’s a point to show, and it can be educational if you listen to the problem and their solution, because while they’ll kid around a lot, the Tappets are often dispensing correct and potentially useful information. Not to mention the weekly Puzzlers are always interesting. Furthermore, their humor is enjoyable too, because it’s good clean family humor, and they’ll make fun of themselves as much as anything.
With the animated TV show, it’s more about goofing around than providing useful information, and the humor is slightly less off color. That said, it’s worth noting that radio crew members like Doug Berman and Howard Grossman team up as co-creators, and Doug is also the head writer for all the episodes. Each episode stars Click and Clack as they do everything they can to avoid their jobs as on air personalities. For the most part, the humor is a lot like what you would hear on the radio show, right down to the signature voices and laughter of Click and Clack.
I figure the most efficient way to lay out what’s on this release is to provide brief episode summaries of all ten episodes, so here they are:
Episode 01 – Campaign – In this episode, Click and Clack decide to put off work and suddenly run for president.
Episode 02 – Outsourcing – The brothers decide to outsource the show to India, so they have more time for vacations and goofing off.
Episode 03 – Boston Blackout – Stash, one of the character’s on the show, invents the ‘Wallet Vac’ but it requires too much power and causes a blackout in the city of Boston.
Episode 04 – Pasta Wars – Pasta, as an alternate fuel source. The brothers invent a new car that’s powered by pasta instead of fuel, and it’s immensely successful.
Episode 05 – Gigantic Motors – When Click and Clack lose their biggest sponsor, they reluctantly take jobs promoting an automaker’s gas guzzling vehicle.
Episode 06 – Fidel vs. Zuzu – Fidel, an employee on the show, quits after an unreliable news source says that the dog, Zuzu, is better at discovering car problems than he is.
Episode 07 – Abercrombie And Wrench – Click and Clack resort to their days in the disco era to combat a new mechanic shop in town with good-looking mechanics.
Episode 08 – Pocket Full of Motor Oil – Crusty’s niece comes to visit him under the presumption that he’s still teaching at Harvard.
Episode 09 – Gotcha! – The brothers fail to take a potential sponsor’s visit seriously, and instead joke around and goof off.
Episode 10 – Casino – A radio caller from Newfoundland tells Click and Clak that he’s found evidence to one of their ancestors. The brothers take this too far and think they’re Native Americans, and decide to turn their mechanic shop into a casino.
As the DVD doesn’t have any extras, this is the full content of these two discs. Total you’ll get about 300 minutes, as each episode is about twenty-seven minutes long. The shows don’t really connect, as in there isn’t much of a common thread from episode to episode, but these are still fairly enjoyable, just not as much as the radio show. The animation quality is fine, and the sounds are alright, but the additional characters aren’t interesting.
In a nutshell, that’s what you’ll find on this two disc DVD set; it’s an okay show, but take my advice and listen to the radio show – it’s much better and free.
