Sealab 2021 Season One

Madman Entertainment / M / 2 disc set / 150 minutes / region 4

Adult Swim is the Cartoon Network’s none too serious adult animation strand, featuring quite often spot on and better than the original pastiche series of shows from the sixties and seventies. Happily for us Madman are now releasing them on DVD.

Sealab 2021 is a sure fire classic, hilarious and great fun. A send up of the 1972 show Sealab 2020 by Adam Reed and Matt Thompson who are clearly very familiar with the original series. In the far off future of 2021 Captain Murphy is in charge of the underwater research station Sealab and along with his crew Marco, Debbie, Stormy, Doctor Quinn and Dolphin Boy (sounds like an early line up of Adam and the Ants) manages to get involved with aliens, giant squids or starting a pirate radio station!

Purposely campy and often quite basic in terms of animation Sealab was one of the first of the Adult Swim shows and is one of the most enjoyable, this two disc set features all 13 episodes from the first season and has a lovely touch of quality about it, right down to the groovy retro packaging.

File under Treat.

Extras are good and include the original Pitch Pilot, an alternate ending for I Robot, an uncensored Radio Free Sealab and deleted scenes from Little Orphan Angry.