Strangers With Candy: one of the most offensive shows I've ever seen...and I love every bit of it. From "pin the tail on the retard" to the school's principal: Mr. Blackman (who just happens to be black), there wasn't a minute that I wasn't laughing while watching this set of episodes. I'm sure you know what the show's about by now: Jerri Blank, a 46 year old high school freshman. Her dad is stuck in one position every time he's shown, and seemingly never talks. Her mom couldn't care less about her, and her brother is a total frumpy jock loser. This family is hilarious, and it's a shame the show's ended after just 3 seasons. They're even more messed up than the Bundy's in Married With Children.
In the first episode, Jerri makes drugs for a girl just to gain popularity after nobody is interested in coming to her party. She ends up overdosing, and trying to cram herself head-first through a key hole. During her funeral at the school, when Principal Blackman is going on about how the culprit that gave her the drugs must be feeling horrible, Jerri stands up and screams, "I'VE GOT SOMETHING TO SAY". Her message...is that she's throwing a party at her house for the girl. So Jerri finally gains temporary popularity in the end. In another episode, the drama class gets to do a play of Raisin in the Sun, which is a book/play about black people. Well, the first two people that get parts are Susan Cream and Craig Snow. Then, beating out someone perfect for the lead role, is Jerri. All the other students (and again, they're all black) get to play trees. I swear, I laughed at that one bit for at least 10 minutes. And it only took about 2 minutes to do that scene.
As you can see, the producers show no mercy, and everything is a target. Even "violent kids" are thrown in, left in padded rooms (the commentary about that episode is very strange). And yes, even babies show up. Jerri has to take care of a 10 pound baby for health class in order to learn a lesson. She ends up getting sick of him, and leaving it in the park in order to go "throw rocks at the Indian". It'll make sense once you watch the show. If you've seen the movie Bubble Boy, take that and make it 1.5 times worse as far as offending things go and that's what you get here with Strangers With Candy.
The only reason I'm not giving this dvd 5 stars (though it deserves it for how great the show is) is because of the lack of special features. We get 4 commentary tracks and then 2 Comedy Central shorts of South Park and Crank Yankers. That's it. The commentary tracks are ok, but there are too many long periods of silence. And the stars (Amy, Stephen and Paul) more or less just watch the show with you and laugh at things as it goes along. They had fun though, which was cool. They mention how the school the show was shot in was a real school that was going to be torn down, and they could do whatever they want with it. One room had padding on the walls, and nothing else, which was very strange. I would've loved to have seen some interviews with the cast (especially the dad) and what they thought when they first read the scripts. The audio quality isn't that great either...it's just barely better than how it was shown on tv.
I'm still glad I picked this up though. After seeing these 10 episodes, I can only imagine what they make fun of in the second and third seasons. If you like South Park's sense of humor, this is perfect for you. And at this price, you have no reason not to buy this.
