TV Review: Beavis And Butt-head

lauren stern reviews the return of TV’s favorite couch potatoes …

When I heard that Mike Judge’s Beavis And Butt-head was returning to TV after 14 years, I couldn’t believe it. For a while, I was skeptical that MTV would bring back the cartoon since they have built the majority of their programming on reality shows. I also couldn’t help this skepticism, because the idea of bringing back this show and MTV’s other famous cartoon Daria were repeated rumors throughout the years. When advertisements of the debut were revealed all over the internet, I accepted it with excitement and starting counting down the days. There was only one thing I had to question: the content. Was is going to be the Beavis And Butt-head I used to watch reruns of a long long time ago? On October 27, 2011, when the show re-debuted on MTV, I had learned that my answer was yes.

For those who have never seen the show, it revolves around the lives of two high school delinquents who basically just say and do whatever they please. They have often been deemed “stupid” for their behavior, which is quite true of the duo in hindsight. Most of their behavior is based on what they see from pop culture. The show was pretty controversial in the 1990s for its explicit sexual content and and promotion of dangerous behavior. The new episode haven’t really brought an extensive amount of those topics out, however it’s only Episode 1.

The creators also brought back the music video element, where Beavis and Butt-head would sit down in front of a television and comment on a recent music video. Back when the show came out in the ’90s, MTV played a ton more music videos, so I was really surprised that they still continued to add this element. However, they introduced a surprising twist. Along with these music videos, Beavis and Butt-head would also critique reality shows, which isn’t a bad idea. Reality television is a huge hype in this country and it would be silly for the duo to avoid it.

The first episode of the re-debut juxtaposed all the previous elements of the show quite nicely. There were two main story lines that were separated by music video and reality television critiques. The first dealt with everyone’s favorite pop culture phenomenon to criticize: the Twilight series. The episode started out with Beavis and Butt-head seeing the movie Twilight in theaters. While watching, they got this idea to pick up women. When Beavis tried a similar line from the movie (with his own little twist of course,) he got smacked in the face by the woman in front of him and the duo got kicked out of the theater. After seeing the movie and attending one of their high school courses on the series, Beavis and Butt-head set out to turn into wolverines, which they believed would get them chicks. They had found a homeless man whom they believed was a werewolf. They asked the man to bite them, giving them a number of diseases including all three forms of Hepatitis and gonorrhea. The duo were found in a comatose state by two women and were brought to the hospital when they were deemed “a medical marvel” for their survival of multiple diseases. Essentially, the duo gave the idea of picking up chicks a whole new meaning.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_PzXIeKeQU

The other story line can be summarized by the line “Beavis is crying.” This statement was derived by an incident when Beavis and Butt-head were watching the elimination ceremony of The Bachelor. Beavis had discovered an onion in his hot dog which caused him to shed a tear. Then different timelines were shown throughout their lives of Butt-head making fun of Beavis for crying. It was pretty humorous to see Beavis freak out each time Butt-head made fun of him for crying. The best was the timeline was where the two were in gym class, where their teacher was going over the rope climbing procedures to where Butt-head replied, “What happens if Beavis starts crying?” This is where hilarity ensued as Beavis started beating the crap out of Butt-head in front of everyone.

Interrupting these two story lines were the video clip segments. The episode featured music video clips from Skrillex, MGMT, and LMFAO and television clips from Jersey Shore and True Life. My favorite music video segment was definitely the one from Skrillex’s video for “First Year Of The Equinox.” For those who have never seen the video, it has a man trying to escape from a possessed girl. In the episode, Beavis and Butt-head were trying to figure out the storyline of the two people. I think Beavis wrapped up their consensus quite nicely after viewing the scene where the man was trying to call 911 when he says, “Why didn’t he call 911 before? And what is he going to tell them, ‘I told my niece I couldn’t see the Smurfs again and she just started warping space and time.’” That was definitely one of my favorite lines of the night.

The big television clip hit was the Jersey Shore segment where they made fun of all the characters from watching an episode from their Italy trip. There was not one part where you weren’t laughing at their commentary. One of the clips they viewed was one where Vinny told everyone at work that Snooki “loved hot salami,” to which Beavis replied, “She loves hot salami. What he really means is SCHLONG.” I think that part and the overall criticism really brought back elements of the show’s past of explicit sexual content. Since people really love Jersey Shore and it is one of MTV’s biggest hits, I wouldn’t be surprised if they included more clips of the show in future episodes.

Beavis and Butt-head’s re-debut did not disappoint in laughs nor did it did not disappoint in keeping elements from the shows past. Lets just hope the continuing episodes follow the same pattern and that the show sticks around for much longer.