Skip to main content

My Lovely Sugar Lumps: An Advance Review of the First Three Episodes of "Flight of the Conchords" Season Two

HBO's deliciously absurd musical comedy Flight of the Conchords returns after a far-too-long hiatus between seasons due to the writers strike.

I had the opportunity last week to watch the first three episodes of Season Two of Flight of the Conchords, which launches January 18th on HBO, and like the title sequence's whale, I too soared away on a magical carpet of storytelling and imagination.

While the season premiere has been available online via various platforms for a few weeks now, I was particularly curious to check out the season's second and third episodes. Time has not dulled Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement's peculiar brand of off-kilter humor, fortunately, and they return after a seemingly endless break between seasons to engage in bizarro conversations about nothing in particular and perform more hysterical songs. (If you've seen their "women's only toothpaste" commercial advert in the season premiere, you know what I mean.) For fans of FotC, these fantastic episodes are the bee's knees and will leave you craving more Kiwi humor once the end credits roll.

So, what can you expect from Season Two of Flight of the Conchords? Let's discuss.

When we last saw Bret and Jemaine, they had been cast adrift after Murray (Rhys Darby) took on managing duties for a hot band (the Crazy Dogz). Forced to rely on their own skills, they're actually doing better without Murray than with him and manage to get a few gigs going (even if Bret is sans a shoe) and land a job writing and performing a jingle for that "women's only toothpaste" commercial. This being Flight of the Conchords, look for things to naturally settle back into an equilibrium by the end of the first episode as Bret and Jemaine find themselves in a bit of a legal situation and Murray is forced to (sort of) come to their rescue.

Later, look for the guys to take a gig at a local library (shush!) and Bret to form a rather, uh, motley gang in order to take back the streets, which leads to the funniest West Side Story parody ever on film. (Okay, it might be the only West Side Story parody ever, but that doesn't diminish just how hysterical their idea of gang warfare is.)

Meanwhile, Mel (Kristen Schaal) takes up painting and Brett purchases a second coffee mug, which causes major financial complications for the guys resulting in them losing their instruments and Jemaine having to prostitute himself in order to make ends meet. Which in turn leads to two hysterical new songs, one that's a send-up of The Police's Roxanne and the other which is entitled "Sugar Lumps," and which, over a week later, I still can't get out of my head.

Yes, it's already shaping up to be the sort of season where anything, and indeed everything, is possible. Flight of the Conchords has always been the type of series that could feature romantic entanglements, David Bowie impersonations, and ruminations on the trivialities of everyday life, from Mafia retaliations to unpaid electric bills, side-by-side. It's a topsy-turvy world that might seem terrifying were it not so painfully funny.

Season Two of Flight of the Conchords premieres Sunday, January 18th, at 10 pm ET/PT on HBO. Be sure to come back later this week for my interview with Flight of the Conchords co-star Kristen Schaal.

Comments

karigee said…
Thanks for the sneak peek, Jace -- I'm so glad this show is finally back. It's going to be quite a weekend for the ol' TV.
Anonymous said…
I laughed just reading your descriptions of the first few episodes (especially about Brett's purchase of a coffee mug leading to Jemaine prostituting himself) so I definitely can't wait for the real thing!
Anonymous said…
Ha! I can't wait for FotC to start. Very curious about the hints you drop about coffee cups and prostitution and gangs. Nothing can top the the David Bowie tribute the guys did last season but your review sounds like they are on form!

Popular posts from this blog

What's Done is Done: The Eternal Struggle Between Good and Evil on the Season Finale of "Lost"

Every story begins with thread. It's up to the storyteller to determine just how much they need to parcel out, what pattern they're making, and when to cut it short and tie it off. With last night's penultimate season finale of Lost ("The Incident, Parts One and Two"), written by Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, we began to see the pattern that Lindelof and Cuse have been designing towards the last five seasons of this serpentine series. And it was only fitting that the two-hour finale, which pushes us on the road to the final season of Lost , should begin with thread, a loom, and a tapestry. Would Jack follow through on his plan to detonate the island and therefore reset their lives aboard Oceanic Flight 815 ? Why did Locke want to kill Jacob? What caused The Incident? What was in the box and just what lies in the shadow of the statue? We got the answers to these in a two-hour season finale that didn't quite pack the same emotional wallop of previous season

Pilot Inspektor: CBS' "Smith"

I may just have to change my original "What I'll Be Watching This Fall" post, as I sat down and finally watched CBS' new crime drama Smith this weekend. (What? It's taken me a long time to make my way through the stack of pilot DVDs.) While it's on following Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars on Tuesday nights (10 pm ET/PT, to be exact), I'm going to be sure to leave enough room on my TiVo to make sure that I catch this compelling, amoral drama. While one can't help but be impressed by what might just be the most marquee-friendly cast in primetime--Ray Liotta, Virginia Madsen, Jonny Lee Miller, Amy Smart, Simon Baker, and Franky G all star and Shohreh Aghdashloo has a recurring role--the pilot's premise alone earned major points in my book: it's a crime drama from the point of view of the criminals, who engage in high-stakes heists. But don't be alarmed; it's nothing like NBC's short-lived Heist . Instead, think of it as The Italian

The Daily Beast: "How The Killing Went Wrong"

While the uproar over the U.S. version of The Killing has quieted, the show is still a pale imitation of the Danish series on which it is based. Over at The Daily Beast, you can read my latest feature, "How The Killing Went Wrong," in which I look at how The Killing has handled itself during its second season, and compare it to the stunning and electrifying original Danish series, Forbrydelsen , on which it is based. (I recently watched all 20 episodes of Forbrydelsen over a few evenings.) The original is a mind-blowing and gut-wrenching work of genius. It’s not necessary to rehash the anger that followed in the wake of the conclusion last June of the first season of AMC’s mystery drama The Killing, based on Søren Sveistrup’s landmark Danish show Forbrydelsen, which follows the murder of a schoolgirl and its impact on the people whose lives the investigation touches upon. What followed were irate reviews, burnished with the “burning intensity of 10,000 white-hot suns