The Brak Show

The series premiered with a sneak peek unannounced in the early hours of December 21, 2000, along with the "Radio Free Sealab" episode of Sealab 2021.^[3] This "stealth" pilot (titled "Leave it to Brak") featured hand-drawn backgrounds and different opening titles. The show's official showing was on Adult Swim's debut on September 2, 2001.^[4]

It originally started off as a parody of sitcoms which depicts the day-to-day lives of the dysfunctional Guerta family, including Brak, as well as Zorak, various other neighbors, and peers from Learnmore High School, but just like its sister show, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, the plot dissolved over time and became increasingly bizarre.^[5] The setting is Spacetown, which resembles American suburbia, but with an extra-planetary hint. A Saturn-like planet appears in the background on occasion, and many of the extras are aliens. Often, episodes parody stereotypical episodes of regular sitcoms (e.g., the son showing an interest in women, the dad being reconnected with an old passion, the mother temporarily leaving after a fight, etc.).

The show was canceled in December 2003. However, on October 22, 2006, Adult Swim announced in a bumper that The Brak Show would return to production as an internet cartoon on the network's website. On May 24, 2007, a single webisode premiered online,^[6] but no further webisodes were produced thereafter, hence serving as the de facto series finale.

On August 1, 2008, Adult Swim had a retro night, an all-night marathon of shows featured on Adult Swim in 2001 and 2002. Two of the early episodes of The Brak Show aired during the marathon.^[7] The series has since appeared in Adult Swim's "DVR Theater".^[8] Since 2019, Adult Swim has aired The Brak Show as part of "Pete Smith Day", a yearly event celebrating the career of one of The Brak Show's co-creators.^[9]

In 2024, Brak's mom and Clarence were mentioned in the Jellystone! season three episode ″Space Con”.

Characters

• Brak (Andy Merrill) is a sort of teenage anthropomorphic "space cat" with an eccentric personality and a speaking lisp, who is a student at Learnmore High School. He is quite silly and unintelligent but with a very sweet and gentle personality. He still has attachments to stuffed animals but starts to get attracted to girls. He frequently breaks into impromptu song, lyrically about events in the episode. The writers use a wide variety of musical styles for the songs — covering jazz, country, show tunes, rap, and rock & roll. His closest friend is Zorak, although in return he treats him with open contempt and little respect. Brak's demeanor is derived from his appearances on both Space Ghost Coast to Coast and its spin-off Cartoon Planet.
• Zorak (
  misanthrope
  who expresses more than a platonic interest in Mom. He hangs out with Brak, but only as a way to force him into doing something for his own benefit. Zorak considers himself "above" the Guertas, and is constantly criticizing and insulting them. He enjoys bullying Clarence, the neighborhood nerd. He is also homophobic, breaking into furious rage when one of his romantic interests, Pepper, is revealed to be male.
• Dad (
  ski boat
  and being unfazed when Sisto was selected as "the lucky one" and seized by an alien mothership.
• Mom (Marsha Crenshaw in episodes 1–13, 18 (DVD), 28, and the webisode, Joanna Daniel in episodes 14–17, 18 (broadcast), and 19–28) is a middle-aged creature of the same "species" as Brak, with a more humanoid facial structure and the fashions of a housewife character on a 1950s sitcom. She is largely the only semi-sane character on the show. She displays little romantic or sexual interest in her husband and only tolerates him for her children's sake. When she gets drunk, however, she finds him suddenly irresistible. When voiced by Crenshaw, she is most often a homage to June Cleaver and similar motherly characters, with occasional hints of discontent with her husband's laziness and most importantly, his sexism. When Daniel took over the role, Mom inexplicably acquired a British accent and became far more open in her discontent with domestic life and her annoyance with and disdain for her husband. Her change in accent has been commented upon several times on the show.
• Thundercleese (
  Frylock
  bought and raised him, which is the in-universe reason for their similar voices.
• Clarence (Andy Merrill) is Brak's second closest friend, a teenage chubby purple alien from Learnmore High School. He was a supporting character on the show who made more regular appearances towards the end of the series. Clarence is socially awkward and idolizes Brak. His constant talking often annoys those around him, and when faced with an extremely stressful situation, he wears his mother's sundress and bonnet for comfort. In a rap contest, he revealed that he dearly misses his father, who left them for unknown reasons. In the same contest, he also noted that his mom has since married his stepfather Gary, whom he does not like. Many of his appearances end with him being maimed, usually by Zorak.
• Sisto is Brak's younger brother, an elementary school aged "space cat" who resembles his elder brother even though he wears a red outfit as opposed to his brother's blue one. In three early episodes, he would make random
  appearances
  walking across the room farting. He was killed and eaten by mothership aliens in his fourth and final appearance in the episode "Pepper". Afterwards, only a picture of himself was depicted on a scratch and sniff card in the episode "Sexy New Brak Show Go".

Episodes

Series overview

Season 1 (2001)

Season 2 (2002)

Season 3 (2003)

Webisode (2007)

International broadcast

In Canada, The Brak Show previously aired on

The first 14 episodes were released on DVD on February 1, 2005, and the remaining episodes were released on August 8, 2006. In addition to being available on DVD, The Brak Show is also available on iTunes.

The series was made available on HBO Max on September 1, 2020.^[14] Unlike Space Ghost Coast to Coast, the series was kept on Max when it launched on May 23, 2023.

References

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to The Brak Show.

• Official website
• The Brak Show at
  IMDb