Disenchantment looks a lot like a medieval Futurama, but it’s more accurate to say it falls somewhere in the middle of that series and The Simpsons. Futurama embraced its Star Trek parodyness, sending the Planet Express crew off on adventures away from home in more episodes than not. Disenchantment typically keeps its plots anchored to its home base, the castle and kingdom of Dreamland, making it feel closer to a conventional sitcom than a D&D campaign. Also unique for a Groening sitcom is that, as this series follows the Netflix model of an entire season being produced and released all at once, the plot is consciously serialized. There are independent conflicts in each episode, but some pick up directly where the preceding left off, and certain plot threads persist and build over the course of the entire season. Disenchantment shines best in its plotting, fairly consistently setting up and paying off storylines in a satisfying way and keeping things interesting throughout. I’ve always hated how Netflix shows clock in at arbitrary lengths (an aspect of why Arrested Development’s return is so poor is the lengthy episode runtimes result in much slower pacing). However, though Disenchantment’s episodes are a bit longer than your average network sitcom’s, mostly coming in at a little under a full half-hour each, I never felt that they dragged. The middling humor must therefore be down to the writing. The writers’ room is made up of a combination of Simpsons and Futurama vets, as well as Gravity Falls’ writers (and at least one episode is attributed to the brilliant Rich Fulcher). However, the jokes simply don’t sing the way they did on The Simpsons during its prime or Futurama at its best. The comedy style feels charmingly familiar in that Groening way. It’s that cocktail of cutaway gags, funny signs, characters acting impossibly stupid, and cartoon violence. The approach is solid, but the writing just isn’t quite up to snuff. Jokes are rarely outright bad, but they also usually fall well below hilarious. It can be hard to pinpoint exactly makes comedy work or not, but it’s possible some of this can be attributed to the length of the episodes affecting the pacing. Again, the storytelling works fine, but perhaps the jokes suffer. I’d also like it if the series didn’t rely on violence as much as it does, not because I’m bothered by it, but because it’s almost never funny. I recognize it’s a holdover from The Simpsons (Homer gets roughed up a lot), but maybe it’s gotten a bit stale (one questions if Homer getting hurt was ever one of The Simpsons’ strong points in the first place). It certainly feels as though the series falls back on it a little too often. Luci, being a demon, can’t die, so Disenchantment takes great glee in regularly beating the crap out of him, but it’s frankly just boring to watch. The art is bolstered massively by Mark Mothersbaugh’s score. Disenchantment has an awesome, catchy theme and variations of it are heard throughout the series, changing in tone to match their respective scenes. It’s lucky that the music is so professional and well-used throughout. The series is truly elevated by it and, paired with the colorful visuals, makes for, at times, stirringly beautiful moments. That professionalism is what makes Disenchantment a decent series. When Matt Groening develops a show, he’s able to assemble a stable of top-notch people for it. Basically, there’s simply too much talent in and behind the scenes of Disenchantment for it to fail. It’s a reasonably good-looking show. It’s a great-sounding show. It’s a wonderfully acted show. The storytelling is above-average sitcom fare (which is no small feat; great sitcom plotting is rarely achieved). Still, it’s just not all that funny. I enjoyed Disenchantment, but as of right now, I’m in for it largely for the plot and to see if it can build into something greater come next season. The entire first season of Disenchantment will be available to stream on Netflix on August 17, 2018. Read the latest Den of Geek Special Edition Magazine Here!
