Perfect Hair Forever
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This article relies on references to primary sources or sources affiliated with the subject, rather than references from independent authors and third-party publications. Please add citations from reliable sources. (March 2009) |
| Perfect Hair Forever | |
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| Format | Animated Comedy |
| Written by | Mike Lazzo Matt Harrigan Matt Maiellaro |
| Voices of | Kim Manning Dave Willis Nick Ingkatanuwat George Lowe Dan Dumile[1] |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 2 |
| No. of episodes | 7 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Mike Lazzo Keith Crofford[1] |
| Producer(s) | Dave Hughes Matt Harrigan[1] |
| Editor(s) | Dave Hughes |
| Running time | 11½ minutes |
| Production company(s) | Williams Street Radical Axis |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | Adult Swim |
| Picture format | NTSC (480i) |
| Audio format | Stereophonic sound |
| Original run | November 7, 2004 – April 1, 2007 |
| External links | |
| Website | |
Perfect Hair Forever is an American comedy animated television series which is largely a parody of anime. It was created and produced by Williams Street, and aired on Adult Swim and The Detour in the US and Canada respectively. Perfect Hair Forever premiered with "Perfect Hair Forever" on November 7, 2004, and ended with "Return to Balding Victory" on April 1, 2007; with a total of seven episodes.
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Overview
Perfect Hair Forever is a parody of stereotypical anime clichés combined with Williams Street's now well-established style of absurdist humor first developed in series such as Space Ghost Coast to Coast, Aqua Teen Hunger Force and Sealab 2021. The series blends frenetic visual montages and anime subculture references.
The series concerns a young boy named Gerald who is on a quest to find the perfect hair to remedy his premature baldness. He is joined on his wanderings by an array of strange companions. Gerald is opposed by the evil Coiffio and his minions for reasons which are never stated in the series.
Perfect Hair Forever employs an ongoing serial format, a style that had been uncommon to previous Williams Street projects, due to their lack of emphasis on continuity. Each episode of the series featured different opening sequence music and visuals. The style and music of the end credits also varied from episode to episode.
Following the first six episodes, members of the Perfect Hair Forever creative team posted on the official Adult Swim message board that they weren't interested in continuing the show to a second season, and at the Adult Swim panel at Comic-Con 2006, the cancellation of the series was announced.
In October 2006, Adultswim.com confirmed that Perfect Hair Forever was back in production with 16 episodes to be aired on its online streaming network The Fix. However, this was apparently incorrect, since after episode seven aired, the series was never continued.
Episode 7 was aired April 1, 2007, as part of Adult Swim's April Fool's Day joke. It is also available on Adult Swim's "The Fix" website. In 2007 the Japanese noise rock band Melt-Banana recorded the song "Hair-Cat (Cause the Wolf Is a Cat!)" for Perfect Hair Forever.
Pilot episode
The Perfect Hair Forever pilot first aired on November 7, 2004, in the time slot that had been advertised as the premiere of the Squidbillies pilot. Unknown to the audience at the time, the existing Squidbillies pilot had fallen behind and wasn't ready to air[2]. Williams Street continued advertising the Squidbillies premiere up to and including the bump directly preceding the show, which talked about wanting to make the show "perfect" for you and your "hair" "forever", revealing the title "Perfect Hair Forever." The night's confusion continued when, instead of seeing the opening titles for Squidbillies, viewers were confronted with a title card for an episode of Space Ghost called "Perfect Hair Forever", thus starting the pilot episode.
After the ending credits ran, a bumper card appeared, apologizing for the apparent scheduling mixup only for it to fade out to a fake "Technical Difficulties" card featuring a selection of Perfect Hair Forever's characters. This was shown on screen for several seconds, accompanied by typical music before the card faded to static whilst the Action Hot Dog's "Do da la la la la!" echoed. The card returned and the music was replaced with a techno remix of Action Hot Dog's chant[2].
Characters
- Gerald Bald Z (Kim Manning) - The main protagonist of the story, Gerald is a young boy suffering from extremely premature hair loss. Because of this, he goes off on a journey to acquire "Perfect Hair Forever" (a reference to the golden Super Saiyan hair, found in Dragon Ball Z, which also lends Gerald his name). He is portrayed as a sometimes melancholy, yet optimistic young lad who believes that his goal is possible.
- Uncle Grandfather (Matt Maiellaro) - Described by producer Matt Harrigan as a "bald, pot-bellied, dirty old man",[citation needed] Uncle Grandfather is Gerald's father figure of sorts. He spends almost all of his time snacking, watching Brenda put on lewd displays, or reading pornography. He also exhibits a stereotypical Asian speech impediment, where he pronounces English 'r' sounds as 'l' sounds.
- Action Hotdog - The first character to join Gerald's journey. Action Hotdog is a hot dog which flies around and is only capable of uttering the words "Doo da la-la-la-la-la-la la la-la-laaaaa-la-la!".
- Coiffio (Dave Willis) - The main villain of the series, Coiffio is a self-centered old man with an enormous, multi-colored "coif" atop his head, who otherwise looks like a more fit version of Uncle Grandfather with a slightly different beard. He speaks in an odd, indeterminable accent, and possesses a unique censor sound, wherein all his uses of the word "fuck" are censored by the sound of Coiffio yelling "EFF!"
- Brenda - A silent girl in an outfit spoofing those of anime females. Her only means of dialogue is a non English language and she is kept by Uncle Grandfather to bring him trays of hamburgers and satisfy his lewd needs.
- Catman (Dennis Moloney) - A grumpy, fat man in a cat suit who is Coiffio's main henchman. Catman lives in a large, litterbox-shaped house, and is shown working at a convenience store in several episodes.
- Norman Douglas - A talking tree, also known as the Inappropriate Comedy Tree. Originally an agent of Coiffio, his task was to follow Gerald and watch him. The character talks loudly and shares the same facial animations as Terry/Twisty.
- Terry/Twisty - A sapient tornado that appears to suffer from dissociative identity disorder.
- Young Man (C. Martin Croker) - A young, enthusiastic man in a bright purple suit that claims to be from the "Ministry of Planning" and calls himself the "King of All Animals".
- Rod: the Anime God (Matt Maiellaro) - An entity made of fire, who calls himself the god of anime. Rod is introduced early in the series, and pops in at seemingly random intervals. Rod is the focus of a secondary plot in the series involving Coffio attempting to sell him a house.
Episodes
Adult Swim references
In addition to various references to other anime series, PHF has included several visual references to other Adult Swim shows.
- Clown Planet - Several PHF episodes have references to Clown Planet, which is a reference to an episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, "The Clowning"[citation needed].
- 12 Oz. Mouse - Pictures of Mouse Fitzgerald (protagonist of 12 Oz. Mouse) and Skillet (Fitz's sidekick) are found in episodes 5 and 6.
- Aqua Teen Hunger Force - A special airing of the episodes on April 1, 2007 had subtitles which were actually lines from ATHF episodes. Additionally, images of Master Shake are visible at various points in the series[citation needed].
- Space Ghost Coast to Coast - Space Ghost appears in every episode, either as a character with an actual role, or in the background.
DVD release
On October 27, 2009, Adult Swim and distributor Warner Home Video released Adult Swim in a Box, a seven disc DVD box set of a variety of different Adult Swim shows, the pilot episode of Perfect Hair Forever is featured on this box set on a special DVD along with Welcome to Eltingville, Korgoth of Barbaria, Totally for Teens, and Cheyenne Cinnamon and the Fantabulous Unicorn of Sugar Town Candy Fudge[3]; in June 2010, the bonus DVD, from "Adult Swim in a Box", was made available for separate purchase through the store on the Adult Swim website.[4] The entire series is available on the "Build Your Own DVD" feature on the Adult Swim website.
References
- ^ a b c Perfect Hair Forever episodes
- ^ a b Squidbillies, Vol. 1 DVD commentary
- ^ "Perfect Hair forever pilot episode DVD release on Adult Swim in a Box, 2009". http://www.tvshowsondvd.com/news/Site-News-Adult-Swim-in-a-Box/12405.
- ^ Adult Swim Pilots DVD overview at adultswimshop.com
External links
- Adult Swim
- AdultSwim.co.uk
- Perfect Hair Forever at the Internet Movie Database
- Perfect Hair Forever at TV.com
- Perfect Hair Forever review from The Hollywood Reporter
- Perfect Hair Forever review from TV Squad
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- 2000s American television series
- 2004 American television series debuts
- 2007 American television series endings
- Adult Swim original programs
- American animated television series
- Anime-influenced animation
- English-language television series
- Television programs featuring anthropomorphic characters
- Williams Street Studios series and characters
