Final Space - Season 1 (2018)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2018
	Creators: Olan Rogers, David Sacks
	Actors (voices): Fred Armisen, Tom Kenny, Olan Rogers
	Country: USA
	Genre: Animation, SF, Comedy
	Conditions of visioning: July 2018, VOD, 10" tablet screen.
Synopsis: Gary was sentenced to years of forced labor, alone on a remote space station. Close to the end of his sentence, he meets a green creature that he baptizes Mooncake and soon after bandits, bounty hunters and an evil mastermind.
Review: There used to be a time when if you wanted to watch a funny animated series for (young) adults the single go-to choice was The Simpsons. Then came South Park, then Futurama, and nowadays the choice is much larger for my rejoicement in particular. This is made possible by the simplification of digital production means over the last years, that allow producing more risky series for cheaper. Crowdfunding can also help talented artists bring their dream to life. At the same time, new distribution networks like Netflix ensure that many series will reach a possibly large audience. It seems that it is what happens for Final Space, which from what I read started by a small episode on Youtube and ended up being produced and distributed. Searching for some original animated fun, I went for it and quite enjoyed it. Beware that it is no Futurama but a much less ambitious series, in both scale and visuals, although it looks good enough and in fact pretty good in a way that matches the SF theme. It is also targeted at a more specific audience: space geeks. But in the end I found it nice to watch and if not always funny, some repetitive humor and offbeat characters made it work. For example H.U.E. (obviously inspired by 2001, A Space Odyssey's HAL) and KVN are robots with attitude like Futurama's Bender or The Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy's Marvin. In the series Space is quite the western, reminding a bit of Firefly or Cowboy Bebop, and many liberties are taken with Science, but this approach and the story (sometimes going astray) fits with the unique tone selected for the show. A second season is in production, and maybe more. Like Mooncake says: Chookity Pok!
Rating: 6 /10