Xavier: Renegade Angel

Stop what you’re doing right now and watch Xavier: Renegade Angel. It is without a doubt one of the weirdest things I’ve ever seen but at the same time the most hilarious show I’ve seen in a long, long time.

It’s difficult to describe why I like it. The main character is a man covered in fur with 6 nipples, a beak for a nose, a snake for an arm and his hips on backwards but his feet on forwards. The only premise of the show is to follow him around and listen to his constant philosophical ramblings. The animation is low-budget shit that looks like it’s rendered straight out of Poser. It looks and sounds like it should be appreciated by the “so bad it’s good” and “so random lol” lot, both schools of thought that have really begun to irk me as they both seem to lead to shit like The Mighty Boosh becoming ridiculously over-rated.

This is all completely irrelevant because the one advantage Xavier has over all comedies I’ve seen recently is that it’s got gags - well-written gags, throwaway gags but most of all, funny gags in fucking spades. It looks like it’s superficially random and all stream-of-conscious but there are so many jokes you’ll miss until at least the second or third viewing because of all the multi-layered writing. Jokes will be set up and then abandoned, just to confound expectations. My only issue is that you’ll see some amazingly well-crafted lines thrown out and discarded, while terrible gags get laboured. But overall, this is the best written comedy I’ve seen in ages - although I’ve yet to see any of the new Boondocks.

If that hasn’t sold you, it’s written and produced by the people behind Wonder Showzen. Now stop reading this and go watch it.