It’s not that Childrens Hospital doesn’t have its funny moments, it just doesn’t seem to work as a whole. The first episode has a kid fall into quicksand. He’s carted into the hospital, and they’ve taken the quicksand around him as well, in a giant crate. The hopelessly inept hospital staff can’t figure out how to keep him from sinking. They try everything you could try other than pulling him out or breaking open the box. Sure it’s a funny concept, but somehow it just gets stale after the first 10 minutes. Even humorous shows can help from being a bit grounded in reality.
So the show goes on, taking concepts from pop culture, social issues, and the general hospital drama formula and turning them on their heads. Blake is a clown doctor who actually seems to be born a clown, and deals with clown racism issues. The issues being mocked, however, are a bit out of date, and include him having to use the "multi-colored" bathroom. A dying kid gets a wish from the "Dying Wish Foundation" and wishes for unlimited wishes. He then proceeds to make all sorts of outlandish requests, and this being a show for Adult Swim, they include a pregnant lady in a bikini, a goat, and Peking duck directly from China. It all sounds like it could be really funny, but the execution is just a little too on the nose.
Perhaps Season 1 and 2 were a riot, but at this point, the formula is a bit like modern Saturday Night Live. The gags just repeat too much, and the humor is all on the surface. You can try to scratch down, but there’s nothing deeper below.
Of course, it could just be my taste in humor, so if you’re a fan of the show already, this is at least a decent DVD. There are plenty of deleted scenes, bloopers (and gags, which are for some reason in a different category on the DVD), and even a whole group of scenes where Glenn breaks bad news to a mom in a dozen different ways (this was one of my favorites, as it’s genuinely funny to me). There are a number of Web Promos included as well. And of course, it’s all 14 episodes of Season 3, which you’d hope to find on something that’s called Childrens Hospital: The Complete Third Season.
