August 07, 2004 - After a somewhat uneven pilot that aired months ago during Cartoon Network's Adult Swim programming block, The Venture Brothers, the network's irreverent sendup of Jonny Quest-type animated adventure series, is finally ready to go.

The break definitely helped the series, giving the producers a chance to refine the concept and the characters that seemed a little too rough in the pilot episode (which is currently not scheduled as part of the show's run).  In theory, the series centers around the precocious twin sons, Dean and Hank and their "way cool" adventures.  Hank, as voiced by Chris McCulloch (The Tick) the slightly older of the two, fancies himself the jock of the duo and looks like a young Freddy from Scooby-Doo. Dean (voiced by Michael Sinterniklass, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) reads a lot of books, most of them young detective / adventure books and considers himself the brains, looking a lot like a young, Steve Ditko-drawn Peter Parker.   In reality, both boys are about as dim as you can get, a duo so irritating and annoying that everyone, including their father, can't wait to get away from them.

Their father is a second generation adventurer / genius, son of the late Dr. Jonas Venture. Young Rusty Venture (who now goes by his full name of Thaddeus and voiced by James Urbaniak, last seen as Robert Crumb in American Splendor) tagged along on his dad's grand adventures but really picked up very little of his father's genius or flair for adventure.  He has now run his father's business, Venture Industries, into the ground, is constantly strapped for cash and constantly takes "diet" pills.  At first glance, he appears just like any other writer for IGN if not for his personal bodyguard, Brock Samson.

Voiced by Patrick Warburton (The Tick, Family Guy), Brock is Race Bannon with a homicidal streak.  Meeting any threat with excessive force, Samson is everything Venture wishes he could be but hasn't got a chance in hell of becoming.  Forgotten by the shadowy, secret agency that assigned him to the Venture family years ago, there's probably a good argument that the "Swedish murder machine" (as one of Venture's enemies refers to him) is taking his frustrations out on everyone that crosses his path, the only exception being Dean and Hank, whom he's sworn to protect with his life, whether he likes it or not. 

	-Cartoon Network

Along with this fairly motley crew is H.E.L.P.eR., a robot built by the original Dr. Venture in the '60s.  Like most of the rest of the things around the Venture compound, the robot has fallen into disrepair and seems to take the most damage during the course of the series.  Needless to say, that much abuse over the years has turned H.E.L.P.eR. into a neurotic, emotionally unstable mechanoid who seems to spend a lot of time chewing on test tubes and hiding in corners. 

With the addition of various colorful villains led by the hilariously ineffectual Monarch, The Venture Brothers is exactly the kind of show that belongs in the Adult Swim lineup.  One of their first shows that makes the move to a full half-hour, creator Jackson Publick III manages to invoke the spirit of '60s action adventure cartoons while injecting the kind of sharp edged satire that viewers of the Adult Swim block have not only come to expect but demand.  With many of AS's other series like Sealab 2021 starting to blow apart at the seams and new comedies like the wretched Stroker and Hoop threatening to destroy one of the coolest programming blocks on television, The Venture Brothers is a welcome addition that has the potential to be one of the channel's breakout hits.  The design of the series is just plain cool and the homage to various literary, comic and real world characters like Doctor Doom, Walt Disney, Mr. Fantastic, Dr. Strange, Black Widow and others are a riot. 

The Venture Brothers premieres on Saturday, August 7th at 11:00 PM Eastern / Pacific on The Cartoon Network.