Rex the Runt (1998)

Wallace & Grommit meets Monty Python and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I caught on immediately that Rex the Runt is hilarious claymation full of surrealism and rapidfire silliness. It took a few episodes to realize it's not an odd family unit with a dog, it's four dogs in an odd family unit. Rex (the titular lead and narrator), Wendy (who is as frustrated as any woman living with three male slobs would be), Bad Bob (the oversized bloke who wears an eye patch and always carries an oversized gun), and Vince (who has gangly teeth, murmurs nonsequiturs, and suffers from Random Pavarotti Disease) apparently all sleep in the same bed, eat constantly, watch a lot of absurd programmes on the telly, and go on surreal "adventures" (deflating the Earth and riding it through space like a deflated balloon for three episodes, frequently using their shrink-ray gun or their time machine made from a can of beans, entering a star search contest, getting brainwashed by the celebrity head of the Church of Chemicalology, and the like). Most of their adventures involve getting ripped off for "10 quid" at a time by a creepy love camp headmistress, the unethical Dr. Dogg, and others. Vince falls in love with a vacuum cleaner he ordered from the telly and gets married. Hygiene is often a discussion topic. A lottery is won -- and immediately taken back due to damages caused by the quartet's shrinking, adoption, and abandonment of the city of Birmingham. Children under 10 may find much of the rapidfire verbal silliness and British slang over their heads but adults with a warped sense of humor should love this show. It could perhaps be rated PG since Wendy has obvious if nondescript boobs (though one telly spoof has girls with bigger fake ones), the language can be mild (crap, fat bastard), and one character gives the finger to the telly. Rex the Runt is an excellent British spoof of modern television programming and suburban ennui. 5 stars.