Good-natured serial self-abuser Mervin J. Minky is one of the dysfunctional puppet characters in MTV UK’s Fur TV .
Fur TV is a new British puppet series for adults based on an award-winning short by filmmakers Chris Waitt and Henry Trotter. The show revolves around three puppets named Lapeño, Edward and Mervin who share a flat together and spend their time drinking, fighting, and chatting up (and sleeping with) women.
The basic “Muppets for adults” concept goes all the way back to Meet the Feebles and has been put to work on a number of projects (including Puppets Who Kill, Pets, MTV’s own Wonder Showzen and umpteen zillion YouTube videos) in the years since. It’s become so common recently that I’ve started to think that the idea has been run in to the ground so I wasn’t expecting much from this. It doesn’t help that the show is being billing as “Puppets Behaving Badly”, a oft-used tagline that suggests this isn’t nearly as new or ground breaking as the producers would like you to believe. Even the viral marketing for the show is unoriginal, relying in part on the tired “fake sex tape” gimmick (in this case one featuring one of Fur TV’s puppets and Chanelle Hayes, who seems to be aspiring to be the British equivalent of Paris Hilton).
Much to my surprise though, Fur TV seems pretty funny. One thing it definately has going for it and what sets it apart from most of the other rude, crude adult puppet shows out there is quality. If the sexual content doesn’t bother you – and believe me, there is a lot of sexual content in this show – it’s fun to watch. It also features good writing, great directing and a top-notch team of British puppeteers that bring to life appealing, believable puppet characters (I don’t know who all the puppet people involved in this are, but at least one of the characters was built by Darryl Worbey Studios).
Fur TV airs in the UK on MTV One on Sundays at 10 p.m. There’s a selection of clips available to watch online here and if you live in the UK or Ireland you can watch the first episode of Fur TV online.