Interview: Doc Hammer & Jackson Publick Deliver a New ‘Venture Bros.’ Movie That Made Me Wanna Cry?
From 2003 to 2018, The Venture Bros. was a popular staple of Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim programming. Then, after seven seasons and four specials, the show was canceled, despite having been previously renewed for “an eighth and final season.”
However, Adult Swim tweeted in September 2020 that “We also want more Venture Bros. and have been working with Jackson and Doc to find another way to continue the Venture Bros. story.” Well, friends? That project has arrived!
Hank, Dean, and their Better-Scientist-Than-A-Dad Rusty return in a feature-length special arriving this week called The Venture Bros.: Radiant is the Blood of a Baboon Heart. Whether you’re already a Venture Bros. fan or you’re looking for something snarky and emotionally affecting, you should check this out. RITBOABH is currently available to stream on Digital, with the Blu-ray dropping on July 25.
What are those Ventures up to now?
Here’s the official synopsis from Adult Swim:
Doc’s latest invention will either bankrupt Team Venture or launch them to new heights, as Hank searches for himself, Dean searches for Hank, The Monarch searches for answers, and a mysterious woman from their pasts threatens to bring their entire world crashing down on them.
The original voice cast, including James Urbaniak as Dr. Venture, Patrick Warburton as Brock, Michael Sinterniklaas as Dean, Jackson Publick as Hank, and Doc Hammer as Dr. Mrs. The Monarch are back for the film. That’s in addition to guest stars like Nina Arianda as the mysterious Mantilla, Clancy Brown, Jane Lynch, John Hodgman, and J.K. Simmons, among others.
I’ve been a Venture Bros. fan since 2012 when my wife introduced me to the show on DVD, and it became one of Our Shows. So when I heard there was a new Venture Bros. coming out, I got really excited!
So, I was glad for the chance to see the film and have a chat** with show creators Doc Hammer and Jackson Publick. The film, despite having all the trademark hilarity and inappropriateness the show is known for, was also surprisingly moving as the story centers around several characters’ search for themselves and their purpose.
The Venture Bros. has always been about family and the fans
Hammer and Publick knew they were telling a version of this story from the moment they heard they were canceled.
Publick explained, “The minute we got the call canceling us they said ‘But do you wanna talk about maybe doing a long-form special?‘ Because it would be a different part of the network that would handle that. Somehow it got around the ‘cancellation loophole,’ or whatever.”
The duo couldn’t possibly get all their ideas for a full season of TV into this film, but Hammer expressed surprise at how much they did manage to get in.
“We got [in] like bullet points of season eight,” Publick said. “And a whole new epic piece of excitement that we added to it. And a bunch of new characters that had no place in season eight. So that was good. We solved it!”
I asked what elements of season eight ended up finding their way into the film, and the biggest ones had to do with Hank’s journey, and what happens regarding the Guild in the film.
“Hank’s story probably would’ve been stretched out almost the whole season,” Publick said. “It would’ve been an arc. We wouldn’t have seen him until episode three, and then it would be ‘Here’s what Hank’s been doing,’ you know? And he’d be on the road for a long time. And then Dean would do something similar to what he does in the special.”
Hammer mentioned that the return of an old character (I won’t spoil it for you) was also an element from season eight that they worked in. “It became just a back-story montage [in the film],” Hammer said. “But that was going to be a huge part of the season.”
Condensing plans for their never-produced eighth season into this film, while also creating something new that could stand on its own was tricky business. Publick said:
“We built some stuff up and left some cliffhangers at the end of season seven. We couldn’t just come into this and go: let’s just do a completely standalone thing. We had to answer for Hank walking out the door. We had to answer for someone telling The Monarch he’s related to Dr. Venture. We had a lot of baggage, but we also had to try to do something new, and we were also dying to get some stuff out of us that we planned for season eight.”
One central question that emerges in the film concerns the identity of Hank and Dean’s mother, though according to Hammer, that’s something that they only really delved into because of the fans. Hammer said, “Who the Venture Mom was was never something Jackson and I talked about except that it was asked of us constantly. It was something we started to question occasionally … ”
Publick jumped in to disagree slightly, saying that he had ideas for who the Venture Mom is throughout the series and that her identity has been seeded throughout. “There’s a huge call-back to season five in this thing,” he said. “She’s been seeded constantly.”
Hammer takes their responsibility to the fans seriously, and didn’t want to leave them hanging:
“We’re The Venture Bros. We’re a rock band, and we can’t just go out and go ‘Here’s our symphonic record‘ and not expect people to be like ‘This blows!‘ We’re indebted to this thing that we created and we love as much as the fans do, so we don’t wanna to poop on it. We were indebted to wrapping it up with a bit of neatness.”
Hammer also hopes that in addition to getting their questions answered and enjoying one last go-round with the Ventures, fans take away some deeper questions:
“[The film] ends with the sentiment of: Choose your family. You can read it as: ‘It’s your family that matters.‘ It also reads as: ‘You’re the one who decides who or what your family is.’ I think our viewers have the opportunity to decipher that sentiment and go ‘what does that mean to me?‘ That’s the sentiment we wanted to leave. This is about family. This is about relationships. These are your choices, and you should choose them. And you can choose them.”
The Venture Bros.: Radiant is the Blood of a Baboon Heart is currently available on Digital with the Blu-ray releasing on July 25.
**This interview was conducted before the SAG-AFTRA strike.
(featured image: Courtesy of Adult Swim)
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