New Zealand musicians Bret and Jemaine – aka Flight of the Conchords – come to New York to try to make it in the music business, only to struggle.

CRITIQUE

Flight of the Conchords is one of those quirky TV comedy series, like Curb Your Enthusiasm, that isn’t going to be for all tastes; some people love this show, while others just don’t get it at all.  Still, the result manages to be pretty consistently entertaining and always unpredictable, and there is a lot to like here.

This collection is made up of twelve half-hour episodes, featuring Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement, playing characters named after themselves; the conceit here has them living together in New York City while their hapless manager Murray tries to get them gigs.  They have a single fan, the bubbly, obsessed Mel (Kristen Schaal), who is given the nice touch of being married to meek Doug, who often drives her to their performances.

Each episode also manages to work in 2 or 3 of Flight of the Conchords’ signature style of song-parody tune, riffs on any number of genres, from rap and hip-hop to rock to disco to bits that riff on The Pet Shop Boys and David Bowie.  These are often amusing, though as the season goes on, they become a bit less sharp; they work in the context of a show, but I’m not sure an actual concert, featuring all these songs in a row, would really work all that well.

But Bret and Jemaine are likable and play off each other, while their haplessness with women (they are amusingly shy about intimacy) and near-nonexistent career is mined for a surprising amount of comedy.  The result is somewhat slight, but it is still funny for what it is, and it is worth sampling.

THE VIDEO

Flight of the Conchords is presented in 16:9 aspect ratio.  The picture is okay, though there are no particular demands made on it.

THE AUDIO

Flight of the Conchords is presented in English 2.0 and Spanish 2.0.  All the songs sound pretty good.  There are English, French and Spanish subtitles.

THE EXTRAS

There are no extras.

FINAL THOUGHT

Though some extras would have been nice, the six hours of episodes here hang together pretty well.