Double the Fist - Volume 1

It’s an extreme world. It is. And those of us who embrace that knowledge can truly be held in a revered state by those of us too weak to acknowledge it.

Personally, I acknowledge it, but don’t live it, making me a weak coward. The four chaps in Double the Fist, gung-ho morons with not a lick of intellect between them, are not. They are all trying desperately to attain:

"Full Fist!"

It’s achievable, but not by the everyday pedestrian. In this ABC series, these four madmen set themselves extreme goals taking what may already be called ‘extreme’ and cranking it up to 11. And it’s a program that will find but one audience, unfortunately. This audience is made up of the disillusioned, the unrepentant and the subversive. This audience knows the shows DtF parodies and revels in the abuse so-called ‘reality shows’ have flung at them. There isn’t much by way of sacred cows here. Loving tributes to The Late Show segments Shitscared and Shirty – The Slightly Aggressive Bear are here among deserving insults to practically all lifestyle programs, as well as corny reality crap like Fear Factor. It doesn’t stop there, with extremist parodies of braindead stuntwork in the American Jackass and English Dirty Sanchez programs.

The show features four regular participants in Steve Foxx, the extreme host with a penchant for Kung-Fu and Rod Foxx, his brother and extreme athlete. Mephisto, a mentally defective Security Guard, and The Womp, a retired all-in wrestler fill out the group and between them all they make dirt-cheap television. Plus proving that it isn’t necessary to have a huge budget (or even a script half the time) to make very funny and very entertaining television. And again, this isn’t going to appeal to a wide audience, but those with a pet hate of all ‘reality’ will find much to amuse themselves with here.

This disc features four episodes from the first series, a series which was until minutes ago still playing on Friday nights. While the beginnings may be a bit wonky, the guys soon find their feet and have a lot of fun exploring the idiosyncrasies of their characters. Forget the scripts, forget the excellent and comical use of digital animation, this is just silly and ineffectual fun that pokes a sharp and extreme stick at the watered down garbage the commercial stations plague our televisions with.

It seems like a hell of a risk, but kudos to the ABC for giving it a shot. Even the less-than-lucrative Friday night 11:30pm timeslot doesn’t seem to bother these guys and why should it? They’re just a bunch of guys who prove that hard work and limited budgets and equipment is good enough for genuine comedy. I give this series an unashamed:

"Full Fist!"

Shot 15 minutes ago, this is all fine. Shot mostly on varying forms of DV, we have ourselves a tight 1.78:1 aspect ratio with 16:9 anamorphic steroids. The animation segues throughout are great and well themed, while the digital animation of the horrendous results of stunts is dodgy but entirely comically suited. Colours are fine with only occasional patches of grain when shooting in the dark and this doesn’t really do any harm to the viewing capability. Otherwise a pretty fine effort from a bunch of cameras that are ‘less than standard’.

Dolby Digital stereo is the general offering here and this does a very good job in promoting the dialogue and sound effects (lifted from Star Wars websites by the sound of them). Music has been scored and played by the Fist Band and this is naturally an extreme form of metal backing that grunts and groans its way through the series and menus. It’s very nicely suited here and keeps the subwoofer working throughout the episodes and even the menus with a deep rumbling akin to video games like Quake - assuming you have Prologic enabled, of course.

Never ones to back down from a challenge, Double the Fist comes replete with a swag of good extras and crappy ones. But they freely admit this.

First up, on the main menu, is the eternal question we all ask ourselves; 'Are You Weak?' The answer is inevitable, but it is proven by selecting this pain-inducing piece.

A Word From Steve is a :58 bit in which Steve, our extreme host, let’s us know a little bit more about the Fisting experience. Thanks Steve.

Weakness is a criminally long 4:3 (anamorphically enhanced) 12:35 segment that cobbles together various behind the scenes moments and proves the guys really don’t rely heavily on scripts. Or industry experience.

Deleted scenes feature three from each episode and while some are funny, they’ve been cut for being too weak, and that’s the way it should have been. They are. And they should appear in the reversing time clock segment known as What Was Weak in which we see something shattered brought back to completeness. Which is funny and appears at various points throughout the series. What Was Weak? Deleted scenes is what.

An 8:56 photo gallery is a mistake you shouldn’t make unless you consider yourself Fistworthy. And even then, well, it may be too much. Good luck… and at least it’s in full screen, as all weak galleries should be.

Superhero Fist is a short advertisement for another DVD and is essentially weak, but in How to Make Double the Fist we have the best collection of television subversion I’ve yet witnessed. Wholly Fistworthy, this 24:00 documentary details in, erm, detail the tricks the guys utilised to make their show on a hobo budget. A brilliant doco from start to finish, this is entertaining, revolutionary and well-played entirely out of character. And refreshingly honest. That’s the best thing. It receives:

"Full Fist!"

Bargains is a short crap advertisement for Lakemba Auto World where the guys get all their useless Fistmobiles. Truly weak.

Finally, there’s an Easter egg to fill out any space left over on this bulging extras section and its secrets can be discovered in the DVDnet Egg Wing.

Overall a mixed bag in which one hand is No Fist, the other Full Fist. Good fun though.

Australian television has seen programming of similar ilk in short form but not in a regular series like this. DtF impresses with its unique blend of silliness, seriousness and anti-commercial television. Heroes like these four should be held high upon the shoulders of the majority of weak cowards and given tickertape and Post-It note parades in each capital city of our extreme nation. Or not, I dunno.

At any rate, I loved the show for its irreverence without the sacrifice of its homages to former subversive greats. It’s funny, it’s well edited and while not always the best in the ad-lib department, is still well worth the watching for anyone as sick to bloody death of ‘reality TV’ (which isn’t even real anyway.) I give Double The Fist:

"Full Fist!"