Of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is officially the most awesome web series I have seen. Joss Whedon, Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion, Felicia Day and everyone else who worked on it are awesome, plain and simple.

I've watched all three parts multiple times and am well on the way to memorizing the words (particularly 'My Freeze Ray', 'My Eyes' and 'Brand New Day'). The songs are catchy and thankfully everyone can sing, which cannot be said of other musicals I have seen. For example Sarah Chalke whilst being amazing in Scrubs and How I Met Your Mother can't sing (see "My Musical" where she is given barely any song time). Alyson Hannigan was also awesome in Buffy and How I Met Your Mother but couldn't sing in "Once More with Feeling".

Now this could mean that no one on How I Met Your Mother can sing, however NPH just blows this theory out of the water as Dr. Horrible. He's a proper Broadway musical actor and he sings amazingly in this. Whilst Fillion and Day are both great singers (particularly surprised about Fillion) NPH blows them out of the water. Some of the best parts of the songs come from NPH's delivery, it also helps that he was amazing as Dr. Horrible.

Now I'm not going to spoil the story or ending. All I will say is that it's a love story told from the prospective of a super villain (NPH) watching the superhero (Fillion) getting the girl of his dreams (Day) that is the story in a nutshell. But obviously being a Joss Whedon product means great dialogue, great direction, great plot etc. I sincerely think Joss is one of the best directors out there at the moment (Serenity is phenomenal btw) and whilst he doesn't do anything awe inspiring with this web series it is just well directed and has all of his trademarks from his years in film and television which prove why he has such an adoring fanbase (proof). This makes the wait for Dollhouse in January even more arduous as this is the end of new Joss Whedon products till then (thankfully I have several seasons of Buffy and Angel to watch).

I can safely say that I will be buying whatever DVD/CD comes out for Dr. Horrible in the near future because to be honest these guys need to be paid for doing an awesome job. Personally I want more stuff like this with good production values and good actors, and if it means forking out a tenner for the DVD and Soundtrack I'm perfectly willing to do so.

Overall (i.e. all three acts) I'm going to give Dr. Horrible 9/10 and will probably add it into my increasing shortlist for Top 10 TV Shows I Watched in '08 (yes I know it's not TV but it's Joss Whedon and he's about as TV as you can get). As or my favourite episodes of '08, if any part of Dr. Horrible makes it on I'll probably choose Act 2 as it was the perfect match of everything that made it great (it also had the best line in the entire production which definitely helps).

Well as I write this there is still some time left to watch Dr. Horrible for free so I'm going to do so for what must be my fifth viewing (and if you haven't watched at all then shame on you).

I do realise that I've done two NPH posts in a row but it must be said that he is awesome as Barney (aka 'Swarley') and Dr. Horrible. In actual fact I did have two other blog posts planned but they'll have to come at a later date.

So I'm going to leave you with promises of more reviews (of Lost season 4, Veronica Mars 1, 2&3, HIMYM 1, 2&3 and many others) and a critique of the Wire up until this point and the premiere of Season 5 (which will be posted in a few days). I will now leave you with a video of NPH and Jason Segel singing Les Mis (it's not Dr. Horrible but it's awesome none the less)


P.S. Watchmen trailer has me psyched oh so much (particularly since I just re-read the graphic novel).