Last year, a friend of mine sent me a link to a video called "Red Vs Blue: The Internet." I had no clue what it was, but knowing my friend's sense of humor… it had to be good. The opening credit did little to fill me in on anything. All it said was "Rooster Teeth Presents." As this credit faded I was suddenly faced with two characters from the video game 'Halo' talking about the differences between situations in Real Life as opposed to on the Internet. They discussed and gave examples of things like getting mail, meeting people, parties and political conversations. Realizing that this description probably makes it sound a little boring, I'd like to say that this 3 minute short was anything but. I laughed my butt off. I think before the day was through I must have shown it to 30 people around my office, who all laughed as hard as I did. (Hey, as long as I get a good 20 minutes of work done in my 8 hour day, I'm good.)

Several of those people were already familiar with 'Red vs. Blue' and were amazed that I hadn't heard of it. By the next day I was on a mission. I had to find out just who or what Rooster Teeth was and see if there were any more videos out there like this one. Thanks to the wonder (and curse) that is the Internet, my researching skills weren't needed and within seconds I was able to discover that there weren't just a couple more videos available. Oh no. There was a slew of 'Red vs. Blue' videos encompassing 4 full 'seasons' of webisodes. These webisodes tied together an all encompassing storyline of two factions at war with each other over a seemingly worthless piece of real estate. Well, okay… it really was worthless.

The term 'Red vs. Blue' comes from the two opposing forces. The Red Team is made up of Sarge, Simmons, Grif and Donut, while the Blue Team gives us Church, Tucker, Caboose and Tex. Each webisode is treated like a chapter in this 'bigger picture' of a plotline. The situations, and moreover the dialogue is some of the most hysterical I have ever heard or seen in any real world situation comedy. You might have two 'soldiers' discussing existentialism, neither of which having the slightest idea of what it is or what is going on around them. As the seasons progress, new characters come into play while some who have 'died' come back to inhabit the bodies of others. It as confusing as it is hilarious.

But the great writing and terrific voiceover work aren't the only things that make 'Red vs. Blue' so darn funny. It's the whole concept of how it's created. What the ingenious group of guys at Rooster Teeth do (as I understand it) is hook several Xbox units together so they can all control the environment and characters in the "Halo" video game (and in later 'seasons' "Halo 2"). Then they painstakingly set up each of the scenes, using one character as a central 'camera' to follow the action. As is the case in the game, you never see the characters faces, you only know they're talking by the nodding of their helmeted heads. You really need to see it to completely understand it, but it is one of the funniest things I have ever seen.

I'm not much of a video game player, but having watched my son play "Halo" and "Halo 2" for hours on end, I can appreciate just how difficult setting up these scenes to work with the dialogue has to be. I can't imagine how long it must take just to create one webisode, but it must be a frustrating endeavor of gigantic proportions.

As I learned more about the geniuses at Rooster Teeth, I found that they were extremely popular around the gaming world. Even my son had heard of "Red vs. Blue" (that's how un-cool I am). As a matter of fact, "Red vs. Blue" had become so popular that the main website (listed below) is selling DVD sets of all 4 currently available 'seasons.' Once I learned this little fact, I thought it might be prudent to see them myself so I could see if they were as consistently funny as the one little video I saw so long ago. Having watched all 4 'seasons', I can say without hesitation that these guys need to move on to bigger and better things. Not because they have to, because all 4 'seasons' of "Red vs. Blue" are funny, but because they have the talent to.

Moreover, the 4 DVDs they have released so far are so tricked out with special features that I have yet to see everything. Each release includes a commentary track by the cast/crew that is full of extremely invaluable information about how certain shots were done and explanations of inside jokes. Needless to say, these guys are sometimes as funny in the commentaries as they are in the series. You'll also find tons of outtakes, deleted scenes, and some ingenious coming attractions where they spoof famous movies and show. They also have some hysterical public service announcements (like "The Internet") that are alone worth the price of picking up the sets.

I cannot recommend Seasons 1-4 of "Red vs. Blue" enough. I can’t wait for a Season 5 to come out! Now, I'll have to admit that not everyone will have the intelligence required to appreciate the humor, but if you are even remotely a fan of video games, you'll laugh 'til you cry. One quick warning though if you have little ones. The language occasionally gets a little rough, so don’t let the kiddos watch these until they get a little older. I can’t tell you how old, they're your kids for cryin' out loud!

Starring (the voices of): Burnie Burns, Gustavio Sorola, Geoff Fink, Matt Mullum, Joel Heyman, Kathleen Zeulch
Studio: Rooster Teeth Productions
Release Date: Available
Region 1
MPAA Rating: NR
Website

We'll give Red vs. Blue: Seasons 1 -4 an A.