Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #638 in DVD
• Released on: 2008-02-11
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Format: PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 165 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Is there anything on television quite like The Mighty Boosh? Bluntly, who cares, for the ongoing adventures and antics of Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt remain a comedic treat, even if season three does have its up and down moments.

Let’s temper that, quickly: The Mighty Boosh on one of its lesser days can still generate more laughs than 90% of other modern-day comedy series, and that’s certainly the case with the six episodes here. Lead characters Howard and Vince are found working in the Nabootique this time, and it’s not long before they’re joined by some old favourites. Cue Bob Fossil, the sublime Shamen, and the Moon, among others.

If there’s one downside to The Mighty Boosh’s third season, it is perhaps a little too much self-indulgence, which occasionally tempers things. But then that’s set against some brilliantly ambitious episodes, some of the finest surrealist humour on the telly, and the terrific Crack Fox.

There’s little denying that as a show, The Mighty Boosh can easily be classed as bizarre, bonkers, and straight-out odd. But here, that’s turned into the show’s strength. And given the side-splitting laughs it continues to generate, we wouldn’t have it any other way. --Jon Foster

DVD Description
Vince Noir and Howard Moon return for a third series of this cult comedy hit featuring another fantabulous mix of surreal humour, musical interludes, shiny clothes and strange haircuts.

Now working in Naboo's second hand shop, 'Nabootique', Howard mainly whiles away the hours in delusions of grandeur whilst unsuccessfully trying to sell his esoteric jazz records, while Vince lays around in a hammock playing loud music, trying on wigs and finding Howard ludicrous.

They assemble their usual accomplices, including Naboo the enigma and Bollo the ape, reunite us with some familiar faces including the Hitcher, the Moon and Bob Fossil, as well as introducing us to a whole host of new characters.

Synopsis
Coming 'at ya' with the third series of BBC3's cult phenomenon THE MIGHTY BOOSH. This time Howard and Vince have left the comfort of their Dalston flat to work in Naboo's shop--his 'Nabootique'--wherein Howard's passion for jazz, stationary and practical attire, clashes with Vince's obsessive love of haircare, accessorising, and his own reflection. There's the welcome return of old favourites such as the Hitcher, Bob Fossil, the assorted Shamen council and of course, the Moon. As well as new characters; the Crack Fox, Lester Corncrake, the Flighty Zeus and Sammy the Crab. Includes all six episodes.

Customer Reviews

The men who killed the crimp...
I am a devotee of the Boosh, and I still managed to enjoy the good bits of this series, but the more prominent, ill-judged sections made it very difficult. The Boosh used to be a gentle, talky, phantasmagorically nonsensical bizarrerie in a world of formulaic and banal entertainment, and the third series suffers from the enforcement of 'normal tv' rules on material which can't survive such an imposition.

In the third series, obscenity has to be blatant rather than suggested, jokes and ideas are explained rather than simply produced for us to construe in the privacy of our own diseased minds; relationships are described rather than demonstrated, and the magic is squashed down by reams of The Explicit. The joy of a Boosh joke used to be the ellipsis, the obliquity; even a tiny pause in the delivery could be a recognisable stylistic quirk which became a joke in itself: the texture of the language was rich and subtle enough to improve with re-watching.

In the third series, the atmosphere is oddly alien to this kind of humour: suddenly the dialogue is laddishly sarcastic and harshly modern, or employing nostalgic whimsy only to point at it in a knowing way. The friendly, loose yet satisfyingly constructed tales of series one and two become a routine, formulaic sit-com, and the prosaic harshness punctures the fantasy.

The second series flat was a less magical environment than the Zooniverse, and the Nabootique is worse: suddenly the Boosh-space is very much indoors in mundane London, and oppressively crammed with obtrusive hordes of the self-consciously trendy. What happened to the lonely, obsolete corners of the universe populated by mystical, sad and dysfunctional monsters, or the dreamily lush back-projected landscapes?

Somehow the role of Vince and Howard's relationship has eroded: instead of being two terminally-bored idiots eternally yoked together in unspoken sympathy when faced with a world full of pitiful grotesques, they have become a trendy urbanite jerk and his profoundly depressed doormat, the dissolution of their mutual affection rendering the Boosh colder and less appealing.

The re-use of familiar material is unfortunate: it could have been handled much better or avoided, and the third series music doesn't reach the joyous level of the second series. That said, I enjoyed 'It's what's inside that counts', and a few other high points such as Howard's dance with Elsie, and the jewel-like animations. I was also pleased to see a decent selection of roles for the always sultry and delectable Rich Fulcher, and I only wish our voluptuous Bob Fossil had had some more original material.

I still think Barratt and Fielding have the potential to return to form, and continue the best British tv programme around in the style it deserves. Whatever else is said, it's still better than all the other pedestrian drivel around and this dvd is firmly on my shelf with the others. However what I really hope is that the Boosh give us another radio series, and get back to the quality of writing that made the first radio series so glorious. If you're looking for a first Boosh purchase, I direct you to that fine body of work, or the utterly charming first television series.

Yes and/or no
Some of this is really funny. Some of it is fan service (and fair enough - I like to see boys kissing as much as the next girl). Lots of it is recycled (which is such a shame coz one of the best things about the Boosh is originality). Some of it is not funny.

The worst thing is this: the bits that are not funny aren't unfunny in the kind of still-interesting, somehow-strangely-mesmerizing way that the less funny bits of the first two series were. In some of the episodes Fielding seems just - well, tired. And a tired Vince doesn't work.

Also, the last episode was plain bad.

On the plus side, there are still flashes of genius. More than in most comedy series. It's really only the comparison with the first two series that makes this disappointing.

Not as Good as... but Better than...
Series 3 is sort of uneven - three standout episodes that are strong enough to overwhelm the lazy, self indulgent strand running through all six. The main problem for me was that they brought to the fore those wonderful details that added unique texture in series 1 & 2. For example, crimping. Before crimping had a name, it was something that cropped up every now and then in a natural, brilliant sort of way. In series three there's an entire episode dedicated to crimping. Knowing it's something that can be taught, can be practiced and even copied just sorta cheapened it. The same goes for the Council of Shamen, and particularly Tony Harrison who's been transformed into a hard living drug fiend.

The other big problem is that the Boosh now inhabit the same space as a lot of the real world, and it's not a particularly great one - it's full of Camden posers. In Party, they're even told by Vince that they're the chosen people. They're arrogant, shallow body fascists. That was charming when Vince was the only one and it was taken to a surrealist extreme, but now it's just irritating. That's one of the bigger problems - Vince has stopped being lovable and the friendship between him and Howard descends into point-scoring and spite.

The standouts are Eels (the Hitcher remains reliably nasty), Journey to the Centre of Punk and especially the Crack Fox (definitely Julian Barrett's best turn and an effective comedy/horror mix). Even those have moments you'd rather weren't there, just as the weaker episodes have moments you want to savour.

Mighty Boosh 3 is not as good as their previous work but it's still better than any other comedy on British TV. I reckon series 4 will be a vast improvement and in the meantime, it's still not that bad. They just set the bar so high before that it was hard to top it the third time out.