Series / Blark and Son

Unmoored. Uncaged. Downright Unreasonable.

Blark and Son is an adult puppet comedy series created by Ben Bayouth and produced by Stoopid Buddy Studios for Comedy Central. The show centers around a well-meaning but bumbling father named Blark (voiced by Bayouth) who struggles to bond with his middle school-aged son named... er... Son (voiced by Christopher Mintz-Plasse). Often drawn into Blark's household shenanigans are his friend Fletch (Donald Faison), his neighbor Stacey (Jim Rash) and Son's schoolyard crush Regina (Deborah Baker, Jr).

The series has so far aired two seasons.

Blark and Son contains examples of:

• Actor Allusion: Blark calls Stacey "Dean" several times during The Handsomest Neighbor in the World. Jim Rash, who voices Stacey, is best known for playing Dean Pelton, the dean of Greendale Community College on Community.
• Admiring the Poster: In his attempts to be more like a man, Son puts up a poster of a 'sexy ass cartoon girl' (that looks a lot like Lucy Heartfilia) on his door. Junior perversely comments on her ass, only to then show the poster depicts the girl from just the bust up.
• Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Blark tries to bond with his son and be emotionally supportive of whatever he does. The problem is that he's a bit too enthusiastic about it and often barges in to provide support at the most inconvenient times. Blark is actually aware of this but struggles and typically fails to properly restrain himself from doing something embarrassing at a really bad time.
• Arc Villain: Chimpy could be considered one for Season 2, as he makes his debut in the first episode of the season and comes back for revenge in the finale.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking
  • As mentioned below, telling George Lucas to center the prequels around trade disputes is lumped in with Lincoln's assassination and the sinking of the Titanic.
    Son: Dad, those are inarguably the darkest and most terrible moments in human history!
  • When granted some Famous Last Words, Fletch describes how he'd lost his love, his family, brothers-in-arms, and "a variety of Pomeranians I loved like they was my own children."
  • The legend of Clovis La Roche, a serial killer who fused with his alligator. He sucks out your soul and condemns it to eternal agony, cut the fingers off your corpse as trophies, and he'll steal and wear your hat!
• Art Evolution: Compared to the earlier Instagram series of shorts, the TV series has more advanced puppets with movable arms and the sets are much more detailed and elaborate.
• Artistic License – Geography: Blark and Son have a large tropical jungle in their backyard which Chimpy escapes into. This is Lampshaded by Fletch when he yells about why they have a jungle in their backyard and that it doesn't make any geographical sense.
• Badass in Distress: Despite being a war veteran with the strength to restrain and snap a giant rat's neck, Blark was easily captured off-screen by Chimpy in the season 2 finale, forcing Son has to gear up to save his father. Though considering how easily Blark broke out of his bamboo bonds after seeing Chimpy get killed by Stacey, it's likely he was just being a Play-Along Prisoner in another attempt to test Son.
• Been There, Shaped History: According to Blark, the men of the Blark line were responsible for numerous historical disasters, including gifting Abraham Lincoln tickets to a show at Ford's Theatre, encouraging the captain of the Titanic to ram the iceberg and giving George Lucas writing advice for the Star Wars prequels.
• Be Yourself: The moral of episode 9, "The Internet Will Turn You Into a Jerk".
  Fletch: Now I used to know a boy who lived at the end of this hall, who was one of the most unique, stubborn, funny, fucked-up unicorns I ever met! And I liked that boy. Be a shame if I never saw him again.
• Big Damn Heroes: Stacey, when he kills Chimpy by impaling him from behind with a bamboo stick after Chimpy kidnapped him, Junior, and Blark. Subverted in that Son just talked Chimpy down and he was no longer a threat, with his death just traumatizing Son and devastating Blark. Played Straight in Junior's eyes though, as he is grateful for his father coming back to save him, even calling him a "real dad".
• Black Comedy: The series is rife with it, whether it's Zeke bringing up the awful things in his country, Blark or Fletch talking about their past in the military, or any of the things that keep happening to Stacey.
• Blatant Lies: Son fakes cutting his hand while cleaning yet after Fletch orders him to do his chores yet instantly has it wrapped in a bandage and there's no blood on either the knife or the counter. Despite this, Blark believes him and decides to murder Fletch for revenge. Though it turns out Blark wasn't fooled and was just trying to teach him a lesson.
• Blood-Splattered Innocents: Son gets Chimpy's blood spilled all over his face when Stacey brutally kills the ape.
• Book Ends: The first episode of the series ends with Blark yelling "I LOVE YOU SON!" as he restrains a giant rat in one arm and hugs Son with the other as he screams for dear life. The season 2 finale ends with Son similarly screaming in terror but at Chimpy's stuffed corpse in his closet, as Blark again yells "I LOVE YOU SON!!".
• Bring My Brown Pants: While attempting to patch things up during their breakup, Son and Regina consume a mind-altering root that also happens to be such a powerful laxative they have to stay completely still to avoid crapping themselves. They end up voiding their bowels in shock the moment Blark and Fletch burst into the room.
  • Fletch was so terrified of being held at gunpoint by Blark that he pisses himself, as he really believed he was going to die senselessly over the Blatant Lies Son made.
• Brutal Bird of Prey: In "Fletch's Anger Management Lesson" Blark comes face to face with a Harpy Eagle outside his room window, and loses a stare-off against it with the bird taking over his room as a result. At the end of the episode the bird figures out how to open the door and terrorizes the rest of the house.
• Bumbling Dad: Blark, being of an especially unhinged variety.
• Butt-Monkey:
  • Poor Son has to constantly deal with the antics of his crazy father and is frequently subjected to his crazy plans and "lessons".
  • Sometimes Played for Drama with Stacey Swanson. The man lives life passing from failure to failure and frequently ends up getting hurt. To make matters worse, the show as of now only has two seasons and ends before his character can find any sort of catharsis. Though his talk with his mother finally convinces him to start working on things he actually wants to do and his killing of Chimpy does get him the respect of Junior however, considering him a real dad for doing so and hugging him. This is despite the fact that Chimpy was no longer a threat.
• Cain and Abel: Son and Chimpy, Blark's "first son"/a chimpanzee he adopted. They briefly reconcile in the second season finale but this is cut short by Stacey killing Chimpy in retaliation for kidnapping him and Junior.
• Captain Ersatz: Blark is a big fan of the band Shred Zeppelin.
• Casual Danger Dialogue: Despite wrestling a genetically-enhanced Burmese battle rat, Blark wants to know what his son was about to say as he fends the beast off.
• Cerebus Call-Back: The "sink gun" mentioned in passing comes back twice, once when Blark uses it to threaten Fletch for getting Son injured by making him clean a knife, and again when Blark threatens to shoot himself because Fletch isn't letting him barge into his son's room. Downplayed in that both are Played for Laughs, but Fletch didn't know Blark wouldn't go through with shooting him and thought he was actually about to die.
• Character Development: Son becomes less bratty over the course of the series, even becoming more social and striking a genuine friendship with Junior.
• Claustrophobia: Stacey suffers from this and has a panic attack when wearing a cardboard alligator head.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Blark is an eccentric madman. It runs in the family, apparently. He can also be bizarrely aware of just how weird he gets, to the point he has a contingency plan for Fletch to restrain him when it would be an especially bad time for him to be a public embarrassment... and he still manages to cause trouble.
• Cluster F-Bomb: Son lets loose one of these when Blark keeps pestering him about doing the son swap with Junior in "Son Swap". Stacey lets out a similar one when Blark, after getting the interest of Stacey's mom, keeps trying to call Stacey his son in "Stacey's Mom Has Got It Going On".
• Continuity Nod: In "Son Swap", Blark manages to connect with Junior by dressing in the pelt of the rat he'd killed in the premiere.
• Cooldown Hug: Ultimately how Son 'defeats' Chimpy, apologizing and sympathizing with his plight of being a zoo animal forced to fend for himself, then taken into the Blark household only to be used as a pawn for another one of Blark's lessons. Son then hugs Chimpy, accepting him as his own brother. Chimpy admits he just wanted love, and it all seemed like it'd end well until it became an Interrupted Cool Down Hug when Stacey suddenly impales Chimpy from behind with a bamboo stick.
• Creepy Child: There's something really... "off" about Son's playmate Junior. Even Stacey, his adoptive father, thinks he's weird. Him being voiced by a manic Justin Roiland might have something to do with it. Although it turns out he's actually extremely intelligent despite his weirdness.
• Cruel Mercy: Blark refrains from killing the Burmese battle-rat at the end of episode one - he just popped its medulla oblongata, paralyzing it for life while still allowing it to live and "feel rat sadness."
  Son: I don't see how that's any better.
• Dad the Veteran: Blark is implied to have had a military career in the past, with a Purple Heart being seen in a frame over his bed. He also frequently reminisces about his past experiences with Fletch, with whom he served.
• Darker and Edgier: Season two downplays some of the comedic elements in favor of more Character Development and plot progression. With some episodes ("Date Night", "Son Swap", and "Meet Mr. Pockets") being pretty devoid of humor and ending on genuine depressing notes that aren't Played for Laughs.
• Dark and Troubled Past:
  • Played for Laughs with Blark who has an ever-expanding list of bizarre and horrifying things happen to him through out the course of his life.
  • In the episode "Son Swap" Junior reveals his life story to Blark through paintings on rocks and a drawing on a piece of hide. His family was in a car wreck that trapped his parents who were then eaten by wolves while begging him to run. He was bullied throughout his life for being weird and was eventually adopted by Stacey Swanson who merely wanted a kid because all his friends had one. He then reveals that Blark is the first person who has made him feel happy again, but this is soon ruined when Blark tells him he cannot stay at his house.
• Deep South: The Creepypasta- er, "Freaky Fettuccine" character Clovis la Roche, a Bayou-themed alligator killer from New Orleans.
• Deranged Animation: While Blark and Son is a live action puppet show, the character designs and puppetry evoke this trope. The show's puppets are intentionally Uncanny Valley ugly, and their exaggerated facial expressions and movements make them look even more unnatural.
• Different in Every Episode: The "Room Rules" note on the inside of Son's door changes with each episode.
• Dirty Coward: In the season 2 finale Stacey escapes from being captured by Chimpy, leaving Blark and his own son Junior behind. Subverted when Stacey actually comes back alone to save Junior and is the one to kill Chimpy by impaling him from behind with a sharpened bamboo stick.
• A Dog Named "Dog": It seems as though Blark literally named his son "Son".
• Don't Explain the Joke: Played With when Son tells Chimpy about how he couldn't hear Chimpy's mother because she was gagging on his banana. Son himself doesn't explain it but Chimpy has to slowly and verbally figure out that Son is using a banana as a metaphor for his own junk.
  Chimpy: Banana look like... Penis? Banana mean... Son penis? BANANA!? MEAN!? PENIIIII-
• Downer Ending: See below.
• Drama Bomb: "Son Swap" was intended as a way to help with some wacky sitcom antics. By the end of it, Stacey is passed out drunk while Junior, reeling from Blark rejecting him as an adoptive son, tries cuddling into his unconscious body.
  Blark: Son Swap was a bad idea. Most of it wasn't even that funny!
• Drill Sergeant Nasty: Fletch was this in his younger days, and old habits clearly die hard for him.
• Even the Guys Want Him: Stacey is apparently so handsome Blark can't stop swooning over him. This is Informed Attractiveness though, given how his puppet is just as hideously Uncanny Valley as anyone else's.
• Everyone Has Standards: Blark admittedly gets his son into more than a few dangerous and insane situations with his 'lessons' but they're (usually. Mostly.) done with good intentions. When he sees that Stacey was trying to get Son (a 12-year old) to drink with him however, he immediately raises his fists, ready to beat the snot out of Stacey.
  Blark: What the f*ck is going on here?
• Fell Asleep Standing Up: Fletch only sleeps like this. In Son's closet, more specifically.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: Season 1, episode 11, "Stacey Goes into a Downward Spiral" has a full-page article about having sold his psychiatric practice to become a public speaker that's fully written out... including a section about how the only reason they're publishing the article is because Stacey's father is pretty much the only reason the newspaper is still in business.
• Fun T-Shirt: Blark sometimes wears a burlap "shirt" that says "I MURDER BABIES" on it as a fail-safe to force him to do the laundry.
• The Gadfly: As much of a Well-Intentioned Extremist Blark is, he occasionally plays some jokes on Son for his own amusement. Case in point, he has Son give him a hug after he snaps a giant rat's neck and seemingly kills it, only for the rat to come back to life and start shaking violently in Blark's grasp, with Son still being embraced by his other arm and unable to escape, only being able to scream in fear. Then there's the time that he loudly laughs at Son and Regina shitting themselves. And in the season 2 finale he props up Chimpy's stuffed body in Son's closet as some kind of sick joke, even laughing as Son understandably screams in terror.
• Gender-Blender Name: Blark thought Stacey's name was a joke at first. Seems to run in the family, as Stacey's mom is named Frankie and he mentions having a sister named Craig.
• Genki Girl: Regina, especially in her first appearance.
• Good Parents: For all his faults, Blark genuinely loves his son, is unwaveringly supportive of him, and reacts very poorly whenever Son is threatened.
• Growing Up Sucks: "Meet Mr. Pockets" ends with Junior realizing he needs to grow up and that includes getting rid of the titular Mr. Pockets, who has been nothing but kind.
• Helium Speech: Blark has Son breathe helium in through a balloon so that he could practice speaking like a rat in an attempt to draw out the giant rat in the first episode, which only pisses Son off as he tells Blark off in a very high-pitched voice. Needless to say Blark couldn't take his words seriously until after he storms off.
  Blark: Son come back! Ohoho you sound hilarious haha... Oh boy... I really Blarked that one didnt I?
• I Banged Your Mom: Blark ends up doing it with Stacey's mom, very loudly too, with Stacey being able to hear it in the next room. Beforehand Blark even went up to Stacey and says right into his ear "I'm gonna f*ck your mom".
• Ignored Aesop: Blark ends almost every episode on the cusp of learning something about being a good parent only to take it all back with one final comment.
• I'm a Humanitarian: Blark was once in a plane crash that left him stranded in the Himalayan mountains where he had to survive by eating the corpses of his friends. He's a bit unhinged as a result.
• Inelegant Blubbering: After learning Blark wasn't really gonna kill him over the misunderstanding with Son cutting himself with the Ginzo knife, Fletch breaks down into tears.
• Killer Gorilla: Chimpy, Blark's 'other son', is a large chimpanzee capable of primitive speech and is the closest thing the show has to a villain, as he terrorizes Son.
• Logic Bomb: In "Stacey's Mom Has Got It Going On", Blark takes a picture of himself, Stacey, and Stacey's mother Frankie at the dinner table together. Frankie asks him when on earth Blark took that picture, and even he doesn't know.
  Blark: I mean, we're all in it, and I don't even own a printer...
  • He then holds up another photo of them at the table with him holding the first photo.
• Mood Whiplash: For a show with admittedly creepy looking characters there are some surprisingly emotional moments. Such moments are usually followed by horrific and/or humorous ones, probably due to the Quarter Hour Short length of the episodes.
  • The first episode has Son trying to tell Blark that no matter what he'll always be his son, only to be violently interrupted by a giant burmese battle rat crashing from the ceiling.
  • "Son Swap" ends with Junior sadly trying to sleep with Stacey on the cold floor after he had knocked himself out slipping on a wine bottle... then a Smash Cut to an up-beat, sitcom style closing song.
  • Son manages to de-escalate the situation with Chimpy by sympathizing with him and hugging him, Chimpy then admits he only wanted love. Chimpy is then immediately impaled from behind by Stacey.
• Mundane Made Awesome: Pretty much constantly, but Fletch's solution for helping Son work through his frustrations tops it. He sets up a Tang Dynasty Anger Circle with an elaborate explanation of how it's supposed to help one leave their anger behind.
• Murder Is the Best Solution: Lampshaded and defied in "Murder is a Terrible Way to Teach a Lesson"
• Ninja Log: Blark somehow switches himself with a pumpkin when Fletch chains him to a chair in "Only an Ex-GI Can Stop This Embarrassing Dad". Even better, he somehow did it while Fletch was staring right at him.
• Noodle Incident: Blark's past contains a large number of these as he tends to not elaborate on the strange events that happened to him.
• Not So Above It All: While Son and Stacy are normally the voices of reason, there are times like "Stacy Goes Into A Downward Spiral" where they're willing to join in on Blark's craziness.
• Oblivious Guilt Slinging: In the episode "Murder Is a Terrible Way to Teach a Lesson", Blark holds Fletch at gunpoint and repeatedly implies Son could stop him from shooting Fletch if he just confesses to lying. He knew Son had lied to him the entire time and was just guilt tripping him into a confession.
• Offing the Offspring: During "Only an Ex-GI Can Stop This Embarrassing Dad", Blark alludes to sacrificing his firstborn child in a religious ceremony
• Once per Episode: Every episode has Blark barge into Son's room with a cartoonishly loud crash sound effect.
• Papa Wolf: Blark to a T. Even something minor like Stacey reprimanding Son for bad behavior is enough for Blark to get very confrontational. Stacey himself becomes one in the season 2 finale, despite running away at first, he comes back and brutally kills Chimpy for kidnapping Junior.
• Parental Neglect: Regina's mother Gene often misses her daughter's birthdays.
• Parents as People: Spoken almost word-for-word in "The Adults Are Not Alright".
  Regina: Parents are people too, ya know.
  • Stacy genuinely loves Junior even if he adopted him just because all his friends had kids, but he suffers from depression and struggles to properly raise Junior right.
• The Pig-Pen: Much to Fletch's chagrin, Blark is an extremely unhygenic housemate. He only does laundry once every five months and uses shampoo as body-wash.
• Power Floats: In "Keep Blark Out", the sheer mental stress of not intruding on his son's privacy causes Blark to levitate down the hall towards his door.
• Quarter Hour Short: The TV series episodes are usually around 9 to 11 minutes in length.
• A Rare Sentence: In the first episode, Blark apologizes to his son.
  Blark: I can't believe this is the fourth time I'm saying this, but I'm sorry for spraying rat pee in your face.
• Real Men Wear Pink:
  • At the climax of the Season Two finale, instead of a dramatic fight, Son instead empathizes with Chimpy for all the pain he's been through and offers a sympathetic ear before giving him a Cooldown Hug. Even Junior calls the act that of "a real man".
    • This leads to a brief debate between Blark and Son over what being a "real man" should look like. Blark thinks it means burying your emotions and trying to project strength to others, while Son advocates for being empathetic and responsible.
• Revenge: After being knocked out by Blark and learning he was just being used to test Son in another one of Blark's crazy lessons, Chimpy breaks out of his crate and into the backyard jungle, then very loudly swears revenge on Blark and Son. The Season 2 finale has him come back for it, kidnapping Blark as well as Stacey and Junior.
• Rodents of Unusual Size: The first episode of the TV series has Blark and Son deal with a genetically enhanced burmese battle rat that was living in their walls.
• Russian Guy Suffers Most: Played for Laughs. Zeke is from an ambiguous war-torn Slavic country which he constantly alludes to being a terrible dictatorship, saying how their language doesn't even have a word for "happy".
• Scary Black Man: Fletch is a very intense ex-drill sergeant. However, he can also be very gentle and reasonable, sometimes providing surprisingly down-to-earth and understandable advice to Son that Blark would struggle to deliver.
• Serious Business: "Solids" for Blark and Fletch. These favors never expire, and the ones who owe it must fulfill them to the best of their ability when it's time to collect. They can be called off by the beneficiary though, which Blark tries to get Fletch to do by threatening suicide during "Keep Blark Out".
• Shell-Shocked Veteran: Blark is generally unhinged and has a past in the military. Notably, in one episode Son talks to him about a dream where he fails to do anything for his team in League of Legends before dying, Blark can describe the dream fairly accurately but substitutes in his own experience in the war.
• Shout-Out: Quite a few of them, as Son regularly plays League of Legends with Zeke and one episode highlights his favorite champion being Tryndamere.
  • Blark has Predator vision in "Only an Ex-GI Can Stop This Embarrassing Dad".
  • From the same episode, Blark sneaks up on Fletch from a closet to which he says "Clever Blark" before getting attacked like a wild animal. Fletch was even armed with a rifle and wore a hat much like Muldoon's. Near the end of the episode Fletch tranquilizes Blark and says "Come at the King, you best not miss".
  • One of the episode titles is "Stacey's Mom has Got It Going On"
  • Son puts up a pin-up poster of Lucy Heartfilia on his door in "Meet Mr. Pockets".
• Stylistic Suck: Zig-zagged. The puppets are all purposely hideous and Uncanny Valley for comedic purposes, but they're also extremely expressive and high-quality.
• Take That!: Son's behavior throughout episode 9 is a pretty blatant one to Andrew Tate and his public persona inspiring young men to take after him. The punchline at the end is that Rocko Flash is a bestiality pedophile - a literal puppy-fucker.
• Taxidermy Terror: Chimpy's fate, as Blark has his 'On-the-fly black market taxidermy guy' immortalize him and has his stuffed corpse propped up in Son's closet in a horrific pose with the piece of bamboo used to kill him still embedded in his chest, severely freaking Son out.
• Tough Love: Blark is an interesting example. Unlike most cases, Blark is very vocal about his love for Son and makes it very apparent that all his actions he does to Son are done in an effort to turn him into a man. However said actions are often done without taking Son's considerations in mind and frequently lead him to a world of ire and embarrassment. His lessons on not telling lies and his chimpanzee brother being the most offending examples as they both lead Son either traumatized or in actual life-threatening danger.
• Verbal Backspace: The "continuing a sentence" variety in "Stacey's Mom Has Got It Going On"
  Stacey: No! I am not staying in Son's room! (Death Glare from his mother) For more than a night!
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Blark and Fletch, at least during their reunion, as they devise ways to get back at each other over minor slights in their decades-long friendship.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Pretty much all of Blark's insane plans and schemes he forces Son to endure are either attempts for the two of them to bond more or Blark trying teach him a lesson.
• Whole-Plot Reference: "Blark and Son Learn the Ultimate Lesson" is one for Saw. The Jigsaw stand-in even says blatantly "Greetings, and welcome to a Saw movie parody."
• You Are Not Alone: Fletch says this to Son when he goes off to save Blark from Chimpy in the season 2 finale, saying he'll come to his aid when he confronts the ape. Subverted when Chimpy throws a spear at Fletch and he retreats, telling Son "You ARE alone!" leaving him to deal with Chimpy on his own.
• Your Mom: Son's go-to insult whenever he's flaming on League of Legends.