- Kid: Is this gonna be more like Futurama or Rick and Morty?
Renzo: Well, actually, it's gonna be more like shut the fuck up!
Farzar is an adult animated sci-fi comedy on Netflix, created by Roger Black and Waco O'Guin, the two behind Brickleberry and Paradise PD. It premiered on July 15th, 2022.
On the distant planet of Farzar, venerated yet venal royal czar, Renzo, and his intergalactic crew, known as S.H.A.T., defend their domed human city from the evil alien overlord, Bazarack. To help him on his journey, Renzo hesitantly enlists his son, Prince Fichael, who is as good-natured as he is feeble-minded. Although ecstatic to be a space warrior at first, Fichael soon finds out that being a space warrior isn't all it's cracked up to be, once he discovers the dark and bleak reality about who his father truly is.
On November 16th, 2023, it was announced that the series was canceled after one season.
Farzar provides examples of:
- Aerith and Bob: Characters named Renzo, Fichael, Flammy, Zobo, and Scooty coexist with characters named Billy, Barry, Vallory, and Mallory.
- Ambiguously Brown: Prince Fichael is supposedly mixed-race, considering he's the offspring of the very dark-skinned Renzo and the very light-skinned Flammy, yet he is very light-passing, so much so, that one would never assume he's mixed just by looking at him.
- Arch Nemesis Dad: Season 1 concludes this way, with Fichael accepting that Renzo is an irredeemable asshole who only really cares about himself, to the point that he's willing to let every living thing on Farzar die just so he doesn't have to give up his power.
- Art Shift: The animation style used in the first few scenes of the show and also the theme song is noticeably a lot more fluid and three-dimensional than the rest of the series. The characters move with more freedom, fluidity, and depth. There's a lot more detail, texture, and shading put into the backgrounds, creating some gorgeous artwork. The animation drew heavy inspiration from 80's media, filtering the art style of He-Man through a vintage vaporwave aesthetic. This all immediately changes as soon as we cut back to the rest of the show, which displays a bunch of flat and generic Family Guy-looking caricatures, living in a one-dimensional environment.
- Bad Boss: Ironically, both Bazarack and Renzo fall under this trope; Bazarack is a horrifically incompetent warlord who's only in charge because he sent off his only rival for the throne on an unwinnable mission, constantly ignores his minions, and wastes resources on ridiculous pet projects like a castle made of candy. Renzo is a Fake Ultimate Hero who married into power, shamelessly glorifies himself through propaganda, and has on several occasions forced his guards to kill themselves for seeing him do something unheroic. Technically, Fichael also applies, thanks to his incompetent leadership of S.H.A.T but in his case, it's out of well-meaning incompetence, not malevolence.
- Big Bad Wannabe: Bazarack is, narratively speaking, the main villain of the show. Unfortunately, he's so clownishly incompetent that he's a bigger threat to his own men than he is to the human city.
- Black Comedy: This show loves to joke about dark subject matters.
- Body Horror:
- Barry's creation Billy, a mentally stunted abomination made up of several different creatures, and with at least a dozen different sex organs hidden across his body.
- Flammy's inbred family members, who are so horrifically deformed that they can't even process normal food anymore, instead subsisting on rudimentary breast milk from one of their own family. They're all very proud of their disgusting and monstrous appearance, seeing them as a sign of being part of the elite.
- The Caligula: Renzo is a bloodthirsty war criminal who only married Fichael's mother Flammy to gain access to the throne, and enforces all manner of unjust and racist policies against the alien natives of Farzar. He also opresses the human inhabitants, forcing them to constantly praise him, and literally rewrites history just to make himself look like a legendary hero.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: This happens on several occasions per episode, mainly so that characters can insult the show or turn to the camera after telling a joke and point out how funny it was.Bazarack: We did that joke already? Oh, boy. This is gunna be a long season.
- Conjoined Twins: Val and Mal.
- Creator Thumbprint: Although this show seems to be different enough than its two spiritual predecessors, there's still a trace of the artist's original style in some of the human characters. Also, the humor of the show screams "Paradise PD IN SPACE".
- Cypher Language: There are several signs and posters with alien letters written on them that can all be decoded into English letters, revealing hidden jokes and gags.
- Domed Hometown: The hometown of the humans is a city in a dome. The dome is impenetrable, and protects the city from alien attack.
- Doppelgänger Crossover: When Renzo tries to clone himself, Agent Clapper from Paradise PD emerges from the cloning machine. Renzo comments that they sound nothing alike though they're both voiced by Lance Reddick.
- Dumb Blonde: Prince Fichael is a rare male version of this; he has blonde hair and is about as intelligent as the other protagonists of Roger Black and Waco O'Guin's previous cartoons.
- Evil Gloating: A couple times Bazarack (the show's main villain) gloats to Renzo during the war when he (at least thinks) he's gotten the upper hand.
- Evil Overlooker: The promotional poster of the show featured Bazarack, looking over them.
- Fake Memories: Fichael's memories of his happy childhood bonding with his father are all fake, implanted on Renzo's request so he wouldn't accidentally screw him up. Fichael started suspecting something was off when his memory of Renzo teaching him to ride a bike ended in a parody of the Amblin Entertainment Logo
. - Fake Ultimate Hero: Both Renzo and Fichael are portrayed as this. Renzo has some fighting skills, but not nearly as much as he claims, and he's also a racist, violent, and incompetent Dirty Coward who glorifies himself through propaganda. Fichael actually wants to do good and is much more idealistic and benevolent, but he's a pathetically naive Manchild with no fighting skills, no brains, and no real idea what he's doing.
- Fan Disservice: For starters, the show gives us several scenes in which we see Queen Flammy's breasts... and she's an old woman with saggy boobs.
- Fantastic Drug: Snufflesnarfs, a tiny alien race native to Farzar, can be crushed into a cocaine-like powder that is a popular recreational drug. Scootie is hopelessly addicted to them... despite not having sense organs, a physical brain or anything else that could possibly be affected by chemicals. He later gets Zobo hooked on them too.
- Fantastic Ghetto:
- The city's robots live in the rundown Robot District.
- There's an alien shantytown just outside the dome.
- Fantastic Nature Reserve: Fichael built a reserve for the endangered Reaper Demon, not realizing that the reason it was endangered was because it was a near-invulnerable apex predator that devastated Farzar, and one of the few wars Renzo is willing to admit the humans lost. A single Reaper Demon easily overruns the whole preserve and almost kills the whole cast until they figure out it's weak point.
- Fantastic Racism: The human colonizers of Farzar, Renzo especially, are incredibly racist towards aliens, and force them to live in slums outside the city. The same goes for robots, who are essentially slaves with no rights at all.
- Fantasy-Forbidding Father: Renzo doesn't believe that his son Fichael is qualified to be a military general of any kind.
- Finger Gun: One episode has a Clappers-like clone of Renzo use his hands to imitate guns, with Renzo soon doing the same.
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: Farzar is basically a dark parody of franchises such as He-Man or Flash Gordon, where instead of humans battling against alien invaders, the humans are the invaders, and have made up an elaborate mythos of why their actions are justified.
- Gag Penis: After losing his human penis, which was already pretty big, Scootie has Barry replace it with a massive robotic one that extends like a Transformer. Billy points out that he's clearly just trying to compensate for his insecurities.
- Killer Rabbit: Zobo. He might look like a Ridiculously Cute Critter, but he's actually a member of an Always Chaotic Evil race that literally feeds off chaos and misery, and will unleash an apocalypse on Farzar if he absorbs enough of it. The season 1 finale has him to exactly that, except it's aimed at Renzo's Humongous Mecha, limiting the damage he manages to do.
- A Long Time Ago, in a Galaxy Far, Far Away...: It's mostly set on the titular planet. Several The Genie Knows Jack Nicholson references are made to Earth culture for the sake of comedy but isn't not clear if the planet actually exists in the setting. The creators have teased the idea of a crossover with their other two shows, Brickleberry and Paradise PD which are set on Earth.
- Mad Scientist: Barry was once the foremost scientific mind of Farzar, until he had some sort of nervous breakdown. These days, most of his inventions are abominations in the eyes of both God and Man. Just ask poor Billy.
- Mama Bear: Flammy might be an inbred, racist old crone, but she deeply loves her son, to the point that when her family members mocked and bullied him for his appearance, she ends up killing most of them during a mock execution of Renzo (due to having attacked Flammy's ex-fiancee).
- Maligned Mixed Marriage: Played for Laughs when it's revealed that Flammy's family despise Renzo for marrying her, not because he's black, but because he isn't related to them! Being royalty, the entire family is actually severly inbred, which they take pride on, and even look down on Fichael for not being hideously deformed.
- May–December Romance: Flammy is an elderly woman and at least twice as old as Renzo, probably more. He only married her for political reasons.
- Meta Mecha: Fichael and Renzo fight each other in a pair of these (designed to look like themselves) at the end of season 1. They fight to a stalemate, only for Renzo to reveal that he has an even bigger mecha that fits his original one. Fichael is forced to resort to drastic measures to match it.
- Multi Boobage: It's common for alien women to have multiple sets of breasts though a rare gender flip where some male aliens like the Intellectoids have several man-boobs.
- Never Trust a Trailer: Renzo being at the forefront of the promotion poster, (pictured above), coupled with the show's description mentioning Fichael's name only, misled many to believe that Fichael was the main character and the name of the blond-haired space warrior on the cover before the show came out. Once the trailer dropped and clarified who everyone was, the fanbase was thrown into a bit of a whirl to say the least.
- Non-Indicative Name: The Intellectoids, a race of aliens with massive heads that have a reputation for being hyper-intelligent. They're actually this series incarnation of Roger Black and Waco O'Guin's recurring author avatars, meaning they're also incredibly stupid.
- Only Sane by Comparison: He might be a walking abomination in the eyes of God, but Billy often points out obvious plot points or story cliches that everyone else ignores, even with his Hulk Speak and Kindhearted Simpleton personality.Billy: Oh, what silly C-story will Billy be involved in today?
- Off with His Head!: Fichael cuts off Bazarack's head at the end of the first episode, only for the second to reveal that Bazarack's species can regrow their heads, with the drawback that they have to go through Rapid Aging to return to their proper age, puberty included.
- Orphaned Etymology: The show takes place on the distant planet of Farzar, which is galaxies away from Earth, according to
Word of God. It's never been specified that any Farzarians have ever been to Earth or are even aware of its existence. Despite this, there are plenty of instances of these.- Characters regularly use the names "God" and "Jesus Christ" as expressions, despite the fact that the sole religion on Farzar is The Church of Ozner, wherein the only deity is a guy named "Ozner". Christianity does not exist on Farzar, so Ozner only knows where they heard this from.
- Val and Mal are commonly referred to as "Siamese Twins" despite there being no country of Siam for this term to be named after.
- In "Welcome to Farzar", Scootie watched "Disney Channel", even though there was no Walt Disney for this channel to be named after.
- In "Robot Revolution", Scootie requested a "Pacific Islander" doctor to do his penile surgery even though he's not from Earth, so there is no Pacific Ocean to use as a frame of reference.
- In "Save the Reaper Demons", Bazarack had some breakfast sausages that he called "Jimmy Deans", despite there being no Jimmy Dean for this meal to be named after.
- In "Flammily Reunion", Renzo called Splammy "Sesame Street Fighter", a portmanteau of two franchises that don't exist in his galaxy.
- In "Baz, Bangs, & Brains", Scootie told Renzo that he looked like a Korean scholgirl. Sorry, but what's a Korean? This is a non-Earth planet that doesn't harbor the continent of Asia, let alone any of its countries.
- In "The Great and Powerful Ozner", Renzo watched a commercial for a Mercedes-Benz car, somehow named after Mercédès Jellinek and Karl Benz, two people from a planet that Farzar knows nothing about.
- Later on in the same episode, the brand-named drink LaCroix is brought up, which derives its name from the Earth town of Lacrosse, Wisconsin.
- Pedophile Priest: Discussed, implied, yet played for grim laughs. Fichael once revealed that a preacher molested him, implied to be when he was a child. Since this is a black comedy, this wasn't played seriously.
- People Puppets: A very rare voluntary example; Flammy's former fiancee (and her twin brother), is so weak and feeble due to inbreeding that he pays a puppeteer to move him around on marionette strings. Said puppeteer is apparently a Marionette Master, as he can also help his employer fight, and extremely well at that, as seen when Renzo attacks them, resulting in a Curb-Stomp Battle where Renzo can't even land a single hit!
- Planet of Hats: There's a lot of planets and alien races that are like this, such as the banana people, the leaf people, and most hilariously, The Planey of Adorable Cancer Survivors in Wheelchairs.
- Polar Opposite Twins: Val and Mal are polar opposites. With Val being a nice and happy school teacher and Mal being an ass-kicking punk girl. The season 1 finale reveals that Val actually despises this role, having been forced into it to counteract Mal's rebellious nature. When briefly gaining full control over their shared body, she ends up becoming WORSE than Mal.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Renzo, the evil king of a human supermacist colony.
- Post-Stress Overeating: Played for Laughs; one episode has Fichael try to deal with stress via eating many hotdogs.
- Psychotic Smirk: A couple instances have Bazarack (the show's main baddie) make a devilish smiles when in the villainous mood, like when he unleashes "Roombas" to scare away Renzo's corgies.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Farzar threw together a bunch of losers for Prince Fichael's team.
- Real After All: The Church Of Ozner, the main religion of Farzar, revolves around the worship of Ozner, an unseen diety who's edicts always seem to directly benefit his high priest Renzo, his name is literally just "Renzo" backwards, and when he finally appeared in person due to Fichaels insistance, it was clearly just Renzo with a mop on his head... except after Fichael kicked Ozner in the balls and farted in his face to prove the fraud, Renzo showed up himself, revealing that Ozner IS real after all, and absolutely furious at Fichaels actions.
- Recycled In Space: You've seen them at a national park, and you've seen them at a police station. Now get ready to see these character archetypes IN SPAAAAAAAAAAACE!!!!!!!!!
- Robot Buddy: Scooty. He actually started out as a human, only to lose his body bit by bit in battle, until all he had left was his penis... which he loses at the end of the first episode, turning him fully robotic.
- Screw Yourself: Renzo makes Flammy wear a mask of his own face when they have sex.
- Sexbot: Scootie talks to a robot sex worker in the Robot District with a virtual pimp on a screen in the back of her head and Flammy's robot vibrator tries to go on strike much to Renzo's horror.
- Shared Universe: Although it's not completely confirmed yet, this show supposedly takes place in the same universe as its predecessors. Just in a different galaxy.
- Spikes of Villainy: Bazarack has them all over his armor, specifically in the hopes that they make him look more evil and intimidating.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Played for Laughs. Bazarack built an entire castle out of candy, like the Witch's house from Hansel and Greta, and this show (being a sci-fi) isn't a realistic one. Unexpectedly, it's completely overrun with insects when the audience sees it.Bazarack: *while spraying insect killer everywhere* THERE WAS NO WAY TO FORESEE THIS!!
- Team Pet: Zobo, the flying, pink, electric bunny rabbit, who is likely to end up becoming the series mascot.
- Teeny Weenie: Like his predecessors Steve and Kevin, Fichael is rather lacking in the penis department.
- Throne Made of X: Bazarack gets a throne made of bones and skulls in order to make his lair scarier but instantly hates how uncomfortable it is to sit on.
- Wishing for More Wishes: When Renzo owes the wendigo a wish, he tells it it can't wish for unlimited wishes. Instead the wendigo wishes for 10 billion wishes and essentially gets Renzo as a slave.
- Xenomorph Xerox: Reaper demons are basically red Xenomorph queens.
