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  By Pith-e Productions

  Nov 25, 2009
  Visioweb.TV Review of Safety Geeks Series by Alec Corday From underneath the brilliant toupees of Dave & Tom comes a show that pokes relentless fun at a society increasingly over-obsessed with safety. Thus, Safety Geeks: SVI is a parody on many levels. There are large parts of OSHA, bits of Thunderbirds, elements of Geek Squad and a massive helping of CSI. In a nutshell: a team outside all jurisdictions swoops in to investigate accidents — the twist being that they cause more damage and harm than the accident itself. Much of the humor derives not so much from safety and lack thereof but from the wacky characters played by seasoned actors all around. The focus is mainly on the five lead characters and their particular personaes, but there is (unsurprisingly) a big spotlight on the Dr. Randi Minky character and her incongruous stripper-past, played bodyliciously by Brittney Powell (a chest… uhm… face that may be familiar to Xena and Friends viewers). Her acting is solid to say the... More > least, but jokes in reference to her former employment and (in her own words) ‘heaving bosoms’ are frequent and stoop a little low for comedy’s sake, and few are the episode where Brittney doesn’t get to bust a stripper move or point at the camera… and not with her fingers either. Naturally the hits come clicking in whenever you bring innuendos into the storyline, although catering to the lowest common denominator isn’t always the funniest way to go. A good joke is supposed to tickle the funny bone, not the funny boner. Still, all the raunchiness aside (and there is some, so a few episodes may not be entirely SFW, although that depends on your work) Safety Geeks has its comedic merits. David Beeler and Tom Konkle, two veritable Renaissance Men who besides writing, producing, editing, etc, also play their respective characters Reginald Syngen-Smythe and Budwin Yacker with plenty of mojo. David uses a whacked-out version of his ‘Invention‘ character Brian Forbes to become Reginald, the English plonka and founder of the team, while Tom is a dead-pan Oliver Hardy to David’s Stan Laurel. Rounding out the crew are Reginald’s seemingly out-of-place Butler Hopkins (Benton Jennings) and the deliciously too-hot-to-be-a-computer-nerd Sparky Van Der Graaf (Mary Cseh, and FYI: Brittney ain’t got nuthin’ on her, y’all!). The various support-characters deserve a big shout-out as well. So far there is not a single character who stumbles over his lines or seems to distantly read a cue-card. Everyone involved give their most hilarious and they obviously had a lot of fun on the set. Very much noteworthy is also the execution of the show. Shot entirely on green-screen, Safety Geeks is professional enough to avoid the infamous echo-effect in their sound recording, so common in most home-grown green-screen studios. The digital sets are very well done and it is a pleasure to see that it is possible to create on a small budget a massive Flying Wing and have it swoop in and blow up a bunch of cars in the process, without it looking distractingly fake. Safety Geeks is effectively a Theater of the Absurd, much like the other shows by the same creative writing team of Invention with Brian Forbes and Archaeology of Comedy. Albeit not everyone’s cup of tea, it has mainstream appeal with its one-lines, non-sequiturs and black humor. And for everyone else, there are the ‘heaving bosoms’.< Less
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