Review: The Cyanide & Happiness Show “The Nine Ryans”

OVERVIEW

An office worker named Steve is cursed to become nine guys named Ryan whenever he’s around something fun. But he soon uncovers a way to reverse things to finally take back his life.

OUR TAKE
We have another new story this week, but with the same brand of crazy you’ve come to expect from Cyanide & Happiness. In this case, we have a premise that can only really be described as a Newgrounds parody of a cult hit direct to video sci-fi movie from the mid-90’s. That might SOUND overly specific but trust me; it fits this episode to the letter. It’s a pretty damn weird idea for a plot, even taking the other plots we’ve had for the past six episodes. PROBABLY not the weirdest of the entire series, since we DID have an ongoing storyline about a scientist fucking a wormhole, but it is definitely up there with the weirdest. Like at least you could call the time stopping genie more coherent because of it being a monkey’s paw kind of story, but THIS is in its own ballpark.

However, the fact that this is only in the show’s usually eleven minute runtime does inevitably mean that things are going to go underexplored or even ignored entirely. The Ryans, aside from having slightly different looking bodies and mannerisms, are pretty much all the same character. Belligerent sex crazed drunks who care only for their instant gratifications and leave all the bills and repercussions to Steve’s misfortune. Later in the episode, we learn that they aren’t even anything like aspects of Steve’s personality or repressed urges, but some sort of product of an interdimensional portal. Steve himself isn’t even much of a person, but a guardian of order or some such nonsense. Almost a Captain Planet type figure only instead of power rings, it’s a bunch of guys trying to get out of their bar tab.

It honestly feels like every line of dialogue and plot point were picked out of a hat or said in an improv game in order to come up with a full script. And yet, it still manages to feel like a solid complete piece that stands on its own. If there’s another season of this show, I would certainly like to see the continuing developments of the Nine Ryans. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the best I’ve seen of this show, but it certainly wasn’t a bad episode, just a little too random for random’s sake. With three episodes left in the season, we’ve got three chances to top this insanity, but I fully believe Explosm is up to the task.