When talking about “Modern Animation” today, the focus tends to be predominantly on North-American and Japanese productions. But outside of this massive circle are other international productions that are absolutely worth of your attention.

One of these are the works of Balak and Studio Bobbypills (former Bobby Prod), a studio specifically setting out to do adult animation. In this case, “adult” meaning crass, explicit humour, satire and imagery, with the intensity and directness of an oncoming truck.

Previous works from the same staff include Les Kassos (or “The Wakos” in English), a French webseries about many popular pop culture figures trying to solve their problems with the help of a social worker.

For example: The Teletubbies fighting their drug problems, Han Solo not being able to cope with his father-in-law Mr. Vader, or Ash Ketchum getting into trouble for animal fighting, and many, many others. While these sound like classic jokes or “dark” concepts that have been already done, it’s the fast and direct presentation with snappy dialogue and impeccable comedic timing that makes these little skits shine. Especially the wild character design remakes which can go from parody to the straight-up grotesque, are fantastic highlights.

From “Star Wars” to “Game of Thrones”, over to “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles”, the “Smurfs” and “Astérix & Obélix”, you will find everyone in “Les Kassos”.

The whole series of Les Kassos can be found for free on Youtube, in French with English subtitles, or on the free Blackpills App in an English Dub. Three complete seasons exist, and they make for a very fun and highly inappropriate romp through nostalgic properties and through your laugh muscles.

So, what if this team sets out to do a new series that is not a sketch show, but an adult drama with original characters? Let us look at their newest production: Vermin.

Vermin is the story of Mantos, a young praying mantis, who is finally old enough to start his job in the big city. Saying goodbye to his family and beloved fiancee, he is ready to walk into the foot steps of his father before him: to become a proper police officer.

So young, so innocent.

And so, he embarks on his adventure.

Then all goes wrong.

As it turns out, the big city is rough. Gang wars, prostitution, violence everywhere, decaying cityscape, crumbling society and his co-workers are a equally tough bunch. He is paired with Shermock, a fly, middle aged hard-drinking lady with a shady past and even shadier mindset.

They don’t get along, really.

As these two worlds crash, this unlikely duo of Mantos and Shermock must solve cases, stop crime and grow together as a team, in 10 episodes, each 8 minutes long.

It is essentially the set-up for a classic buddy cop film, however, the two main characters are splendid. Especially refreshing is the middle-aged lady Shermock as a lead, who has seen far too much in life, and who has her own arc, together with Mantos, who in return must learn to be strong in this harsh world. The duo goes through many episodic adventures, with re-occuring characters and many different cases, from abductions to robberies.

While this still sounds like your standard cop story business, it’s the presentation, detail and care that his been put into this series that makes it shine brightly.

First of all, the art and animation. This megalopolis of insects has a unique and creative design of thrown away household items and trash, with many backdrops and fittingcolour choice that feel all unique, dirty and run-down at the same time: The worldbuilding and backgrounds are simply amazing.

These backgrounds are fantastic highlights.

Same goes for the inhabitants of the city, who are mostly insects, some are smaller animals, like scorpions or snails for example, and some are pure original designs, where you can feel different animal elements coming together. In short, the visual design is unique and worth it, and fits the darker humour and adult themes of the story.

The Police Department, many shapes and forms!

Not only is the artstyle of this series fitting, but the animation as well. The style is reminiscent of Les Kassos – however, while their previous series only dealt with one static POV camera as a stylistic choice, Vermin has the complete added benefit of being a buddy cop film, with fantastically framed and choreographed action scenes, which I won’t spoil here.

The animation seems to run on carefully chosen keyframes with not many inbetweens, giving a choppy feel to the look, but this is used to great effect, most notably in the comedic timing and immense speed of the action. Movement feels rapid, fast, frantic, and so energetic, that it brings the whole cast to life. Together with the “ligne claire” style of Franco-Belgian comic that date back to Hergé’s “The Adventures of Tintin” and its bold colour choice, it feels clean, snappy, and very satisfying.

Movement makes a difference! (Source: Trailer)

There is, however, another thing that I must point out when approaching Vermin: Similar to Les Kassos, this series humour is dark, crass, on-the-nose, and to a level it will offend someone somewhere. We are talking full on NSFW scenes in nightclubs, crass language, alcohol and drug abuse, a high amount of graphic violence, and dark adult themes.

A random tweet on my timeline brought me to this series, and it described Vermin as “a mix of Zootopia and Devilman crybaby” and this is quite fitting on many levels.

For one, the small town character going to the big city to become a great police officer and the city of animals setting feels very Zootopia, but it is the Devilman crybaby part I wish to elaborate on.

Masaaki Yuasa’s Devilman crybaby, a Netflix exclusive anime that aired in early 2018, was a new adaptation of Go Nagai’s classic manga Devilman from 1972. It built on the source material, putting a new modern spin on a long-running franchise, with many NSFW and explicit scenes of violence and sexual content – fitting for the equally groundbreaking source material.

However, this was mostly only possible due to this anime series being a web-exclusive. All of this content would have been omitted or adapted differently if it had to conform to the rules and restrictions of TV productions. With the freedom of being a series that doesn’t need to change itself in order to be broadcast, the creators can act with complete liberty in their own visions and ambitions. And this is a great step in animation, reminiscent of the times when hyperviolent OVAs could flourish in the 80’s and 90’s, simply because they did not run on television. Hidden behind a paywall, behind a VHS back in the day, and behind an app download or stream service today, they can do however they please. And this artistic freedom that allows for unique, new and surprising projects.

Just make sure that you know this going into Vermin. This show can get very intense and dark. And very, very explicit. Very much.

Nope. Can’t show that here.

If you can deal with the direct approach this series takes to everything, you will have a fantastic time. The characters are endearing, the dialogue is snappy and fast, the action is intense and strong, and the comedy will have you in stitches.

In this raunchy, violent world are characters that look out for each other and try to do their best, even if their friendships start off on the wrong foot. Mantos is a great main character, one who has to grow and learn, and Shermock has to overcome her bad habits, sombre past and terrible lifestyle.

Mantos. Young and inexperienced.

(Spider-Spider gives support. He is a superhero spider. Spider-Spider. Swings around with his butt.)

Shermock. Shining justice.

Mantos and Shermock. An unstoppable team.

Vermin is a great production by Studio Bobbypills that you should check out if you are even remotely interested (and if you have no problem with raunchy, violent and intense imagery). With its short runtime of 10 episodes à 8 minutes, you can easily binge the series in one or two days. Vermin is exclusive to the app Blackpills, a new streaming platform for short webseries, which is free to use, with only one or two 5-second ad breaks inbetween.

On the question of which version you should watch, there is a French Dub, an English Dub and a Spanish Dub, which you can all combine to your heart’s content with a plethora of subtitles, ranging from German, to Italian, to Arabic.

I watched Vermin in its French Dub with English subtitles, as it had the added benefit of a few re-occurring stellar voice actors I already knew from Les Kassos. I especially wish to praise French female rapper Casey for her performance as Shermock, who really breathed her character to life with her rough charme and deep lovable voice.

(I looked into the English and Spanish Dubs as well, and from a first impression, they sound absolutely fine to me too. Down below I have linked all three trailer versions, you are free to choose, as you can put your favourite subtitles under any version whatsoever.)

Conclusion

Vermin is one of those series that nail the premise of: “It’s not for everyone, but if it’s for you, it’s for you.” Not many comedy series can make me laugh so hard that I fall into a minute-long coughing fit, and I highly respect Vermin for that. In the end, it even felt too short, this series could have easily been full-length instead of short-form, as I wanted more of this world, these characters and their adventures. The finale was surprising and a bit abrupt, but fitting, and I certainly would be immensely happy about a Season 2.

Studio Bobbypills, (especially director Alexis Beaumont, producers Hafid F. Benamar and Balak) really have produced a little gem here that deserves more praise, coverage and spotlight. I had a ton of fun, and I will rewatch some of these episodes as they make me laugh hard, and more than once. As I said, if you are interested, check it out, and if not, at least keep this studio on the radar – they will do some more great productions in the future, I can already feel it.

The End.

ENGLISH TRAILER:

FRENCH TRAILER:

SPANISH TRAILER:

Sources: Wikipedia entry “OVA”, Vermin IMDB, Bobbypills, Bobby Prod [1 2 3 4]