Starring:
Neil Patrick Harris as Doctor Horrible/Billy
Nathan Fillion as Captain Hammer
Felicia Day as Penny
Simon Helberg as Moist

(Keep an eye out in the very first scene and look at the top left corner. Does the shape those pots and pans make look familiar to you?)

All three acts of Joss's short web musical are up and available to watch for the next 2 days at drhorrible.com (you have until midnight on the 20th, but I don't know who's midnight - assume west coast America) and I've just finished watching the third and final act now. It's brilliance at the level you'd expect from Joss.

I'll use a mostly spoiler free synopsis rather than a full review at this point.

Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is a 45 minute musical based around a wanna-be supervillain called Dr Horrible (or Billy to his friends). Dr Horrible is an evil scientst type with a "PhD in Horrible" who's desperate to make it into the big time Evil League of Evil. But his efforts in the past have always been hindered by Captain Hammer, an individual described by the Doctor as a "corporate tool".

Doctor Horrible Blogs on the internet about his progress in an amusing parody of many online blogs, often reading out e-mails from viewers who like to point out his general incompetence. In his personal life Billy doesn't have much, he lives with a minor henchman who calls himself 'Moist' and is as pathetic as his name would suggest. His only real distraction from his desire for horrible is a young woman (Penny) who uses the same laundrette as him, but he's unable to strike up a conversation with her as he's inept around women.

Will Doctor Horrible defeat Captain Hammer? Will he get into the league? Will he get the girl? You'll have to watch the three acts to find out.

Doctor Horrible is an enjoyable experience, Joss has produced nothing but quality programming over the years, each of his shows is excellent in it's own field. The man knows how to craft excellent dialog and provide a plot that you'll want to watch again and again. The story is top-notch, the characters are instantly identifiable and everything unfolds without dragging out.

Neil Patrick Harris is stunning as the titular Dr Horrible, he hits the right pitch for every piece of dialog and is brilliant in the songs. I've said in the past that he's exceptionally talented - he's the best thing on "How I Met Your Mother" - and Dr Horrible shows this. Nathan Fillon is fantastic as Captain Hammer, he brings a level of pomp and arrogance to the role that makes you immediately dislike the Captain. He makes it easy to root for the villain when the "hero" is such a bully and a thug. It's refreshing to see a superhero portrayed as someone who gets his kicks beating on people weaker than him, even though he's on the side of the law he's not a good person. It also helps that Nathan can carry a tune and he sounds good singing in counterpoint to Neil and Felicia.

Felicia Day is quite good as Penny, I say quite good because she is one of the only weak points in this whole production. Her singing is rather, generic. That is, her voice doesn't have much variation in it when she sings her numbers. She sounds pretty similar in all of them, it's not exactly a big problem. In fact it highlights how mundane she is in comparison to the other two, she's just an ordinary girl who cares about helping the homeless. She's great in all of the dialog scenes and fantastic in the big musical number where she sings counterpoint to Neil.

Still, that minor grip aside there's very little wrong with Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog at all, the only other complaint I have is that it's only around 45 minutes long. I can't help but wish it was longer. But maybe; as it has been such a success, we'll see more from Doctor Horrible in the future.

It will be available on DVD eventually, so you'll be able to own it after it's been taken down online.


Full marks with the 5 gold TVs, bravo!