Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Human Discoveries’ On Facebook Watch, Where An All-Star Voice Cast Plays Very Modern Cave People

When was the last time an animated show was about early man? The Flinstones? That was almost sixty years ago, and while it was a great show, times have changed. What would happen if you brought a Robot Chicken sensibility to the story of early man? That’s the idea behind the new Facebook Watch series Human Discoveries. Read on for more…

HUMAN DISCOVERIES: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: A group of men in what looks like skirts are running from an attacking tiger.

The Gist: These are the men of a prehistoric tribe, whose leader, Ugg, (Paul Scheer) starts to eulogize the fattest member when he gets caught by the tiger, who for some reason starts eating the guy feet first. Meanwhile, Gary (Zac Efron) hates the vine rash he got on his inner thigh while escaping the tiger, and he assures his cavemate Trog (Lamorne Morris) that the tribe should address this whole skirt situation.

Back at camp, Jane (Anna Kendrick) is so sick of being a gatherer, and she says so to her bestie Minerva (Jillian Bell). “We gather fruit. And weave baskets. While the men chase a ferocious tiger through the forest. I think we got the better end of the deal here,” Minerva responds. But Jane thinks the women’s intelligence is wasted gathering, and would be better served trying to figure out how to defend the camp from that tiger that’s picking them off one by one.

At the tribal meeting, she tells Ugg that she should be doing something else, but he says the men hunt and the women gather. He puts the feeble old man Marsh (Ed Begley Jr.) in charge of the gathering while the group tries to attack the tiger. But Jane rebels, telling Marsh to weave (which he secretly loves) while he tries to figure out how to defend the camp. She thinks she has a solution — it kills the crows who want to eat the berries — but the tiger just blows right through it. That makes Gary, who wants to impress Jane, shit his newly-created shorts.

But then Gary accidentally discovers fire, and the entire game changes… but Gary will still not live down shitting his pants.

Our Take: The idea behind Human Discoveries is that this group of not-all-that-competent cave people are going to stumble upon myriad discoveries, like fire, wine (which they call “garbage juice”), monogamy, racism and other things that we just accept as fact. But the tribe talk like modern humans, and there’s going to be plenty of situations where modern situations are imposed on ancient things. In the second episode, for instance, Jane decries how everyone is staring at their own personal fire stick and don’t look where they’re going.

There’s a temptation to weigh this dueling dynamic down with rat-a-tat jokes and thrown off lines. But creators Chris Bruno and David Howard Lee make sure that they build a world, and they establish most of the characters right away. It makes things like Gary shitting his pants even funnier because it was a long setup, one that included Gary’s crush on Jane. But we also know that Ugg just wants to hunt and keep things the way they are. Minerva doesn’t care about… anything. Trog likes to try new things. Bog (Sam Richardson) and Tristan (James Adomian) like to do things (ahem) together.

But the main thrust of the show will be Gary and Jane, and Efron and Kendrick (both are EPs) do a fine job settling into their characters. Kendrick is an old hand at voice acting — she plays Poppy in the Trolls movies — but Efron becomes the fumbling Gary pretty quickly. It also helps that even some of the minor characters have major voice, with Lisa Kudrow playing an elk and Stephanie Beatriz playing Beth, who has at most three lines in the two episodes.

There are also running gags that become established by episode two as well as other situations that immediately show that Bruno, Lee and their staff understands that Human Discoveries is more than just cave people jokes.

Sex and Skin: Lots of talk — Trog tells Gary that he just has to ask women to have sex instead of building something called a “relationship” — but no action.

Parting Shot: An ember from a campfire floats away, and Gary says “Whoever finds that piece of fire, I hope they can appreciate the power of one little spark.” Cut to a credits scene of a forest fire and woodland creatures running for their lives.

Sleeper Star: Jillian Bell is so nonchalant as Minerva, we almost want the show to be about her.

Most Pilot-y Line: Trog sucks in smoke from the fire, and Minerva says, “Trog, that can’t be good for you,” to which Trog replies, “Yeah, but it makes me look so cool.” Then he coughs.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Human Discoveries has a continuing story, great voice acting, and relies as much on its characters as it does on jokes. It’s definitely worth figuring out how to bring up Facebook Watch in order to see it.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company’s Co.Create and elsewhere.

Stream Human Discoveries on Facebook Watch