Brak

Brak is a bizarre, cat-like alien teenager with a heart of gold, a brain full of static, and a singing voice that can derail almost any situation. Originally one of Space Ghost’s old enemies, this version of Brak has been completely reimagined into a sweet, childish, deeply strange goofball whose greatest weapon is not evil genius, but total nonsense delivered with absolute sincerity. Brak is best known for his high-pitched, lisping voice, his blankly cheerful personality, and his habit of bursting into random songs about whatever happens to be going on around him. He is friendly, excitable, easily confused, and almost impossible to embarrass. Even when surrounded by violent weirdos, sarcastic jerks, cosmic absurdity, or sitcom chaos, Brak usually approaches life with innocent enthusiasm. He may not understand what is happening, but he is almost always happy to be included. During his appearances on Space Ghost Coast to Coast and Cartoon Planet, Brak functions as Space Ghost and Zorak’s strange companion: part former villain, part sidekick, part musical comedy gremlin. He often appears in sketches, songs, and surreal bits where his naïve stupidity clashes with Zorak’s cruelty and Space Ghost’s pompous weirdness. Brak’s chemistry with Zorak is especially important: Brak sees Zorak as a friend, while Zorak usually treats him with contempt, manipulation, or outright hostility. Brak rarely seems to fully notice. In The Brak Show, Brak becomes the star of his own twisted parody of a family sitcom. He lives in the suburban alien town of Spacetown with his mother, his tiny Cuban father, and his younger brother Sisto, while attending Learnmore High School. His life is shaped by ordinary teen sitcom problems filtered through pure Adult Swim absurdity: popularity, girls, school, neighbors, family arguments, musical numbers, sudden danger, and situations that make less sense the longer they go on. Despite being foolish, Brak is not mean-spirited. He is gentle, affectionate, and weirdly wholesome compared to most of the people around him. He still has childish attachments, including stuffed animals, but he also begins showing teenage interests like crushes and wanting to seem cool. His innocence makes him easy prey for characters like Zorak, but it also gives him his charm. Brak survives in a cruel, stupid universe by being even stupider, but in a sweeter way. Brak’s defining trait is his joyful absurdity. He turns conversations into songs, misunderstands basic facts, accepts impossible situations at face value, and speaks with the confidence of someone who has never had a coherent thought but is very proud of it anyway. He is not a traditional hero, villain, or straight man. He is a living non sequitur: a former space criminal reborn as a lovable alien manchild whose stupidity is so pure that it becomes almost noble. At his core, Brak is the ultimate Adult Swim anti-icon: a forgotten Hanna-Barbera villain transformed into a surreal comedy star. He represents the strange magic of early Cartoon Network and Adult Swim, where old cartoon footage, bad talk-show parody, musical nonsense, and deadpan stupidity somehow created one of the most oddly endearing characters of the era.