In a time of sanitized, bland, political correctness, a little good old fashioned violence tends to go a long way, and Rhode Montijo and Kenn Navarro’s “Happy Tree Friends: Second Serving” is a blissfully deranged, bile-spewing breath of fresh air.

If Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino collaborated on a cutesy cartoon for children, “Happy Tree Friends” would surely be the result. Abrasive, bloody and beautifully irreverent, “Happy Tree Friends” makes the likes of Reservoir Dogs or “Kill Bill” look downright tame by comparison.

With a look oddly reminiscent of classic Golden Books, “Happy Tree Friends” is a series of cartoon shorts centered around adorable animal characters with names like Cuddles, Giggles and Petunia dying horrifically cartoonish deaths in one episode after another. While some would refer to such blood-soaked carnage as excessive or even offensive, the outlandish antics of the show’s characters are the perfect foil to the current trend of television and film to avoid controversy at all costs.

With “Happy Tree Friends: Second Serving,” the creators offer up 17 episodes alongside a slew of extras packed into the convenience of DVD.

Although each episode is typically only a minute or two in length, the animators pack in more gallons of blood per second than most could even imagine. Boiled to its essence, “Happy Tree Friends” is overly happy characters in seemingly benign situations suddenly eating it in new and creative ways.

It’s easy to assume such a simple formula would quickly become tiresome, but with more than 20 characters to kill off, Montijo and Navarro continually reinvent the wheel.

While the episodes prove humorous, gruesome and sometimes simply cringe-inducing, the real value in “Second Serving” is the painstaking work taken to pack the DVD with more extras than is present for most films, let alone a Web-based cartoon.

Included in these added features are writer and director commentary during all episodes, a series of holiday themed greeting cards and a sing along. Most intriguing, however, is the first appearance of Buddhist Monkey as well as a “Behind the Music” style documentary titled “Under the skin of Happy Tree Friends.”

The documentary tells the story of the creators’ meeting, meteoric rise, ensuing sugar addiction and the show’s cancelation. Although not entirely necessary, the documentary offers a humorous take on the show and gives a greater glimpse into the wonderfully demented minds of its creators.

Most entertaining though is the aforementioned Buddhist Monkey who appears for the first time in the extended episode “Enter the Garden,” which is a simultaneous Bruce Lee/ “Matrix” parody. Although spoken of on HTF’s first DVD, Buddhist Monkey’s true powers finally come to fruition as the character provides a great excuse for “Dragonball” style carnage and mayhem.

Although not for everyone, “Happy Tree Friends” raises the bar on breathtakingly gory cartoon violence with a liberal dose of humor, and that’s just what the world needs.

Three STARS