General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Aunty Donna's Big Ol' House of Fun

Aunty Donna's Big Ol' House of Fun is a six-part Australian sketch comedy series that premiered globally on Netflix on November 11, 2020, starring the Melbourne comedy trio Aunty Donna: Mark Samual Bonanno, Broden Kelly, and Zachary Ruane.¹ Netflix describes it as a hybrid of narrative and sketch comedy about three roommates making their way through an absurdist world.²

Key fact	Detail
Premiere	November 11, 2020, globally on Netflix¹
Format	Six-part sketch series blending narrative and sketch comedy, about three roommates in an absurdist world¹^•²
Cast	Mark Samual Bonanno, Broden Kelly, and Zachary Ruane¹
Producers	Ed Helms, Mike Falbo, and Brett Harris for Pacific Electric Picture Company; Scott Aukerman and David Jargowsky for Comedy Bang! Bang!¹
Episodes and runtime	6 episodes, average runtime 21 minutes; total classified duration 122 minutes³^•⁴
Australian rating	MA 15+, with strong themes, violence, sexual references, blood and gore, coarse language, and crude humor⁴
Critical reception	Metascore 85 on Metacritic, based on four positive critic reviews⁵

Spoilers

Premise and format

The series takes viewers along for an absurdist adventure through the everyday lives of the three comedians, who play suburban housemates. Sketches grow out of their day-to-day lives as they watch TV, tinker with their Wi-Fi settings, interview potential new housemates, search for treasure, sing songs, and talk to their dishwasher.¹^•⁶ Netflix's synopsis promises satire, parody, clever wordplay, and breakout musical numbers.¹

A loose narrative thread runs through the episodes: after a falling-out with their sentient dishwasher, the trio seeks a new flatmate, and the interviews for her replacement carry much of the first episode.⁷ The dishwasher is voiced by Kristen Schaal.⁷ The first episode opens with the trio bundling into their shared house, decorated in primary colors, and performing "Everything's A Drum", a high-octane number from their live shows.⁷

The six episodes, all released on November 11, 2020, are titled Housemates, Treasure, 'Lympics, Dating, Night-Time!, and Dinner Party; the finale has the guys preparing to host the Queen for dinner.³^•⁴

Production

The series was produced by Ed Helms, Mike Falbo, and Brett Harris for Pacific Electric Picture Company, and by Scott Aukerman and David Jargowsky for Comedy Bang! Bang!.¹ Helms and Aukerman served as executive producers.⁸ The group's director Max Miller has described the steps that led to the Netflix series in a Screen Australia podcast.⁸

How it reached Netflix. After two pilots failed to get off the ground in Australia, Netflix US picked up the group to make the series.⁹ According to an SBS interview, it was also the only time the group was given free rein to make the show they wanted.¹⁰ The troupe had earlier been supported by Screen Australia through online production funding and joint initiatives such as ABC's Fresh Blood and Google's Skip Ahead.¹¹

The Australian Classification Board classified the complete season on November 10, 2020, at 122 minutes, crediting direction or creation to Mark Samual Bonanno, Zachary Ruane, Thomas Armstrong, Broden Kelly, Sam Lingham, and Max Miller, with country of origin listed as USA.⁴

Reception

The season holds a Metascore of 85 on Metacritic, labeled "Universal Acclaim", based on four critic reviews, all positive.⁵ The A.V. Club's William Hughes scored it 91, praising a mixture of playful silliness, sudden violence, and self-skewering meta-comedy.⁵ RogerEbert.com's Nick Allen scored it 90, calling it delivered with forceful energy and an incredible amount of creativity.⁵ Decider and Paste Magazine each scored it 80; Paste found it louder, more cartoonish, less patient and less rewatchable than other sketch comedy, but still funny.⁵

The Chortle review by Steve Bennett called the show a direct descendant of The Young Ones, brimming with punkish energy and a rampant disrespect for the conventions of television, and noted that the densely packed ideas reward repeated viewings.⁷ User ratings on Metacritic were cooler than the critics' score, at 6.5 based on 25 ratings.⁵

Place in Aunty Donna's career

The series brought the Melbourne trio, who had built their audience through YouTube sketches and live touring, to a larger international platform; PC Gamer writes that they came to greater worldwide attention with the Netflix series.¹²^•¹³ It was followed in 2023 by the six-part ABC sitcom Aunty Donna's Coffee Cafe.¹⁴ The group has since founded the production company Haven't You Done Well and the channel Grouse House to showcase Australian comedy, aiming to bypass traditional media gatekeepers.¹⁴^•⁹

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026