Check out the intro entry before you begin to get an idea on how I plan to cover these shows.
R.L. Stine is a name many readers should be familiar with. You've all read or at the very least heard of Goosebumps. I had some books in my possession years ago (though I never read any of it.), and I'm sure at least most of you heard of the TV series from the 90s. I weirdly remember the first episode I ever saw from that show (Hairiest Adventure), I didn't get the context of it and the sad thing is that it's revealed at the end. If you remember The Hub, this was reran there and I caught more episodes there.
Anyway, Goosebumps was Stine's foray into 90s television while The Haunting Hour was a foray into the early-2010s. Must've been a slow day back in the early-2000s, or was it?
The Nightmare Room
The Nightmare Room is a bit of an anomaly, not because it's terrible, more on that later, but because of where it came from, who was involved (for the most part) and where it wound up. The Nightmare Room aired on Kids' WB in 2001 through 2002. How's that an anomaly? This was the only live action show to air on a block dedicated to cartoons. Guess anything really was possible back then when it came to television. The last place this show ever aired was Chiller (of all places) back in the late-2000s, and since I'm only now getting into cheap horror anthology shows, I missed out and hard.
When you get into the show, you'd be surprised to find who was involved, but not so much who they got. The series was created by R.L. Stine and based off a companion series of books published by . The show was produced by Tollin/Robbins Productions, a name you should all recognize, Smallville, many classic Nickelodeon shows, the fact that Robbins is now the president of Nickelodeon, along with his so-so resume of films, I'd say more, but I'd like most hoses to remain dead.
I bring Tollin/Robbins up because I think it's through their connections they got many of the stars included on here. The series was hosted by James Avery, masquerading as R.L. Stine. Guess they thought Stine wasn't scary enough to helm the show. Do I even need to talk about who Avery is? Narrator aside, who did they get into the show? Well, child stars from the period, though to be fair many of them still get by in some way.
They got Amanda Bynes and Drake Bell, regulars on The Amanda Show so that's expected. They got Shia LaBeouf, fresh from Even Stevens and... damn... been ages since I heard his name. Good. But it doesn't stop there, they got Brenda Song (London from Suite Life of Zack and Cody and the star of some shit Neftlix movie.), Junior from My Wife and Kids, Gracie from The Nanny, one of the guys from that Nick show Brothers Garcia, Reese from Malcolm in the Middle, Kaley Cuoco from The Big Bang Theory in an early role, even Robert Englund, arguably in a better place than a certain other series.
I've seen six episodes out of a thirteen episode season. What stood out to me the most? What was the weakest?
What I liked.
Tangled Web. This is the one that had Reese in it. The story centers on a pathological liar named Josh who after lying about missing homework, is told by a substitute that he is believed. The kicker is that now every lie Josh tells comes true. He's so slow on the uptake he doesn't take advantage of this and suffers almost instantly. But by the end, after we expect him to die for his sins, it turns out this was just a story to another student, told by Josh as a teacher, and all he got out of it was a scar from a hot door knob.
Aside from the novelty of seeing Reese outside of Malcom in the Middle, the episode was a bit light. It felt like they were mostly struggling to keep it going, some scenes going quicker than expected, others going on for too long. But there is a bright side to this, everything checks out, nothing was left untouched and I guess Josh wasn't rotten enough to deserve death, so that was a nice twist at the end.
My Name is Evil. Deals with a boy who is told by a fortune teller that he is evil. A series of events plague him and he believes it's coming true. I expected a Carrie-like twist, but as it turns out, it was all a set up (and another popular antagonist type thing.) who had powers which she intended to use to frame the boy in order to... I dunno, make him lonely for the rest of the school year? This may sound like a major strike against it, but I still like the episode. What helps is that it has good characters, I can buy the awkward bromance between the boy and his friends, it's satisfying to see the antagonist get it at the end, and in a weird twist, the boy had evil powers all along. It did have some cool practical effects, highlights being the second trip to the fortune teller's tent as well as the track scene where someone sinks into the sand. My Name is Evil works for its set ups, characterization and effects.
What I Didn't Like
Scareful What You Wish For. The one with Shia Le Merde. Essentially, Shia is stalked by a doll that was magically brought to life. The doll goes after his friends (non fatal of course.), all culminating in the doll turning him into one. This episode reeks of missed opportunity. They could've easily made it into a psychological thriller. Shia is looking forward to growing up, but deep down he doesn't and he uses the doll as an excuse for sociopathic behavior. The episode felt empty as a result.
Not for nothing, but while an episode in another show didn't follow this principal, it does a better twist.
Don't Forget Me. Lazy title aside. This stars Amanda Bynes. My issue with this? Bynes can't do horror. I'm sorry, but she's not cut out for anything beyond teen drama or comedy. She's about as wooden as those actors in that god awful Sharon Tate movie (be grateful I'm not giving you the title), or maybe just very awkward. The story seems interesting, but it once again ditches a good opportunity by getting resolved and rushing to the end. The basement has a rift that causes kids to be forgotten, and if this were good, it would be gradual and end on a grim note, or a repeat of the start. But no, all ends happily and then they repeat the start.
Summary
Best Episode: My Name is Evil
Worst Episode: Don't Forget Me
Best aspects: Making good use of unexpected actors, surprisingly held up better than most shows of the 2000s, decent practical effects, good twists in most episodes.
Worst aspects: Missed opportunities for many episodes that would've made them far more interesting, bad acting is hard to ignore for most of the characters.
Overall
From a writing standpoint, some episodes leave much to be desired, but hey, I guess they have enough to keep your interest. For all these episodes, I managed to watch them in full. I can't say the scariest thing about this show is that it aired on a block dedicated to cartoons.
For the next few days, or weeks or whatever, I'm going to cover various horror anthology shows. They'll follow the same principal as my usual reviews, but with some changes.
I'll go over the history and a general consensus, along with posting some IMDb reviews for the latter aspect.
I'm going to summarize my most and least favorite episodes, though if I can only find one for free, I'll just discuss that one.
I'll point out whatever failings I find with it, but I intend to be neutral.
A link to the episodes I mention will be below.
The first one I'll discuss is The Nightmare Room. Stay tuned.
Let's face it, few people care for Thanksgiving nowadays, at least when it comes to a marketing standpoint. People are pushing for Christmas now more than ever, which is why we're getting promotions for the latter as early as mid-October. The only thing keeping Christmas alive is the monetary gain, to hell with family gathering and eating yourself to a diabetic demise. But as long as my family's around, I'll be around to pick up the pieces.
Anyway, Nicktoons, they began the the same year the Cold War ended, and I believe they don't need any introduction. But, did you know that there were some predecessors that would lay the groundwork for Nicktoons as we know them? Nickelodeon's Thanksgiving Feast is the catalyst that led to Nicktoons, coming out in 1989 (there was another special that came out the year before, but for another day.) It was produced by Vanessa Coffey, a name you may recognize from the first few Nicktoons. You can thank her for paving the way for those shows.
The special remained in circulation until 1996, later resurfacing on The Splat. Unfortunately, that's as much as I could dig up on the special's history. Good for you, not for me, let's carve this turkey.
Structure
This special contains two stories, with interludes between each of them. The interludes, visually, may look familiar to people who grew up with Nickelodeon up to that point. They were directed by Joey Ahlbum, who directed the singing dinosaurs bumper, among others. For these, they are comedic looks into the ins and outs of Thanksgiving, mainly focusing on how turkeys celebrate the holiday. Gee, I wonder what the twist will be? I wonder I wonder I- humans. Enough said. Can't be mad over something from the late-80s with a young audience. That's where the first story comes in, more on that in a bit.
The interludes were directed by Ahlbum, but the stories were handled by a different studio down in the Philippines. Apparently, their prints came back corrupted, leading to otherwise iffy results. This is apparent in the second story, where for the first quarter, it's presented through still images. But, for the times where the animation is proper, it's okay, it lacks a unique style but I give them props for trying something to shake things up for the special.
The Stories
Both stories are essentially polar opposites, told from different periods and obviously different execution.
Thanksgiving Nightmare is set in a modern period and really pushes the envelope on the food aspect. We start with a fat family finishing off a meal, and they don't want anything to go to waste, which is why the mother loses her shit when a bone lands near her cat. This is the making of a decent dark comedy, but that's nothing compared to a war between rats and cockroaches.
And most of you know the aesthetic by now, both teams are against one another but find a common enemy, this is all to get something valuable to the humans, they get what they need, the enemy is blamed and the humans are non the wiser to what happened.
Name a rats against coackroaches, a cat, the thanksgiving meal, both teams getting it, the cat is caught in the crime scene and is kicked out. This annoys the hell out of me, maybe I just hate guilt by association, or I've seen Tom and Jerry too many times (and that cartoon is cliche as hell.) The cat snags a piece of turkey upon getting out, but to me it feels kinda hollow, and leaves me in a rare instance where I expect something bad to happen to the family (they're an ice cream away from a coronary.)
Thanksgiving Dreams is set in the depression. Let's see, we're told about what everyone didn't have back in the day, we center on a family who's going through turmoil, the tone is mellow dramatic, the kids are optimistic. What, you expected a joke? This is how the first quarter goes, and as I said, this is where the animation quality dips. I can't even cap it to do it justice. Anyways, it's nearing Thanksgiving, and the kids realize that they will be without a proper meal come that day, all they have to salvage are cans of beans.
It picks up when the kids go to bed. They shrink down and begin interacting with anthropomorphic food, and that's not a throwaway line, that's an actual summary. Nothing interesting happens until the boy knocks yeast into the dough and creates a bread-based monster. From there, a fight occurs and that finishes out the dream.
I know I'm slacking here, but this special gives me nothing to work with. For something that's meant to be outrageous, it's ironically played straight.
Anyhow, the kids wake from their dream, but apparently it wasn't. They go downstairs and find that a feast has been prepared, but it wasn't at the hands of the mother. We get an implication that the dream was real, given by a clue where the mother sneezes due to how peppery most of the food is... I'm stumped, how did we go from there to this? Did the kids sleepwalk and steal food for themselves? Was the monster meant to symbolize something? Is it just magic and nothing else?
Conclusion
I don't know what I could say. It's not weird enough to be memorable, it's not spectacular, but I guess it did play a part in Nicktoons becoming a thing. Not good enough? Maybe Thanksgiving is best left to bottle episodes.
2D animation at its core aged gracefully. While it's easy to tell when something is done on paper or on a computer, the basic principles are still the same, drawn characters manipulated by an animator by whatever means. Snow White and the Seven Dwarves doesn't reflect the age with which it came out, and it was the first feature length animated film ever, heck, it looks a bit like Pocahontas.
Point is, a drawing is timeless, all that's different is the artist behind it and their vision. CGI on the other hand is a whole other kettle of fish. With it, you could see how much it has evolved over the years. What began as a series of test sequences in a near three-decade long experimental phase, evolved to some cutting edge special effects for 80s films abound, and later got its own life with television, and it doesn't start where you think it does.
Background
The year is 1994, Canadians abound beheld ReBoot, a small production by Mainframe Entertainment that ushered in a new means of animated entertainment. People would be quick to set the bar here, the CGI at the time was... something, and it would surely get better from there (it didn't, at least old CGI cartoons had an eerie quality to them.) But, little did many know that another show not only beat them to the punch getting completed in 1993, but it aired on television a few months before ReBoot did. Only reason it didn't get as much recognition was because in its first year it only aired in France, though it was later dubbed and aired on YTV, with a British dub also existing. It has slipped under the radar, but it is recognized as being an important footnote in CGI history (at least if we're going by Wikipedia.)
The show was produced by Fantome. Very little is known about this company other than that it's no longer in operation. This series is credited to them for sure, but they did have involvement in one other series. They produced the third season of Tales from the Cryptkeeper, and surprisingly it was entirely 2D. Nelvana, the show's prime producer, tended to outsource the animation to other studios, so I don't know how much involvement Fantome had unless they transitioned to another format to expand their horizons. I briefly talked about them in my Tales from the Cryptkeeper review, but I had no idea they had a greater level of significance from that.
Of the talent present, I could only find two I recognize. Of them they're David Gasman, an American actor currently living in France, who I recognize as lending his voice to Code Lyoko. There's also Karen Strassman, who I know as the most recent voice of Rouge the Bat in the Sonic the Hedgehog series.
Animation
I can't be too hard on something that began the CGI bandwagon. The animation here is okay. It has the sensibilities of the average Mainframe cartoon and it seems like a more refined rendition of the average Spark Plug Entertainment production. This was saved by what I assumed to be a much higher budget. One advantage this show has is that it doesn't feature humans, instead just the insects, and for many shows centered around cartoony creatures there isn't a risk to be faced. Let's face it, all people talk about is how the art quality looks, and if the humans look bad in shows like these, then they'll judge it solely on that while embellishing other qualities. They did to Mr. Meaty what the Democrats did to Barry Goldwater and what the Republicans did to Michael Dukakis.
Anyway, off track, I'd be willing to say this is better than the animation in Pet Alien, but then again that show was probably done on a smaller budget (hence why they couldn't even afford to outsource voice duties to Vancouver, Charlie Ad-least stop with the Peter Lorre, Jess Har-dly able to shake Wakko Warner off and Candi Mi-goodness are you just an understudy these days?)
Whatever the case, obviously the animation isn't as good as it was back then, and it'd be incredibly bold to say it's better than the CGI shows from the late-2000s (though ironically this show isn't nearly as stylish as Fanboy and Chum Chum), but it's harmless. From the one episode I've seen, as long as there isn't an opportunity for a meme or a Twitter cap, it's essentially in the clear. Plus I didn't catch too many glitches, so it seems time wasn't a hinderance to the animators.
Structure
The show is basically a light-hearted adventure series, centered on bug-like creatures as they attempt to preserve life in their part of their world, and the big bad obviously tries to complicate that. The version I caught was the British version, and they have the luxury of a funny narrator. This is a plus for me because it's a good way to bring humor to a show they know isn't as remarkable as others without delegitimizing it (which could be done with a number of lazy fourth wall jokes).
This isn't a heavy-action oriented show, so the humor tends to carry it the most. I doubt it'd be fair for me to go into the humor as a whole since I only have one version to go off of, but for the most I've seen, it's about the same as other CGI shows, as in harmless enough, but maybe you should reserve the money toward better writers (still better than Pet Alien.)
Overall
Basically, I wanted to introduce you to an obscure series that laid the ground work for a new medium of television animation. Whether or not it's good will be left up to you, but you could say that I'm doing what few others could, and that's reaching into the far depths of the animation industry and picking the scraps others didn't want, oh, and that this show is better than Pet Alien.
It's safe to say that politics have drastically shaped film and television this day and age. Nearly every mainstream show wants to cater to all racial groups and genders, but in the long run, it shows how shallow many people can be. How can we fight racism if we attack another race repeatedly? The political landscape has gotten so rotten that it's hard to distinguish coincidental choices with legitimate ones. The obvious being with films like the latest Star Wars (until that changes), Mad Max, Captain Marvel (if you bring aboard someone as toxic as Brie Larson, you can't shake that connection), and basically anything by Jordan Peele.
Jordan Peele is an interesting man. A man who has transitioned from comedy (he started off on Mad TV, one of my favorite shows of all time and is best known for Key and Peele) to directing horror. That seamless transition alone is admirable in its own right, but... we're dealing with a modern day director, and given his ties, we know where this is heading. I'm not a big fan of Jordan Peele (I prefer Keegan Michael Key), and I wouldn't care about his films regardless of my political standing. I haven't seen his films, but in a way, I don't need to see them because the summaries and political climate give me an idea on what I'd be in for.
Then came The Twilight Zone.
I'm just going to get this out of the way, I'm not a big fan of the original Twilight Zone. I'm not a fan of the original The Outer Limits either, so maybe I just don't have a taste for horror from their respective eras. On the opposite, I love the first revival, namely because I love Tales from the Darkside. I feel 80s horror anthologies have a bit more life to them thanks to their cheesy dialogue and endearing antagonists. For the more polarizing second revival, it's okay, I made it through every episode I wanted to see, there's far worse. Then came Jordan Peele.
When they announced the new Twilight Zone, I was obviously skeptical. I mean let's face it, we know what rhetoric would do to any show. The white guy always dies or turns out to be the bad guy, and Trump jokes all around. I never got to see the show because it was only made available on CBS All Access. My philosophy on streaming services, I don't use PayPal, and I wouldn't pay for a streaming service if I only intend to use it once. I do have Hulu though, but nary a reason to use it yet.
For the record, this won't be a verbatim review, I want to use The Twilight Zone as a jumping off point for how much Jordan Peele sucks ass.
It's not that he's a hack director, and it's not even about his political leanings. It's the fact that he's terrible at translating those views to film. When you take into account what he believes in and the premises behind his movies, you could probably predict where they'd head. The suspense would be cut drastically.
Get Out, about an African American who gets into a girlfriend's family who turns African Americans white. A symbol for the "decimation of black people the world over" or just an attack against white people's dominance in the world.
BlacKKKlansman, okay it's about a bust that happened in the 70s, but of course it'd be something made today by someone like Peele, and Spike Lee while we're at it.
Us, likely a metaphor for "crab mentality", a well off African American family attacked by lesser dopplegangers.
I may be reading too much or too little into Peele's writing, but let's go into how he manages The Twilight Zone.
Peele is the narrator and producer of The Twilight Zone. Just to make this clear, he has only written one episode, he hasn't directed any of the existing ones. What's the problem with that? We have abominable episodes going right under his nose.
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Asalieri said it best in his review, but just to get you up to speed, I may need to borrow some points. Like I said before, Peele lacks subtlety, the first two episodes, while nothing to write home about, are at least serviceable, though frankly not even the premises can lure me in. While I can't blame Peele for the next few episodes, remember, he's the showrunner, he created it, he stars in it, he produced it (along with Simon Kinberg who was coincidentally involved with the garbage Fant4stic movie right when it was going south), and given his influence, I think he has as much say as the network when it comes to what's good enough to air.
Under Peele's watchful eye, we got episodes of the Twilight Zone that are incredibly off base. I guess this was to be expected given how radically each version of the show was when it came to tone. The original was a collection of cautionary tales with a sci-fi twist, the first revival had a focus on horror, with a mix of the spirit of the original, the second revival tried to be a modern take on the original... this one has a very partisan edge. Guess it really is a steady decline, this isn't even that original, they weren't even the first to have a person of cover host it (Forrest Whitaker helmed the second revival.)
How partisan is this? The third episode focuses on cops and their supposed vendetta against African Americans, complete with it being a fat white guy as the cop (because stereotyping is only offensive to non-whites I guess, double standards hurrah), a not so subtle Black Lives Matter message (displayed in the foreground but not hard to see), complete with irony; one of the main characters is heading to an all black college, and we treat it as a positive thing, even though having an all-any race anything goes against anti-segregation. It's bad if there's an all white college, but don't you be touching those all black colleges. I'd like to remind people of Alabama's black belt and them embracing the history of Rosa Parks, as well as the fact that Oklahoma is an example of a state with an all black college, and they're one of two states with no blue counties. Would that make them racist too?
I wouldn't be so upset about this, had it not been for the fact that they included a supernatural premise that is practically thrown out the window. It's a magic camcorder that reverses time (I imagine the other buttons have an effect but an hour's not enough to establish one of the cornerstones of the Twilight Zone, the supernatural.) I won't be harping on all episodes, namely due to the fact that it'd amount to their choices for the antagonists and protagonists, plus one about illegal aliens, but to show how creative the writing for that is, they're actually portrayed as aliens. However, I will focus on episodes that make clear what message the show is trying to push.
For starters, we have a gun control episode, because that certainly isn't an obnoxious topic that isn't as idiotic as it is futile. It gives the idea that once we have a gun or one's in eyeshot, we immediately go insane. Get back to me when they make something where someone goes crazy over the paranoia of having a gun. Since the episode descriptions on wikipedia are so generous, it's like you don't even need to watch the show.
Next they threw in an obligatory anti-Trump episode. Their stand in for Trump is an eleven year old YouTuber. Okay...? Points for not using a rapist or klansman, but a child? You want to present yourself as the voice of reason? Well through this, you ironically act like a kid yourself, which is why I don't identify as a democrat. Unless Tulsi Gabbard takes office, I need to stay out of this election. Plus, Asa didn't point this out, but John Cho of Harold and Kumar fame actually starred in this episode.
Next, and for this I'm less offended at the subject matter, more at the fact that they weren't subtle about it. They made an episode where men became violent rapists, with a meteorite serving as a mcguffin, but guess what? The meteorite had no effect and it just served as an excuse. Wanna know how not subtle this is? The episode is called "Not All Men". As if they took a objective viewpoint and decided to twist it to push a bigotry agenda. Okay? So does that mean African American men are rapists? Does that mean gay men are rapists? Does that mean transgender men are rapists? Does this mean Muslim men are rapists (okay they rape the minds of women but that's another story.) Obviously this was written by a woman and directed by a woman, perhaps to avoid double standards, but this just adds more strikes to the episode. You want to be considered credible? Don't resort to promoting agendas like this (because frankly, you're about to join the ranks of history's biggest bigots.)
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A big reason we have so much opposition to politics in media is because it interferes with the quality of it. Politics speak louder that the stories trying to be told, and ironically, it's a tad bit bigoted. Representation is fine, but promoting it so fiercely can harm self-esteem. People will ignore the liberties they already have and become entitled brats, possibly bigoted too. Now look, I simply choose to not watch shows and movies like these, but, as someone who was never that big of a fan of the Twilight Zone, I could easily say that I'd hate this show even on its own merits. It's as if they knew few people would watch these agendas if they were their own thing, so they cash in on existing brands, and poison it. I wouldn't be so idiotic about this, but they can't even incorporate it well into stories about the supernatural.
Wanna know how bad it is? I saw reviews on IMDb, and many of them came from left-leaning people who also agree the political stuff is delivered in a heavy handed manner. Peele, you can keep doing what you're doing, but you won't get a crumb from me, because I'm on the right side of history.
There's a long forgotten cardinal rule when it comes to reviews. No matter how objective your points are, no matter how blatant the flaws are, it's all just opinion. There's a reason why shit movies still maintain some kind of percentage on Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb, why the concept of so bad it's good exists, why we have people willing to defend bad media. Sometimes we lose sight on why we hate things, or other times the mainstream opinion is so repetitive and toxic you feel the need to curb it just to mess with everyone. I have this in spades, I think people have no good reason to hate The Buzz on Maggie (the biggest reasons people have to hate it is the setting and the fact that it's about flies. It's still a mediocre show though, but not worth hating), I'm sick to hell of the hate The Emoji Movie's getting, I think Mark Ruffalo sucks as the Hulk and I prefer Eric Bana and by extension the 2003 Hulk film, I feel like ramming a corkscrew through my eye every time I see an NPC complaining about how bad The Simpsons have become, etc.
I'm polarizing when it comes to opinions on shows and movies. On the upside, this means I'd be able to offer my own opinions on whatever without regurgitating what's said (and that's why I typically go after unmentioned or obscure topics for some extra security.), and it also means that I don't have to worry about covering fairly liked episodes of certain shows. Which is why I'm not afraid to go back to a show I so obviously hate.
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I've covered All Grown Up many times before, twice for the pilot TV movie and a Halloween special, and twice again for the show in general (a written review and one for when I thought I could mix the format with textual YouTube videos.) To prevent myself from revisiting this show as much as I revisit some Shrek video game, I'll sum up my thoughts on all three.
The pilot was mediocre. A key element to why Rugrats worked was because it centered on babies taking in the world around them. Take that and switch it with a world of pre-teens and you're left with a carbon copy of As Told by Ginger. The Halloween special was even worse, with poor attempts at suspense, giving away a twist and making me hate one of the characters even more. Rugrats Pre-School Daze was at least held off from airing in the US and canned four episodes into production, but this show actually lasted for a few years.
I did see the show growing up, and as the years went on and after the obligatory revisit, I grew to hate it. In fact, to bring the unpopular opinion spiel full circle, I'd not only call this the worst Rugrats spin-off, but a garbage show altogether. The Buzz on Maggie was better than this and will always be better than this.
A problem with All Grown Up (and while we're at it, Rugrats Pre-School Daze) is, again, they don't stand on their own, especially without the key aspect present in the main show. They do stand out in unique ways however. Pre-School Daze decided to up the gloss for some reason (either that or they had to pay out of pocket to get this going), All Grown Up is a different kettle of fish, namely the characters.
A majority of the characters are mostly the same, but this mainly applies to recurring characters like the grown ups. The main characters have definitely been altered, for better or worse, emphasis on worse.
Tommy Pickles turned out okay, but for the first season he was a bit iffy. In one episode of the first season he nearly sold out his friends just to create drama for a film project. If you had no reservations of selling out your friends and defending yourself immediately after getting caught, you'd probably be better off becoming a journalist. It's interesting to note that this premise was repeated for an episode of The Loud House. Did they do it better? Well, in that episode Lincoln took humiliating videos of his sisters for a funny video project, so... I guess he had a better motive. Dil had been reduced to the obligatory awkward character... voiced by Tara Strong. I guess art emulates life after all.
Chuckie has become a bit more headstrong lately, but I could see this as him trying to come out of his shell, and sadly he's the most entertaining part of every episode focusing on him. Kimi had become deeply rooted into her Japanese heritage, which makes sense given her upbringing, and heck, at times when this caused friction with her brother she pulled through at the end.
Angelica is the most interesting of them all. She had definitely simmered down from her bratty upbringing. But apparently I'm the only one who sees it this way, because throughout the first season she's treated like crap. I'd still take her over Susie. She's a special kind of annoying in my opinion. Fairly perfect, everything's going for her, right no matter the situation or the situation would be resolved and she'd face no ramifications. Basically I don't like her, but she's not why I'm here.
Phil and Lil are the strangest by far. Phil had maintained his personality from the original show, but Lil... I think she got a bit of Angelica in her. She's basically reduced to a whiny bitch with borderline sociopathic tendencies. To put that into perspective, people hate Mabel Pines from Gravity Falls, I don't, and Lil's a reason why.
Those who followed me back when I covered this show will immediately get this, but for the sake of getting newcomers to speed, to emphasize how much I hate the upcoming episode...
This is where the series officially began. Not counting the pilot, this is where the show started as a full half-hour series. Season one, episode one.
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This is one of many shows to utilize a cold open. I like the concept, it's a good way to gear out a good joke or foreshadow what's to come. You'd think the latter would be put to good use as this show is a slice-of-life affair. Well in this show's case, they typically go for the former and mix in a bit of the latter.
The cold open for this episode details the synergy had between Phil and Lil. Both play an arcade game which is suitable for a pre-teen centered show, I guess. There's no foreshadowing for the drama in the episode, apparently All Grown Up was all about surprises back in their inception. Just for the record, there's a B plot, but I'm not going to discuss it.
In the episode, we do get some incredibly mild build-up, where a lunch server assumes Lil wants the same food as Phil. Not even a few minutes later, Lil is called over to sit with two supposed divas. You could say they're trying to be realistic, but this was by the same studio that did As Told by Ginger, come on, Miranda and Mipsy were far from realistic, and that show was still good.
Anyhow, they throw shade at Phil due to him maintaining his love for gross things, and Lil soaks it up like the highest quality paper towel and goes harder than the divas. Personally I would've talked things out, but I imagine Lil lost some braincells over the years. It's no surprise I'm taking Phil's side in this, because frankly, the worst thing he ever did was be gross. Oh, but Lil had plenty of sympathetic moments, for instance, right after the lunchroom scene, she loses her shit, which she throws at Phil after both get paired up for a science project. To make things worse, they're referred to as the dynamic duo. I mean I understand, Lil would treat that statement as if she was called the n word.
The biggest problem with the conflict is that it's impossible to side with Lil. Sure I get what they're trying to say here, that she's a person and not just an extension of a pre-existing twin, but that's muddled by her obnoxious behavior. Phil is also obnoxious, but in the other extreme. The worst thing he does in this episode is question her behavior, but all he really does beyond that is seek out a new friend and try and make heads of the dilemma.
Lil's inner angst comes full circle when she throws a tantrum over her parents wanting to go to a water park to take advantage of a two-for-one guest deal (twins make up one payment.) Sure, it sounds like exploitation, but it's really just to get a ticket, then yay, time at a water park. How horrible, right? Plus Lil gets her own room, gimme gimme gets I guess.
Come a party Lil was invited to early on, the divas make fun of Phil some more and rather than join in because let's face it, making fun of Phil is something she can do with sheer ease, get this, sit down, brighten your screen, expand the window, get your face to a reasonable distance. Okay this build-up shit's cheesy, but what happens still gets to me.
Lil suddenly decides to defend Phil, and any sensible viewer would laugh harder than than the New Yorker toward any decision Bill De Blasio has ever made. Like, you can't do that. You can't just act like a little bitch for a majority of the episode and then just act like none of that shit happened. How can I take any of that seriously. It's followed up with the worst apology I've ever seen, it's not even an apology, but rather an acknowledgement of a relationship. They go the water park, I think the parents in the average Cinar cartoon (save for Mona the Vampire) have competition for the least affective child care strategies, the end.
============
I've talked about this plenty of times before, but I think this needs to be really soldered into everyone's minds. Don't leave the moral of the day in the hands of people who're just as bad, if not worse. Lil had been nothing but a whiny bitch the entire episode, and suddenly she's about her brother's feelings? If it were up to me, I'd probably give her the independence she wants, in that I pretend she doesn't exist. She doesn't get any better in the later seasons, in fact, she becomes a borderline sociopath. Mabel Pines is a better twin than Lil, I could understand the former's motives much better than Lil, and for one, she had a more likeable personality and gave a better apology than Lil.
Lil's behavior is in the same vein as Angelica, young Angelica. I wasn't kidding when I said Angelica sorta improved in this series. At the very least, I sympathize more with her than I do with Susie, where everything is practically handed to her. Long live the underdog.
I hate this episode, I hate this show, there's my closing statement.
In my junior year of college, I took a class dedicated to discussing the ins and outs of horror; we learn about the means of setting up atmosphere and the like, then we actually watch a horror movie. Why am I bringing this up? I kinda owe this class to opening me up to horror movies. I used to avoid horror like the plague but after getting a proper glimpse into the genre... well you get the idea.
For my tastes, the cheesier the horror movie, the better. As a result I'm more of a fan of films within the sensibilities of Creepshow along with the occasional late-90s, early-2000s indie stinker. The unintentionally humorous dialogue helps give the film a bit more charm, along with a break from prior or upcoming bloodshed. Not to mention, but I'm also a fan of horror anthologies, and that goes for many TV shows within the genre.
I covered Terror Tract a few months back, namely because I had access to it for free. Since the following film is also on YouTube, surprisingly, I decided to cover one of the earliest popular horror anthologies and see how well it holds up to today's standards.
Background
Before becoming the rotting pun cackler we know today, the Cryptkeeper entertained many through the equally revered EC Comic series Tales from the Crypt. All you need to know is that it's a series of horror stories that laid the groundwork for horror anthologies today. The comics did so well that in 1972, a movie adaptation was released.
The film was directed by Freddie Francis, a cinematographer who did work on The Elephant Man, but has directed various Hammer horror films. With that in mind, he seemed to be a good pick for this project. He had also done work for Amicus Productions, a company so well into its craft of horror that they are interchangeable with Hammer's works (save for the lack of gothic features in the latter.)
If you didn't know, Amicus was behind this movie. The film was released through Metromedia Producers Corporation, an offshoot of Metromedia Incorporated which would later be overtaken by Fox in 1997. Speaking of, 20th Century Fox distributed the film in the United Kingdom, while American distribution was left to Cinerama Releasing Corporation (and for those not in the know, Cinerama was the name of a widescreen movie screen process from back in the day.)
What's interesting to note is that most of the segments present in the film would later be adapted into episodes of the more familiar HBO series (then again, that could just be them going from the same source the movie did.) Seemingly, whoever owns the movie nowadays isn't so strict on copyright, because I actually found the entire movie online, untampered.
Plot
The framework of this film is that a tour is occurring in the catacombs, and five individuals get separated from their group. They locate a hidden room and they meet who else but...
The Crypt Keeper
For those who're more accustomed to the rotting pun-spouting corpse, this may come as a surprise. But remember, this was based on the comics, and, well, this was a UK production. Okay now I have to explain. For many years, the United Kingdom's movie output was in line with the various stereotypes that plagued the country for years, i.e. mass sophistication. What I mean is that their more wacky output is resigned to more rebellious pieces (namely on television and for many comedies), while their dramas and horror films double down on the seriousness.
It boils down to a strong sense of realism, mundane as can be with some occasional bloodshed, and this is amplified in this film. You never noticed it in many Hammer Film productions because of their gothic presentation; the atmosphere rectified the straight forwardness of the premise, while Amicus' output, being set in the present, is a bit more mundane as a result.
Before I get into the segments, I'd like to point out a recurring trend with each. They're going for suspense on many of these. This was the way for many non-monster/serial killer horror movies until Hollywood ruined it. Since this was from the early-70s, a lack of a hold up is to be expected.
Each story begins when one of the five strangers questions the Crypt Keeper or vice versa, and we get the impression that they're getting warnings on how they may expire.
...and All Through the House
I'm sorry to say, but this goes by rather quickly. A woman murders her husband on Christmas Eve. I don't know what led up to this. The husband seemed faithful, heck, the first time we see him he leaves his wife a present and a card. Okay, the immediate go-to suggestion is money, well congratulations the suspense has died and I'm anticipating her death.
What a dick, amirite?
The wife, Joanne, learns that a serial killer dressed as Santa Claus is on the loose, and lo and behold, he can apparently smell fresh spilt blood. Obviously she can't call the police while evidence of her crime is out in the open, so she spends her time getting rid of the evidence, which she does, only to be done in by the stupidity of her daughter who lets the killer in. She probably senses evil and hides it with naivety. Guess what happens?
For many horror anthologies, they tend to get the weakest one out of the way first, provide an appetizer to prep you for the rest of the movie. This was certainly a weak offering, the suspense factor was kinda weak, and that really comes into play if you factor in the little kid aspect... or just recall that these stories are, seemingly, mortality warnings.
Reflection of Death
Seems even the writers knew the first one was a bad note to start on, so they tried the couple deal again.
Carl leaves his family for a tryst with an acquaintance, Susan. Whether it's karma or not, they get into an accident trying to avoid an oncoming car. This is where this segment's gimmick comes into play. It's shot from the perspective of Carl, he sees Susan is gone, and every person he comes into contact with is scared shitless, even his wife who has found another man.
Alright I know this is going to be a low shot given that this is an early entry into the horror anthology lineup, but this is kinda predictable. We know that Carl would've gone through some kind of disfigurement in the crash, there was nothing implying it was anything more. We know something happened to him. This would've worked better if it were a horror-comedy, the comedy coming in the reactions of the people and Carl and the horror in the revelation of how bad his issue is.
Anyway, our revelation here is that Carl returns to Susan, who had been blinded in the accident (and seemingly didn't break or lose any body parts, go figure.) We get a slew of exposition namely that Carl had died two years ago, and now... how bad does Carl look?
Eh...
I understand what they're going for, a sense of realism. But for the execution... I dunno. I want to respect their attempt at suspense, but in order for suspense to work, there needs to be a good conclusion. All I got out of this was a mild sense of surprise, but even that was ruined by the fact that it was mentioned that he died (meaning some form of disfigurement had occured), and that he was moving toward something with a reflection, meaning that we knew we would see his face.
But the worst part is, that wasn't the end of this segment. What's the worlds greatest cliche folks? This was all just a dream. Early on Carl awoke from a dream, and they did the equivalent of playing that scene again. This would've been fine if it led to the events from before, this time with a sense of awareness, or perhaps make it a twist where Susan goes through what Carl did.
I think a reason many horror movies from here on out put in some cheesy and often times comedic elements was because they knew they couldn't provide any suspense, people would see the resolution a mile away.
Poetic Justice
This is one of two highlights from the film, no joke.
So two snobs live across the street from a nice guy who plays with children (and not in a sexual way.) They see him as a depreciative threat to the neighborhood and want nothing more than to get him to leave, well, one of them wants him to leave, that being the son James, cuz his father don't give a shit.
One aspect to note is that Peter Cushing, who played Arthur Grimsdyke, the Hitler to the snobs, lost his wife around the time the film was made. A portrait of her is present throughout the story and it aids in the emotional turmoil Cushing goes through. He is frankly the best actor in this segment. Let me tell you though, James really helped push Arthur to that point, he cost him his dogs, his job his relationship with the kids, broke his heart through poison pen valentines and he gave us the worst actor in the entire movie.
Broken to the point of no repair, Arthur hangs himself, and perhaps saving the best for the middle, he returns from the dead a year later to exact revenge on the pain in the ass.
I'm sold.
I shat on Carl's dead face, but this one is better in terms of execution. The build up is better and the face is kinda creepier looking.
Seemingly even James' father had enough of his son because he doesn't even scream when he finds his son's corpse (they could've put in a generic orchestrated sting when his body was revealed, but maybe they had a case of future shock and saved themselves from a cliche.)
'ello son, karma made you its bitch hasn't it?
Basically he tore James' heart out and made it part of a final valentine's day card.
Wish You Were Here
I'm just gonna say right off the bat, this one kinda pissed me off.
Ever hear the tale of the Monkey's Paw? Well this applies here. Ralph is in danger of losing all of his money. Here, you'd expect him to be some miser or a penny-pinching douche who'd kill to have a dollar burning a hole in his pocket, however... that's not so. The man takes the news like anyone else would, heck, he's unwilling to sell treasures he found around the world for some quick cash.
The Monkey's Paw gimmick comes in the form of a magic figurine, one that can grant three wishes. You'd expect Ralph to make those wishes, but... he doesn't. In fact he actually recalls the Monkey's Paw tale and goes in with skepticism. It's his wife Enid that gets the plot rolling when she wishes for a fortune.
It comes true and Ralph is sent to claim it, where he comes across a vision of death along the way. News of Ralph dying on the road reaches his boss and he delivers the news to Enid. Predictably, Enid uses her next wish to bring him back to life, albeit as he was before the crash. Obviously this backfires, because Ralph actually died before he crashed due to the aforementioned vision. In her infinite ignorance, Enid wishes for Ralph to return to life and remain so forever. But there's a hitch, he had been embalmed and now he has to live a life of pain forever, nice going idiot.
This really got to me. To get the obvious out of the way, the implications were so obvious that the victim, the victim saw it coming, yet he had to suffer for it. I don't know what Ralph has done, but surely it couldn't have been bad enough to warrant such a punishment. Then there's the fact that Enid's not present in the wraparound segments. I don't know if you figured out the twist yet, but once we get there, you'd be questioning how a man who has lost the ability to die could possibly be there and no longer affected by embalming fluid.
Enid got away with this way too easily. I'm just saying, people have given Mabel Pines shit for getting Dipper into shit that'd be resolved anyhow, and heck whether or not you want to admit it, she helped give us a proper finale to an otherwise amazing show. Enid had ignored an obvious red flag, wished blindly before hearing her husband out and didn't think her other wishes through. You may be thinking she couldn't due to pressure, but remember, these are wishes, no matter how long you take to make them, they will happen. In fact, here was a wish that could've saved some trouble.
I wish Ralph was the way he was before he left the house.
See? He died while on the road, so this could've rectified everything.
Here lies Ralph, he was too smart for this movie.
Blind Alleys
Hunting for a high note. How high is this one?
William Rogers, oh excuse me, he wants people to refer to him as Major Rogers, is a former army man who's made into the director of a blind housing community. I... don't understand. Having a set designer direct a movie makes more sense, and I maintain The Cat in the Hat isn't as bad as people make it out to be.
As to be expected, he gives little shits about the residence, giving them shit food and usurping them of their heating. He had been thoroughly warned by one of the members, but he was so wrapped up in his major-ness he made an old man succumb to the brutal cold.
To get back at him, they lure the Major's dog to them and starve it, locking the Major in a room and constructing a narrow hallway with razor blades sticking out the walls. The blind have put their other senses to good use, I would never underestimate the abilities of the disabled. The Major ventures through the sharp corridor, but alas it was a trap, as he had been led right to his dog who proceeds to maul him, but that would've been too graphic, so that's where it ends.
This isn't as suspenseful as the previous stories, but it works in a different way. It can technically be considered a morality tale with a statement regarding the treatment of the lower class by high society, or a metaphor for how the government usurps everyone of personal liberties to cater to those they deem worthy. It's not as subtle as "They're Creepin' Up on You" from Creepshow, but I guess this isn't the worst entry on the cutting board.
Resolution
You know how these were seemingly cautionary tales? Well it turns out they actually died and have been led to the gates of hell. They make it like the twist was hinted at with elements like Joanne's brooch, but for a horror film, you always gotta expect the worst. Ralph was the most innocent of the five, so obviously he was the one who'd introduce the twist by plummeting into the fiery abyss. That'll teach him for falling victim to his wife's ignorance.
All of this came about due to a lack of repentance (bear in mind this was before media began openly attacking religious undertones.) For those who may question where I stand, I believe there is a God, even in the biblical sense. I also believe the key to salvation is to take the high road and be willing to own up to your mistakes. If you're truly sorry, it'll show.
Overall
I'm taking a risk here. It isn't fair to judge a low budget film abiding to the sensibilities of British horror. This did lay the groundwork for horror anthologies to come, but this could've been better, not through budget but through making the most of what they had.
For ...And All Through the House, give the wife a clearer motive, maybe have her killer be a revenant in the form of her husband. For Reflection of Death, make it more comedic, that'd make the final revelation more scary because it'd abruptly break the humorous flow. For Poetic Justice... actually it's fine as it is, Peter Cushing did a great job and the story shines through. Obviously for Wish You Were Here we'd have to overhaul the end, or at least add logic to Ralph suddenly being in the gateway to the underworld (or maybe swap casualties, Enid did much worse than Ralph.), as for Blind Alleys, that's also fine as is.
One other aspect I don't like about this film is that, at its core, it's too uptight. It's played straight the entire time. I prefer cheesy aspects in horror movies because, ironically, they give the film more life, we get to see the actors have fun with their roles and our attention could be kept longer. If you're more into straight-up horror/suspense, this could work better for you than it did for me.
I respect this film for being the start to a new era, but on its own nowadays, it's good for curiosity, if you want to know about the origins of the HBO series. But as is, it depends on how you were brought up in horror. You either roll with the Romeros of this world, or... not.
Print to film/TV adaptations are a gamble. This has worked well with many book adaptations where there's more than enough material necessary to translate to the screen. Some just play it safe and adapt the entire book page by page, only adding to it when necessary (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is close to Roald Dahl's book and didn't stray as much as another adaptation), others just go off the rails with varying payoffs (they turned Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory into a crappy morality tale and they turned a ninja amphibian graphic novel into a 30 minute toy commercial that's sadly overlooked when it comes to crappy 80s cartoons (but Fred Wolf doesn't give a shit about roots (Toxic Crusaders anyone?)) This was intended to be two separate entries, but since I have little to say about what'd be covered in one of the two, I decided to merge them while giving a general idea on the mindsets these adaptations have. Call it a bonus.
Retrospective
Newspaper comics are another kettle of fish. In the past this went well, Garfield is as celebrated in the papers as he is on the screen (even The Garfield Show isn't that bad.), and Popeye stands as one of my favorite characters of all time (there were also adaptations for Blondie and at one point Hagar the Horrible had one.) At their core, comic strips do have the potential to work as a series, they have a wide enough cast and due to the gag a day principle, there's some flexibility when it comes to embellishment (I would love to see a TV show adapted from Heart of the City, The Lockhorns, Zits and Foxtrot.)
There is a problem with this, many of these would translate to general sitcoms, and those drop like flies on major networks. There've been several cases of this and to some it up, only one of the following examples had two seasons, at least two seasons that aired on television.
To start off there was Dilbert. Admittedly, I enjoyed this show and it got better as I got older. It kept the principle of the original strip series which was about the inner workings of the business industry. Seemingly the only reason this show didn't last longer was because it aired on UPN. On one hand, that network didn't have any major standards for show creators, on the other, few programs on that network last, especially the animated ones.
Then there was Baby Blues, which is where the sitcom standard really starts. I could see some form of effort with this (I mean heck, it didn't follow the Homer Simpson standard of an idiotic patriarch.), they did try some visual gags and some attempts at quirky humor, It's nothing special, but nothing I'd deem to be within the realm of so mediocre it sucks. Then again, the strip was more of the same so I can't say I'm one of the supposedly disappointed "thousands of fans" who saw it. A second season exists, but it's inaccessible. Bummer.
Next there was Committed. I covered this a while back and for you more seasoned animation followers, Mr. Enter covered the show as well. If you've seen Enter's review, let me tell you that there's more to this show than it being another generic sitcom. It's a generic sitcom with a feminist edge. Liz is the smart one, but only to push the female power aesthetic. We have a stereotypical Trumpian boss, a smarmy male co-worker, an airheaded bleach blond, basically a world of strawmen to make Liz look better by comparison. They didn't even try to hide it in the last episode of the series. I'm fine with female empowerment, just don't beat it into a pulp due to your own creative bankruptcy.
One last example I want to bring up before we get into the main course is Free for All. Never heard of it? Well believe me, this actually made it into papers, it was syndicated by King Features (of Popeye fame.) Obviously this wasn't very popular and the only way this got any kind of resurrection was through the creator, Brett Merhar.
This is worth bringing up for the sheer notability of the backstory. Merhar had to lie to get it greenlit by saying the strip was still in production (it wasn't.) One interesting aspect is that this was the first animated series to ever air on Showtime. I brought it up in my Our Cartoon President review, but for consistency, here we go. The show had 2D characters against a typically 3D landscape, and that makes the show interesting through a technical standpoint. The show succumbed to the sitcom bug, only this time it led to an ultra raunchy production. Key reason Merhar went to Showtime with it was for creative freedom. It's not for everyone, but even you would take this over Our Cartoon President. I hope.
Until now, every show can be considered forgettable. Each had one quirk to give it some life, but in the end, it wasn't worth any more than thirteen episodes. But since I spent like what? The whole first quarter babbling about this, isn't there one show that broke the cycle? Well yes there is, sorta.
For Better or For Worse
To get you up to speed, For Better or For Worse was created by Lynn Johnston. It centered on the lives of a family of four (later five) and the obligatory pet dog. This strip was unique in that it was portrayed in real time. We go through personal anecdotes of each family member (with the gag at the end of course), and we see them grow up over time. We get a new child later on down the road and we lose the family dog along the way.
There have been several adaptations of this comic over the years, starting in the mid-80s and coming up to the early-2000s. It began with a Christmas special produced by Atkins Film Company. This wasn't just something cooked up to sell toys or get some quick cash (ala Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), Lynn had direct involvement in this, heck, she got her kids and husband involved in this. In the 90s, we got six more specials. I can't say anymore because I'm side-tracked enough as is.
But the one adaptation I want to talk about the most is the 2000 cartoon series. The show aired on Teletoon in Canada from 2000 until 2001 for two seasons. Johnston once again had plenty of involvement in this, and heck, she appears in this too. I don't know if this ever aired in the US, something tells me it didn't.
I've talked about many Canadian shows, this one is special because it was produced in Ottawa. Until now I've covered shows produced in Vancouver and Toronto. This is one of two shows I know about from that part of Ontario (the other being Freaky Stories which I hope to cover someday.) The animation was produced by Funbag Animation Studio, who was behind that show I just mentioned as well as taking over animation duties from The Ink Tank for the Sniz and Fondue segments on Kablam!. That's one name to keep an eye out for if you want to know what part of Ontario that show came from. Another name to look for is Sound Venture. They also worked on Freaky Stories but are mostly dedicated to TV movies that occasionally pop up on Lifetime. Both of these had live action segments so that could be the reason they were involved.
The show had a mixture of styles. We had the traditional animation in the strip segments, mixed with digital animation for transitions, as well as a digital backdrop for Johnston's segments. Pretty ambitious I must say, those tax dollars went to good use up north. I'd talk about the actors, but I don't know who a lot of them are. I take it many of them do live action work for Ottawa productions. There is only one actor I recognize, and that's Bryn McAuley. Some may recognize her as the voice of Mavis in that animated adaptation of Hotel Transylvania, or Suzi from Camp Lakebottom, or Laney from Grojband, or Gina Lash from Angela Anaconda, or heck, how did I not recognize her when I briefly talked about Harry and His Bucketful of Dinosaurs in my Tickle-U retrospective?
Structure
Every episode begins with a live-action segment with Johnston. She gives a personal anecdote on her life or some advice which connects to one of the three stories of the day, while she draws one of the characters. Basically, this show is a collection of life experiences as told by Johnston, so I guess the live-action bumps make sense. This certainly helped make this show stand out from the competition.
We then get three segments. These represent the different decades of For Better or For Worse, The Early Years (80s), The Growing Years (90s) and The Later Years (00s). These amount to daily experiences with little urgency. It's the safest depiction of life you could imagine. It's fine, don't get me wrong, not everything needs to be tits and bloodied. It all depends on your mood, if you want something relaxing to watch or you want to be reminded of better times, or maybe you relate to what's happening (that in itself is very plausible.) They also show a strip from the original comic series, but these rarely have anything to do with the plot and likely only exist to please original readers.
I saved the character and setting description for here because I already wasted time talking about behind the scenes details. Set in a fictional Ontario suburb, we encounter the lives of the Pattersons. Elly, the not-so neurotic, not so, well anything really. John, the child at heart dad who's uber wholesome and thankfully not borderline retarded. The parents hardly change in each segment.
Of the kids we have the not-so obnoxious and not much else Michael and his younger sister Elizabeth, who ironically has some more noticeable personality to her. Michael starts off as a stereotypical rude brother (gotta fulfill the older brother picking on younger sister stereotype.) but even in the early segments... there's little else to him. He's mostly just there. The same mostly goes to his younger sister Elizabeth. One aspect about her is that she can stand up for herself and is fairly resourceful, but given that this show is more of a slice-of-life affair, there's little headroom for more unique qualities.
In the Growing Years, Michael gets some more personality. He's now somewhat childish and occasionally plays pranks. I like the voice he has here, it really ties the character together. Elizabeth seemingly lost some braincells over the years, because now she's somewhat naive, as well as an awkward dork. Hey, more power to her, she's developing as a character. At this point we get the third child, April. She's a bit weird to me, not because she's an archetypical bratty child, but because... she's got a full head of hair and is certainly above the age of one, but she still acts like a newborn. It's just a tad weird, not bad, but weird to me.
In the Later Years, Michael's more of the same, but now he has someone on the side. If this happened now he'd bring this up when he's getting beaten in a debate on YouTube. Elizabeth went through a more major change, in that she became a sorta-rebel. Well she acts like one and she has somewhat of a bowl-cut, is she... explorative? Okay maybe I should back off. For April, she is definitely weirder now. She sounds like she has some sort of mental block, her dialogue isn't too natural, at least to me.
Now for the meat of these segments. So they're daily life unfiltered, sounds like a typical day in Ontario, is that a bad thing? Not in the least. This can definitely appease the more seasoned animation fans and it breaks the sitcom stereotype, but maybe a bit too well. The worst thing that this show did was kill off the dog Farley, but that's because the actual Farley died while trying to save one of Lynn's daughters from drowning under thin ice. Would you like to see something like that in the show? Negated to exposition. I mean the episode where it's brought up is carried out very well, tugged at the heartstrings good enough I guess, and it is more realistic. This episode will be linked below.
There was one aspect that kinda ticked me off. They did an episode about a friend to the Patterson's moving away (Michael's friend Lawrence), and they build it up as some emotional affair. But guess what? The segment after this shows that Lawrence is back in town. Okay, they made it so Michael knew Lawrence would be back one day, but... I dunno, it gives me some mixed signals. You mean my friend who moved to Croatia will be back one day?
This was a standard for many Canadian shows back in the day, just showing daily life. This happened in the days of Caillou, where all it was was the experiences had by an undisciplined boy. Nothing out of the norm for many of these shows. It's pointless to talk about every episode in this show. Since it's a collection of segments about different encounters in life at different periods that share one similar theme, you could apply that to every episode and then call it a day. Nothing in this show got under my skin, we didn't have a snob lecturing someone on equal treatment in a hackneyed discussion on racism, we didn't have a scrawny Stan Smith act like he had the grounds to talk shit about a liberal douche, we didn't have a sadistic cheapskate strip someone down to teach him a lesson while making him paranoid, it's not a fucking half-hour toy commercial, it's just aspects of life we've all encountered in one way or another.
Here're three parts to one episode to get you up to speed.
So overall, props to Lynn Johnston for making one of the more unique entries into the comic-to-screen genre. Maybe I'll return to the past seven entries in your repertoire someday. Key word, someday.
Wednesday, May 1, 2019
Fo' reference:
Basically, it sucks. Let me get my overall opinion on this out of the way. I don't think SEGA's getting through this without a year's+ worth of scathe, and I'm kinda hoping this is deemed worse than The Emoji Movie (for the sake of people no longer beating such a dead horse.) I'm not going to see it in theaters, some people need to learn to not pay money to see something you hate, because then it's just going to lead to more movies like this. Obviously, we have an influx on reactions to this movie, it's all over Twitter (mine included) and just about every big YouTuber threw in their two cents.
But to be totally fair, I think a thorough explanation is in order. Here're some reasons why I personally think this movie would suck, obvious points included.
The hyper-realistic elephant in the room.
It's impossible to talk about the Sonic movie without bringing up the ridiculous Sonic model. I'm not going to complain about the blue arms and junk, but I am going to complain about the face. Look at it like this, it's that face that'd be staring right back at you throughout the film. We all have limits and I doubt the limits would last as long as an entire movie. No matter how you look at it, it's just plain wrong, like something that'd be made for a shit-post. I would say that Hollywood is the last collective I'd expect to do something so disgusting, but then I remember that they're the ultimate crusaders for the unholy dollar, and as long as they have something that could turn any kind of profit, anything's fair game (especially since nobody can keep their mouths shut with their complaints, (it's people like you that gave Michael Bay five Transformers movies.)
Also, I'd like to point out the shoes. I know it seems like I'm about to hit Chris Chan and Richard Kuta levels of nitpicking, but look at it like this. Sonic's shoes don't have laces in any prior installment. This makes sense since Sonic runs a lot. In the movie, Sonic's shoes have laces, and if undone, I think Sonic would lose tremendously to the asphalt.
The premise doesn't peak my interest.
At its core, it's a buddy-cop flick with some mischief from Dr. Eggman. That's been done plenty of times before, heck, Detective Pikachu's doing it too (at least I think it is.) There may be more to it, granted, but on a surface level, it isn't interesting. Wanna know how bad it is? The Emoji Movie has a more interesting plot, regardless of how bad it is, it was interesting. It was memorable for whatever reason and the cell-phone aesthetic gave it some kind of edge.
For this movie, if they had it where Sonic was the result of an experiment gone horribly wrong (perhaps some twisted twist on Fleetway (if you know what that is)), I could at least say it would be worthwhile through demented curiosity. But as is, cop meets Sonic, Eggman is sent to stop Sonic, some cringeworthy filler. I'll give it this though, at least it's not set in New York City, sick to hell of that place.
Me, Myself & Irene 2: Revenge of Hank.
One aspect about this movie that has been singled out from the scrutiny is Jim Carrey's portrayal of Eggman. Yeah, they've got a point, he may be the highlight of the film. However, to me, it's not by much. It's really just Jim Carrey being Jim Carrey. He has become typecast as a wacky dude, meaning that many of his roles are verbatim at worst. I don't see much of Eggman in Carrey's performance, it's just Jim Carrey. I'm not saying his performance sucks, but let's be real, it's far from Dr. Eggman. Admittedly, Jim Carrey comes very close to looking like Eggman as the movie goes on, but I think the producers were trying to find some form of redemption. Little hope for this.
Whenever I do a review on television shows, I tend to focus on the show itself rather than certain episodes. If I judge an entire show based on what occurs in one episode, it wouldn't be fair to the show. I normally don't cover single episodes because few exist that get to me. But trust me, some do, and I'm going to focus on one that really gets to me. Consider this an experiment, I want to see how well I could do with episode reviews, I won't give a summary of every plot point unless I need to provide context, there will be spoilers, and I'm bound to strike nerves with people who have nothing against it.
Preface
Not too long ago, I made a brief essay regarding a Hey Arnold! character I didn't like, it being Rhonda. Let's face it, episodes centered around her are predictable once you figure out the patterns in them, she doesn't really learn anything and I question why she associates with the main gang when she is quick to make complaints about personal hinderances. This has been in the back of my mind for a while, and I've debated what Rhonda-centric episode I wanted to cover. After some consideration and honing in on the more positive aspects of many episodes, I found the perfect candidate.
Rhonda's Glasses is a blend between the typical rotten behavior of the character, mixed with a social political slant. The episode is a homage to Rosa Parks, and if you know the story behind it, save for race being the focal point, it's practically beat for beat. Personally, I'd consider this a hybrid of Rosa Parks and Melvin Van Peebles' Watermelon Man (basically about a racist white man becoming black and going through the turmoil African Americans experience.)
The stand-in for race is social status. Basically, if you're geeky (bonus points if you wear glasses), you're not allowed up front. Yeah, wasn't kidding about how obvious of a node to Rosa Parks this was. I'll give it this, our stand in for Parks is no better. I'd normally make a joke about how someone like Sheena or Eugene would be Parks, but the title pretty much gave it away. Apparently Rosa Parks was a snobbish pain in the ass who woke up black and decided to get some social cred back by starting an argument on the bus, why else would we get someone as suited as Rhonda? All else I could say about this scene is that it introduces animation's first transsexual (seriously, I don't know if it's a boy or a girl, has a skirt but a lack of feminine features.), or maybe it's non-binary?
We got the Rosa Parks allegory out of the way, so what about the Watermelon Man one? Well, P.S. 118 is hosting an eye exam, Rhonda fails and has to wear glasses. It's a more realistic take on Watermelon Man, hold the racial slant. As you'd expect, Rhonda takes this incredibly poorly, and I take it we're supposed to feel sorry for her? Yeah I get it, it's hard being at the top, one time I had to wait an extra few to get my soy latte because the cashier had to break open a coin roll. My life partner had to talk me out of cutting vertically.
The next day, Rhonda gets a taste of her own medicine, and we're introduced to someone I'd like to dub, Strawma'am. I call her that not because she's forgettable, but because she was never given an actual name, at least to my knowledge. I'm referring to her as a strawman because the few times she speaks is when the writers want to make Rhonda look better by comparison. To better explain, she only spoke in this episode and Polishing Rhonda, both times when Rhonda was in eyeshot. Personally, I'm rooting for Strawma'am, for one she has better taste in shoes and goes about the social order better than Rhonda could ever hope to achieve.
Naturally, Rhonda goes through what the geeks go through, which include sitting at a table with a wobbly leg, getting routinely teased, not getting good quality kickballs and losing play areas. Rhonda also goes through some inconsistency. Apparently she was able to see fine in previous episodes, but now she can't do it as well. What is this? Karma? After a whole day (mind you, it was a rough day from the eyes of the snoot.), Rhonda decides to rally against the upper class and everyone laughs at the blatant irony- I mean they join her side. I have so much to say about this, but we're almost home, and we need as much context as we could.
It culminates in another exchange between Rhonda and the ma'am of straw. Throughout this, the strawma'am tries to keep things rational, heck, she implies that she didn't make the rule, she just followed what's established. Yada yada yada, Rhonda virtue signals her way into the hearts of the ignorant, nobody brings up her hypocrisy (come on, she's a regular character and nobody knows shit?) and Strawma'am probably got harassed to the point she had to switch schools or return under a new identity (hence her going from blonde to brunette for future appearances.)
But wait, it gets even better. The next day, Rhonda re-encounters the non-binary kid and glamorizes wearing glasses. Perhaps now she's sending the good looking to the back, she's already reverted back to her old self, to the delight of people who only saw the surface of the previous scene, and I hope next time she gets zits and freckles. But no, she just got contacts and resumed her reign of raping the snob trope, because like many bad renditions of this archetype, they have no self-awareness.
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I could live with Rhonda reverting to her old self even before the episode ends, but when you make an episode where she fights for equality, it's pretty damn ignorant. Having someone like Rhonda lecture someone on the treatment of lower social classes is like Rage Against the Machine lecturing people on corporate dominance (pro-tip, never sign to a major label if you want to follow in the footsteps of Rage, and don't originate out of Southern California either.), or if you want to be more in tune, think of an African American lecturing rich white people on the treatment of blacks in the ghetto, even though said lecturer lives in a gated community with a Rolls Royce, a Bentley and a Lamborghini in her garage. Why act like you care about the lower people when you're either not nor were you ever one of them.
You want to teach people about equal treatment? You want to allude to key historical moments? That's perfectly fine, its been done in the past and it's been done well, but it all comes crashing down when you use the wrong character to push your message. Rhonda was the worst possible character to use as our protagonist, all she did was whine and well, be herself. Come to think of it, I wouldn't be shocked if Rhonda implemented that geek check in the first place. She's the epitome of a safe-spacer (inviting people that never opposed you to a party.), she's selfish (caring more about her outfit even though she was playing a contact sport and sucking ass at bowling because, oh dear, nails will be broken), she sees most people as a means to an end (using Patty to help her graduate first at a polishing school because your own hubris led to a lie saying so.), among many other overlooked sins. You're probably wondering, well who else could've been the focus in this episode if Rhonda was apparently so awful?
Well, what about Eugene? In spite of his jinx and social standing, he's still confident and very extroverted. He could've killed the racial tension with kindness, showing that we're all human deep down (yeah I know, the inside that counts is becoming overdone.) Or what about Sheena? Her aunt was the nurse that caused Rhonda's internal suffering in the first place. Perhaps Sheena could show that even with glasses, people can still be cool and generally good people. Oh, excuse me, forgot the football-headed elephant in the room. Arnold had little to no presence in this episode. He could've set the record straight on the whole thing, and I mean get Rhonda to get off her high horse and actually try to improve and stick with it, while also putting an end to that asinine fashion rule.
You may be thinking that Rhonda was the sole reason this episode wasn't very good, but, I do have some other reason. It missed a good opportunity to properly talk about racism. People tend to herald Hey Arnold! as one of the few kids shows to touch upon real world issues, but at its core, it didn't reach that far. I don't know if it was because of network interference or pressure from activists, but many issues are narrowed down to issues that only vaguely resemble legitimate ones. They could've just as easily made an episode about racism, Static Shock did it and that came out not long after this.
I hate this episode because it watered down a legitimate social issue and put the focus on someone who instigated the issue in the first place. It's like a 4Kids dub in how ridiculous it is. Or hell, if we got all races to go to the back of the bus for wearing glasses or what not it may be even worse than basic racism, it'd be racism with a hint of bourgeoisie.
Obviously I'm not against nerdy people, heck I'm a bit of a nerd when it comes to many things. For the physical appearances, sometimes things happen to our eyes and faces that are beyond our control. If we judge anyone based on looks alone, we might as well be alone for the rest of our lives. Heck, if I were in that episode I'd just go to the back of the bus on my own volition, no way would I give someone like Rhonda the satisfaction of silent support (then again, they may have issues with neckbeards and pedo-stashes.)
TL;DR, they had the wrong person stress a message of equality, and Hey Arnold! really chickened out on talking about a legitimate issue full stop.
