Defending A Third Dad Cartoon

 If I was forced to choose a Chris Savino cartoon for the rest of my life, his run on Dexter’s Laboratory would be my choice. It’s down to perspective when it comes to the final two seasons of the show, if you view it with some degree of separation from prior ones, it honestly kinda helps it.

I never take any discussions on the state of long running shows seriously, because no matter what, it always comes down to how inferior later episodes are, no matter what. And some get it worse than others.

A Third Dad Cartoon is considered the worst episode from the Savino era, and I honestly disagree. Here’s why.

While a lot more went on in the previous two Dad cartoons, this one took a different direction, and to put it simply, it’s a few things. It’s a demonstration of how boring golf is, and Dad is an enthusiast who would take it seriously to the point he would take a while for the perfect swing. It’s down to patience in golf, pick the right club, make sure you’re in the right position, relax, no sounds, they nail how it goes.

There’s also an obvious joke.The joke is that we’re waiting for him to hit the ball, and then bam, the suspense leads to a fake out thanks to a rain out. Either that or there’s a hidden subtext. They ran out of time and wanted to pad the rest of the block out with this.

Even with this in mind, I get it, it leaves a lot to be desired, but my problem is that the joke went over everyone’s heads. It’s not “I get what they’re doing but this was just boring.”, but more “Hit the ball already! Jesus abandoned us!” I can’t control how people think, but I can still whine about it. If you have to spell out the joke, it would make it even less funny than it actually is.

So, TL;DR, A Third Dad Cartoon was either filler or a demonstration of how boring golf is as told subtly through show don’t tell. Or perhaps I just don’t hate this episode as much as everyone else. Pick your poison.