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Episode 32
Chairman
of the Bored
As a show that embraces the animation medium, it’s the
perfect one to take on unique story ideas.
These are the kind of abstract ideas that sound mundane or ridiculous on
paper, but in execution, are significantly impactful. This cartoon is simple but leaves a lot to
talk about.
It starts the Warners
attending a gala of Hollywood stars.
While snagging food from the buffet, they meet a guest named Francis
“Pip” Pumphandle who tells them a long rambling story. That doesn’t sound like much nor all that exciting.
Strangely enough, the lack of excitement from
the Warners’ situation makes the cartoon so great. They usually go all-out with cartoonish antics
to handle anyone who gives them trouble. The thing is their targets are usually jerks who have them
coming. The only trouble Pip gives the
Warners is telling them his never-ending story.
Not only that, but it’s told in such a drab monotone voice, parodying Pip’s voice actor Ben Stein who’s known for such
a tone.
It certainly doesn’t help that his
story keeps going off on long tangents of any single minor thing mentioned at
certain points. A talk about cheeseballs
turns to one of Bob Barker, to Chinese food, to relaxing, to playing an
instrument, to flowers, to a cat he had, etc.
It’s just a long droning ramble about random things Pip’s been up
to. Yet, Pip himself isn’t a jerk at
all. He’s a friendly guy who wants to
have a nice conversation. The only
problem is that he’s too boring to listen to, even if his attitude gives a nice
cadence to his longwinded story.
Livening things up isn’t Pip’s story, but the Warners’ reaction to listening
to it. Because he’s not doing anything
bad apart from being boring, Pip doesn’t deserve their usual cartoonish antics,
and the Warners don’t use them on him.
Their best option is to try and escape him, and their attempts have
their own brand of strong comedy. Yakko
uses extreme means to escape the story, as well as Pip’s eternal handshake,
such as using a crowbar and chewing his arm off. Dot uses an assortment of stop signs which
Pip takes no notice of and later tries escaping through turning herself into a
butterfly, cocoon and all. Wakko goes
for the remainder of the buffet while stuck in Pip’s handshake in his
cartoonish fashion, and tells Pip to “go away” unenthused immediately
after.
Each Warner evokes great comedy
through trying to escape Pip individually, but they’re just as funny together
too. There are times when they abandon
Pip, but he keeps popping in. This
results in many hilarious wild takes and screams from the kids. Eventually, there’s an interesting direction
where the Warners have no choice but to admit they just can’t escape Pip. They just live with him being around no
matter boring he is. This is huge for
being a rare time of the Warners being in a situation they’re powerless to
stop. It’s a welcome subversion to the
formula making the whole cartoon stand out even if you do feel bad for the
Warners.
However, to not make the tone
too sympathetic, the cartoon ends with the Warners deciding they can’t live
without Pip. Just as he finally finishes
his story and leaves, they run after him to hear another one. I can’t speak for everyone, but I see this as
a plausible outcome to listening to a long story from a boring yet likable guy. It further makes the
cartoon an interesting play on the Warners formula through showing how they
react to an opposing force who isn’t a total jerk. Above all, it’s a winning abstract concept
put to entertaining effect that must be seen to be believed.
A++
The Planets
The songs of this show are almost always a joy and a put an
entertaining spin on educating. Packing
in a substantial amount of information into a short music piece makes for a fun
way to get certain subjects into one’s mind.
With this song, while it’s fun to listen to and effectively gets tidbits
about the solar system to stick, it’s not exactly one of the show’s best
songs. It’s basically just Yakko flying
around the planets in a spaceship while singing what makes each one stand out.
It’s nothing all that special and goes by a
little too fast, less than a minute in fact.
Yakko comes in, sings what needs to be taught, and the song’s over. It just doesn’t leave anything exciting or
memorable to take from it.
The best we
get is a joke at the end when Wakko shows up to tell Yakko that he forgot
Uranus. While the joke is less mature
than what we’re used to from this show, it is a comedic way to point out that
the planet was left out. Even if it is a
good punchline, it’s not very effective because by then, we’re all done.
The song is good all things considered, but
if it didn’t end so quickly, I’d probably hold it in regards as high as this
show’s other educational works.
B+Astro-Buttons
The escapade takes place in outer space. While settings like suburban homes and
prehistoric times have similar tropes, it’s anyone’s guess what space life
would be like. As a result, the gags
during Buttons’ chase for Mindy, who runs after her ball through the cosmos,
are some of their most creative.
The
chase starts at the usual suburban house, just under a glass bubble. The reason
for the bubble brings on the first gag.
There’s a passage leading to space that automatically fits anyone who
passes through into spacesuits. When
Buttons goes through too fast to get a spacesuit, his head not only shrinks,
but folds into his neck. After Buttons
gets his suit, the gags, as well as the creative structure of space,
continues.
When Mindy goes over an edge
at one point, the lack of gravity in space subverts the usual outcome where
she doesn’t fall and chases her ball along the side of a cliff. It does bring an issue where Buttons falls as
expected when he shouldn’t. That just
doesn’t make sense. Once the chase leads
to a space city, also under glass, the ensuing gags become more creative and
believable to the space setting.
Among
the more memorable gags is one with a teleporter. Mindy and Buttons use it which places them
with a surprise cameo from Star Trek
characters who observe them in a manner faithful to their franchise. The funny part is Mindy and Buttons
teleporting back with their heads and bodies swapped, and the heads have their
expected intelligence.
The space setting
also puts interesting spins on the formula.
Mindy’s usual “why” conversation, this time with space bug men, stand
out with Mindy’s questions answered with unintelligible alien talk. The chase as a whole fits how vast space is. At
one point, Mindy chases her ball onto a rocket due for detonation and Buttons
struggles to get aboard as it takes off.
The takeoff, detonation warnings, and Buttons chasing Mindy in the void
outside bring a large scope. It makes
the cartoon bigger and grander than normal, even if it’s only for a moment with
Buttons getting repeatedly wacked by asteroids shortly after. Those gags aren’t as effective with Buttons looking
beaten up in a way truer to real life than a cartoon, but an impression he
leaves on the side of a rocket is funny.
There’s also one of the more sentimental moments between Mindy and
Buttons here. As they’re about to
teleport home, Mindy sadly tells Buttons that her ball is going to get left
behind prompting Buttons to rescue it just before the rocket explodes. This moment shows that there is meaning to
Mindy running off and putting Buttons through so much trouble. It’s something you hardly get in their other
cartoons.
The ending also makes the
cartoon stand out. The last gag has Mindy
teleported into her parents’ duplicator which creates innumerable Mindy clones. That’s enough to make Buttons show more
backbone than usual and quit. It’s actually
refreshing to see that for all the trouble one Mindy causes, he’s smart not to
put up with tons of them. The idea of
her multiplying is kind of unsettling no matter how cute she is.
While this cartoon is still mostly the same
formula and not all gags are winners, there’s plenty of them that are
winners. Because of this, we have proof
that different settings can make Mindy and Buttons cartoons stand out, if only
on certain occasions.
A-
Cartoon Ranking
- Chairman of the Bored
- Hot Bothered and Bedeviled
- O Silly Mio
- Phranken-Runt
- Jockey For Position
- Sir Yaksalot
- Potty Emergency
- Puttin’ on the Blitz
- Draculee Draculaa
- Babblin’ Bijou
- I Got Yer Can
- Astro-Buttons
- Moby or Not Moby
- Skullhead Boneyhands
- The Good, the Boo, and the Ugly
- Moon Over Minerva
- Mesozoic Mindy
Miscellaneous Ranking
- Testimonials
- You Risk Your Life
- The Great Wakkorotti: The Summer Concert
Song Ranking
- The Planets
The next Animaniacs review brings cartoons coming from Wakko's body starring the Hip Hippos, Chicken Boo, and the Goodfeathers.
Next time on MC Toon Reviews is "We Got Hacked" from OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes.
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