If you like this review and want to stay updated for what else I have in store, become a follower of this blog, click here to like the official Facebook page, and click here to follow me on Twitter. Now on with today's review:
Who’s For
Dinner?
Most
cartoons we’ve covered this season have featured Heffer as a gluttonous but
still likable friend. This one stands
out more for going deeper than that by exploring his dynamic with his wolf
family.
It happens when Rocko’s invited
to Heffer’s house for dinner. Although
he says he’s inviting him because he’s trying to find a ride home, the
hesitation in his voice suggests that he’s a little worried about introducing
his best friend to his family. This
would be hard to believe since we’ve seen his wolf family a few times before this cartoon, but you can chalk that up to these reviews arranged in airing
order instead of production order.
Even
so, those few appearances didn’t really show what the family is like
personality-wise, so this cartoon feels like a proper introduction to
them. We have the loving mother, the
isolated and easily-agitated father, the grumpy grandpa with a particular
disdain towards wallabies (though he’s near-sided so Rocko’s OK), a mysterious
cross-dressing brother, and a mostly silent sister who snaps when things get
too intense. Altogether, this family
features an interesting background for Heffer which stands out more since he’s
a completely different creature from them, though it’s much stranger for the
wolves to deal with than Heffer who seems to go about his life with them just
fine. He even takes part in wolf
mannerisms like eating a dead elk raw like wolves typically would for
dinner. If anything it’s Rocko who feels
out of place amongst this strange family, not just at dinner, but also through
seeing how his friend lives with a family following customs not typically
suitable for steers as seen through a few visual gags of noticing the wolves
have a room full of Red Riding Hoods and cabinets of the three little pigs on
his way to the restroom.
He’s also
likable for being friendly and accepting of his friend’s setup despite his
discomfort, but brings about a huge shift in tone when he points out that
Heffer was adopted, something Heffer apparently never knew. It would be an issue that Heffer never really
figured out something so obvious, but he’s been established to not be so
bright, so this is acceptable. However,
he’s still genuinely shocked about the reveal that he decides to run away and
find his real steer family. It’s not a
bad idea for a plot, but it’s a bit of a jarring change of pace for the cartoon
that’s mostly established itself as a simple evening with Heffer’s family. At least they’re still seen looking for him
frequently alongside scenes of Heffer being depressed, getting fatter than
usual during his search.
As for Heffer, his actions may be extreme, but they
are understandable since he is a completely different species from the wolves,
and you have to wonder what his real family was like. With this in mind, when he finally finds the
farm he came from, he gets a vision of his dad who’s extremely cold and bitter
not wanting anything to do with his son.
It begs the question of how valid this is since it’s just a vision and
doesn’t completely solve the mystery to Heffer’s origins, but it’s still a
decent one to get him to see sense that his true family are those who love him,
even if they are different from him.
This is one of the more wholesome cartoons of the season for solid
introductions to the personalities of Heffer’s family, and is especially a good
watch for anyone who was ever adopted.
A-
Love
Spanked
Finding
love is an aspect of life that’s featured a lot in shows. In a show that gives creative interpretations
of life’s challenges, it’s interesting to see how a cartoon tackles this topic.
Rocko’s love interest here is his neighbor,
Melba Toast, and he’s so obsessed with her, he rushes to see her get the paper
every day. The fact that Melba isn’t
even seen gives her an interesting feel of mystery of what Rocko sees in her
and symbolizes her as a crush who feels unattainable.
Speaking of unattainable, the cartoon’s
relatability is felt when Rocko finds out that Melba now has a boyfriend, which
is always a common problem to deal with when someone you like is taken. Heffer tries to help Rocko by getting him a
personal to meet other girls. Given
Heffer’s track record of roping Rocko into strange alternatives to challenges,
you can probably guess things won’t go as planned, but you can’t fault his
effort to help.
As it turns out, the
dates Rocko goes on offer one mishap after another with many of them turning
out far too eccentric for his liking.
They include a pink bunny with a huge desire for embracing while her
father quickly goes from calm to enrage out of nowhere, a heavy elephant woman
who’s impossible to sail with without sinking, a jogger who gives a moose as a
token of appreciation, and a fitness woman who delights in using Rocko as a
weight. This set of dates is mildly
amusing in a way, but aside from a few exaggerations, they don’t feel as
investing or creative as other interpretations this show has turned out, so the
sting of their failures is more prominent.
It also doesn’t feel right that
Heffer later sweet-talks Rocko into going on a dating show looking for
wallabies. That’s an even more
ridiculous way to find love, and since the personals didn’t work, it’s easy to
predict that this won’t work either. The
game show is certainly entertaining with an energetic dolphin host making up
stuff about Rocko, and a voting studio audience amusingly too bored to be there
which enhances the environment. It’s
through this audience’s carelessness while pushing a random button that decides Rocko’s next date . Rather than getting to date two nice looking women,
he’s roped into dating Heffer, whose silhouette makes a convincing human
figure. While it’s concerning that the
guy who convinced Rocko to do the show, and his best friend at that, ended up
as an option when he knows Rocko’s looking for a girlfriend, it eventually
chalks up to bad luck on Rocko’s part since Heffer was just doing a stand-in
for the third date.
In the end, Rocko
decides to just be honest to Melba about his feelings for her, but his attempts
get sabotaged again when a love column of him pining for her ends up in the
paper and she drives away embarrassed.
As a result, the whole cartoon is nothing more than things going wrong for
Rocko with little to no good coming out of it.
He may be designed to endure life’s challenges, but he usually gets some
positive outcomes, but not so much here.
That’s not even mentioning that this isn’t the best display of his
friendship with Heffer who caused most of his misfortunes.
It’s still easy to get a solid laugh here and
there and the cartoon is still good overall since Rocko ends the cartoon
content with where he is, but the overbearing misfortunes are not what I call
the ideal love-themed cartoon.
C
The Ranking
- Popcorn Pandemonium
- Cabin Fever
- Skid Marks
- The Good the Bad and the Wallaby
- Canned
- To Heck and Back
- Who Gives a Buck?
- Dirty Dog
- A Sucker for the Suck-O-Matic
- Trash-O-Madness
- Jet Scream
- Rinse and Spit
- Carnival Knowledge
- Who’s For Dinner
- Keeping Up With the Bigheads
- Rocko’s Happy Sack
- Sand in Your Navel
- Spitballs
- No Pain No Gain
- Flu-In-U-Enza
- Power Trip
- Love Spanked
- Bedfellows
- Leap Frogs
Be sure to stay tuned for the review of the last episode of Season 1 where Spunky falls in love with a mop, and Rocko discovers the dangers of laundromats.
If you would like to check out other Rocko's Modern Life reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.
No comments:
Post a Comment