Let's Watch This - An Episode of "Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends"

Once upon a time, there was a show called Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends. It premiered on Cartoon Network in 2004, and was an immediate success. Millions loved it. Fansites were made. Six seasons were produced. One character even became the mascot of sorts for Cartoon Network.

Remember THESE billboards?

When the show was on, I watched it and found myself liking it. Then the show came to an end. Around... 2014, I think, reruns appeared on Boomerang and I decided to give the show a rewatch.

And I soon discovered that it really didn't hold up.

What's the main problem with the show? I can sum it up in one sentence: IT'S NEEDLESSLY MEAN-SPIRITED. Are you familiar with the trope "Sadist Show"? A "Sadist Show" is when a TV show relies entirely on being needlessly cruel and mean-spirited. Very few episodes end on a positive note, the characters are all unsympathetic jerks, and about ninety-seven percent of the jokes focus on abusing them. Examples of "Sadist Shows" include Family Guy from Season 4 onward, South Park, Robot Chicken, and The Big Bang Theory. Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends is, to put it bluntly, a "Sadist Show". All of the characters are unlikable and it seriously seems as though no one can win.

Don't believe me? Today we'll be watching the episode "Beat With a Shtick". Perhaps a more fitting title for this episode would've been "Everybody Hates Bloo".

The episode begins with Bloo (Keith Ferguson) making the other imaginary friends laugh by doing impressions of them. "YOUR BRAND OF COMEDY ENTERTAINS US!" one imaginary friend (voiced by Tom Kenny doing a bad Indian accent) cheers. He tells a joke about dinosaurs to an imaginary friend who looks like a dinosaur (and who I'm pretty sure is ALSO voiced by Tom Kenny*). Then a very tall imaginary friend simply known as "The New Guy" (Phil LaMarr) comes by and Bloo does that "how's the weather up there?" joke. The New Guy then grabs Bloo and angrily says, "YOU THINK YOU'RE PRETTY FUNNY, HUH?!"

Shouldn't this guy be stomping through the City of Townsville?

"OUTSIDE. THE TWO OF US. 3:30," the New Guy barks (though Bloo says that 4:00 would work better for him). "WHEN I'M THROUGH WITH YOU, YOU'RE GONNA HAVE FUNNY ALL OVER YOUR FACE!" After the new guy leaves, the Indian-accented Tom Kenny-voiced imaginary friend tells others that Bloo and the New Guy are going to face off.

Hey, here's a fun game we could play. It's called "Have a Sip of Water Every Time You Hear a Character Voiced By Tom Kenny or Grey Griffin". Hope you have a very large bottle of water nearby.
Bloo is oddly not too concerned about the New Guy planning to pummel him. Another imaginary friend voiced by Tom Kenny tells Bloo that the new guy is from "Looneytown". Then an imaginary friend voiced by Grey Griffin adds that he was "created by some deranged looney". Bloo rudely tells them that they're boring him and that he's "tough and gritty". "Blooregaurd Q. Kazoo isn't afraid of nobody or nothing!" he insists. Then he sees the New Guy chasing after another imaginary friend and realizes, hey, he's in big trouble.

Long story short, he winds up hiding under the New Guy's bed with Eduardo (Tom Kenny). What's Eduardo doing there? He's apparently hiding from the New Guy as well (so why are you hiding in his ROOM?). "I heard that he once left a guy in stitches!" he says.

He kind of looks like a rejected Muppet, doesn't he?

The New Guy finds Bloo and Eduardo, and Bloo tricks Ed into letting the New Guy beat him up while he makes a run for it. Bloo is such a good friend, isn't he?

Anyhow, Bloo tries to hide in a laundry basket, but then he gets dumped down a laundry chute into the laundry room and winds up in a washing machine. Wilt (Phil LaMarr) lets him out and then Bloo fills him in on what's going on. Wilt - who's intended to be the show's nicest character - goes into a rant about how much he hates "tall jokes" (because Wilt himself is very tall) and how Bloo deserves to be beaten up by the New Guy. Totally in-character, right?

Wilt is having none of your DARING TO BE AFRAID OF BEING BEATEN UP, Bloo.

Bloo's next plan is to destroy every clock in the house - that way, the New Guy will never know when it's 4:00 and Bloo can't get beaten up. Frankie (Grey Griffin) demands to know WHY he's destroying the clocks, and then Madame Foster (Candi Milo) comes in and gleefully tells Frankie that Bloo is going to get beaten up at 4:00. She then has Coco bring in a large clock that counts down to when Bloo gets pummeled. And Bloo can't even smash it with his hammer because it's made out of Plexiglass.

As if Madame Foster wasn't being enough of a donkey's rear end already, she and Coco then calculate Bloo's chances of defeating the New Guy. And she and the other imaginary friends are BETTING ON WHETHER OR NOT BLOO IS BEATEN UP.

Then Eduardo shows up, and he's angry at Bloo for leaving him to get beaten up. And then we get... uh, a random Imagine Spot with Bloo in a pitch-black room, hearing screams from every direction before the New Guy arrives and chases after Bloo with multiple weapons.

So, yeah. A character in a CHILDREN'S TV SHOW spends much of the episode fearing for his life.
You know, for kids!

The Imagine Spot culminates in the New Guy smashing Bloo with a giant hammer. After... THAT, Bloo overhears Mr. Herriman (Tom Kane) ranting about how when he gets his hands on whoever stole his monocle (Bloo stole it earlier), he shall expel them from the house. So he gets the idea to put the monocle in the New Guy's room, which will result in the New Guy getting expelled and Bloo not getting beaten up by the New Guy. No one will ever know!

Alas, Mr. Herriman trips on him and spots him with his monocle, meaning that Bloo's plan has been foiled. Mr. Herriman announces that Bloo shall be expelled from the house... which flies in the face of their agreement with Mac (who hasn't shown up in this episode yet)... that is, if he can prove to Madame Foster that what he did warrants it (which I don't think it does). This gives Bloo an idea - if he's expelled from the house, the New Guy won't be able to beat him up, right? So he brings up another nasty thing he did recently. Specifically, he put hot sauce in everyone's tacos the other night and framed another imaginary friend named Jolly Buttons. "We had him deported," a shocked Mr. Herriman says.

Bloo brings up a bunch of other past misdeeds, then adds that he's getting in a fight this afternoon. With the New Guy. Then Mr. Herriman changes his tune and ALLOWS THE FIGHT TO HAPPEN IN THE HOPES THAT THE NEW GUY WILL DESTROY BLOO.

"Ha ha, you're gonna get beaten up!"

Mr. Herriman continues to be an enormous jerk by pointing out to Bloo that he has an hour and forty minutes left before he gets pummeled. He even lets out an evil chuckle.

Then Mac (Sean Marquette) finally shows up. I would like to take this moment to point out that Mac's voice is A) annoying and B) unfitting for a character that's intended to be eight years old. Anyhow, the New Guy shows up as Bloo is explaining to Mac what's going on and scares the pants off of Mac and Bloo. Mac suggests that Bloo make a run for it, and after he brings up Terrence, Bloo gets an idea. "We're gonna fight fire with fire!" he tells Mac.

Bloo's idea is to have Terrence (Tara Strong) beat up the New Guy. He agrees to it after Bloo says that if he does, Terrence will be allowed to beat up Mac - and also Mac will have to wear this t-shirt that Bloo made.

Comic Sans? Seriously?

And also a baby bonnet. Don't ask.

You know, Bloo being a massive jerk doesn't make the other characters
taking sadistic pleasure in seeing him get beaten up any less awful.

Terrence winds up getting his rear end handed to him by the New Guy, and Bloo decides to take Mac's advice and RUN LIKE HECK. We get a montage of him traveling by taxi, traveling by boat, traveling by plane... and then it turns out he was just imagining it. Long story short, he winds up back at Foster's just in time for his confrontation with the New Guy.

Mr. Herriman literally kicks Bloo outside, where the New Guy is waiting... and it turns out that the New Guy's not gonna beat Bloo up. Instead, he uses the mallet to smash a watermelon, which gets watermelon all over Bloo - making him "blue and red all over". "I told you I was gonna give you something to laugh about!" the New Guy says cheerfully. It's all part of his act - he's a prop comic! All those other guys - Eduardo, Terrence, etc. - he was just practicing his material on them. "I mean, I'm just an amateur, and you're, like, the funniest friend in the whole house!"

So what's Bloo's opinion on the New Guy's act? He thinks it's lame. The New Guy then clobbers him. "That is the best punchline he has delivered all day!" Eduardo quips, and then the episode ends.

Okay, maybe this isn't the worst episode of Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends that I've ever seen, but it's still a pretty big indicator as to what's wrong with the show. The Flash animation is pretty fluid, but that's the only good thing I can say about it. It's just needlessly mean-spirited. All of the characters - with the exception of Mac - in this episode are ungodly unlikable. Even if Bloo's acting like a jerk, and the New Guy wasn't going to harm him, seeing the entire house treat Bloo so crappily just gave the entire episode an necessarily harsh and cold feeling. Maybe I could forgive this if the episode were at least funny, but it isn't.

Now, I know that there are a lot of people that like this show. And if you like it, that's fine. I just don't think the show holds up very well.

* I checked the credits, it's actually Keith Ferguson.