Let's Watch This: An Episode of "The California Raisin Show"

NOTE: Please do not take any of the little nitpicks in this review (or any of my other reviews, for that matter) seriously. I write these reviews in the hopes of making people laugh. Those nitpicks are really just dumb little observations that I'm attempting to make jokes out of, not complaints that add to whether or not I like something.

If you watched TV in the 1980s, there's a pretty good chance you know who the California Raisins are.

These cool, croonin' claymation characters debuted in 1986 and promptly became one of the most popular - if not THE most popular - advertising mascots to come out of the 1980s. Countless ads featuring the raisins were produced, they appeared in the Emmy Award-winning A Claymation Christmas Celebration (which I might look at some other time), four albums featuring songs by the raisins were produced, merchandise of them sold like hotcakes, they got their own VIDEO GAME, and their signature song, "I Heard It Through the Grapevine", recieved a spot on the Billboard Hot 100. Not bad for a bunch of animated raisins, huh?

Nowadays, the Raisins are still... reasonably well-known, but they haven't appeared in a commercial in decades. Their most recent appearance, advertisement-wise, was a 2014 Radio Shack commercial that aired during the Super Bowl. With animated product mascots in commercials slowly becoming a thing of the past, I wouldn't expect the California Raisins to return anytime soon. Although it is worth noting that in 2015, it was announced that they were making a live action/CGI movie starring the Raisins, but I have no idea if it's still in production.

The California Raisins might not have their own movie yet (no, the cameo in Foodfight! doesn't count), but they did have their own TV show. 1989 saw the premiere of The California Raisin Show.

This show was based on the TV special starring the raisins that aired the previous year, Meet the Raisins!. Unlike that special, however, the show was cel-animated as opposed to claymation. The characters' creator, Will Vinton, acted as creative director and executive producer. The show recieved just thirteen episodes, but it was lucky enough to get a DVD release in 2011.

Hey, wait a minute... I thought advertising mascots weren't allowed to have TV shows during this time period. That's why the Chester Cheetah cartoon that was being made for FOX Kids didn't get off the ground, isn't it? Maybe the difference is that raisins are a healthy food?

The show takes place in a world where anthropomorphic fruits and vegetables exist - predating Veggietales by four years. While the advertisements usually featured at least ten raisins, this show only had seven - Beebop (voiced by Cam Clarke), A.C. (Jim Cummings), Stretch (Dorian Harewood), Red (Brian Mitchell), and three females. Is the show any good? Well, I watched Meet the Raisins! and its sequel special, The Raisins: Sold Out! and thought they were pretty good, so I'd say there's a fifty-percent chance I'll like this too. So, let's watch the tenth episode of the show, "Hold That Jungle", and see if the Raisins can carry a cartoon series as well as they can carry a tune.

The episode starts off with the Raisins in concert, performing "Ain't No Mountain High Enough". As soon as they head backstage, their manager, Rudy Bagaman (Todd Tolces), barges in and tells them that they're going on a trip. He chartered a plane, it's waiting for them at the airport.

You might be thinking "Who the heck is Rudy?", which is understandable - I don't think he appeared in any of the ads. His debut was the aforementioned Meet the Raisins! special. I also have no idea what he's supposed to be. There is no such thing as a vegetable called a "bagaman". His name suggests that he's a rutabaga (and I'll be honest, it took me a while to get the pun), but he doesn't look much like one to me. Maybe a carrot?

Rudy Bagaman is also a bit of a crazy person... er, veggie.

The Raisins are all on board with this, despite the fact that Rudy just sprung this on them and isn't even letting them know where the plane is taking them. He does mention later that they're going back to California, but he doesn't say that in this scene. How do they know he's not taking them to, say, Antarctica?

The Raisins aren't thrilled to find out that the plane looks like this:

...that's the lumpiest plane I've ever seen. It looks like some sort of vegetable - a yam, maybe? - with wings and a propellor slapped onto it. In fact, maybe it IS a vegetable. But wait, this world takes place in a world where sentient vegetables exist. Is it just like Veggietales, where there are also non-sentient vegetables that the sentient vegetables eat without a problem? Or was that airplane (again, assuming that it IS a vegetable and not just a really lumpy plane) once a sentient vegetable that they hollowed out and converted into a plane? I really, really hope it's the first one. But even if it is, where did they even find a vegetable big enough for the anthropomorphic produce to fit inside? Then again, in the ads the California Raisins were pretty small, so maybe ALL of the anthropomorphic produce in this world are tiny as well? Am I thinking too hard about this?

The pilot skydives out of the plane halfway through the flight, torpedoing any confidence the Raisins have in them getting to their destination. Rudy tells them to remain calm, because he thinks flying a kite once makes him qualified to fly the plane himself. I hope the Raisins are considering getting a new manager by this point.

Raisins should not have mohawks.

Fortunately, Rudy manages to land the plane safely. Unfortunately, he lands it in the middle of a jungle. "This place looks WILD!" Beebop points out. And when you're in a jungle, you tend to encounter some pretty ferocious animals. Such as... a strawberry?

A strawberry with a schnozz that even Ferb would be jealous of?

Okay, hold on. In this world, fruits and vegetables are anthropomorphic, but berries are non-sentient animals? Huh? I mean, I get the joke, there's a type of strawberry called a "wild strawberry" and this is a literal wild strawberry, but it's kind of confusing... considering how much the writers of this show love puns, why not do some sort of cool produce/animal hybrids? Eh, but that's just me.

Rudy and the Raisins run, but the wild strawberry manages to corner them. "If that strawberry gets any closer, we'll really be in a jam!" Red says. See what I mean about the writers of this show loving puns? Fortunately, a Tarzan yell signals the arrival of a grape in a loincloth... did I seriously just type "a grape in a loincloth"?

Hey, wait a minute... if berries are the equivalent of animals in this sentient produce-populated world, why does the loincloth this grape is wearing look like a leopard skin? Are there regular animals in this world too?

George, George, George of the Jungle, strong as he can be...

The grape defeats the strawberry, then gets on the Raisins' case for being in the strawberries' preserve. Get it? Strawberries' preserve? Strawberry preserve? Puns!

Raisins should not have pompadours either.

The grape introduces himself as "Garzack of the Grapes". Alas, he can't help them get back to civilization because he's too busy taking care of the jungle. But then one of the female grapes, Shirelle (Rebecca Gilchrist), catches his eye...

That awkward moment when a raisin has nicer legs than you.

"Me get idea! Me show way to 'civilization'. When Shirelle see Garzack hero, she stay with me!" Garzack declares. Shirelle tells him not to bet on it. And this is where things get REALLY confusing...

See that green thing? That's a snake. It's for all intents and purposes a snake. I'm not even going to question why it has whiskers, does this qualify as proof that there ARE actual animals in this world? Or is that "snake" actually just some sort of vegetable? It can't be a berry, there aren't any berries that look like that.

And then what appears to be a turnip, that wild strawberry from before, and... I'm not even sure what that thing on the right is show up. So vegetables can also be the equivalent of animals in this world, even though there are also vegetables who act like people AND regular animals? None of this makes any sense!

Come to think of it, what do the anthropomorphic produce eat? Is there indeed non-sentient "normal" fruits and vegetables in this world? Wouldn't eating them still be considered cannibalism? Or do they all just live off of bread and candy or something? Or are bread and candy sentient in this world too? Augh, my head hurts...

Seriously, what IS that thing on the right?

And then the Raisins start singing about how they have nowhere to run... while running. Isn't that like singing about how you're not hungry while scarfing down a roast turkey? The female raisins come across a giant eggplant... wait a minute, now EGGPLANT are non-sentient animals in this world too? We saw at least TWO anthropomorphic eggplants in the audience at the Raisins' concert at the beginning of this episode. This is some sort of weird Goofy/Pluto-level Furry Confusion.

I can't think of a funny comment to make here, so instead, here's a joke: why didn't the baker
put any dried fruit in his cake? Because he didn't see any raisin to do so. See, I can make produce puns
too.

A.C. encounters a bird-like pepper... so now fruit can ALSO be non-sentient animals, even though the MAIN CHARACTERS OF THE SHOW are anthropomorphic fruit clearly meant to... y'know what, I'm not even going to question the logic of this world anymore.

Nice eyebrows that pepper has, huh?

Oh, and apparently that snake from before is actually some sort of snake/asparagus hybrid thing. I'm still not going to question the logic of this world. You can't make me.

The Raisins, Garzack and Rudy come across a golden statue sitting on a cliff. One of the girl raisins (I honestly can't tell them apart) thinks the statue would be a great birthday present for their mother, so she has Garzack grab it. Only problem is, the statue belongs to a tribe of kiwi natives wielding toilet plungers.

I'm going to repeat that - kiwi natives wielding toilet plungers. And by "kiwi", I mean the fruit, not the bird.

And yet, this STILL isn't as weird as Ned's Newt...

The kiwi natives are none too pleased by Shirelle's stealing their artifact, and we get another chase sequence. Eventually Stretch just grabs the statue and tosses it to the natives, which makes them leave. So, conflict resolved, right? Yes, but now they've got something ELSE to worry about - they're standing on a rickety rope bridge that's about to come apart. Then Stretch notices a branch overhead that they can grab onto, so they do that... except for Garzack, who falls onto a small cliff below.

And he didn't grab onto the branch as well becaaaaaaaaaaause?

After getting to solid ground, the Raisins wonder how they can save Garzack. Except for Stretch. He lowers a vine down to Garzack, then lassos the other end around a "Musk Melon" to pull him up. I notice that Stretch seems to be the one who always has the solution to the Raisins' problems. And that is why he is the best character in this episode.

Oh, so NOW we're getting the produce/animal hybrids. I wonder what zoology books in this
world are like.

Shirelle mocks Garzack for being a wimp who needs to be rescued by Stretch. Wow, Shirelle's a tool. Fortunately, Garzack doesn't know what a wimp is, so Red tells him that "wimp" = "coolest person ever".

Garzack's chin is freaking me out.

The next problem for the Raisins rears its ugly head as a volcano in the distance is heard rumbling. Garzack claims that the volcano is at the edge of the jungle, so maybe if they head there, they'll find civilization. Since Rudy had his phone stolen earlier by a wild turnip earlier in the episode, he tries to signal somebody using the bongoes. Alas, his drumming apparently means "Kiwi King is big fat noodlehead", and those kiwi natives just so happen to be nearby. Uh oh...

"We've always preferred the Noid over you guys anyway!"

The good guys run, and one of the girl raisins yells at Garzack for being a lousy jungle guide, even though this situation is in no way his fault. Fortunately, Garzack knows a shorcut through a cave, and he knows the kiwis won't follow them because the shortcut leads to a part of the jungle with lots of quicksand. Rudy and the Raisins start to sink into the quicksand, but fortunately, Stretch spots an "UP" button on a nearby rock and presses it, launching him out the quicksand and into a bush. Garzack's attempt at saving Shirelle lands them both in the quicksand but washes the other two girl raisins ashore. Once again, it's up to Stretch to save the day.

Show of hands, who else wants Stretch to be the main protagonist?

The other two girl raisins save Shirelle and Garzack, and the group continues on their way. Next they come across a river, which they can ride a boat down to the volcano.

Can't think of a funny comment to make here, so have another joke about produce: which vegetable
shouldn't you take on a boat? A leek. Ba dum kssssh. Please laugh. I'm trying so hard...

Unfortunately, Garzack forgot to mention the rapids. Or the waterfall that the river, being a river in a cartoon, leads to. Eventually, the boat takes them into an ancient temple. "It took an advanced civilization to build this pad," Stretch points out. And wouldn't you know it? The temple is actually inside the volcano, which is - of course - about to erupt. Rudy's reaction is to make this face:

"DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH..."

Then the kiwi natives show up. They're working on a potion to appease the "mountain spirit", and when they feed it to a stone head, it causes the rumbling of the volcano to stop... for a few seconds. Some potion.

The Raisins tells the kiwis that they have to work together. "We have to take a mega-dose of your potion right to the source!" A.C. explains. And by "the source", he means the crater at the top of the volcano. Garzack grabs the pot with the potion in it, and they all ride the escalator... yes, there's an escalator, just go with it...

"When do we get to the ride?"

"This IS the ride! YIPPEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

The escalator takes them to a bus stop, where they get on a bus... again, just go with it... that takes them to a place where they all get on bicycles... and then they ride a chairlift... and then they hail a taxi that takes them to the top of the volcano... oh, and did I mention that the whole time they're singing "Ain't No Mountain High Enough"? I guess it makes sense, a volcano does qualify as a mountain, doesn't it?

Garzack dumps the potion into the crater, the volcano burps, and the day is saved. And we get a twist ending - the uncharted jungle is part of the Hollywood Hills! They were in California all along!

What a twist!

The Raisins make it to their mother (Lulu Arborman)'s house in time for her birthday, they give her the statue, and Shirelle now has the hots for Garzack. Also, Rudy calls up somebody in Hollywood with a great idea for a movie. I hear Brendan Frasier is in talks to play Garzack.

What's the Verdict?

Y'know, I actually kind of liked this. I think I liked Meet the Raisins! and The Raisins: Sold Out! better, because those had more clever writing. And all that stuff about the wild animal equivalent produce existing alongside human equivalent produce really confused me. But the animation is pretty good, the voice actors all do a good job, Stretch is awesome, and there's just an inherent charm to those raisins that keeps me from brushing the show off as a lazy commercial for dried grapes. You can find every episode of The California Raisin Show on YouTube, so even if you haven't seen any of the ads, I'd recommend checking it out.

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