Let's Watch This: An Episode of "Beverly Hills Teens"

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.

NOTE #2: No disrespect is meant towards anyone who worked on the show I am reviewing today. I'm sure they are all very nice and talented people.

NOTE #3: If you like this show, that is great. Go ahead and like it. I'm not judging you.

I've never been to Beverly Hills, and I am not nor have I ever been rich, so a cartoon about a bunch of rich kids living in Beverly Hills is something I likely would never watch if it weren't for my doing a blog about little-known cartoons. Of course, I'm not a sea sponge who lives in a pineapple or works as a fry cook either but that never stopped me from enjoying SpongeBob SquarePants.

Beverly Hills Teens was the creation of Jack Olesker, Michael Maliani and Barry O'Brien, and a co-production between DIC Enterprises, Access Syndication, and Coca-Cola Telecommunications. It first aired in syndication on September 21st, 1987. One season consisting of sixty-five episodes were produced. After its initial run, the show was made part of a package with two other shows called Maxie's World and It's Punky Brewster. Why does the show exist? Apparently, the producers were bothered by the "neo-materialistic, boy-toy animation" that dominated 1980s television like SilverHawks and ThunderCats. The president of Access Syndicate, Ritch Colbert, asked, "Where are the Tom and Jerrys, the Flintstones, the rich characters for children to nurture and identify with?"

Uh, have kids EVER identified with Tom and Jerry? I feel like everyone was too busy laughing at them beating the crap out of each other than they were seeing themselves in the characters.

Well, anyway, the show focuses on a bunch of teenagers Richie Rich-ing it up in Beverly Hills. All sixty-five episodes were eventually released on DVD in 2013, and you can also find episodes of the show on YouTube. Is Beverly Hills Teens worth watching? Let's find out. We're going to watch the second episode of the show, "The Dog Ate My Homework".

Here's a question: has any student in the history of school ever actually told their teacher that a dog ate their homework? Somehow, I doubt anyone is dumb enough that. Unless they couldn't find a sheet of paper so they wrote their homework assignment down on a T-Bone steak.

The episode starts off with one of the show's main characters, Larke Tanner (voiced by Mary Long). She's a part-time model, a straight-A student, good at everything, and drives a pink Ferrari who she might or might not have gotten from Barbie. I'm sure all the part-time model straight-A student kids at home are going to identify with HER!

Doc Brown soon regretted allowing Penelope Pitstop to give his DeLorean a paint job.

She is talking on her video-phone to Troy Jeffries (Jonathan Potts), her boyfriend and the most popular boy in Beverly Hills. They talk about how excited they are for the Midnight Ball that night - especially since Troy has been chosen to be prince of the Midnight Ball. Maybe it's just me, but I don't think having a school dance at midnight is a good idea. Isn't midnight when the Fairy Godmother's magic spell wears off and the girls' coaches turn back into pumpkins?

Then we cut to the show's main antagonist, Bianca (Terri Hawkes). She's described on TV Tropes as being Veronica from the Archie comics without any redeeming qualities. She is accompanied by her chauffer, Wilshire (Michael Beattie), who looks like a giant Cabbage Patch Kid, and a pink poodle named Empress.

And she rides around in a pink limousine, too. There's a lot of that color in this show.

She goes to a dress shop to find a gown for the ball, and when she sees the dress that aspiring actress Nikki Darling (Corrine Koslo) is wearing, she announces that she's going to buy it right off her back. "All's fair in love and shopping, you know," she claims. Then Wilshire accidentally spills Moroccan grape juice on the dress, creating a stain that the French-accented clerk claims will never come out (not even with OxiClean? It's tough on stains!), and Bianca changes her mind.

It's just as well, Nikki. Gold ballgowns won't be "in" this season until Beauty and the Beast
comes out in 1991.

Eventually, Bianca finds a gown that she must, MUST have, but the clerk tells her that Larke has already paid for it. This makes Bianca MAD! She storms out, telling the clerk that she wants every other gown in the store delivered to her house by tonight. Larke shows up just as she's leaving the store, and WHACKY SHENANIGANS ensue as Bianca's poodle chases after her cat.

Later on, at Larke's house... jeez, there's way too much pink in this screencap. It's like she lives in a bottle of Pepto-Bismol.

Who was her interior decorator, the Pink Panther?

Larke is talking to Troy about how she needs to finish her homework. She sits down at her extremely dated-looking 1980s computer and starts typing. At HER house, Bianca gets an idea. An awful idea. Bianca gets a wonderful, AWFUL idea. You see, there's a rule that if you don't complete your homework, you don't get to go to the Midnight Ball. For some reason. And since Bianca wants to be named the princess of the Midnight Ball but knows that Larke is more likely to get it, she has her poodle go inside the house and chew up Larke's computer disks that features her homework assignment (what exactly that assignment IS, they don't say)... after a lengthy sequence where the poodle chases the cat again.

Where are Larke's parents? Why aren't THEY doing anything about the crazy dog running around their house making a mess of things while trying to eat their cat? Anyway, apparently NOT hearing the dog's barking, Larke thinks that her cat chewed up the disk. Now she won't be able to go to the Midnight Ball! Oh, Bianca, how could you be so cruel?

Word about Larke's homework assignment being chewed up apparently travels fast, as it quickly reaches the ear of this girl named Jett (Karen Bernstein). I know this was the 1980s, but take a look at this girl's hair. She looks like a member of Jem and the Holograms. It's like what head lice would think Nirvana is.

It's probably even harder to find a needle in THAT thing than it would be in a
haystack.

And to make matters worse, Larke will have to do the homework assignment in... cue the dramatic music... DETENTION HALL! "Oh, how GRODY! Gag me with a silver spoon!" Jett whines, in case you forgot that this show was made in the 1980s. Well, at least she has a butler to keep her company.

So... are they gonna tell us what the homework assignment actually IS?

Larke has to tell Troy that she probably won't be finished in time for the ball - in fact, she'll be stuck in there all weekend. Wait, her teacher gave the class homework on a FRIDAY? The fiend! Fortunately, hope arrives not in the form of a Fairy Godmother but rather in a ten-year-old genius. Say hello to Chester McTech (Sean Roberge), a bespectacled boy who always wears a labcoat and comes up with bizarre inventions. He overhears Larke's sobs and thinks that they're doing horrible things to her in Detention Hall, so he attempts to break down the doors... which just swing open, so either he's incredibly strong for a A) presumably-ten-year-old and B) a nerd or they just weren't locked.

Refreshingly, the show DOESN'T have a lot of "LOL he's such a nerd" jokes at his expense.

Chester takes out a magnifying glass to see just how bad the damage to Larke's disk really is. He identifies that the bite marks are actually from canine inscisors. That's pretty impressive - I probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference between bite marks from a cat and bite marks from a dog. Larke puts two and two together and realizes that Bianca's dog is to blame, and then Chester says that he might be able to retrieve her homework. He creates an "un-chew" program on his computer to "un-erase" her homework. It works. Scientifically accurate? Doubtful. But it's a cartoon, so who cares?

It's 10:00, but the Midnight Ball is already in full swing... which raises the question of why it's called the MIDNIGHT Ball if it starts BEFORE midnight, but eh... after they deliver Larke's homework assignment, she and Chester head off to pick up her gown. But, oh no! The dress shop is closed! Fortunately, Chester has some sort of invention that can unlock any lock in the world. Word of advice, Chester - make sure that doesn't fall into the wrong hands. A lot of bank robbers would have a field day with it.

"And if you press this button, a laser shoots out and fries Bianca's head!"

"Chester, you can't just break in like that!" Larke points out. "It's against the law!" Chester says that since she already paid for the gown, it technically isn't stealing, but Larke still isn't comfortable with it. If only there were some mice around to whip up a dress for her (why am I making so many Cinderella jokes in this review?). But then Chester gets another idea: if Larke could make a sketch of that ballgown in the window, he could reproduce the dress with his giant sewing machine. I like Chester, but at this point I feel like they should've just named him "Mr. Deus Ex Machina".

A male sewing dresses? Chester is defying gender stereotypes, too!

Faster than you can say "take a chill pill", Larke has a completed dress. But it's 11:50, and she has to get to the ball ASAP. But the universe isn't done making things difficult for Larke - her gown is too big for her to fit in her Ferrari. Fortunately, Chester has the solution once again.

...aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand all those Cinderella jokes I made in this review have just been rendered redundant.

So off they go in Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater's car - Chester's driving, by the way, I didn't know ten-year-olds could get a driver's license - and arrive at the dance just in time for them to announce the ball princess. With eighty-two votes, Larke is dubbed the princess. Bianca, of course, is furious, and chases after Wilshire with the intent of beating him up for not voting for HER (not that it would've made much of a difference).

His name is Troy, so I suppose I should make some sort of High School Musical joke.
Alas, I can't think of anything funny.

What's the Verdict?

I probably would've liked this more if I were a sixteen-year-old girl in the 1980s. I am not. It's not a bad show, the animation is fine and the voice actors all do a good job, but I really don't find the characters engaging or relatable, nor do I relate to all this stuff about school dances and dates. There is one thing I do like about it, however, and that's Chester. Sure, he's pretty much a walking Deus Ex Machina, but I tend to like "adorkable" cartoon kids, and Chester's presence sure made the second half of the episode better than the first.

Aside from Chester, though, I didn't care much for Beverly Hills Teens. At best it's a guilty pleasure (a lot of the other episodes can get pretty out there). Still, I suppose it's a good thing that there was a cartoon about teens where they didn't fight crime or solve mysteries or whatever. Teens need cartoon characters they can relate to, after all.

Rating: Two and a half expensive gowns out of five. Fun to mock, at least.

By the way, I also watched the episode of the show where Chester creates a robotic seventeen-year-old girl to be his date to the dance. Yes, it's just as creepy as it sounds.

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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Let's Watch This: An Episode of "The Get Along Gang"

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.

NOTE #2: No disrespect is meant towards anyone who worked on the show I am reviewing today. I'm sure they are all very nice and talented people.

NOTE #3: If you like this show, that is great. Go ahead and like it. I'm not judging you.

Somebody requested that I review The Get Along Gang, and I am nothing if not a people-pleaser. Unless that person who wants to be pleased is someone who likes Jellystone!, then they're just gonna have to put up with me.

The titular Get Along Gang consisted of six anthropomorphic animal kids: Montgomery Moose (voiced by Sparky Marcus), Dotty Dog (voiced by Bettina "Rainbow Brite" Bush), Bingo Beaver (voiced by a young Scott Menville), Zipper Cat (voiced by Robbie Lee), Woolma Lamb (voiced by Georgi Irene), and Portia Porcupine (voiced by Sherry Lynn). They were first created in 1983 by Tony Byrd, Tom Jacobs, Ralph Shaffer, Linda Edwards, Muriel Fahrion, and Mark Spangler for a series of greeting cards by American Greetings. Loosely inspired by the Our Gang short films, the cards sold well enough for Nelvana to produce a pilot for a cartoon show starring the characters, which aired on Nickelodeon in May 1984. After the pilot, production of the show was handed over to DiC, and the show began airing on CBS. Only thirteen episodes, each one consisting of two segments (making for a total of twenty-six segments in total), were produced before the show was canned and greeting card sales started to decline. Attempts at relaunching the franchise since then have been washes. Sorry, Get Along Gang... we can't all be the Care Bears.

This show was made during that time period in the 1980s when cartoons had to focus mostly on learning valuable life lessons about getting along, working together, group harmony, and things like that. Garfield and Friends writer Mark Evanier talked about this sort of thing on his blog in a post talking about his time working on the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon that premiered a year before (note to self: review that cartoon at some point). Specifically, he said, "There are those our there who attempt to influence the content of childrens' television. We call them 'parents groups', although many are not comprised of parents, or at least not of folks whose primary interest is as parents. Study them and you'll find a wide array of agendum at work... and I suspect that, in some cases, their stated goals are far away from their real goals. Nevertheless, they all seek to make kidvid more enriching and redeeming, at least by their definitions, and at the time, they had enough clout to cause the networks to yield. Consultants were brought in and we, the folks who were writing cartoons, were ordered to include certain 'pro-social' morals in our shows. At the time, the dominant 'pro-social' moral was as follows: the group is always right... the complainer is always wrong. This was the message of way too many eighties' cartoon shows. If all your friends want to go get pizza and you want a burger, you should bow to the will of the majority and go get pizza with them. There was even a show for one season on CBS called The Get-Along Gang, which was dedicated unabashedly to this principle. Each week, whichever member of the gang didn't get along with the gang learned the error of his or her ways." This was what led to the creation of the Buddy Bears in Garfield and Friends, although Mark said that while he did cross swords with Standards and Practices and argued a lot "with one particular lady at ABC", none of this actually inspired the Buddy Bears. "Sometimes when you're a writer and you have strong feelings about something, you just find yourself writing about it," he explained.

So, why is The Get Along Gang so infamous? Why don't we watch an episode of the show and find out? Specifically, we'll be watching the second episode, which consists of the segments "Caboose on the Loose" and "Montgomery's Mechanical Marvel". This is The Get Along Gang.

We start off with Portia and Bingo playing marbles, with Bingo doing some sort of "special super-shot" that sends a marble flying into Zipper's mouth. For some reason, this leads to Zipper nagging Bingo about how betting is "for suckers" - apparently one of Bingo's character traits is that he has a betting problem. Better keep this kid out of Vegas, then.

After that, Montgomery, Dotty, and Woolma show up with some great news: they're having a rowboat race in the park tomorrow, and Montgomery signed up!

It really annoys me that they gave the moose a dog/bear nose. What, a moose can't
be cute if it just has its usual big nose? I believe Disney proved that is false.

Bingo is so sure that Montgomery will win, he tells him that he's gonna get a big surprise ready for after the race. Dotty claims that Montgomery won't win unless he trains, and then Bingo is subjected to WHACKY SHENANIGANS!

"Bingo, what are you doing?"
"Oh, y'know, just hanging around?"
"Boooooooo!"

"How's about you help by not helping, okay, Bungo?" Zipper snaps. Jeez, what is this cat's problem? He's done nothing but chew out Bingo for the smallest of things since the episode started. I know cats in cartoons more often than not have a bad attitude, but Zipper's really starting to annoy me.

We then cut to the show's antagonists, Leland Lizard (Nicky Katt) and Catchum Crocodile (Timothy Gibbs). Catchum is your typical 1980s cartoon bully, the kind who probably would've been the one selling drugs if this show had a "drugs are bad for you" episode. Leland is his wimpy, milquetoast sidekick. You'll notice that they, the bad guys, are reptiles whereas the Get Along Gang, the good guys, consist entirely of mammals. This is because, at this point in the animation industry, reptiles weren't considered cute like mammals are. Unless they were turtles, that is.

I know it's kind of silly to bring realism into a show with talking animals, but why is the
lizard almost as big as the crocodile?

I figured the majority of the episode would be focused on Montgomery training for the race, but instead, we promptly cut to the next day, just as the race is about to begin. Catchum's in the race, too, and because he's a two-dimensional cartoon bully, he's decided that the only way he can win is by cheating - he hides in the water and takes a saw to Montgomery's oar. And believe it or not, he wins the race. I thought cheaters never prospered. Wacky Races lied to me!

And how come nobody noticed Catchum get out of his boat and jump into the water, or the saw sticking out of the water cutting away at Montgomery's oar?

Incidentally, I wrote this review on August 14th - which is World Lizard Day. I swear it's
just a coincidence that I chose to write a review of a cartoon with a lizard in it.

Later, the kids are sitting in their clubhouse moping when Catchum barges in and declares that he's taking over their clubhouse. How does winning a rowboat race give you the right to steal somebody's clubhouse? Well, Bingo made a bet with him that if Montgomery won the race, Catchum would give him ten gallons of "chocolate woodchip ice cream"... but if Montgomery DIDN'T win, Catchum would get their clubhouse.

I think this calls for that clip of multiple people slapping their foreheads in unison...

"Bingo had no right to bet the clubhouse without asking all of us first!" Dotty complains. Can't they just, I don't know, refuse to give Catchum their clubhouse? Somehow, I doubt Catchum would've actually given Bingo the ten gallons of ice cream if Montgomery had won. But according to Montgomery, Bingo's word is the club's word, and so long as there wasn't any cheating, it's a fair bet. "You heard him, Get Along Gang! So GET ALONG!" Catchum snaps.

After the Get Along Gang leaves, Catchum whips out a birthday cake and party hats. I didn't know it was his birthday. Or maybe it isn't and he doesn't know that you're only supposed to put candles on a cake when it's somebody's birthday. Oh, wait, it could be his UNbirthday. In that case, it's fine.

"A very merry unbirthday to me!"

Zipper finds Bingo moping at the dock and points out to him how stupid it was for him to bet the clubhouse. He also reveals that he found Montgomery's oar floating in the water, and Bingo notices that it's been sawed through. Clearly, this must mean that Catchum cheated. Uh, small problem, guys... while we, the audience, know that Catchum is a cheating cheater from Cheatanooga, you don't have any proof that he's the one who sawed through the oar yet. How do you know it wasn't, say, a mischevious trout?

Bingo runs back to the clubhouse and confronts Catchum, who promptly throws the cake at his head... way to waste food, Catchum. Bingo ducks, so the cake hits Leland instead, sending him flying over to the caboose's steering wheel. This somehow causes the caboose to start rolling downhill. Cartoon logic, just go with it...

Meanwhile, Zipper finds Montgomery, Portia, Woolma, and Dotty at the ice cream shop and tells them that Catchum tricked them. That means they have the clubhouse back! That is, if they can stop it from rolling down the track.

"I don't know how, but something tells me this is Bingo's fault..."

The caboose eventually flies off the track and onto a conveniently-placed raft, which travels down the river towards a waterfall - remember, rivers in animation ALWAYS lead to waterfalls. Montgomery manages to polevault aboard, and Catchum tells him that he can have the clubhouse back if he just saves them... then does a 180 and decides to jump off via pogostick. Long story short, the other members of the Get Along Gang manage to save Montgomery and Bingo with a rope.

Now, how will they get the caboose out of the water? Easy - the tracks aren't far, Montgomery points out, so they can just push it there. So, we're supposed to believe that these kids can lift a caboose off a raft and onto dry land, then push it all the way back to the train tracks? Unless all six of these kids are on steroids, I'm calling shenanigans. Especially since the segment ends before we can even see them attempt it.

"Montgomery's Mechanical Marvel" begins with the Bingo, Zipper, Dotty, Woolma, and Portia waiting to see Montgomery's creation for the science fair - apparently, he wins the science fair every year.

"In hindsight, maybe we shouldn't have mounted Montgomery's head to the outside of
the clubhouse."
"But he looks so good up there!"

So what does Montgomery's project turn out to be? A robot. Yes, he actually managed to build a robot. Usually, in cartoons, kids who enter science fairs make paper-mache volcanoes and small stuff like that. This young moose somehow managed to build a ROBOT. A robot who even seems to have artificial intelligence. Forget winning the science fair, Montgomery should be getting a Nobel Prize or something!

He also named the robot "Hermey", presumably after his favorite Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer character.

If he's named Hermey, shouldn't he have an "H" on his sweater instead of an "M"?

Everyone is very impressed by Montgomery's robot. Unbeknownst to them, who should be slithering over to take a peek at his project but Catchum and Leland. Yes, Catchum is entering the science fair too, and once again he's going to cheat. Clearly he learned nothing from the events of the previous segment.

Catchum and Leland spot the Get Along Gang playing baseball with Hermey, and upon discovering that Montgomery built, y'know, a ROBOT, Catchum gets an idea: he'll disguise Leland as a robot. Apparently he's hoping that the judges at the science fair either need glasses or are very, very stupid.

"Doro armigoto, Mr. Roboto!"

Meanwhile, the Get Along Gang take their mechanical marvel into town to get some ice cream, but upon seeing it, an old lady rabbit panics and calls up Officer Growler (Don Messick) about the strange "monster" walking around. He doesn't see Hermey, but he DOES see Leland in his robot costume and thinks that HE'S the monster he was called about. And then he... does nothing about it? Uh, okay then...

We then cut to the science fair. Portia talks to Woolma about all the funny inventions on display there, but we don't actually get to see any of them because I guess there just wasn't enough time in the episode for that. The judges announce that they've narrowed it down to Hermey and Catchum's "robot". Portia and Dotty recognize Leland in that metal getup because, unlike the judges, they're not idiots. But just to make sure he wins, Catchum sneaks backstage and starts sabotaging Hermey, pulling wires out of his back. It's futile, Dotty manages to make Leland sneeze, revealing to everyone that he is not, in fact, a robot. And here's something else that might surprise you: the White House is painted WHITE.

The judges apparently didn't see this, or Catchum and Leland promptly running off. Wow, these guys are even dumber than Bingo. Instead, they just say they'll see Hermey perform first. Since Catchum sabotaged Hermey, this results in WHACKY SHENANIGANS!

Insert reference to that scene from The Exorcist here.

"Hermey's circuits are overloading! There's no telling WHAT he might do!" Montgomery exclaims. Eventually, Hermey starts chasing after Catchum and Leland, cornering them in the ice cream shop, but the Get Along Gang manage to catch him in a snare trap. Portia presses the red button in Hermey's back, shutting the robot off. The day is saved, and Catchum and Leland are punished by being forced to clean up the town. Huzzah.

What's the Verdict?

Y'know, I've said this before, but the hardest reviews to write are the ones of things that are mediocre. It's difficult to make saying "this isn't the worst thing ever but it's not particularly good either" funny.

This is one of those examples. If I could sum up The Get Along Gang in one sentence, I would say this: it doesn't stand out at all. There's nothing here we haven't seen in other 1980s cartoons. Cute animals? Lotta other cartoons starring cute animals from the 1980s. A gang of kids learning life lessons? Potato Head Kids might not have been anything spectacular but it was at least slightly more interesting than this. The characters are dull, the animation is fine but nothing to write home about, and the jokes aren't funny at all. I wouldn't say this show is awful, but unless you're under the age of seven, I would not recommend watching it. There are better cartoons worth your time.

I will say this, though... I didn't notice any of the "complainer is always wrong" thing people say this show was obsessed with in this episode at all. The closest they came was Montgomery saying that the gang would fix whatever problem they had by "working together" or whatever in both segments. Granted, this was an early episode, so maybe it got more prominent as the show went on...