Let's Watch This: An Episode of "Dr. Dimensionpants"

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'm back! Apologies for being on hiatus for so long. It's just gotten extremely difficult to write funny blog posts and get them done once a week. I used to be able to write them in advance and then just choose which one I want to post which week, but by the beginning of this year I've been pretty behind. Fortunately, I now have at least eight posts written up and "in the vault". I'm hoping that's enough to get this blog going again.

So, what is Dr. Dimensionpants?

I'd never heard of this show until someone suggested I do a review of it. I don't think it ever aired on TV in the United States, although it did wind up on Hulu here. It's a Canadian cartoon, made by DHX Media for Teletoon, where it premiered on November 6th, 2014. And the show's creator, Brad Peyton, is also the guy who directed Cats and Dogs 2 and Journey 2: The Mysterious Island... two movies that I've never seen.

The theme song gives us the show's premise: in an average town lives an average boy named Kyle Lipton (voiced by Sam Vincent) with average pants and an average life. Then one day a unicorn named Philip (voiced by Richard Ian Cox) shows up and gives him a pair of magic pants that turn him into superhero Dr. Dimensionpants. Now he has all of the powers he ever wanted, including the power to travel to different dimensions. Two seasons consisting of twenty-six episodes, each one consisting of two segments, were produced (IMDB claims that the show is still going, but the most recent episode aired in 2015 so...).

Given my past experiences with Canadian cartoons, I wasn't quite sure what to expect with Dr. Dimensionpants. For every Grojband or Sitting Ducks, there is a Spliced or an Almost Naked Animals. And, alas, Dr. Dimensionpants falls into the latter category. Why do I say that? Well, let's look at the third episode of the show, which consists of the segments "Dr. Dimensionpants Camp" and "Cupcakes at Large". This is Dr. Dimensionpants.

"Dr. Dimensionpants Camp" starts off with Kyle and his dad, Dunley (Brian Drummond), riding through the woods in their Oscar Meyer Wienermobile.

Which is making me hungry for a hot dog... and I'm posting this review at 7:54 in the morning...

Kyle is very excited because he and his dad are going camping. And Philip is there, too! I guess this isn't like Ned's Newt where the kid's non-human best friend is kept a secret. Kyle's dad knows about the talking unicorn and is okay with it. Maybe he's a Brony?

Between this character and Dewitt, Richard Ian Cox seems to be typecast as the
non-human sidekick of red-headed boys a lot...

When they get to the campsite, Philip proceeds to make things difficult by finding a skunk and showing it to Kyle and Dunley, calling it a "whoopsie-dog". He doesn't know what a skunk is? Apparently, Philip is a few sodas short of a six-pack.

The Liptons aren't the only ones camping. Also around is the villainous Glass Skull (also Brian Drummond), called that because he (natch) has a skull made of glass. He is accompanied by his bratty daughter Rebecca (Shannon Chan-Kent), who did not inherit her father's lack of head skin, hair, and eyeballs. Yes, somebody married and had a kid with Glass Skull. Because who could possibly resist such a handsome face?

I like his hat.

Unaware of the presence of one of Dr. Dimensionpants' recurring foes, Philip continues to make things harder for Kyle and Glass Skull. It isn't until he causes a tree he just chainsawed down to fall on top of Glass Skull that he knows the guy is around. Okay, we're only three minutes in and already I'm starting to feel sorry for the villain. I should not be feeling sorry for the villain.

I'm just now noticing that Glass Skull has a laser beam on top of his tent.
I guess that's ONE way of dealing with mosquitoes...

"Enough! I'm going to do what I should have done before!" Glass Skull declares. Philip runs to Kyle, interrupting his dad's talking about marshmallows, and says that he must become Dr. Dimensionpants. Which Kyle promptly does.

He goes to stop Glass Skull... who it turns out is just making s'mores. I guess he DOESN'T plan on doing anything evil today. That explains why he didn't immediately blast Philip after the guy made a tree fall on top of him.

Kyle returns to his campsite, where his father tells him that Philip ate all the marshmallows. Now they'll have to forage for berries. Alright, y'know what, I've decided that I don't like Philip. Could he at least go five seconds without doing something stupid or obnoxious?

"Funny guy, sending me off to chase a totally harmless bad guy while YOU get to chill with my dad!" Kyle tells Philip. But then Philip says that he just saw Glass Skull poisoning the lake. He recreates the scene via a puppet show. I'll give him this, for somebody without fingers he's pretty good at puppetry...

"It's The Muppet Show, with our very special guest star, Dr. Dimensionpants! YAAAAAAAAAAAY!"

For obvious reasons, Kyle is skeptical, but Philip insists that he's right this time and that it's Kyle's duty as Dr. Dimensionpants to save the day and blah-blah-blah. So Kyle becomes Dr. Dimensionpants again and discovers that Glass Skull IS poisoning the lake with some sort of strange sprayer. He destroys the sprayer, only for Glass Skull to tell him that he was actually spraying organic lavender essence in the lake. Dang it, Philip.

"Philip, you are totally ruining my camping trip!" Dr. Dimensionpants complains. Then he and Glass Skull start fighting each other for some reason. Why are they not beating the crap out of Philip? HE'S the one ruining their camping trips. Dr. Dimensionpants just said that! While this is going on, Rebecca is floating in the lake in a raft, but the fight sends her raft drifting towards a waterfall. Y'know how all rivers in animation lead to waterfalls? Apparently, that goes for lakes now too.

So now Dr. Dimensionpants and Glass Skull fight over who gets to save Rebecca. Dunley shows up to ask them if they've seen his son. He knows about the talking unicorn, but he doesn't know about his son being a superhero? Go figure. Anyhow, now HE'S heading for the waterfall as well. And Dr. Dimensionpants and Glass Skull are too busy battling to do something about it. And Philip doesn't attempt to save Dunley or Rebecca himself because I have no idea.

Okay, I'll say this: I do like how Rebecca is just nonchalantly reading a book while she's
in danger. That's kind of funny.

While they fight, Dr. Dimensionpants and Glass Skull summon portals to other dimensions, reminding us of why the show is called Dr. DIMENSIONpants. Dr. Dimensionpants summons an opera-singing alien that shatters Glass Skull's head, then Glass Skull summons a giant mouth from the Garlic Breath Dimension to incapacitate Dr. Dimensionpants. And eventually, Dunley manages to save himself and Rebecca... while putting Philip in pain at the same time, which he totally deserves.

Glass Skull and Rebecca head off to the outlet mall, and then ANOTHER recurring villain of the show appears in a canoe. Philip does something smart for once and decides to pretend he didn't see him so Kyle and his dad can spend some quality time. Okay, I hate Philip slightly less now. Next segment!

"Cupcakes at Large" begins with Kyle's sister Amanda (Kazumi Evans) flying a toy airplane... which seemingly kills a seagull, that's pretty gruesome.

Well, maybe it just shreds off the seagull's tailfeathers. It's not clear what the implication
is. Either way, poor seagull...

Even though, according to Dunley, it's a perfect day out, Kyle and Philip are inside watching TV. After flipping through the channels for a while, Philip decides on a show called Dingo the Bounty Hunter, but then their attention is grabbed by a tasty smell from the kitchen.

Kyle's mom, Ann-Mary (Kathleen Barr), has made cupcakes! But she won't let Kyle have any before dinner because it'll spoil his appetite. We get a montage of him attempting to get his mother out of the house so he can sneak a cupcake, but none of his attempts work. But then Ann-Mary remembers that she needs to go to the store and get the stuff to make dinner. As soon as she leaves, it's cupcake-eating time for Kyle.

I suppose, since Philip is a unicorn, I should make a reference to that one My Little Pony fanfiction...
but I won't. Seems too obvious.

After eating all the cupcakes, Kyle realizes that when his mom returns, she's going to be really mad. She has a habit of overreacting, you see. He and Philip must get MORE cupcakes, and instead of, I don't know, going out and buying some (you can get 'em for cheap at Target), Kyle becomes Dr. Dimensionpants and they go to a dimension full of giant cupcakes.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand now I'm hungry for cupcakes. It's 8:04 now.

I guess Kyle is hoping that his mom won't notice that the cupcakes are now much, much larger when she returns from the store. They also only bring back two, so either way I think she's gonna realize that you ate some.

Anyone else notice that all four members of the family have different hair colors? Kyle is
a redhead, the mom is a brunette, the dad has black hair, and Amanda is blonde.

And this is where the episode takes a turn for the bizarre. Not that a talking unicorn and a dimension with giant cupcakes isn't already pretty bizarre, but things get stranger from there. The cupcakes turn out to be ALIVE, and they promptly EAT Ann-Mary and Dunley. Philip runs in and explains that he's discovered the dimension they went to is a prison for the criminally tasty. The cupcakes trap Kyle, Amanda, and Philip in a giant pile of icing and declare that they're going to use their house as a secret hideout. You just HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD to eat the cupcakes your mom made, didn't you, Kyle? You couldn't have just waited until after dinner?

...is anyone else wondering exactly what crimes these giant sentient cupcakes have commited? Do they regularly go around eating people? Do they even have digestive tracts? One of the cupcakes threatens to digest their father, so I guess they do, but that just raises further questions...

Suddenly, I'm not hungry for cupcakes anymore.

And apparently Kyle, Amanda, and Philip are powerless against the evil cupcakes, because the next day Kyle is walked to school by them and nobody questions the fact that his parents have been replaced by giant sentient cupcakes. Here's an idea, Kyle: just EAT THEM. Take a bite out of them until you find your parents in their stomachs. Actually, now that I think about it, why don't the cupcakes just eat Kyle and Amanda too?

Adding to the confusion, the cupcakes give out normal, non-sentient cupcakes to Kyle's school chums and teacher. So these cupcakes are encouraging the consumption of their species? They must be really good cupcakes, too, because all they have to do is give one to the mayor and he gives them THE KEY TO THE CITY. Okay, is EVERYONE in this city incredibly stupid?

Eventually, Kyle and Amanda get an idea. Kyle dresses up like Dingo the Bounty Hunter and chases the cupcakes out of the house, where they are dive-bombed by Philip riding on the toy airplane, which Amanda is controlling. Eventually, the cupcakes vomit up Ann-Mary and Dunley, and now that they're safe Kyle becomes Dr. Dimensionpants and sends them back to their dimension.

Or you could just eat them. But this works, too.

"I'd say those cupcakes got their... ahem... JUST DESSERTS," Dr. Dimensionpants quips. You'd think that Ann-Mary and Dunley would be traumatized by the whole experience, but instead they assume it was all just a dream. So for breakfast, they serve their kids... broccoli. And Kyle faces no repercussions for eating the cupcakes after his mom told him not to, unless having to eat broccoli counts as a repercussion. The end.

Is the indication here that they regularly serve their kids cupcakes for breakfast?

What's the Verdict?

Just because something is weird doesn't mean it's GOOD. I've noticed that's something you can say about a lot of Canadian cartoons. Stuff like Yakkity Yak, Ned's Newt, and Spliced are certainly UNIQUE in how strange they are, but being bizarre does not a fun cartoon make.

Dr. Dimensionpants is another cartoon that assumes all it needs to do is be weird and it'll entertain the viewers. It does not. The characters are uninteresting, the jokes fall flat, the animation is THIS CLOSE to looking like something made by GoAnimate, and they don't even take advantage of the show's premise. You've got a superhero who can travel through different dimensions in the blink of an eye. Great! There's potential there. And what do they do with it? Nothing, outside of the occasional unfunny gag. Heck, even the presence of GIANT EVIL CUPCAKES isn't used very well.

So, no. I don't recommend watching Dr. Dimensionpants. The good news is, there's another cartoon show from the 2010s that focuses on a kid traveling to different dimensions and fighting evil. And it's much better than this.

But we'll look at that one another time.

Let's Watch This: An Episode of "Chop Socky Chooks"

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.

This has been on my "to review" list for a while. It's another show that I never watched, but did see ads for. I'm not sure how I decided what shows to watch and what shows to avoid... well, some of them I obviously just thought looked stupid. This is probably one of them.

Chop Socky Chooks was created by Sergio Delfino, Aardman Animations and Decode Entertainment (who also gave us The Save-Ums!). The show is about three martial artists named Chick P. (voiced by Shelly Longworth), K.O. Joe (voiced by Paterson Joseph), and Chuckie Chan (Rob Rackstraw, with Chris Hardwick apparently taking over at some point), who live and work in a city-sized shopping mall called Wasabi World, which is run by an evil piranha named Dr. Wasabi (Paul Kaye). In each episode the good guys use their kung fu skills to foil Dr. Wasabi's evil schemes. The show was inspired by shlocky low-budget Hong Kong martial arts movies made between the 1960s and the 1980s, which are usually described as being "chop socky". And for those of you who don't know what a "chook" is, it's apparently an Australian slang word for chicken. The three main characters are chickens.

Now, let me ask you a question: do these three look like chickens at all? The only thing that kind of implies "chicken" is Chuckie Chan's comb-esque hairdo. That's it. I always just assumed they were just weird cartoon humanoids, because the characters look nothing like any sort of animal species, let alone chickens. Even the Breadwinners guys look more like birds than our protagonists.

I don't know where they even got the idea for kung fu-fighting chickens, because that sounds like a really stupid premise for a cartoon show. It's a one joke premise, and you'd need really good writing to actually make it good. Then again, a lot of people probably had no idea that the characters were chickens so it probably doesn't matter how stupid the premise was.

Chop Socky Chooks premiered on Teletoon in Canada and Cartoon Network in the U.S. and the U.K. Apparently, the show received high ratings, but Cartoon Network gave it erratic airdates and limited reruns after Star Wars: The Clone Wars premiered and they shifted all of their focus onto it. Twenty-six episodes were produced before the show was canned.

This series seems to mainly have a negative reception online. Common Sense Media claimed it was too violent for kids. Most of the comments for this Cartoon Brew article about the show from 2008 don't think highly of the show - somebody called it "just another predictable and blandly-written animated television series that's about as interesting as watching paint dry." Are they correct? Let's find out, shall we? We're going to watch the nineteenth episode of the show, "Planet of the Bubba". This is Chop Socky Chooks.

The episode starts off with Dr. Wasabi watching the television channel "More On TV" ("more on" sounds like "moron", get it?). Problem is, his television is on the fritz because he's having a gorilla work on his satellite dish. Why is he having a gorilla work on his satellite dish? I'm glad you asked!

Say hello to Bubba (Rupert Degas), your typical cartoon villain's henchmen who's really big but dumb as a rock. He's in this show because, as everyone knows, primates are automatically funny. Oh, wait. No, they're not.

Usually, this character wears a suit. Y'know, a MONKEY suit. The pun is ruined
when you realize that he's actually an ape, but there are far dumber things about this show
to complain about...

Unfortunately for Bubba, there's a meteor heading right towards him. Presumably, this meteor was heading for Earth, as meteors in cartoons always do, but Bubba was blocking his path. So Bubba saved the Earth. Way to go, Bubba! Unfortunately, his way of saving the earth involves the meteor smashing into HIM and the satellite, causing it and Dr. Wasabi's TV to explode - and cable to go out all over Wasabi World.

This means that the three kung fu-fighting chickens can't watch a show they really like called See You Later, Alligator. Chick P wants to use this as an excuse to watch an educational special about Albert Einstein... even though, if the satellite has been destroyed, technically they shouldn't be able to watch TV at all. That's how TV works, right? I could be wrong...

This would be a good time to talk about our three main characters. Chuckie Chan is a gigantic Asian stereotype with squinty eyes, a Fu Manchu mustache, and a bad Chinese accent provided by a white guy. Chick P is your typical tough action girl who, judging from this scene, is much smarter than the other two, who looks like a geisha girl - reminder, geisha girls are Japanese, not Chinese, I guess their mindset was "well, it's still part of Asia, right?". And KO Joe is a sassy black-coded guy who wears a disco suit, has an afro, and fights with an afro pick. Are you offended yet?

Her head looks like a balloon.

Suddenly, the city is shaken by the impact of the meteor smashing into the earth's surface... I guess Bubba blocking its path wasn't enough to keep it from reaching Earth after all. Time for the Chop Socky Chooks to investigate!

Does anyone else smell roast chicken?

Already at the site of the meteor's landing are Dr. Wasabi's ninja chimps, because if there's one thing that's funnier than CHICKENS doing kung fu, it's PRIMATES doing kung fu (and yes, I'm aware that monkey style kung fu exists, but I sincerely doubt that was the mindset behind putting the ninja chimps in the show). They watch as Bubba emerges from the crater with... eeeeeeeeeew, his brain has swelled to an enormous size and is sticking out of his head. Couldn't he borrow a helmet from Mojo Jojo or something?

Maybe put a shirt on, too? His nipples are grossing me out...

"Truly, you are the ape of legend!" one of the ninja chimps says in a stereotypical Asian accent just as offensive as Chuckie Chan's. Is Bubba indeed "the one"? "That depends. Can there be one true one? One of such wonderful oneness that one must act for the good of one and all?" Bubba asks. "One wonders... but I'll give it a go." The reason why he's so smart now is because there's a chip from the satellite lodged into his brain. I doubt putting a satellite chip in your brain would really make you smarter, but it's a cartoon, just go with it.

Just a dumb little observation: if he's a gorilla, why does he have white fur? Perhaps
he's related to Snowflake, the only known albino gorilla in the world, who lived at the Barcelona
Zoo in Spain.

The Chop Socky Chooks are spying on Bubba from nearby. After Chick P describes him as having an "unidentified flabby object" on his head, they confront him for making a "big smoky hole in [their] mall", and then Chuckie Chan quotes an old Asian proverb as all Asian stereotypes in cartoons are known to do. And KO Joe doesn't understand the proverb I guess because he's not Asian. Was that supposed to be an "Asian person talks funny" joke? If so, I'm offended.

But enough about proverbs, we're due for an action sequence! Will the ninja chimps to make KFC out of the Chop Socky Chooks, or will our three stereotypes kick the behinds of the Skunk Fu! rejects?

They look more like sock monkeys than chimpanzees, don't they? I'll admit, the idea of
sock monkeys doing kung fu is a lot more amusing than regular primates doing kung fu...

The chimps manage to defeat the KO Joe, Chick Pea, and Chuckie Chan using baby oil, a mousetrap, and an unpopped bag of popcorn and throw them in jail, with shock collars around their necks for good measure. Dr. Wasabi - who, by the way, looks more like a giant pickle than a piranha - is very impressed.

Here's a joke for you: when you're in the Amazon Rainforest and a jaguar is chasing you,
it's important to remember that jumping into a piranha-infested river won't help at all.
Why? Because jaguars are excellent swimmers.

Bubba, now a rare combination of brains and brawn, demonstrates that he's not going to take orders from Dr. Wasabi anymore by basically making him into his pet. We get a pee joke... classy, fellas... and then Bubba throws him into the jail cell with the Chop Socky Chooks. Next, Bubba gathers the ninja chimps together to tell them that they're gonna rise up against the non-simian citizens of their planet (and yes, there is indeed a Planet of the Apes reference). "We'll start out small, then spread worldwide," he claims. "Monkey SEE, monkey DOMINATE!"

Oddly enough, this is pretty much the exact same plot as that 1996 Jetsons movie script I looked
at a week ago... except instead of machines rising up against humanity, it's apes.

Quick question: is EVERYBODY in this world an anthropomorphic animal? It's really hard to tell what species ANYONE aside from Bubba and the ninja chimps are... also, I was not expecting Dr. Zoidberg to make a cameo.

Need a Futurama character to make an appearance in a crappy 2000s cartoon?
Why not Zoidberg?

The ninja chimps run around the mall trapping people in nets. Meanwhile, the Chop Socky Chooks and Dr. Wasabi are trying to escape from their cell, but the sentient AI software that's holding them captive is making that very difficult... until Chuckie Chan's confusing proverbs make it go all "DOES NOT COMPUTE! ASIAN STEREOTYPE SAYS THINGS THAT MAKE NO SENSE!".

Did they have to give the brown-skinned character light-colored lips? He's offensive
enough already...

Chuckie Chan manages to take out the AI software with confusing proverbs, but as they're escaping the ninja chimps show up and trap them with nets. These guys suck at being kung fu masters, I've noticed.

Wah wah wah wah waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah...

So what has Bubba done with all the non-simians at the Wasabi World mall? He's put them in a zoo! And he's making the Chop Socky Chooks his star attractions... oh, wait, never mind. They escaped off-camera. Though I'm not sure how he expects to make a profit seeing as he and the ninja chimps seem to be the only non-primates around.

Blah blah blah, more fighting and then they manage to take Bubba down. With the big ape unconscious, they head to Dr. Wasabi's headquarters to free all the people. And then there's a fart joke because this show apparently hates me. But who's waiting for them in the headquarters when they arrive? Bubba, who knocks them out with tranquilizer darts! The Bubba they took down was a robotic duplicate out of nowhere!

Bubba plans on stuffing the Chop Socky Chooks and mounting their heads over his fireplace. Wouldn't it make more sense to cook and eat them, what with them being chickens and all? Then again, gorillas are herbivores...

Bubba's brain is still grossing me out.

Bubba also created a satellite that allows him to shoot lasers at whoever annoys him. Fortunately, Chick P gets an idea after Bubba mentions something that reminds her of the Albert Einstein show she watched earlier - that thing lodged in Bubba's brain must be a "TV receiver chip", ergo it must be tuned directly to the TV channel that shows educational stuff and making him smart. All they have to do is pick up the remote control and change the channel, which I'm sure everyone watching this episode when it first aired on TV did by now as well. Only problem is, Bubba and the ninja chimps won't let them do that without a fight.

At one point, this happens.

Long story short, Chick P gets her hands... er, wings... on the remote and changes the channel to "More on TV", which shrinks Bubba's brain back to its original size with its incredibly stupid programming, releasing the TV receiver chip - which Chick P promptly smashes. The citizens of Wasabi World are freed. Dr. Wasabi is repeatedly zapped with the laser. The end.

What's the Verdict?

It's bad. It's not worth your time. The characters are all one-dimensional, with a good chunk of them also being racist stereotypes. The jokes aren't funny. The animation is mediocre at best. None of the quirky British humor and charm that we find in Aardman's other work is present at all - in fact, nothing about this feels like an Aardman production. Maybe this "chickens doing kung fu" premise would've worked fine for a Chicken Run sequel or maybe a Foghorn Leghorn short, but... actually, what was the point of even making them chickens if the fact that they're chickens has no bearing on anything in the show?

My advice for you would be NOT to watch the show, even if you can find most if not all of the episodes on YouTube. It's not the worst cartoon I've ever seen, but it's still pretty cock-a-doodle-dumb.

By the way: yes, I know this is my fourth review in a row about a cartoon starring farm animals. Hey, at least this one takes place in a mall as opposed to a city. Oh, wait, the episode of Pig City that I reviewed mainly took place in a mall, too... I promise my next review will be about something else.

Let's Watch This: An Episode of "Pig City"

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.

Why have most of the cartoons I've reviewed in January been about farm animals? Ponies, sheep, and now pigs. And on top of that, they all take place in the city. Very peculiar...

Pig City was created by Andy Knight, also the creator of a show I've previously reviewed twice on my blog, Ned's Newt. It was co-produced by CineGroupe, AnimaKids, and Red Rover Studios and aired on Teletoon in Canada, ProSieben in Germany, and Fox Kids internationally - believe it or not, however, it never aired in the United States. Apparently, it was originally going to be called The Three Pigs. Maybe they thought that title was too on-the-nose.

The show is about a pig from the country named Mikey Hoggins (voiced by Thor Bishopric), whose parents send him to live with his cousins Martha (voiced by Emma Campbell) and Reggie DeBoar (voiced by Philip LeMaistre). After its premiere in April 2002, thirty-nine episodes were produced, making for a total of three seasons. Pig City's only home video release says that it's "more than 60 minutes of pure pleasure in the company of the most sophisticated and funniest pigs in the world", "a series that manages to be witty, worldly and warm at the same time", and "hilarious, original, and sophisticated".

Is it indeed all of those things? Well, you can find episodes of the show on the Internet Archive, so why don't we find out? We'll be watching the ninth episode, "Raising a Stink". This is Pig City!

The episode starts off with Martha having just returned from the mall. Mikey shows up with a phone in his trotter, telling her that the credit card company wants to speak with her. Martha initially assumes that they want to congratulate her for all the shopping that she's done, because credit card companies do that a lot. She is wrong - they tell her that she's overcharged her card. Teenage girls in cartoons... always going hog-wild at the mall. Get it? HOG-wild? This is the first of what will likely be MANY pig puns in this review...

With those long ears, Mikey and Martha kind of look more like aardvarks than pigs.

Martha calls up her parents to see if they can clear things up. Wouldn't you know it, they can't - in fact, they're a little concerned about her "money sense". Two pigs in business suits have checked their records, and a chart shows that Martha goes through more money than Mikey and Reggie combined.

Say, do you think these pigs keep their money in human banks? Y'know, 'cause we keep our money in PIGGY banks? Please laugh. I'm trying so hard...

Notice that the girl pig appears to have lips, unlike every other pig we've seen so far.
It doesn't look like she's wearing lipstick, though... you know what they say about putting
lipstick on a pig.

Mikey brings up that he was raised out in the country, where people... or pigs, it would seem... know the value of money, because they WORK FOR IT. Martha is all "WORK?! Oh, horror of horrors!", but her parents seem to be on board with the idea of Martha learning the value of money by going to work. "I think it's time you got a job," her father says, much to her dismay.

I guess you could say that Martha will be bringing home the bacon. Ba-dum-ksssh. Actually, that would be cannibalism, wouldn't it?

"Footballs are made of WHAT now?!"

After Mikey and Reggie crack jokes about how Martha will probably wind up cooking fries at a fast food joint, Martha reveals that she's already gotten a job at Pi-Gee, the most pretentious perfume store in the mall. She's going to be their Point of Purchase Marketing Coordinator of In-Store Merchandise. Once she leaves, Reggie suggests that Martha is a lying liar from Liarsburg. "Only one way to find out," Mikey says, narrowing his eyes.

I still think Mikey looks more like an aardvark.

Actually, Martha is telling the truth - her job is to set up the merchandise on the shelves, and she alphabetized the displays by country of origin and placed them according to their land mass from least to most. She's also allowed to mock the customers.

I wonder what kind of scents they have there... "Eau De Mud Puddle", perhaps?

After her boss, the ever-so-creatively-named Mr. Swine, heads out to have lunch, Mikey and Reggie show up and through their stupidity wind up destroying a display. They help her fix it, but when Mr. Swine returns, he's horrified to see that a red bottle is in the blue bottle area. You have to keep them separated or else I imagine THIS happens...

I know he was referring to PERFUME bottles, but this is what I imagined...

"This is what I get for leaving an amateur in charge!" Mr. Swine declares. "You're FIRED! AWAY with you! LEAVE this place! Martha, DESTROYER of Perfume!" As she glumly leaves, Mikey tells Reggie that they have to get Martha her job back. Reggie's idea for how to do that: go to a music store and buy a Pig Floyd album. Metal has all the answers, you see.

"Pig Floyd"? They couldn't think of anything funnier than THAT? I mean, it's
at least slightly funnier than the pig puns I'VE been making in this review, but still...

"If we could find something that a perfume store would want," Mikey suggests, "We could deal for Martha's job." What they need is a Nose. Not the kind on one's face, which they already have two of, but a guy who makes perfume. And they know a pig named E. Brian (Michael Yarmush) who has a big nose...

...his nose doesn't look any bigger than Mikey or Reggie's does to me, but okay, let's see where they're going with this. E. Brian whips up a perfume recipe that is so potent it turns whoever wears it into a girl magnet. Mikey and Reggie then find Martha in the food court and drag her back to Pi-Gee's, where they give Mr. Swine the powerful piggy perfume. When Reggie tries some, they discover that it smells like taco chips, sour cream, and a football locker room. Apparently those are scents that drive girl pigs crazy - or boy pigs, it would seem, as there are several in the doorway sniffing the air.

"I WANT it! Who is the Nose! I must speak to the Nose!" Mr. Swine pleads. Mikey claims that HE is the Nose, and that they'll give him the perfume if he gives Martha her job back. Mr. Swine agrees... just before Reggie suddenly gains hives. Fortunately, all they have to do to get rid of the hives is douse Reggie with water. And his hair looks healthier and shinier than before, too. Very strange...

After that, Mikey and Reggie walk by the movie theater, where The Hogfather is playing. That's actually a pretty good pun... which is promptly followed by "Joe Piggy" and "Robert De Porco". Oy. Ignoring how bad those puns are, Joe Pesci and Robert De Niro weren't even in The Godfather (they WERE in The Godfather Part II, though). What, could they just not think of good pig puns for the names of people who actually WERE in the first Godfather? Al Porcino and... actually, I can't think of anything other than that either.

"Y'know, the third one of these films sucked."

Mikey gets another idea - Joe Piggy and Robert De Porco are scheduled to sign autographs at the mall. If only they could get them to go to Pi-Gee and ask Mr. Swine to give Martha her job back, but chances are they'll be too busy to do Mikey and Reggie that favor. So what do they do?

Okay, I get that they're supposed to be disguised as Joe Piggy and Robert De Porco, but they don't look like Joe Pesci and Robert De Niro at all. But it's enough to fool Mr. Swine, particularly when Mikey says, "Are you servin' ME? Are you... SERVIN' me? I don't see anyone else around, so you must be servin' ME." That's not even from The Godfather, it's from Taxi Driver, but whatever, if you parody Robert DeNiro in anything you HAVE to do the "you talkin' to me" shtick. Because that's what we all think of when we think of Robert De Niro. Kind of like how all Al Pacino parodies have to go "Say hello to my little [SOMETHING]!" at some point.

"I heard dat Martha DeBoar works here. And truth to dat rumor?!" Reggie barks. "Cause we'd sure like to buy some of dis expensive toilet water here!" When Mr. Swine says that Martha does NOT work there, Mikey demands, "Are you callin' my friend a liar? 'Cuz, he HEARD things... and I gotta be honest... I heard things." So the moral of today's story is: if a relative of yours gets fired, impersonate a celebrity and threaten their boss so they'll get their job back!

But guess who walks into the store? If you guessed "Robert De Porco and Joe Piggy", you're right! Mikey and Reggie's plan has been foiled. Oh, and Robert De Porco ALSO does the "Are you servin' ME?" thing.

"Listen to me very carefully. There are three ways of doing things around here: the right
way, the wrong way, and the way I do it."

(Also, the guy who did his voice sounds nothing like Robert De Niro)

When Mikey and Reggie get home, Martha is waiting there to chew them out. Mikey assures her that they have another plan to get her job back. Martha says that they'd better or else she will remove their ability to eat solid foods. And until then, they are on her "list", and you do not want to be on her "list". "I'm on so many lists, you'd think I lived in a grocery store," Reggie pipes up.

Mikey's new plan: they took a bunch of comment cards from Pi-Gee and they're going to write nice things about Martha on them, so that when Mr. Swine reads them, he'll give Martha her job back. Oh, and ever since Reggie has been sprayed with the perfume, he's been acting strangely feminine. When Mikey calls up E. Brian to ask about it, he says that he must have put too much estrogen in the formula, so it's now a feminizing spray.

The next day, not only is Reggie upset that Mikey didn't notice his new Van Wailin' t-shirt, but as they're putting the comment cards in the box, Mikey gets perfume in his eye again and winds up making a mess. Mr. Swine shows up and catches them red-handed... er, red-trottered. He's all "I'm not hiring Martha back!", to which Mikey declares that it's time to "kick it up a notch". I was going to make a reference to Emeril Lagasse, but then the show did it for me - specifically, they have Reggie say, "Bam!".

So, what do you think the name of the Emeril parody in this show is? "HAMril Lagasse",
perhaps?

Mikey and Reggie start boycotting Pi-Gee's and singing a protest song. Soon all the pigs in the mall are hyped up and boycotting the store too. "Perfume sucks!" one member of the crowd shouts... not sure how they got away with that in a kids' show.

"I can't ignore an angry mob parked outside my store!" Mr. Swine laments. "This pig knows when his bacon is cooked." He agrees to give Martha her job back, to which Martha says that she doesn't want her job back. Apparently her father solved her problem with the credit card companies, making all of Mikey and Reggie's efforts a colossal waste of time. Also, E. Brian shows up and sprays Reggie with an antidote so he'll stop being so feminine. The end.

What's the Verdict?

Pig City is another cartoon I'm putting in the "okay" category. There's nothing remarkable about it, but it's not awful. Not much is done with the whole "they're pigs" part of the premise, most of the pig puns weren't funny, and the characters aren't interesting at all. Ned's Newt is probably worse, but at least its bizarreness and obnoxious talking newt gave me stuff to talk about. This is just... something that existed. Unless you really like pigs, I wouldn't recommend giving it a watch. Still, there are far worse cartoons out there.

Frankly, I'm shocked that I made it through the entire review without making any jokes about Miss Piggy or Porky Pig. I was fully expecting to make at least ONE. I didn't even make any references to the other cartoon show about pigs I reviewed, Piggsburg Pigs!. Weird, huh?