The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle
Creator: (ie the guy to blame) David P. Smith
Produced by DreamWorks Studios
Available via Amazon Prime
I’m taking a one-time break from reviewing audio-books to hopefully save some of you from an animated travesty.
The Cartoons:
Then vs Now
There is so much wrong with this incarnation of a favorite family classic. Where do I start? I know! Hey remember that truly awful mixed live action/3D Animation production of “The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle” in 2000? It has a 43% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, 4.2/10 stars on IMDB and 36 on Metacritic. It was panned by most reviewers, and yet it is a shining beacon of cinematography and an homage to the old cartoon in a way that this latest attempt fails in every possible manner.
The movie attempted to recapture the humor and maintain the basic natures of the characters. This cartoon does none of that.
First of all, the characters bear only a passing resemblance to the originals. The artwork of the original series was nothing to write home about. Jay Ward’s cartoon relied on the mix of childish and sophisticated humor (mostly in puns that kids would find funny on face value and that adults would find amusing, assuming they caught the references), but let’s face it, the animation was rubbish. Still the animation of this new series makes me long for the da Vinci-like masterpiece Ward presented us. The characters in the 2000 movie looked more like the originals. For that matter, there are characters in Star Vs. The Forces of Evil and Happy Tree Friends that look more like Bullwinkle than what we have to endure here. Kindergarten-produced fan art looks more like the originals. If only the artists had ever seen what the characters were supposed to look like, but given how far of the mark they went, they must have been working from written descriptions
Also, Captain Peter “Wrongway” Peachfuzz has been transgendered into an African-American woman – Commander Peachfuzz. Actually, I could get behind that one, if only she weren’t such an insulting racial stereotype. The Peachfuzz of the new series is a far more intense character without a stated backstory so we only see her as the outrageous stereotype she is.
Appearances might be forgiven, however, if the characters acted like the originals… No, abandon all hope, they don’t. For example, in the original, Rocky is a brave and plucky character. He may be a bit naïve – Boris and Natasha could always fool him with a flimsy disguise, but, in all, he is a sensible and mature squirrel. Bullwinkle is dumb as a brick with a brain of pudding, but he generally means well. In this case the boys are both mindless idiots who bumble into one bad situation after another. Oh… and Rocky frequently floats, bouncing up and down lightly to remind us he is a flying squirrel, except that the original Rocky could not float. Also, he apparently only flies when convenient for the plot. In chase scenes (most of the time) he runs on the ground. In the first story, the appropriately named “Stink of Fear” he complains often about how tiring the running is to be repeatedly reminded, “You can fly, you know.” “Aw, nuts!” Aw nuts, indeed!
Think of this series as “Ren and Stimpy” meets “Spongebob Squarepants” meets the “Three Stooges“ without any of the “redeeming” satirical social commentary or “fine writing.”
I might have forgiven the attempt to update the cartoon with the addition of modern tech (smart phones, ghetto blasters (is that modern anymore?) etc.) and some modern slang (if by modern, we mean 10-15 years out of date, yo.) if they had only attempted to pull some of the good bits of the original cartoons, but no.
The characters are all over-the-top – Fearless Leader is more crazed than the cold evil character he was, Cloyd, the moonman, is a little alien kid (his father looks like Gidney) with amazing and convenient powers rather than a scrooch-gun, and… well, I’ve already described Rocky and Bullwinkle above. The same can be said for all the rest. Oh, btw, Boris and Natasha aren’t so much a team as two spies who hate each other who have been forced to work together. Worst of all, there is an appearance by Gordon Ramsey (Boris is in fan-heaven) who seems far nicer than he is in reality, so the one chance to go over the top fails.
The stories are simplistic, straightforward and missing all the obscure references that gave it something for adults watching with their kids something to enjoy. So, no Ruby Yacht of Omar Khayyam, Rue Britannia, Treasure of Monte Zoom, or The Miceman Cometh.
This is not a remake, it’s a reboot. The difference is that in a reboot, the people producing it totally ignore the original and start all over again. This allows them to ignore everything that came before, including character development, storylines and production values. My usual example is the J. J. Abrams attempt at Star Trek wherein it was decided to change the past and present an entirely new history and set of characters with all the same names. So, Abrams was able to suddenly make Kirk and McCoy the same age and place them on the Enterprise as raw cadets where previously younger characters like Sulu and Chekov had already been through the Academy and were serving as officers. I don’t recall the change being that big, but I guess Abrams just did not care. And don’t even get me started on promoting a cadet to full ship’s captain in one stroke…
Now I usually like to say something nice about something I pan, so here goes… If you have never seen Rocky and Bullwinkle before and you are, say 6-11 years old, you probably will like this. Other reviewers have given this new series higher praise than I have (well, they would almost have to, wouldn’t they?) but to me if you are going to resurrect an old classic it should not be as a zombie with all the good bits falling off. So, if you treasure your childhood cartoons like Rocky and Bullwinkle, maybe give this one a miss. Or, go watch this for yourself, but don’t say I didn’t warn you!
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