The Critic

Talk about the greatest cartoon for adults that ever existed.

And I honestly mean that. No other cartoon made for adults was funnier, cleverer or wittier than this one. Every episode is hilarious, every character is great... I can't think of anything I hate about this show.

Anyone else like or remember this show?

Oh hell yes, I loved this show. It's one of the funniest things I've ever seen. I really need to buy the DVD someday. It's too bad that it got canceled after 2 seasons, but on the plus side, at least it never went through Seasonal Rot.

One of my all-time favorite shows. Especially the Orson Welles bits.

"...Rosebud...Yes, Rosebud frozen peas! Filled with country goodness and green pea-ness—wait, that's terrible, I quit!"

Franklin Sherman was pure insanity and comedy gold. I've also always wanted have a kitchen counter like Eleanor's with jars for cookies, sugar, and bullets.

edited 18th Aug '14 2:24:29 PM by Rotpar

A cartoon about reviewing movies!? So intriguing!

It's more about the reviewer's life, but we do get to see him review movies,

Who can forget such classics as Rabbi PI, Honey I Ate the Kids and Apocalypse WOW!

Well, not really. Jay's job as a movie critic was, besides a way to insert still-all-too-timely jokes about the film industry, a way to make this show the "anti-sitcom", sticking out from it's TGIF bretheren by being about a snobby, upper-class single father living in upscale Manhattan, rather than a married blue-collar man in a suburb somewhere in the Midwest.

I always thought Honey I Laminated the Kids was an overlooked classic in it's time, personally.

Also, speaking personally, Duke Phillips was probably the awesomest Ted Turner parody ever put in a cartoon, despite that list being terribly small. The only thing I could contribute to possibly improve the character would have been to parody World Championship Wrestling, but since the show was canceled twice before the nWo could make that part of Turner's empire a household name, it wouldn't work. The Critic aired at a time that was not good to the wrestling business in America.

edited 18th Aug '14 5:31:14 PM by maxwellelvis

I've been hearing stuff about it…

Are there any episodes of it on You Tube?

There's tons of clips on You Tube.

My advice is to look up any clips of Franklin Sherman and prepare to laugh like a hyena.

Ok, I did what you suggested and I ended up finding full episodes on You Tube. So I watched the first 2 episodes.

…

No wonder everyone was saying good things about this show.

If I can spread the gospel of this show to as many people as possible, I have done my job.

Well as of today, I've offically seen all the episodes of The Critic.

(I suppose I'm not missing anything by skipping the webisodes?)

Man, why isn't anyone trying to get this show on Netflix or something?

I mean, yeah I have no clue how any of the cast are doing and I'm fully aware that one of them even passed on (God rest her soul), but hey, if Arrested Development can be resurrected, why can't this show?

Also, has anyone seen this before?

edited 3rd Jan '15 8:56:07 AM by TargetmasterJoe

Because apparently nobody gives a damn anymore about this show...

I'll be honest, I don't support the idea of a revival; they already tried it, it was polarizing, and after this long a new revival will just ultimately disappoint us.

That Twitter is hilarious.

Oh.

How about a revival through the comic book route? A la The X-Files Season 10?

Maybe it could work.

So anyone know a good episode to introduce the show to friends and family?

For sheer laugh-out-loud value, I'd say "All the Duke's Men."

If you want to give them a sense of what the show is about, show the pilot.

I've been a real fan of this underrated classic for a few years by now. There are SEVERAL amazing things about this gem. My personal favorite has to be Jay's "If the movie stinks, just don't go" speech from season one.

If I had anything at all negative to say about this show was A. The final episode which wasn't a good way to end this show at all. and B. Jay's season 2 characterization. I felt they made him a bit too likable, too cuddly, too nice. I preferred his earlier Jerk with a Heart of Gold characterization. It was an interesting look at his character. He constantly gets crapped on and yet his jerkish behavior is what causes the world to hate him. Or maybe I'm just looking at this all wrong.

My personal favorite episode would have to be Misery. "Buy My Book. Buy my book! BUY MY BOOK! BUY MY BOOK!

Agreed. I'm so sick of revivals anyways.

Plus, as of now, three of the voice actors of major characters have passed on. I don't support the idea of recasting them either.

Charles Napier WAS Duke Phillips. No one could ever live up to him.

It’s a reference that’s dated poorly, and it’s really a long way toward another cheap shot at Shatner, but the Rosey Perez Robot still makes me laugh very hard.

Actually, if there’s one fault this show has it’s the many topical references that have aged poorly. I imagine the many references to Faye Dunaway’s singing voice will have modern viewers hurting themselves in their confusion. Family Guy, of course, took that one tendency of this show and ran with it.

Which is not to say that this show doesn’t have gags of its own that are of great worth. I thank the poster who reminded me of “Buy my book! Buy my book!”

You're quite welcome Bananaquit!

As for this talk of a revival....I think the most we're gonna get is the brief web show they did in the early 200's and you can just guess how well that went. Though in all fairness the backlash was mostly against all the changes they made including the removal of almost every single character that wasn't Jay Sherman himself! Weirdly enough, they still had Maurice La Marche on board so I' confused why they felt they couldn't at least squeeze in a Jeremy Hawke cameo.

edited 13th Jan '15 7:21:25 PM by 1upmushroom

There were far too many topical jokes that actually still worked to me, who barely knew what they were.

I liked the Webisodes, especially #3 when Jay outs Pikachu, who later returns to hit on him.

edited 19th Jan '15 5:41:20 PM by AnotherGuy