The Fairly Odd Parents and co. created by Butch Hartman!

There's a sequels reboot coming to Paramount+.

We have a thread for that particular series, by the way.

So, someone posted an interesting thread on a theory for how the show went downhill.

Do you all think the change in story editors is what contributed to the show going downhill from Steve Marmel (in season 1-5 golden age) to Scott Fellows (in season 6, the best post 2006 season) to Ray DeLaurentis (in seasons 7-10, the dark age)?

Yes, and by proxy, the cancellation of Danny Phantom might've had something to do with it.

When the writing staff changes, it makes sense that the show would change alongside that, for good, ill, and everything in-between. And I believe most of the writing staff from the show's height had left by the time we get to the Ray DeLaurentis seasons, and were completely gone by Season 10.

Edited by RacattackForce on Jul 16th 2022 at 11:30:02 AM

Someone just did a retrospective on seasons 1-8 (the part with seasons 9-10 and the live action stuff will be next year). Check it out, this guy makes really good obervations.

I dont even want to know what's happening to cosmo in the second thumbnail

He brought up Wishology, and I remember someone posting the script for Wishology and finding out that the mindwipe wasn't in the script. If that's true, then I could see Wishology being intended for the finale before Season 7 was renewed.

I wanna say that’s Cosmo being pregnant with Poof.

Ya heard me.

why just why

Having not seen the episode, isn’t it like some odd fairy biology stuff?

It’s the Mister Seahorse trope.

Since Poof was wished into existing, I'd guess Cosmo messed up in there, really.

Interestingly, there are some observations in Nicktendo's videos of FOP

• Season 3 is the point when Cosmo started to become dumber with episodes like Wanda's Day Out, Abra'Catastrophe, and This Is Your Wish in particular highlighting the new dynamic shift away from Cosmo and Wanda being two halves of a whole idiot.
• Season 4 definitely puts a lot of emphasis on the superheroes that season with how much Crimson Chin and Catman are used.
• Signs of a decline were showing as early as season 5 with stuff like the increased jokes on Wanda being a nag (plus the marriage jokes with Cosmo and increase on the feminine stereotypes on her) and increased cynical humor
• Season 6 does show some borrowed gags from Johnny Test, owing to the season's story editor Scott Fellows (creator of Johnny Test) and also does have more emphasis on how sad an adult's life is rather than the cynicism and self awareness from Steve Marmel's seasons. There's also an increased focus on the Fairy World and related characters this season like Mama Cosma, Cupid, and Dr. Rip Studwell while the focus on school began decreasing around this time (though not full on Out of Focus to the extent of the next few seasons). An instrumental of My Shinny Teeth and Me does pop up in various party scenes throughout the show. The gag of Timmy making wacky faces when seeing something strange does start to pop up this season.
• Poof's a good idea thematically in giving more emphasis on Cosmo and Wanda having a loving marriage (after how season 5 handled them) and giving Timmy more responsibility, but bogged down by how often he tends to be just there in the background.
• Season 7 does come off as a bit of a soft reboot given how the show did begin to put even more emphasis on comedy driving the character's actions around this time, increase in the random humor, characters like Cosmo, Dad, Mr. Crocker, and Tootie getting simplified down to their basic traits, increase in the wackier facial expressions (with darker colors and thinner line art) with Dave Thomas being storyboard director in seasons 7-8, Timmy's parents and Mr. Crocker (with emphasis on him being a loser who lives with his mom) get a lot of focus at the expense of the likes of Chester, AJ, Sanjay, Elmer, Trixie, Tootie, and Francis who stop appearing and speaking in relevant roles after season 7, reused jokes and material become more common, and Cosmo, Wanda, and Poof start to appear in plain sight a bit more often likely caused by new story editor Ray Delaurentis.
• The possibility Sanjay may have been gay for Timmy, given how one of the show's writers is Kevin Sullivan who has experience in LGBT.
• Timmy's Secret Wish emphasizing Timmy's found family with Cosmo, Wanda, and Poof setting up Meet the Odd Parents which explores Timmy being close with both his families.
• Timmy TV does come off as funnier in hindsight especially when Simon started making changes considering how later seasons went.

Or depressing, depending on who you ask.

So, when did Vicky's flanderization from bully to psycho happen? I know many claim season 6 is when it happened, but there were signs as early as season 4 with Vicky Loses Her Icky and Channel Chasers showing her bringing and chasing Timmy with weapons like chainsaws and wanting to be a dictator of the world so it's not as if season 6 is where it began.

Offhand, the second Season's "Boys In the Band" is the first time I remember Vicky being depicted as outright violently evil towards someone who isn't a kid. Before that point, you could believably read her as just an asshole local bully who enjoys having power over people younger younger than her, but who still has limits and is occasionally even kind of hapless. Then that episode comes along and she goes straight into kidnapping, Yandere antics, she's able to set up a whole fake wedding, etc.

While not hugely different from the rest of her earlier appearances, it's an escalation to her craziness and the amount she's ahle to get away with that sparks her whole later shift.

It starts growing slowly from there, though I'd say Channel Chasers is the definitive point in which Vicky goes from "evil babysitter" to "future supervillain just waiting for an opportunity" after which the show never looks back on it.

So, anyone sorta do wonder and know which episode or season was when Cosmo actually started to become dumber with the dynamic shifting from Cosmo and Wanda being two halves of an idiot to Cosmo being the idiot and Wanda as the nagging sane one?

Personally, I'd likely say season 3 marked the shift for Cosmo with Wanda's Day Out in particular cementing Wanda as the sane one to Cosmo's idiocy.

Same here. I'd argue that season 3 was also the point where Cosmo's voice started to change for the worse, but it was still somewhat tolerable until seasons 9 and 10.

I wish they'd kept Cosmo's voice from the first two seasons for the entire series.

Edited by IvanovTroping97 on Sep 10th 2022 at 8:32:46 PM

Also, anyone find it weird how in the intro, they never did rerecord Cosmo's "Floaty crowny things" line even when his voice got more higher pitched in later seasons? This just makes the difference between his season 1 voice (shown in the intro) and later seasons high pitched voice more notable. Heck, when the intro got the HD remaster in season 9, it is weird hearing HD Cosmo still talking in his deeper voice.

His voice isn't that deep in the intro...

It's pretty much where he was around mid-season 3.

Edited by randomness4 on Sep 14th 2022 at 8:51:39 AM

Considering Emotion Comotion shows Chester is allergic to love, does this imply he might be ace/aro?

I doubt it,its more like a cooties thing

Anyone notice Timmy does fall under Hypocritical Humor in Boy Toy where he claims to Tootie that he doesn't want to date her because he's too young for girls, yet he has no problem pursuing Trixie before and after this episode.

It's one of those times where the audience would see the big shiny "LIAR LIAR" sign.

Edited by Blueace on Sep 25th 2022 at 8:09:47 AM

So, would one say season 6 has been Vindicated by History in recent years? Compared to before when people were claiming it to be the point the show went downhill and became bad, at least more people nowadays do tend to consider season 6 to be good or at least decent (having Scott Fellows as story editor instead of Ray DeLaurentis like the other post-2006 seasons likely helped) and preferring that to be the final season due to Wishology. Heck, people used to hate on Fairly Odd Baby (probably for introducing Poof or pregnant Cosmo) back then but now it's usually seen as good.

Edited by SpongeGuy11 on Sep 30th 2022 at 12:40:03 PM