CRITIQUE

There are two ways to look at The Animaniacs. If you like Looney Tunes, you’ll like this show, but if you don’t like Looney Tunes, then nine times out of ten this show will give you a major headache. As a kid in the early 90s I was glued to this show.  Much like Tiny Toons, I thought it was so freaking funny, and some of the regular gags were easy to recite to other kids at school. For example, Pinky and the Brain were quite notable for instance (so popular it generated its own spin-off series) for so many of their fantastic quotes.

Brain: Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?
Pinky: I think so, Brain, but if we didn't have ears we'd look like weasels.

Pinky: What are we going to do tonight, Brain?
Brain: The same thing we do every night, Pinky: try to take over the world!

And of course, Pinky’s famous line: ”narf”.

There were other notable subplot stories intertwining, but the main attraction was the Warner brothers (and sister). These were three different variations of Bugs Bunny, all running around creating havoc. Wakko, the leader of the threesome, had the best moments interacting with the other characters. Yakko had the best lines ever, just on the voice alone, which was a nice imitation of John Lennon. And the Sister Dot didn’t really add much, but that was the point of her character. Also intertwining with the show are characters from the Looney Tunes, Tiny Toons, and a few other special guests.

The voices are one of the main reasons that make the show work. Much of The Animaniacs is a musical so it’s important that the voices work well. In addition, some of the musical numbers are so gosh darn funny I couldn’t stop laughing. The three songs I remember the most are “Yakko’s World,” Yakko sings all the names of countries in the world, “The Great Wakkorotti,” Wakko does a belching opera number, and “Wakko’s America Song,” Wakko sings all the names of the 50 states in America and their capitals.

Unfortunately, some of the show’s stories are extremely dry. But then on the other hand, several stories are just freaking hilarious and smart. In addition, The Animaniacs does a great job at parody and satire by focusing on a single subject without going off on many tangents, such as The Simpsons, while parody in Family Guy and South Park often tend to go on forever.

With Steven Spielberg as producer, who is a big history buff, the show seems to be geared more toward children, so it’s more likely that the show will poke fun at history in a smart and comical matter. Who could have guessed that a cartoon would offer some education value? Speaking of history, the Warners interacting with historical greats, like Albert Einstein, Michelangelo (and there is a nice little TMNT parody included), and Alfred Hitchcock (as a Hitchcock fan, I found “The Boids” was the most genius parody of them all), is extremely funny to watch. These interactions raised continuity problems, sure, but this is obviously a cartoon. Laid out by Looney Tunes themselves, it’s easily assumed there are no rules in cartoon land. This was also established very heavy in “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?”

THE VIDEO

Animaniacs is presented in fullscreen format. There’s not much remastering work in effect here, but that’s fine since it brought me back to 1993 all over again.

THE AUDIO
 
Animaniacs offers language tracks in English Dolby Digital 5.1 and English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo. To much surprise, the sound quality is grand. Since the show is in part a musical, attention would be given to the sound, more so than the video, but that’s not quite so. You can certainly blast this show at full volume through surround sound speakers.

THE EXTRAS

Animaniacs Live!: Comic Maurice LaMarche hosts an in-studio-style interview via satellite big-screen TV with Animaniac friends. This is similar to Inside the Actor’s Studio as it provides lots of insight.

It’s a nice featurette, but the set is lacking in the extras department. I really wish a commentary track were included. In fact, for how much this show satirizes pop culture, it would have been nice to see a mock-umentary that tracks the Warners or the other Animaniacs characters. But that’s just a crazy thought!