Arthur - Where is the Show Going?

[Muppet Master]

Okay... I'd agree with any complaint brought against the show, but I still think the voice acting thing can't be helped. Arthur would sound like a full grown man, because most of his child actor voice actors are. Not that the original one doesn't still collect a paycheck from the show, he's Slink after all. Other than Sue Ellen, the voice actors who were adults originally still have their respective parts. Just... you have to replace kid voice actors when their voices go low. And frankly, they didn't replace them enough. It's a peril that comes with getting that level of realism in kid voices. Would we be better off if Arthur was voiced by a woman the whole time?

That said, while I do feel really really sorry for what happened to Postcards from Buster (especially the kids of the lesbian couple), I'm glad the show's gone. Frankly, it wasn't a good concept. Having an anthro character in an anthro world meet real human children via taping them? Conceptually, there was something wrong there. Other than that, it was dreadfully dull. The controversy about the lesbian parents and the Muslim kids (because religious right) was essentially the only remarkable thing that can be said about the show, and the only publicity it got.

Yes, Postcards From Busters was incredibily dull, but as for Arthur being voiced by a woman, we would not have to adjust to a new voice actor every couple of seasons.

 

[Drtooth]

Yeah, but he'd still sound like a woman trying to sound like a boy. No offense to Nancy Cartwright, Tara Strong, and the like, of course. It just doesn't seem like it would have worked. Something tells me that would have happened if they did one of those earlier attempts I mentioned that Marc himself passed on.

Arthur has had a brilliant compromise with kid voice actors for some characters and adult voice actors for others. It give a nice sound to the show, and Francine and Muffy's voice actresses managed to sound like children the entire run of the show. Of course, Muffy's voice actress has a very childish sounding voice, even when she isn't trying to sound like one (watch a World of Quest or Bolts and Blip, and you'll see what I mean). Yes, it's unfortunate there's inconsistency with Arthur, D.W., and Brain, but I'll take that over an entire cast of adults playing kids.

As for the show itself, I agree that they should be making their way to the exit regarding new episode production. I'll guess that they have a contract with 9 Story for like 5 or so seasons that will run out. But PBS shows come in 2 flavors. Short runners that get rerun several years after production stops, or long runners that keep getting new episodes (like Sesame Street)... and if something ever happened and the shows were out of production, they'd still be around in reruns. There have been shows that disappeared quite quickly, sure... like the unfortunate case with Liberty's Kids... even Boo Bah lasted longer and no one actually liked it.

 

[FunnieGuy]

For some reason,I really want to see Slink have his own episode...if nothing than for Michael Yarmush to come back again. Seriously,that guy has really flown off the radar lately.

 

[Drtooth]

Remember how I complained about how there's an episode where they're too short to ride the rollercoaster?

Look at this image of completely creative, not at all derivative, inspiration that's been released.

They freaking tied stuff to their feet to make them taller. Yeah, I've never seen that one done a million times already.

 

[Muppet Master]

Remember how I complained about how there's an episode where they're too short to ride the rollercoaster?

Look at this image of completely creative, not at all derivative, inspiration that's been released.

They freaking tied stuff to their feet to make them taller. Yeah, I've never seen that one done a million times already.

Wow, for the first time in a while, Arthur is not being cliche, I mean of the cliche kid show roller coaster synopsises I have seen, this has never been tackled, yet it would probably be a bad influence to kids which is probably the reason this is not a cliche story, even I never thought of the characters tying stuff to their shoes.

 

[Drtooth]

I finally got to see "Go Fly a Kite," by the way. It has it's moments, and a great line by Muffy about how a contract was the agreement they all made but written "in a way that no one understands it." But other than that, it was just essentially the sprinkler key episode which Binky apparently forgot!

Several previews of upcoming episodes were posted... nothing looks too interesting.

Yeah, Francine and Muffy have become dumber characters than Rocksteady and Bebop on a bad episode. All they do is get into passive aggressive matches of revenge now. You'd think they would have learned the last dozen times, but... like I said, they've become idiots because the writers love writing Muffy as a devious manipulator that isn't very good.

 

[D'Snowth]

Well Drtooth, so far your prediction has pretty much been confirmed - so far this season, the episodes have been kind of meh: really tired, really formulaic, nothing worth getting excited over.

Well, Ken Scarborough is writing again, his two episodes so far ("Surprise!" and "The Substitute Arthur") kind of have the same spirit as the old classic episodes of ARTHUR, but they both kind of fall flat... actually, both new episodes so far this season have fallen flat. "The Friend Who Wasn't There" does a pretty good job at sending the message across that kids today are so wrapped up in gadgets and other gizmos that it's pretty much zapping them of any kind of natural imagination (that, and it was also to see that Nadine apparently has a deep inner obsession with D.W., in spite of what a brat she is, dreading when the day will come when D.W. outgrows her).

Basically, it's like so far, the stories kind of build themselves up, and then they just end on a really flat note. "Surprise!" has been the worst offender of this so far: much of the episode is spent with Francine, Muffy, Buster, and Binky coming up with revenge plots for Francine to get back at Catherine for not inviting her to her Sweet 16 (which is a pizza party at a bowling alley for some reason), then it pretty much ends with Francine being all I had my plan all plotted out, but then I remembered how all the crap Catherine's put me through in the past made me feel bad and I didn't want her to feel the same way, so I decided not to get back at her after all. Really.

"The Case of the Girl with the Long Face" has a similar setup: much of the episode deals with Buster and George determined to figure out why Fern is so sad to the point that she's basically secluded herself from everybody, and then in the end, she finally confesses, "Oh, I just felt sad for no reason." Honestly. I can kind of forgive it on the grounds that as a kid's show, they're probably trying to tackle the issue of emotions in a way kids can understand... but it just really bugged me that after all the trouble Buster went through with his case (which itself was entertaining in that old black-and-white noir style) it turns out that Fern was sad for no reason at all.

Oh, and once again, Arthur and D.W. have new voices. Actually, for the first time since, like, Season 7 or 8, D.W. actually sounds more like herself again... Arthur on the other hand sounds like a girl now (I don't mean the reverse puberty voice he went through from 9 to 15, but I mean to say, he actually sounds like a girl). Bailey doesn't even sound like himself, even though Bruce Dinsmore is still doing his voice.

 

[Drtooth]

The Friend who wasn't there was surprisingly enjoyable. I liked the Wizard of Oz bit, especially D.W.'s "why couldn't I gone on a quest with dwarfs and elves?" line. But yeah, I really think they devolved the message into "kids should have absolutely nothing so they have imaginations, which are important at that specific period and no other time else." Especially when they had a much better "kids of a certain age are forced by their peers to grow up faster or risk considered immature" message they set up. Seems a bit of some lame "back in muh day" ranting than a true message.

The other episodes were...okay I guess, but had their moments. I really wish someone would take Francine and Muffy out of the Lady MacBeth/revenge thing they've been on. That episode was pretty good and all, but Francine and Muffy conspiring has gotten a little tiresome.

The animation somehow has gotten... less worse. At least Arthur and D.W.'s ears don't flap in the breeze anymore.

Anyway, the probably not too good episodes about D.W. and Bud are coming up today. I'll see how that works out.

 

[D'Snowth]

As far as the animation goes this season, I'll agree they've improved somewhat more again, but still leaves a lot to be desired. I've noticed the characters, like Muffy and Francine in particular, have a new 1/4 angle look to them at times, much like this:

I guess they want to give the characters more dimension and angles as opposed to almost always using front, side, and 3/4 angles.

Now Pretty Penny... the way she moved around was surprisingly smooth and fluid that it actually came off as rather eerie.

 

[Drtooth]

That's another thing I had a problem with, actually. Pretty Penny really could have been a menace in the episode, but just appears and disappears with only the explanation that it was just a manifest of the Master Computer heavy handed rant thing. There could have been a nice subtext about growing up and going through phases on the way. Seems like they didn't have time to really expand on it, and we just got "material possessions are evil because they kill imagination" spit back up.