Animaniacs

I grew with the original Animaniacs. I must've been 7 years old when it came out and I was hooked on it!

No need to mention that I was looking forward to the reboot to relive those memories.

The new series does an alright job getting the 34-year-old kid inside me back in the series, but not "great."

There are good gags, the music is amazing, the HD quality is looking slick (although needs some getting used to, especially if you've just binge-watched the original series,) the intro-song gags are fun and pretty clever but maybe too overthought (e.g. "Animany, totally-insany, don't-need-to-mansplany, Animaniacs.)

However, the animation is not as extravagant and over-the-top funny as the original. It really feels like there is a brand new (too young) team of animators that are not that familiar with the original and rushed into making the new series.

I really miss some of the old characters and recurring sketches, like Slappy and Skippy Squirrel, Mime Time, Mindy and Button, Rita and Runt, the Goodfeathers, The Wheel of Morality, etc.

At the same time, it felt to me a bit desperate in certain episodes to dive into Asian types of animation, such as Japanese anime and K-pop. Really hard to understand, even if the series is trying to recruit new audiences.

The self-mocking jokes on their reboot were pretty funny in the beginning, but as they recur more often, they start to wear off quickly.

This said, I still had plenty of laughs and chuckles throughout the season and looking forward to the second season coming out.

I finally caught up on all 13 episodes of this reboot and it's.... alright. The show starts out kind of weak but it progressively gets better. Warners and PATB are just really fun characters to watch. It can also be pretty funny at times and the songs are pretty decent. I don't mind the political stuff, I think people are just overreacting especially when the original had political jokes in it and made fun of famous figures. Animation is also really good. Overall I recommend it.

I would say the first season of the reboot was... pretty good. Not perfect, definitely stuff I think they could improve upon, but there's plenty enough to enjoy for fans old and new alike.

The show's strengths definitely lie with the hillarious animation, the top notch voice acting (Paulsen, Harnell and MacNeille still got it), the orchestral music and for sure, the writing is often more hit than miss. I could understand why some critics might believe the same charm isn't there -- mainly due to the original creators not being invited back -- but no doubt there is still a lot of effort being put into this by people who respect the source material. Nothing about it feels lazy.

That being said, there are a few segments that could have been condensed down and this is especially where the lack of most of the original series' cast (the irreplacable Slappy Squirrel, the Goodfeathers, etc) is sorely felt -- whether this was a creative choice or the studio, one can't be sure. The first season's desire to be timely also runs the serious risk of some episodes and jokes being dated. It's widely agreed Animaniacs is at its best when it's being timeless and when they are here, it's a barrel of laughs. I just hope the writers tilt the scale more towards timeless going forward, and with any luck, maybe we'll see some of the old cast again. I mean, who doesn't miss 'Good Idea, Bad Idea'?

I'm looking forward to Season 2 next year. There is definitely something of worth here and I'm interested in seeing what they do going forward.

Recently, director Christopher Columbus complained about Disney's plans to remake HOME ALONE. He pointed out that when something has staying power, you cannot recapture that lightning in a bottle, no matter how much money you throw at it. That's kind of the way I feel about this reboot. While it often imitates the style of the original cult series, everything feels so much safer-- and dare I say it, a little more mean-spirited.

Good things first: the Pinky and the Brain segments are amazing. They understand these characters and what made the original shorts so funny without saturating themselves in nostalgia. Also the animation is pretty good on the whole as is the orchestrated music in the style of the old Looney Tunes cartoons.

Unfortunately, the rest of the show doesn't live up to the old one. Firstly, there's something off about this presentation of the Warner siblings. They seem to be going for a more "the 21st century is so insane that the Warners are the sane ones now" approach, which doesn't really work. These characters as originally presented were essentially the Marx Brothers filtered through classic cartoon logic: they spread anarchic madness wherever they went, to both the innocent and the not-so-innocent. The Variety review of the reboot is on point when it says that the Warners were agents of madness driving an uptight world insane, not "snarky pundits commenting on its flaws." To be fair, the Warners shorts do have good jokes and flashes of the old style-- it's not a total failure, but the smug attitude gets old fast, especially when they make the same jokes about being sellouts to Hulu.

But the bigger problem is the lack of other characters beyond the Warners and the mice. I once read that ANIMANIACS was in a way THE MUPPET SHOW of its generation: a variety show that appealed to adults and kids with its vaudevillian sense of humor and willingness to take creative risks. The original series featured several reoccurring characters, ranging from the cartoony to the more dramatic. Not all of them stuck or worked, but the variety made the show interesting to watch. There was a willingness to play around that the reboot lacks-- making all the show's self-aware jokes about the creative bankruptcy of reboots hit a little more sourly.

I seem to be in the minority, but that's fine. There is a lot to enjoy, but it doesn't work for me. Personally, I think the most successful modern reboot is still DUCKTALES 2017, which remembers what made the original series good while updating it in ways that add to its charms.

When you don't include the original creators in a reboot, you're bound to trip. While the animation is good and very entertaining, the writing is its biggest weakness. The show drags out the "hey, we're a reboot!" gag throughout the entire season. It's fine for the first two episodes, but beyond that is stale. I was also disappointed by the lack of time travel. Rather than visiting different events and cultures in history, we're stuck in current year. Lastly, there's way more partisan political jokes. The original made fun of everyone and was only a small portion of the humor. Bill Clinton only showed up a couple times in the original, while Trump shows up at least three times in the first season alone. The Animaniacs are basically anarchists, but the episode "Bun Control" was a very blunt message telling the audience what to believe. That's a good way to alienate half your audience.

In conclusion, for a reboot it's all right. Warner Bros. leaving out Tom Reugger was a mistake. Tom's on the record saying his agent contacted them when he heard about the reboot and Warner said they didn't want him. Big mistake.