I've admired John K. ever since I first saw The Ren & Stimpy Show (well, as an artist anyway). And although he was fired after two seasons, it was clear to me the guy was clearly talented and had a huge passion for what he was doing. Down to the bizzarre characters, dark humor and gorgeous animation there was a lot about The Ren & Stimpy Show to love.
A year after the show ended, he came out with the web series The Goddamn George Liquor Program. Although it made use of crude Flash animation and by no means was as polished as his earlier stuff, the classic artstyle was still there, and George Liquor was as funny as ever.
Then in 2003 he made a move that would tank his career: Ren & Stimpy Adult Party Cartoon. The idea of the show itself was redundant: the original series as it aired on Nick was already more adult than most other kids shows at that time, but mostly what people loved about it was how it managed to be joyful and really clever amidst all the grossout humor. This kind of sublety got completely removed with Adult Party Cartoon. Entire episodes are dedicated to characters only doing gross stuff, as if that is a joke in itself, and the characters felt like pale parodies instead of their real personalities.
Aside of a few TV spots here and there, it seemed John K.'s career was over. But there was one shining gleam of hope in the horizon: Cans Without Labels. The return of George Liquor, and a story inspired by his own childhood? Sounds great! Miraculously he even got Michael Pataki to reprise the role, which he must have recorded for just before he died. There was only one catch: John wouldn't be done with the damn short in time. People backing his Kickstarter fundraiser waited and waited, growing very impatient of the long wait for the next passion project. It looked like it was never going to be released. But now after 7 long years, it is finally here. And honestly...
It was very disappointing.
First, let's go over the few things I appreciated before I rail on it entirely. Michael Pataki is just as amazing as George Liquor this time around. He gives his all as good ol' George, delivering every line as if his life depended on it. The artstyle at *times* still looks like classic John K. The attention to detail when it comes to the facial expressions is still impressive, especially when it comes to George. There's a nice use of colors as well.
Unfortunately, there's no escaping the fact that it just isn't funny. Although Pataki's performance is good, George Liquor is noticeably much less interesting. Instead of utilizing his main character archetype as a parody of oldfashioned patriotic Americans, all he does is yell at Slab and Ernie to eat the face in the can. There's not much humor derived from the boys trying to get rid of the face either. They ask Cigarettes The Cat to eat it, he says no. George ominously storms into the kitchen hoping the face is eaten and it is. He then suggests they open another can. That's pretty much it. The largely uneventful proceedings mainly come down to the pacing: every scene is drawn out for longer than it needs to, and nothing really funny is happening during those scenes. Even the commercials at the end didn't do anything for me.
While occasionally the animation looks good, it's pretty subpar most of the time. The constant motion tweens, the out-of-place CGI and the almost *too* rubbery body movements makes it a visually noisy mess. It's such a shame since I know John K. can do a lot better, but I think he went out of control on the drawing board this time.
And finally... why would someone pay 25 dollars for an 11 minute short of below average quality?
While I've seen *worse* animated outputs, I expect a lot more from someone I consider one of my favorite animators.
A year after the show ended, he came out with the web series The Goddamn George Liquor Program. Although it made use of crude Flash animation and by no means was as polished as his earlier stuff, the classic artstyle was still there, and George Liquor was as funny as ever.
Then in 2003 he made a move that would tank his career: Ren & Stimpy Adult Party Cartoon. The idea of the show itself was redundant: the original series as it aired on Nick was already more adult than most other kids shows at that time, but mostly what people loved about it was how it managed to be joyful and really clever amidst all the grossout humor. This kind of sublety got completely removed with Adult Party Cartoon. Entire episodes are dedicated to characters only doing gross stuff, as if that is a joke in itself, and the characters felt like pale parodies instead of their real personalities.
Aside of a few TV spots here and there, it seemed John K.'s career was over. But there was one shining gleam of hope in the horizon: Cans Without Labels. The return of George Liquor, and a story inspired by his own childhood? Sounds great! Miraculously he even got Michael Pataki to reprise the role, which he must have recorded for just before he died. There was only one catch: John wouldn't be done with the damn short in time. People backing his Kickstarter fundraiser waited and waited, growing very impatient of the long wait for the next passion project. It looked like it was never going to be released. But now after 7 long years, it is finally here. And honestly...
It was very disappointing.
First, let's go over the few things I appreciated before I rail on it entirely. Michael Pataki is just as amazing as George Liquor this time around. He gives his all as good ol' George, delivering every line as if his life depended on it. The artstyle at *times* still looks like classic John K. The attention to detail when it comes to the facial expressions is still impressive, especially when it comes to George. There's a nice use of colors as well.
Unfortunately, there's no escaping the fact that it just isn't funny. Although Pataki's performance is good, George Liquor is noticeably much less interesting. Instead of utilizing his main character archetype as a parody of oldfashioned patriotic Americans, all he does is yell at Slab and Ernie to eat the face in the can. There's not much humor derived from the boys trying to get rid of the face either. They ask Cigarettes The Cat to eat it, he says no. George ominously storms into the kitchen hoping the face is eaten and it is. He then suggests they open another can. That's pretty much it. The largely uneventful proceedings mainly come down to the pacing: every scene is drawn out for longer than it needs to, and nothing really funny is happening during those scenes. Even the commercials at the end didn't do anything for me.
While occasionally the animation looks good, it's pretty subpar most of the time. The constant motion tweens, the out-of-place CGI and the almost *too* rubbery body movements makes it a visually noisy mess. It's such a shame since I know John K. can do a lot better, but I think he went out of control on the drawing board this time.
And finally... why would someone pay 25 dollars for an 11 minute short of below average quality?
While I've seen *worse* animated outputs, I expect a lot more from someone I consider one of my favorite animators.