Cartoon Classics #2: Rugrats

Hello guys, I'm back! Today I'm going to review a cartoon that was a huge part of my childhood. This cartoon was the most popular cartoon on Nickelodeon in the 1990's. This cartoon was called the Rugrats!!!



Rugrats was an animated series that ran on Nickelodeon from 1991-2004, and was the longest running Nicktoon in Nickelodeon history, until SpongeBob beat that record in 2012 with 173 episodes. The show was created by Paul Germain and was animated by the famous animation studio, Klasky Csupo. The series was about a group of toddlers, named Tommy, Chuckie, Phil, Lil, and their older 3-year old cousin Angelica. The series revolved around their day-to-day adventures as babies. Angelica was often mean to the babies and would try to take advantage of them. Tommy also had a dog named Spike, that was the Pickles family dog.



The series was so great and groundbreaking because it was the first cartoon where we could actually see through the eyes of babies and their worldview of things. And it was so cute! However, the series was not originally popular when it debuted in 1991 and played second fiddle to Ren and Stimpy, which domainated in TV ratings at the time. The series would run for three seasons and went on hiatus in 1994. Nick had decided they had enough episodes to show in reruns. The series then started running in reruns all today, and by 1995, the show had skyrocketed in TV ratings and became extremely popular! Nick then decided to air two new Rugrats specials in 1995 and 1996, called "A Rugrats Passover" and "A Rugrats Chanukah," which were both classics. Nick finally decided to make new episodes of Rugrats in 1997, but the same writing team that wrote the first three seasons would not return for the new episodes. Paul Germain was busy with Recess, which would eventually air on Disney's On Saturday Morning Block on ABC. So they had to get a whole new writing team to write and animate the new episodes.



After the show came back in 1997, the show got popular and billions of merchandise was made. The show had made became the most popular cartoon series on TV and made Nickelodeon the #1 channel on television. I remember when Burger King was selling Rugrats toys, and my mom took me their to eat all the time, so I could collect all the toys. And in 1998, we got to see the babies on the big screen in the blockbuster movie called "The Rugrats Movie":



The Rugrats Movie was one of my favorite movies seeing as a child, and seeing these babies for the first time on the big screen was exciting. This movie also introduced the new born baby, Dil Pickles, who would later appear in the series in late 1998. But, a lot of people believe this when the show began to jump the shark.



I'm not going to lie. I liked the Dil episodes as a kid. Sure the show wasn't as good anymore, but I loved to watch the Rugrats. But once 2000 came, the show was still real popular and got a second movie. Yeah, you heard me. A SECOND FILM!

Rugrats In Paris:



Like the first film, I saw this movie in theaters the day it came out. The movie was really good, and in some ways its better than the first movie. However this movie introduced ANOTHER character named Kimi who becomes Chuckie's sister because his dad, Chaz married another woman in Paris named Kira, who was Kimi's mother. After Rugrats In Paris, Kimi and Kira would appear in the series in early 2001.



I thought Kimi was cute. But why did they have to add another character in the show???!!! By this point, you'd think the show had become bloated with new characters. And your right. It did become bloated!!! The Kimi episodes were just plain terrible. By this point, I was lost interest in Rugrats. However, Rugrats unfortunatly doesn't end here. In 2001, to celebrate Rugrats's tenth anniversary, they made a special called, "All Growed Up," which was very good and would end drawing over 12 million viewers. Due to the success of the special, Nick decided to make a spin-off series based of the babies as teenagers in junior high in 2003 called All Grown Up! And that same year, they made ANOTHER movie called Rugrats Go Wild, which was a crossover between Rugrats and another Klasky Csupo cartoon that ran on Nick, The Wild Thornberrys.

Rugrats Go Wild:



I honestly didn't see this movie when it came out in theaters. I waited until it came out on DVD and VHS, and rented the movie instead. And boy am I glad that I did. The movie was just plain stupid and slapstick. Making a crossover movie between Rugrats and the Wild Thornberrys was a bad idea. The movie also bombed at the box office and comfirmed that their wouldn't be a 4th Rugrats movie, and that Rugrats was finally getting canceled, thank god!

All Grown Up:



I hated this series with a passion. Making the Rugrats into teenagers and making a spin off series about it was against the whole point of Rugrats, in the first place! This series was nothing but a typical tween show that revolved around dating an having crushes. I did not watch this series, and I'm glad it failed and was canceled.

So that my friends, is where Rugrats ended. It was a great show and huge part of my childhood, and will always remain a Nickelodeon classic. When I have kids, I will definetly introduce Rugrats to them. But like a lot of extremely popular shows, it eventually jumped the shark, and had to end on a sad note.

Thanks guys for reading my article! Please leave me your thoughts in the comment selection below! In the future, I plan to review more classic cartoons such as:

Cow and Chicken
Dexter's Laboratory
Beavis and Butthead
The Ren and Stimpy Show
Rocko's Modern Life