Christmas in Tattertown

I recorded this show when it first ran on Nickelodeon and watched it countless times over Christmas and school vacation over the years. No matter how many times I saw it it always seemed fresh, there was so much strange stuff happening. Some gags I got right away- when Muffet meets Sidney the Spider, she's basically walking into the last scene of every Merrie Melodies cartoon, where all the citizens mobilize to beat up the bad guy who kidnapped the hero's girlfriend. But I never got the joke (or the irony) about the Christmas Tree, Mr Tannenbaum, being Jewish until I was much older. If Tattertown had been picked up it would perhaps have jump-started the adult animation boom that The Simpsons and Ren & Stimpy eventually pioneered.

Anyway, some others complain the characters are undeveloped but this was a pilot. Also, sometimes Bakshi just rolls that way. I'd rather watch a cartoon with amazing animation that makes me laugh anyway. I think this is actually one of Bakshi's best productions, I enjoyed it way more than Wizards or LOTR.

After a string of cult hits including Fritz the Cat and Lord of the Rings, Ralph Bakshi returned to television with the Nikelodeon pilot 'Tattertown'. The show was about a world where everything that humans discard winds up. Debbie, a girl transported to this world, would explain to the denizens of Tattertown their worth separated from the human world. The pilot dealt with Christmas, albeit not very well, and was reconfigured as a special to be aired on November 21st 1988. There's a reason why you've never heard it. It ain't that good.

Narrated by Keith David, and featuring typically eccentric Bakshi animation, I can see that the concept would have been full of potential, but the characters are all over the place, and the Angelika-like antagonist (all you Rugrats fans will get what I mean) was very, very annoying.

Worth watching as a curiosity.