Doug

I used to watch it all the time when it would come on Snick back in 1993-1994. It's about a kid named Doug Funnie, who moves with his family to Bluffington. Doug immediately feels uncomfortable in this new town, that is until he meets Skeeter Valentine who shows him around and introduces him to some pretty interesting people. There is the usual romantic interest (Patty Mayonnaise) and the bully (Roger Klotz).

This is indeed one of my favorite cartoons on Nickelodeon. It's a shame though that it barely comes on the air anymore now that idiotic crap like Spongebob Squarepants, Rocket Power, and The Wild Thornbarry's is taking over what was once a decent lineup of entertaining cartoons and shows.

Anyway, I give Doug a 10/10.

Most would criticize Doug as formulaic, unoriginal, and all around bad. I watched this show (and it's Disney pimped sequel) for years, and I have to say, it was one of the best cartoons produced during its time; and it still holds up well.

The premise behind the show is simple: Doug is a young boy trying to make it through life, but learning a lot of hard lessons along the way. The difference in the show is just how outlandish the accidents, mishaps, discoveries and general mayhem gets. Despite an amount of predictability (it WAS written for children) the show had great humor that surprised me, given the low age of the target audience. Most of the jokes aren't great repeatable quotations like Family Guy or Futurama's, but they were entertaining (and educational) for us as kids. The Disney sequel had more adult humor and a little more maturity about using a cartoon as social commentary, but the original Nickelodeon production is rife with memorable episodes and characters.

If you don't think Doug's fumblings with Patti or self-indulgent daydreams of Quailman were at all humorous, you don't know Funnie.

I've been asked when I tell little kids 6 years younger than me that "Doug" was my favorite TV show, what is it about? And's the beautiful thing about this show. It's called life and Doug writes about it in his journal, almost like an adventure theme, but with kind of situations that are ALMOST out of real life. Plus, like me, Doug has a very active imagination. I really ID'd with this shoe So much so, that for a long time afterwards, I started writing my journal entries the same way.

I never thought I'd even like this show until I got suckered into watching the episode where Doug is put on a printing committee or something and well, It would take to long to describe. I hear all these questions about why people in the show are different colors? Well, I didn't even notice it at first because in a way, the color of that person simply blends in with the rest of the animated world, and (this will sound CRAZY) I think it really makes the show more realistic. No one else to my knowledge has ever done this with a cartoon. The music was very good also and along with Rugrats made for a fun hour of Cable TV.

Nickelodeon's saga of adolescent and suburban angst has had a bumpy ride, but overall the quality is pretty good. An interesting concept was the idea of colouring characters' skin to colours corresponding to their personalities. What truly made the series shine, however, was the voice acting.

Billy "Ren and Stimpy" West played Doug, Roger and several minor characters. He didn't go for laughs, choosing to play Doug down and Roger up. It is also impressive to hear him have a conversation with himself.

The award, however, should go to the invaluable Fred Newman. He was Porkchop's every bark and growl, Skeeter's eccentric dither, and Mr. Dink's lisp and chuckle. Moreover, he was responsible for composing the music and sound effects. All that scat, rap, vocals, acapella vocal sounds are all him. Listen next time and you'll here what a genius this man is.

Finally, a word on Doug Preis as Mr. Bone. Am I the only one who thought it was Don Knotts?

Doug was one of the first NICK Toons and it is still one of the better ones. Compared to the newer ones, this Doug show is much better than the newer NICK Toons. The animation is standard and normal for cartoons today. A lot of the plots seemed boring to me though, but all the episodes had their moments.