Bob's Burgers

When I first saw the commercials about a new cartoon-series I wasn't really impressed. Bobs burgers, about a burgershop, really..? The style was a strong reminder of Beavis and Butthead and the short commercial didn't really impress me much. Maybe I was a bit skeptical because the last years no cartoon or animation series has impressed me much. Brickleberry for example never made me laugh and I didn't like any of the characters.

When it comes to that, TV is riddled with the McFarlane cartoons and even though I still like family guy (not love), its all becoming a tad repetitive.

So I gave Bob's Burgers a chance. I had to get used to the style and wasn't convinced a Burgershop could deliver anything fun, but after a few ep's I am pleasantly surprised. The pace is really good, dialogs are fast and you have to take notice of all or you will miss a joke or clever pun. The cartoon-style works, it gives a bit of 80's nostalgia and it just looks funny - seeing Louise go nuts wearing those ears is just a funny sight.

The characters all work for me, I noticed a lot dislike Gene but I can see him fit in. He delivers a lot of clever (superfast) jokes (scrotumwax!) so for me he adds.

Even the 'recurring characters' deliver, my fav would be Teddy ("we need a bigger restaurant!").

All in all its well-made and reasonably original (wich is rare these days) and it's actually funny. It may need to grow on you, I needed a few episodes but now I am a fan.

The Belcher family is unique to television in that they all love and respect each other. It took me a few episodes (mostly, after I cleared a bumpy Season 1) to figure this out, but Linda and Bob really do love and respect each other, and they really do love and respect their kids. In turn, their kids, really do love and respect their parents. And, perhaps most bizarrely to modern television, the kids love and respect each other and work, go to school with, and play with each other, as well. And, it's a secular, non-patriarchal family (it appears to be egalitarian).

They manage all of that, and still manage to be hilarious, season after season. Fantastic character-writing. Fantastic story-telling. They are skipping the guns and violence, the prevalent name-calling, the shaming and fighting that you can see in any other family-oriented, or kid-oriented shows.

I love Linda's love-of-life. So many good things (paragraphs) could be said about her. Oddly, I love that she's voiced by a man. I love her sister, too!

I love Bob's steadfastness against changing his restaurant's core value: Quality Ingredients, and his fear of failure. He's so lovable and terribly vulnerable, (and he can SING!); he's a far cry from "Archer." Kudos to the writers and the voice actor to separate the two (But bravo for the mashup "Archer" episode that has Archer working at the restaurant... "Better break-out the purple stuff...").

I love Tina's crazy introduction into puberty. Her moaning (and head bang or faint) for the whole scene, or on key words whenever she is depressed it makes me laugh every single time. Her daydreams are spot-on for hormone-poisoning, as we used to call it. I love that she's the oldest, but gets steered by the sharp-as-a-tack youngest child, Louise.

I love Gene's complete lack of shame and his total joy when wears any female clothes, even though I believe he's heterosexual. He's just got two sisters, so it's no big deal. He says the most amazing stuff about the opposite sex, it just cracks me up. It's refreshing, non-challenging, and no bravado or shaming. The whole family is so accepting of Marshmallow, and that's lovely. It should be like that everywhere.

I love Louise because she is the baby of the family, and somehow, she became the instigator, the troublemaker, the pusher, and the rabble-rouser, but still she is not evil or despicable, by any means. She's not a pathological liar or cheat, or hateful or mean at all. She's clever and happy and looks out for her siblings. Or, gets them to work for her. Whichever suits her best at which ever moment she chooses. Oh, the jawbreaker episode?! So gross! Poor Tina!

A special shout-out to Teddy, Mort and Jimmy Pesto! Then there's all of the kids...

I don't know how this show continues to do it, season after season, but this is a hilarious, amazing and RARE family, that is still going strong in 2020. And, wow, we really need the laughs now more than ever.

More, please!

I used to actively communicate to others that this show sucked. I hadn't even watched one full episode! I've seen every episode of family guy, futurama, and American dad many many times and I was getting bored of reruns. I saw this on demand and thought I might as well give it a try. I put on the first episode and was like "Yup it's crap just like I remembered, but I can't take seeing more reruns so I'll just leave it on in the background while I scroll online" A few episodes later I was hooked. Some people don't like the simplicity of the animation but that's what makes it unique. I love the hand drawn look. I used to hate that all the characters "sounded the same" I used to say. Now I think it's funny that they have masculine sounding voices.

Bobs characters is truly amazing and Lynn is so lovable. The kids are absolutely hilarious I will admit sometimes Gene try's too hard to make jokes but that's just the way gene is. He's always being a jokester. My favourite is Louise and Tina. I like the socially awkward Tina and the mature witty yet childlike Louise. These characters all have such depth that you really don't see in other cartoons. I really like that. I very much dislike teddy. The names of characters are also hilarious. Fish odour omg love it. I say watch one season before you give up on this one. It takes time to get to know the amazing characters. It took me a while to come around.

I am an avid fan of animated television, and have a massive appreciation for MacFarlane's Family Guy, American Dad and The Cleveland Show. And also The Simpsons and Futurama. While Groening and MacFarlane are cartoon tycoons currently dominating animated programming, Bob's Burgers is a pleasing, utterly enjoyable change.

The pace and rapport of all the characters is one that is rare in any other cartoons. This pace is further backed up by the exceptional vocal performances and direction. Bob's monotonous exasperation at his children's outbursts is just hilarious. The script and dialogue of Tina, Gene and Louise is superb. Tina's voice, personally, I find extremely funny. The humour of a situation slowly evading Bob, mainly, is well accommodated by the episode lengths.

I haven't laughed so hard at a comedy since that seen in The US Office where they all start singing staying alive by the bee gees to keep the beat for CPR of the practice dummy.

While I don't find this as good as "Rick And Morty" or even H. Jon Benjamin's other show "Archer", this is still a lot of fun. I really do find the animation funny. The creator has stated that yes, the character designs were in fact inspired by the Muppets. The funniest thing is that I find myself singing the intro to "The Muppet Show" when I see the theme song to this. The story is as basic as it can be, with a guy named Bob running a restaurant named after his burgers. The biggest appeal to this is probably how authentic it is. Despite the fact that the animation is goofy, it comes off as very realistic and the characters do behave like real people. The voice acting is wonderful in this.

Every character has a distinct voice that matches their personality perfectly. It's pretty funny to hear Tina when she's trying to be angry or some other emotion. I simply can not speak ill of anything Kristen Schaal. "Gravity Falls" may be over, but may that voice live on forever with Louise...or at least until this show ends as well. It's hard to pick a favorite character because they are all so funny. Gene is probably the most entertaining, although Louise might be the most eccentric. I just love the idea of a character like Tina who writes fanfics in-universe of her favorite things. It's especially funny because of all the porn she makes. Yes, a perfect reflection of fandom indeed.

The episodes are really quite unpredictable and there's always some new real life adventure these funny characters are getting into. I think my favorite episode might be the one with the mechanical shark. It's just hilarious to see this thing get more powerful as they try to stop it. I like Tina's Romeo and Juliet-esque relationship with Jimmy Junior. Yes, I'm a brony too. I'm just going to reference every other cartoon in existence in this review, aren't I? I will complain about how "King Of The Hill" can be boring as a slice of life story but this is just a lot funnier with better characters who are always saying funny things and actively getting into some new predicament.

I'm impressed at how they have yet to have any supernatural elements introduced as almost every show has at least one paranormal episode or magic realism. Well, they might share a Universe with "Archer" which had some unrealistic stuff, but then again that could have just been a non canonical joke, kind of like when Bob had a cameo in that "Family Guy"/"The Simpsons" crossover. Man, degrees of separation are weird. ***1/2.