'The Secret Mountain of Fort Awesome' (2007-2012)
Opening thoughts: This is not by any means a case of me hating it for the sake of everybody else hating it. Cartoon Network were a huge part of childhood and were responsible for some childhood favourites that are still great now(i.e. 'Dexter's Laboratory', 'Courage the Cowardly Dog'). Weird and absurdist humour is fun when executed well, and there were some talented people involved with the voice acting. Plus the concept was a good one, much better than those for most panned Cartoon Network shows.
It is a shame though that a concept that did have promise and did sound quite inventive was wasted by less than unimaginative execution. 'The Secret Mountain of Fort Awesome' is a long way from awesome and is one of Cartoon Network's all time worst. It is on the same level of dreadful that 'Problem Solverz' and 'Angela Anaconda' are on, and makes other abominations like 'Johnny Test' and 'Uncle Grandpa' look like early days 'Steven Universe' (a great show just to say) or something in comparison.
Good things: Nothing is remotely halfway decent here.
Bad things; Where to begin? First and foremost, the animation is eye bleedingly awful. The colours are very garish and flat, editing is often dizzying and lacking tightness and the backgrounds mostly static in detail and rough. Worst of all are the character designs, some of the most hideous ever in an animated show. At best, the music is very forgettable, some of the scoring was very going-through-the-motions composing, while the theme song is as annoying and as amateurish as that for 'Johnny Test' and 'Uncle Grandpa'. Ranking towards the lower end of the list of Cartoon Network show theme songs in terms of memorability and appeal.
A huge problem with the show is that it just isn't funny. Have no problem with weird absurdest humour, but in 'Secret Mountain of Fort Awesome' it constantly felt lazy and like it was trying too hard. Making every obnoxiously cheesy and witless line of dialogue and every increasingly predictable and juvenile sight gag even more forced and contrived. It also depends whether any weirdness has a reason for being weird, but it came over very randomly more often than not. There is a lot of childish humour and most of it is distasteful. The story lines are also heavy in contrivance, randomness and predictability and incredibly light in emotional resonance, fun or sense to the point all three are practically non-existent. Furthermore there is constantly uneven pacing, with some episodes in serious need of more breathing time and others feeling lazy as a result of the comic timing not being as sharp as it could have been.
None of the characters are remotely interesting or likeable, all of them in fact with no exception being irritating beyond belief. The voice acting is also not very good at all, Peter Browngardt's voice is like nails on a blackboard in how grating it is, and it is hard to believe that talented voice actors like Tom Kenny and Grey Griffin would agree to do this (even more surprising was Clive Revill) and somehow they are made to seemingly forget how to emote or be funny. An unforgivable waste.
Closing thoughts: Summing up, this is more like Fort abomination that should remain secret.
1/10.
