Rated: 2 / 5

“Rocko doesn’t need to get woke. It was woke enough.”

Punksthetic

I was going to review this along with the series on the same post. But once I heard this line:

Isn’t it great how some things never change? My favorite show, and my favorite friends.

Right, I think I’m going to need to get drunk for this one. We’re in for a lecture in this one. We’re in for something closer to Season 4 of Rocko than Season 1. Favorite show never changing my ass.

What show in existence hasn’t had its ups and downs with each season? I can already state from my viewing experience Seasons 1-2 of Rocko’s Modern Life are way better than Seasons 3-4 (that’s not to say there weren’t any good episodes in Season 3 at least). Or how Star Trek: The Next Generation‘s best seasons were 4-6, with only a few good episodes in all the other seasons. Or any season of Cheers past season 3 (though season 6 wasn’t that bad). How Babylon 5 faltered in season 5. How Lexx differs considerably from any of its 4 seasons. And Farscape… well ok, Farscape stayed consistent for its entire existence (though some characters are better than others with what we get in certain seasons). The point is Rocko’s Modern Life doesn’t get the right to take this stance.

Filburt’s children had been lost while being dropped off at the pool–

Hope that doesn’t end up being a cop-out to the one moment in the show where they had some form of continuity. Not that I really care that much.

Not to mention Chokey Chicken!

Hey, alright! We got the proper name for that restaurant rather than the pussified Season 4 Chewy Chicken version.

Ok, not that I should give a shit about continuity for a show like this at this point considering the series itself gives borderline fuck-all about it. But considering this is a sequel to the Future Schlock episode (which for the record wasn’t the last episode in the series), where Earth was already futuristic, and it showed everyone already aged into old people since this episode was set 20 years into the future already, you would hope that Mr. Bighead and everyone else would be so old and decrepit they would be six feet under by now. On the other hand, Future Schlock lived up to the Schlock name by having Filburt transition from old to young by the end just for the fuck of it. So I guess I can’t really bitch about this continuity aspect that much when even the series itself couldn’t give two shits about it. Which makes it irritating that it would even act like it had a sense of continuity in the first place.

Um, fellas. I don’t think we’re in the 90s anymore.

All the more the pity. Hilarious transition from that line too, showing how the neighborhood has changed. As if one or more previous episodes didn’t portray the neighborhood or town in the same way on a couple occasions for satirical purposes.

Ok, that bit with Really Really Big Man (RRBM) being a darker version of himself in some Nolan/Snyder film knockoff, that was actually pretty funny.

“His show is all I have!”

“Rocko. An old cartoon show isn’t going to solve the kinds of problems you have.”

“Mr. Bighead! The Fatheads wasn’t just a cartoon. You’re son created a cultural icon that resonated with millions of people. There’s a huge audience out there clamoring for this show to come back. And whoever gives it to them is going to make millions. No, billions!”

You know what would be nice? A live-action movie about a killer kangaroo. Seriously, when’s the last time we had a cheesy but awesome creature feature? Besides, fucking Tekken did it. Give me a goddamn movie about a kangaroo that kicks people’s heads off!

“My people can do it cheap! They have computers!”

Alright, you know what? The whole “poking fun at yourself” shtick has gotten stale ever since fucking Deadpool. Just because you poke fun at yourself for how you make animated series nowadays doesn’t mean that animated series is good. I mean, for fuck’s sake, South Park, Space Ghost: Coast to Coast, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force were/are great shows that were made on the cheap, but they had more heart/soul/talent put into them than this cash-grab does. And you can bet you’re ass they poked fun at themselves from time to time, but weren’t so blatantly in-your-face obvious about it. This just comes off as explaining the joke to you in the hopes that it will make you laugh. Why not reboot The Critic and get John Lovitz back and have imitators playing as Siskel and Ebert for the At the Movies show while you’re at it? Because that’s something I’d like to see. An honest portrayal of how movie critics of today are. No matter how that show turns out, no matter how it portrays films and audiences (and different sects of audiences) and online media platforms and whatever else, I don’t see how they could fuck that up considering nobody has respect for them anymore.

90s cartoon solves problems.

I know, right? That’s why these cocksuckers are bringing back Animaniacs and Tiny Toon Adventures and Super Mario Bros. and Sonic SaTaM and Are You Afraid of the Dark? Except two of those (currently) hasn’t happened yet, and would probably suck if they did. Though considering how much ass the Mario shows sucked back in the day, the only direction that could probably go at this point is up, because every Sonic show ever made, including the really shitty ones like Sonic Boom, are more entertaining than any animated series Mario got. Hell, the live action 90s Super Mario Bros. movie was better (ie more entertaining) than any of the Mario animated shows. If I wanted a decade that did remakes/reboots and did them right, I’d go back to the 80s when they knew how to remake a horror film, and make a good Star Trek film (though to be fair 1991 did give us The Undiscovered Country). My point being that I can’t think of one single fucking reboot made this decade that’s on-par, let alone superior, to the original show outside of Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood. Oh wait, that was made prior to 2010. Reboots today suck! Stop bringing them back from the 90s where they belong! The only one you did that was decent was the 2011 Thundercats reboot, and you couldn’t even give that one a chance!

That moment where they fall to Earth and miss the pillows. That would be funnier if a certain 90s film didn’t already do that (yet another reason why they want to drudge up the 90s, they were funnier back then!).

“I’m not Ralph anymore. I’m Rachael.”

Right, that moment that was so controversial for the sake of controversy and wokeness that I’ve heard inklings about. Knowing it was coming, I don’t really give that much of a shit about it at the moment. Given the nature of this show weirder things have happened. But I do have some thoughts on it.

1.) Out of all the characters to make into a tranny, why him? I would think that deadbeat crossdressing wolf brother of Heffer’s would be a more suitable tranny candidate.

2.) So typical of something more like the 4th season of the show than the 1st season. Except even the fucking 4th season would handle this better than the movie did. Case in point, the episode where Mr. Bighead became a clown, where clown was a metaphor for being gay. That’s PeeWee’s word of the day, METAPHOR!!!!!!

2a.) Rocko’s Modern Life tended to handle subject matters like these (or virtually any subject matter altogether) metaphorically. Earlier seasons were more intelligent and wacky (and less blunt) about it than the later seasons, but at least they were metaphorical. Why not having him be pink instead of green? Or Orange? Or any kind of rainbow color fags like to identify with?

But whatever.

Roger? But I thought your name was Rachael?

Ok, that was also kinda funny.

I’m not your son, I’m your daughter. And I’m finally happy.

Right. A sex change operation was all you needed this entire time. It wasn’t fulfilling your potential as an artist, it was to gain a pair of tits to fondle and losing your ability to procreate (let alone being able to say you have a pair of balls and can act like a man). This is starting to irritate me more because now they’re rubbing this agenda into your face with the “confronting the father” angle, which I should’ve known was coming.

“Eat this” sign on the back of the ice cream truck. That was also kind of funny.

And it ends with the rich corporate guy and building blasting off into space leaving behind all his wealth for all the people to have to that everyone can be equal because yay socialism and boo capitalism. Like anyone could have faith in these schmucks considering what they’ve done throughout the show and in this movie.

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Thoughts

So here’s the thing about the whole film’s message. It’s not that people like me want to bring the 90s back in the form of rebooting/reviving old 90s property. No. That should stay in the 90s where it belongs. People like me, we would just be satisfied by having physical copies of those shows and films as they originally aired, uncut and uncensored. Apparently that’s asking for too much for the Rocko’s Modern Life series (among others). We would only want that stuff preserved, kept as it was, so that the present age can view it for what it was, and see how good we had it back then. So that they can be inspired to make stuff just as good, if not better today. And you don’t do that by bringing back this shit from that past and trying to re-create the magic.

No more than George Lucas wanted to create a modern samurai flick from watching old 50s and 60s samurai films from Japan. No, you become inspired from that stuff to make something new for today. That’s why George Lucas didn’t make a sequel to Akira Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress, he made Star Wars. In a time where studios were willing to take risks, to let independent up and comers have their shot and make their ambitious films.

If there’s any lesson to take from that sort of thing, let alone from the indy 90s wave, it’s that studios should let up-and-comers just do their thing and hope for the best. But they won’t do that. Because, like the Hay’s Code of the 30s-60s, they had to restrict what sort of content would be in their films, and dictate what content must be mandatory to be included in those films. At least with the Hay’s Code it was done with the intention of upholding morals and ethics based on Christian values. It may have made films too clean and predictable back then, but at least those were good intentions. This woke shit though, this is another beast. They may sound like they have good intentions, pay enough media conglomerates and websites to promote the idea that these are good intentions. But as George Carlin says, “Political correctness is intolerance disguised as tolerance.” At least the Hay’s Code was honest about being intolerant. The Woke Code can’t even admit they wish to be viewed as tolerant by portraying anyone who doesn’t agree with their tolerant views as intolerant, thus becoming intolerant themselves.

The film tried to utilize this message, but it doesn’t succeed in the manner it goes about doing it. It succeeds in the promotion of co-opting an existing property for the benefit of modern trends, more than it succeeds in a message about the necessity of change. Because not all change is good. Just ask those who saw the Ren & Stimpy Adult Party Cartoon (which was in 2003, fresh off from the 90s).

As for the film itself, it’s just ok. At least it looks like the original Rocko, more than the 2017 Ducktales reboot looks like the original Ducktales. And it has the feel of a Rocko’s Modern Life episode, but unfortunately that feel is from the subpar season 4. As for the woke factor, easily a 3/5. Threatens to be 4/5 at times, but I wouldn’t say it quite goes that far.

PS: Well, that’s one animated series and sequel/reboot down. Two more to go. Up next, Invader Zim.