TV Retrospective: Pinky, Elmyra & The Brain

In the annuls of TV history, there has been a plethora of crossover TV favorites such as Mork & Mindy/Laverne & Shirley/Fonz Hour. But what draws creators to make these series more than just a dumb piece of fan fiction? The question remains unanswered with Kids' WB golden age of cartoon series fading into the distance with Pinky, Elmyra & The Brain. After an impressive run of Steven Spielberg-produced cartoons such as Animaniacs and Freakazoid!, who popped up on each other's shows, the era came to an end abruptly with the short lived Emmy-winning program Pinky, Elmyra & The Brain, which fused two of its beloved shows together without any real clue as to why they didn't mesh well. The results were as hackneyed as expected.

It was a series that pretty much knew its fate on a weekly basis. It had no point existing and some long time crew members quit over this show. Even in the show's theme song, things weren't right. Parodying the popular Pinky & The Brain theme with new lyrics describing how Acme Labs had shut down, it spoke of defeat. Still, the entire show's mantra could come later on in the song when the singers announce "It's what the network wants/Why bother to complain?" In the series, there is no network that they are rebelling against, so this is a direct conflict with WB mentioned weekly. When Brain (Maurice LaMarche) ends the song by saying "I deeply resent this," there's a sense of cynicism to come.

Indeed there is. An average episode was a subpar Pinky & The Brain episode at best with Brain's plans being foiled by Elmyra (Cree Summer) and her negligent manners towards animals. It could be seen as comedy, but along with a dictionary of almost no discernible words, Elmyra was a protagonist who never made sense. She was rarely integrated into the plot in a logical way. She was either the foil or a really retarded girl trying to impress her peers at Chuck Norris School. Her peers included Rudy (Nancy Cartwright), which continually baffles as a romantic interest largely because Rudy is an awful character. Yes, Elmyra is awful as well, but the bounds of believability on this series was pretty awful... and that is after we include aliens, magic, and a French robot. 

Even the construct of Pinky (Rob Paulsen) and Brain is questionable. Yes, they still have the pairing of smart and dumb down pat, but Pinky feels altered. He appeals to Elmyra's playful sensibilities in a way that feels like he was brainwashed. He wants to have fun and almost doesn't care about Brain half of the time. With majority of the series being brief segments looped together incongruously, there wasn't an issue with continuity. Instead, they needed to create a reason to care and beef up the schemes. Instead, they went for animal abuse and Brain being foiled regularly by the dumbest things.

Another problem is that the series tried to be "cool." Yes, it is important for an animated series directed at kids to be appealing, but considering the other Spielberg produced shows, this move made no sense. Animaniacs was first a series that had creative characters doing crazy things. In Pinky, Elmyra & The Brain, this is substituted for pop culture references and a sense of being fun. The results make it the most dated of every series in the echelon with a lot of very distinct 90's references, including Titanic, Jurassic Park, and even the low quality of video cameras at the time. To anyone outside of this demographic, these references are likely to go over one's head. The sustainability isn't replaced in story, as they are weak elements thrown together for the sake of a story. Yes, Animaniacs and Freakazoid! had their share of dated references, but considering that their characters had original stories not reliant on them, they managed to succeed.

Despite all of the major setbacks that keep the series from even approaching the greatness of its peers, there was something that felt untapped. There was a mature existentialism developing towards the end of the series' run. "Yule Be Sorry" questions the constructs of the Pinky/Brain dynamic in such a profound way that it almost serves as the writers apologizing for everything before. Even "Mr. Doctor" serves as an embarrassing reflection on a series gone wrong. For all of the problems of the series, there are moments that worked impressively well in encapsulating the faults of its existence.

Even the episodes themselves weren't all terrible. Yes, early on they were plagued with Elmyra's sole credit in beating up animals in creative ways. Luckily it was reduced to really annoying verbage, which even then didn't help its appeal. Still, the stories managed to get better as time went on with "Fun, Space and Time" being surprisingly effective despite being cut short. What made it great was that it managed to be high concept and apply the lowbrow humor in doses that allowed the idea of throwing a black hole out of a bedroom window to coexist. That is what the series needed to do better: coexist. It felt like two different shows competing for attention with both audiences being slightly outside of each other's intellectual range.

Even then, the series' existence as an experiment alone is fascinating. Does the show need to ever have happened? No. However, it did give Rob Paulsen an Emmy, so it wasn't all bad. Also, it is hard to look solely on one show as ending the Spielberg era of Kids' WB, but this one encapsulated everything negative so perfectly that it is an easy scapegoat. It had all of the fun of the kid's show format, but there was a specific desperation to be fun that made it hard to swallow. In small doses, this show works. Otherwise, it is simply just another forgettable kid's cartoon remembered only by those who believe in downfall series.

In a sense, it is hard to hate the series because it did begin trying after awhile. It never had the humor or creativity that made its predecessors great, but it did play loose and fast. It had an episode called "Hooray for Meat," which was rather audacious if misinformed. There was little standouts, but the amount of awfulness isn't nearly as high as you'd think. For those wanting to understand the appeal of 90's cartoons, please consult Animaniacs or Freakazoid!. There is really very little reason to pursue this show, but don't feel embarrassed if it ever pops up on your TV. It's not nearly as terrible as you'd think.

Overall Rating: 2.5 out of 5