The Wild Thornberrys

What went wrong?

chinmouth syndrome

>What went wrong?
klasky-csupo art style

How many bell pepper head shaped buck toothed fish lipped gingers did they intend to relate to? They could have just made her buck toothed and red headed and not look like a Victreebel and maybe more people would have at least picked the show up to begin with. Despite this I watched a few episodes of this and Rocket Power when I had nothing better to watch. They were just okay.

Hey Arnold was GOAT though.

The artstyle

All of the other characters were more interesting and funny than the main character

I liked it.

Besides the art style I don't know Sup Forums issue with it.

Eliza existed and it wasn't just a straight animated nature documentry hosted by Tim Curry.

Besides the art style, the show just didn't seem to be good at... anything.

As a comedy it wasn't very funny. As an adventure show it wasn't that exciting. As edutainment it wasn't that educational.

Main character was shit and very few of the animal characters she met were at all interesting or particularly animalistic. Also ugly art style.

I went into the show as a kid thinking "12 year old girl that travels the world and can talk to animals? this show was made for me!" And like, a few episodes in I just did not give a fuck about it. I still watched it because I watched everything Nick put on at the time, but I never loved it like I thought I would at first. I found myself wishing the main character was Debbie instead of Eliza.

Nigel should have been the main character

Debbie is infinality better than Eliza though

As an adult I can appreciate Nigel but as a kid I related more to Debbie. I honestly cared about Debbie's problems and sideplots and wished she had more screentime to deal with them. Also Nigel would've gotten old and stale if he were the mc and worked perfect as he was already.

So if this show were rebooted what should be different to make it work?

Yes, this so much. It wasn't a "Jack of all trades, master on none" scenario so much as a "Wet blanket of all" situation. It just didn't really do anything particularly well despite trying its hands at so many different things.

Debbie was just the writers' self insert to tell the audience how shitty this show was and what we're all thinking.

Also Debbie's "grunge girl" character design was several years out of date when the show started. The show first aired in 1998; that would be the equivalent in 1988 of wearing a skinny New Wave tie and shades.

/thread

Honestly I'm not sure. Eliza was such a core part of the show that you can't exactly cut her out and still have the same show, but she was the worst part and the first change would probably have to be with her. Just write a completely different character to put in Eliza's position, I guess. Maybe she could go with her parents to help film the documentary show instead of always fucking off on her own, or maybe cut Eliza and give an unwilling angsty teen like Debbie the super power and see how that shakes things up.

One smaller detail I think would be nice would be to allow Donnie to gradually age and learn english and shit over time. The other characters grew and changed in the later seasons but Donnie ended up looking like a retard the way he never learned to speak any english.

I was born in 96 so I have no idea what was "cool" in 1998 desu.

this is what the show should have been

In a funny way it might actually make sense for Debbie to always be a couple years out of date when it comes to trends, because most of the shit she'd have access to in all the third world countries she was in would constantly be behind the times too. Like, the internet wasn't as big back then so I think Debbie got most of her fashion advice from painfully outdated magazines, and probably bought second hand clothes and rarely had opportunities to rotate her wardrobe. With that kind of lifestyle she may have gravitated to the grunge look partly out of ignorance and partly out of convenience.

What if they made Eliza more like...

>The other characters grew and changed in the later seasons but Donnie ended up looking like a retard the way he never learned to speak any english.


Wild children take much more years to learn these things.

98 was when everything was nu metal and skater pop punk. Grunge stopped being a thing after Clinton's first term.

I like this.

>this and Rocket Power
>Hey Arnold was GOAT though

I liked them all. Might just be because I was younger though. Liked Nick a lot back then. My brother and I downloaded Salute Your Shorts about a year ago, and it definitely did not hold up. Pete and Pete did, however, so it's tough to know for sure, unless I actually go back and watch them.

It was pretty SMASHING

Writers being high on God knows what.

You said the word.

Did this show predict Leafy?

It actually would be cool if Debbie was the main character. An apathetic teen that's stuck with the ability to talk to animals, and reluctantly helps animals to help make her parent's lives easier.
Alternately, get rid of the talking animal gimmick, and have Debbie make friends with other kids around the world, learning their culture.

Do they? Because I recall Helen Keller never learned to communicate at all until the age of 7, but then rapidly caught on to a decent vocabulary in the span of months once the concept clicked.

Donnie's gibberish actually was confirmed to be human language in his origin story, so he did have a concept of language before the Thornberries adopted him, and he was at a young age when he should have been very susceptible to learning to speak new languages. On top of that, he clearly understood every english word spoken to him through the whole series- he always reacted when spoken to. I think the show just kept him "wild" for comic effect even though a boy his age in his position should have been at least learning to speak some simple words.

Also Flea from RHCP did the voice of Donnie which is pretty cool.

I'M A LITTLE TINY PEA

The main problem with Debbie being the main character is that she won't go off on adventures unless forced to.

Also the show will be formulaic as it will start with Debbie not wanting to do anything, her parents encountering a problem, Debbie being forced to do something, Debbie going back to not caring. At least with Eliza she felt like the sort of person who would want to do this.

Rugrats Meets Wild Thornberrys crossover movie.

Eliza was a terrible terrible character.

Eliza wasn't a character.

I'm inclined to agree. She had very little personality and was defined pretty much by being "the girl who talks to animals but its a secret you guys", but somehow still came across as aggravating and Mary Sue-ish. I don't even know how that happens.

And, beating a dead horse here, but I dare you to find me an uglier character design.

It was boring.

Wasn't Debbie actually brilliant, but we didn't notice because she wanted to be an angsty teenager who was infuriated with not having a normal life and instead had to live a life of constant adventure and excitement?