Vanilla Beach Presents
hen you hear "Mature Animation" only one thing springs to mind: Hentai. Fortunately we're not about to discuss or review any triple-X Japanese stuff here (at least not at

the moment) so anyone wishing to read reviews of tentacle-sex should head on over to the hentai game review section of somethingawful for that kind of freaky shit. No, this profile is all about cartoons that kids just won't understand.

We're all familiar with the Simpsons. Back in the late eighties Matt Groening and Fox hit upon the novel idea of deploying a cartoon that worked at more than one level; kids loved Bart Simpson and his jaded imagination while adults found humour in the foibles of Homer and Marge. A decade later, along came South Park with a new concept - a cartoon aimed purely at the older audience of teens and young adults. Of course, this had been done before with Beavis and Butthead, but the cartoons were little more than a cover for rock music commentary.

Contrary to popular belief there are an abundance of these adult cartoons out there, proving that we never really grow out of comic books. Sadly they are all to often overlooked or relegated to late-night slots/obscure cable channels. Therefore we feel it's our duty to review and inform you of these cartoons.
Aqua Teen Hunger Force
The Plot
Described as "the most elite human-sized food detective team in history" ATHF starts off with an intro sequence giving the viewer the belief that they're about to watch a cartoon meatball, packet of fries and milkshake go around fighting crime, battling space squids and arresting robots caught stealing Egyptian treasure. Instead the series ends up being a complete farce - roughly 10 minutes of the main characters doing nothing aqua-related (aside from sneaking into their neightbour's pool every once in a while), there is no "force" as they do not solve any crimes and the main characters seem to be every age except teenage. Clearly this is recipe for a pretty shit animation, and yet it is pure genius.
The Characters
  • Shake - a milkshake filled with Caracas, sneakery and complete incompetence.
  • Frylock - a packet of fries that can shoot laserbeams from his eyes, and likes star trek.
  • Meatwad - a meatball with a penchant for dancing, playing with toys and can morph into an igloo or hotdog. that's it.
The Verdict
Aqua Teen Hunger Force looks like one of the most unlikely cult cartoons on parade and yet its brilliancy lies in the fact that it's not trying to be particularly cult or grown-up. Each episode is basically a squabble over an issue: money, toys, internet pop-up windows, spiders, etc. The frequent appearances of their "human" Jersey City neighbour, Carl, who has a preference for hookers and eastern European body parts and the hip-hop narration makes ATHF a kind of mixed bag of gags, jokes and occasionally worrying plotlines. The great thing is that the contents of the bag are all good.
Watch out for

The Mooninites: Ignignokt and Err, two dimensional space-invader style aliens from the moon, make occasional visits to ATHF. They like to encourage the rather naive Meatwad to "smoke while flipping the bird" and "procure some wine on the way to mall so that you can get 'tore up' and pass out in the hot sun". Brilliant!
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Duckman
The Plot
Watch an episode of Duckman and you'll immediately pick up on the Rugrats/Klasky-Csupo style artwork. Then you'll suddenly realise that children's animation is a million years away. Duckman is a detective who is incompetent, irritated, rude and highly strung. He works with Cornfed, a sobering focuses pig who brings the whole "sidekick" thing together. Despite being clearly rubbish at his job, Duckman yearns to be like one of those "good old days" black-and-white private dicks.
The Characters
  • Duckman - Private Detective extraordinare (as in will-only-take-jobs-that-noone-else-will).
  • Cornfed - sober sidekick who attempts fruitlessly to keep disruption to a minimum.
  • Fluffy & Uranus - two irritatingly-perfect office workers who were hired as a result of a computer error
  • Bernice - Resentful identical sister of Duckman's deceased wife who bears a grudge. Bernice lives with Duckman so that she can keep an eye on the kids.
  • Charles & Mambo - siamese-twin son/s who love computer games.
  • Ajax - typical clumsy teenager son
  • King Chicken - obligatory nemesis.
The Verdict
Duckman is pretty much hit-and-miss, coming across in many episodes as routine buffoonary. Fortunately, there are a handful parody that make for excellent viewing. In the episode Aged Heat for example, Duckman is sentenced to life imprisonment on a minor technicality, but ends up (for some reason completely beyond me) in a women's prison.
Watch out for

NOIR GANG: a fantastic film-noir take off. Duckman is assigned to a case involving an exotic dancer, but the real genius lies in myriad of 1940s silver-screen types he meets, including a Peter Lorre type who utters the immortal phrase "I deedn't keel her!" before launching into the precise details of how he didn't keel her including the words "Stripper's G-string" and "Albino". You really have to see it to understand...
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Family Guy
The Plot
Family Guy is essentially The Simpsons for the disillusioned. Featuring the daily exploits of lovable oaf Peter Griffin and his family, jokes based on sex, violence and relationships are touched upon frequently and mercilessly. Featuring excellent animation, Family Guy has become so successful that it survives cancellation by the people who host it (Fox, unsurprisingly) due to a astonishing DVD sales.
The Characters
  • Peter Griffin - father of the family and quintessential family guy. Peter is a virtually lapsed catholic who used to work on a toy assembly line before accidentally killing his boss (a highly dubious Portuguese with one foot in the closet who choked on some food during an invitation to dinner)
  • Louis Griffin - sexy redheaded wife of Peter who was heir to her family fortune before choosing to marry Peter, who her father detested. Now relegated to housewife status, Louis seems content on raising the kids and teaching piano.
  • Chris Griffin - the teenage son who has the weight and buffoonishness of his dad but with a heart of gold and amazing artistic skills
  • Meg Griffin - perpetual knitted-cap-wearing Megan is the other teenager - the archetypal angst-ridden daughter who craves to be in with "in" crowd. Meg is completely talentless (aside from her bird impersonations) - and completely lovable.
  • Stewie Grifiin - one years old, but Stewie has already mastered English (albeit in a clipped British accent) due to his amazing intelligence. He plans to enslave humanity by taking over the world but is still unable to master the art of toilet training.
The Verdict
Fantastic. Every single episode of Family Guy so far has been a winner. Gags are heavily situated around the "sitcom" routine and short clips based on quotes ("Look at Elroy Jetson - he was a child actor and he turned out just fine") cutting to the gag (A drunken teenage Elroy getting ejected from a nightclub) are plentiful, yet rarely unfunny.
Watch out for

SCREWED THE POOCH: In an episode where Brian knocks up a prize racing dog, he is given the choice of never seeing his children or being neutered. Determined to show that he can be a good father, Brian agrees to have the operation. As he waits in the vet, Peter laments what Brian will be like after the operation. We are then treated to the scenario of a post-neutered, bloated Brian sitting on a sofa eating chocolates from a heart shaped box, saying in a camp voice "I *love* chocolate. But I can't eat it or i'll get fat. But it's *soooo* good!". A stark warning to all men wrapped up in comic genius.
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Futurama
The Plot
Imagine if you will what would happen to a Pizza Delivery Boy from New York City who accidentally got cryogenically frozen and emerged in the 31st Century. Now imagine that combined with all the best gags from The Simpsons and even better storylines. When Futurama debued, the first episode scored the highest viewer ratings for any cartoon. Saldly, despite its success Futurama got relegated to a late-night slot and eventually cancelled amidst rumours of bad-blood between Groening and Fox. As with Family Guy, Futurama has enjoyed excellent DVD sales, proving that it is the masterpiece of comedy as well as animation.
The Characters
  • Phillip J Fry - Fry was a pizza delivery boy with a passion for space invaders in the 20th Century. In the 31st Century he works on a rocket ship - as a delivery boy. Fry was never really in tune with the 20th C (although his favourite song was "I'm walking on sunshine") but he fitted straight in with his new-found friends in the 31st Century.
  • Leela - A rather curvaceous cyclops who grew up as an orphan, Leela is the pilot of the delivery ship Fry works on. Her knowledge of martial arts and inability to let her guard down makes Fry all the more drawn towards her.
  • Professor Farnsworth - The Professor owns the delivery company, Planet Express, Fry and Leela work at as a money-maker to fund his harebrained inventions and crackpot ideas (which include the finglonger, and the what-if machine).
  • Hermes - Planet Express' very own Caribbean bureaucrat, Hermes Conrad is the toast of everything chilled about Jamaica and everything anal about accountancy.
  • Amy - Daughter of the megarich Wong family, Amy treats life like a swimming pool as shallow as she is.
  • Zoidberg - A space lobster which a NY-Jewish accent, Zoidberg describes himself as "a medical corporation" when in fact he is the company's doctor. He has more than a little difficulty with the human biology though.
The Verdict
Futurama is a love/hate cartoon. It's humour is plastered with in-jokes and parodies that many people just cannot understand and it is often unfairly compared to other cartoons that just look the same. Fortunately though, there are many people who fully understand the genius behind Futurama - recently a petition was launched to ask Fox to buy more series and thousands of signatures were collected.
Watch out for

THE DEVILS HANDS ARE IDLE PLAYTHINGS: The final episode in which Fry makes a deal with "Robot-Devil" in order to trade his hands for those deft enough to play the Holophonor (an instrument that projects images alongside music - only a handful of people in the universe can play one). If he can master the instrument then Leela will fall in love with him. The devil, however, cannot stand Fry's clumsy hands and so cooks up a whole load of trouble to get them back. This episode is a touching end to the series, but is worth it for Hedonism-Bot alone.

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The Tick
The Plot
Comic books that parody the all-american superhero are abundant, but cartoons that do the same thing without taking themselves seriously are a rarity. The Tick is such a cartoon - a superhero as sturdy as Superman and as ridiculous as one can be as they attempt to mimic the appearance of a small insect, dressed in spandex. The Tick is a superhero who attempts to protect The City from the various criminals who attempt to take over. Predictably, these low-life scumbags include "The Human Ton", "Toon La" and "Uncle Creamy"
The Characters
  • The Tick - The main character and superhero. His warcry is "SPOON!" which is hardly threatening though certainly irrelevant enough to catch even the most evil superbrain offhand.
  • American Maid - reassuringly patriotic, American Maid's key skill is to...uhm... throw her shoes at anyone who dares cross her path.
  • The Human Bullet - a man who adopts a bullet-shaped mask and, upon demand, places himself inside a cannon and tells his son (Fire Me Boy) to light the fuse.
The Verdict
The Tick may not have the gags of Family Guy, or the sublime script of Futurama, but it has a wackiness that too many animated series overlook in the pursuit of being more adult. The scripts are often so ridiculous that it is difficult not to laugh. The Tick has been around for a while and it's humour continues to expand as it gathers popularity.
Watch out for

TICK Vs. EDUCATION: This episode sees The Tick training up a group of would-be superhero recruits when all of sudden they get attacked by a mutant ice-cream/human hybrid by the name of Unlce Creamy. The Tick's pep-talk to his recruits about Evil ("Evil, gathering like lint in the navel of the body public...") combined with the feebleness of his cadets (one guy is called SarCastro after his scathing put-downs and similar appearance to the Cuban leader) makes this a great episode to enter into the wackiness of The Tick.
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