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adultswim2021 · 23 days ago

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Childrens Hospital #1: “A Hospital Isn't a Place for Lazy People/What Is Love?” (aka: "A Hospital Isn't a Place") | July 11, 2010 - 10:30PM | S01E01

We love our cartoons, don’t we folks? We HATE when live-action takes up our valuable cartoon time and replaces all of our beautiful cartoon guys.

From the Twisted mind of Rob Corrdry comes Childrens Hospital, a web-series-come-real-series-but-just-barely that serves up wacky spoof jokes and a bit of a thumb in the eye of shows like Grey’s Anatomy, in that both are soapy medical dramas where attractive doctors fuck and suck their way through America’s healthcare system. All of the characters on the show are constantly making out, except unlike Grey’s Anatomy this is a children’s hospital so there’s kids around.

The show draws inspiration from other shows, like M*A*S*H (Michael Cera as the off-screen announcer on the hospital’s loud-speaker system is clearly a nod, replete with direct references to the show), E.R. (a later episode [possibly others] is a direct parody of their live-episode stunt) and St. Elsewhere (certain episodes of this show resemble St. Elsewhere’s famous format-breaking episodes).

I’ve mined TV from my youth/pre-birth-non-existence and will occasionally connect certain dots to bits of this show, but I’ll try to point them out when we get to those episodes. Or, I’m lying about that, and won’t have anything to show for myself. Remains to be seen. My point is, I’m pretty deficient in knowing about more recent medical dramas, so feel free to yell at me in the comments when I miss stuff.

The show’s origin was as a web series, originally found on The WB’s website. The webseries episodes were shorter than your normal Adult Swim show, so they combined two episodes of the web series to make a single Adult Swim episode. Each one of these two segments originally had closing credits, and a different-looking title screen.

The DVD opted to include the original web series versions instead of the updated Adult Swim ones. Also, they had to add a little extra content to make time, so they added a fake commercial between the two segments as well as an outro where Rob Corddry “Thanks for Watching!”s us. This first episode features a fake ad for NTSF:SD:SUV::, which would eventually become it’s own show. Very sneaky. I think for a time there existed digital versions that followed this format EXCEPT they cut out the fake commercial in the middle for some reason. All I know is whatever versions I have on my plex server seem to include everything as-aired on Adult Swim.

I had my chance to be an early adopter to Childrens Hospital after hearing Rob Corrdry talk about the program on various podcasts. I turned my nose up at it, because watching TV on internet just seemed too scary to me back then. So the first time I actually watched was at this years’ San Diego Comic-Con, I think? They screened the first episode of season two, which followed season one after a very short break (I think it was a one week hiatus, actually). It played pretty well in a room full of people waiting for the Fables panel to start. I remember liking it, and laughing!

But: DO I LIKE IT NOW? I guess. It’s okay. I mean, it’s another one of those joke-machine style shows, but it has that stink of “people are having A LITTLE TOO MUCH FUN making this”. You know what I mean? Like, you can tell everyone who worked on this show was smiling all day and it sorta ruins the comedy in a weird way. I’m not sure. For what it’s worth, I purchased this on DVD back when I was trying to be a completest for Adult Swim on DVD. I still technically own it, I think, but it’s stowed away in a box of other DVDs I pruned from my collection with the intention of trying to sell them. I don’t know where they are, so as such I won’t be covering things like deleted scenes or outtakes on a per-episode basis. I think those DVDs had some extras on them?

The plot of this episode is mostly focused on the two pretty girls breaking up with their boyfriends; one simply doing it in solidarity with the other. They are roommates and it becomes clear that there’s a hot girl-on-girl crush going on. Webisode one ends with the two chicks about to kiss, but it’s comically ruined by a sneeze.

I owe this DISGUSTING, SLEAZY, GIRL-ALMOST-ON-GIRL action mostly to the guiding hand of David Wain, who was involved with the show. If the man has a trademark, it’s having hot women on your show, and writing numerous scenes with them making out with various people, and then eventually, as if it’s just a foregone conclusion, having them make out with each other. I really do think he launders his sense of humor into productions where attractive people can make out like it's high school again. I think this might be why I offered the “too much fun” theory of comedy acting being on display.

David Wain strikes me as a guy who didn’t get laid when he was young so he became a creative and now he just tries to figure out the least-creepy way to surround himself with beautiful women. To be a little revealing, I’m more-or-less made of the exact same stuff as Wain. I’m not even condemning him. I might just be writing these things from a place of jealousy, honestly. He might even be my hero!!!!

Other stuff happened, but it wasn’t too significant; I think they were setting up something with Rob Huebel’s character being a former cop or something. Him and Nick “bacon and eggs” Offerman have an over-serious conversation about it, in which they invoke 9/11 as having happened “seven years ago”, a joke I had to pause to think about because it’s drilled in my head right now that I’m watching 2010 Adult Swim, but this is 2008 Webisode stuff. I thought they were about to make a joke about John Ritter dying on September 11, 2003, but alas this show wasn’t written by me and my friends.

Another joke I feel like picking apart is one where one of the girls tells the other that she has a booger by describing it as a “Stalagmite”. SIGH… the word she was looking for was stalagTITE. The way you can remember this is: A stalagTITE hangs TIGHT to the ceiling, while a stalagMITE MIGHT one day reach the ceiling. Sorry, I was literally a tour guide for a cavern for a summer, and this is literally the only thing I remember from any of it.

Okay, pedantic stuff about episode titles: I did a mild amount of research and found that for some reason there seems to be two sets of episode titles depending on which source you look at. These episodes (both web versions and Adult Swim versions) don't seem to be on the Library of Congress web searcher. I-tunes versions and other for-purchase digital platforms use very long titles, which seem to be two titles corresponding to each webisode. When I encounter these titles, they are separated by a comma and not a forward slash, which is the usual standard for episode titles where the show is made up of shorter segments. I alone have decided to override the comma and insert a forward slash. It just comforts me to do it that way.

So, I'm airing on the side of using the elongated per-segment titles as the "episode title of record". These titles, by the way, I could not find being used in conjunction with the actual webisodes. Weird! Like, I went and looked at the old WB website that originally housed the short webisode versions and they didn't seem to have titles there, just "Episode 1", etc.

Oh, wait, I forgot to say how one of the guys on here has clown make-up on. One of the guys on here has clown make-up on.

EPHEMERA CORNER:

MAIL BAG:

Kon, being a HUGE BITCH about my previous post, writes:

Isn't it e?????????? No it's not

Kon, I'm sorry that guy called you a huge bitch before and I don't condone that kind of name-calling. But I have a humorless explanation that involves the video not uploading correctly, and me needing to close the tab on my write-up in progress and opening the last auto-saved draft, which apparently happened while I was in the middle of typing the word "enriching" or whatever I was writing. Please forgive me for that, and the swearing

Some tidbits I remember about this Frankenhole: I remember Dino or someone talking about how some black members of the animation staff walked off the show because they felt it was racist (all the famous black men advising Jefferson to treat women like shit) and that they last-minute added the bit where Obama and Wilt Chamberlain disapprove of the song to make it seem less bad. Tidbit #2: I liked that Jefferson's voice was inexplicably a Don Adams impression

LOL, I don't think they were wrong to feel that way! That song was probably the bit that worked the least for me, but it was bouncy enough to keep me smiling. Also I am racist :(

I worked on the shooting of the Dino's Dungeon segments and he freaks everyone out at wrap when he hopped back into the coffin and said "im going to bed everyone" which got a good laugh but he proceed to shift his body so hard in there that he knocked the coffin off it's stand and shattered it into a thousand pieces. He was badly cut up after that and I never worked with him again. Hope he's doing well though.

I think he likes getting hurt so he probably had fun doing that. Did you notice a stiffy

Yah i gotta agree with you on the Frakenhole visuals. Not very good. Looks like paper craft. Not real.

It bothers me more often than not, but I guess I like that they did something unique. The main guy looks kinda good. I don't like the creases, they drive me bananas

I know Looney Tunes doesn't have too much of a purchase on it's blog because it's not original content but with Bugs Bunny 85th anniversary coming up have you considered doing anything special for it? Like maybe an Ephemera Corner or a brief shoutout to the guy who practically invented irreverence in cartoons? Am I off base here?

I do actually believe that it's almost TOO harmonious that early Adult Swim sorta feeds directly from all the early stuff that happened to be in the Turner cartoon library at the time it started (Looney Tunes, Tex Avery MGM stuff, Popeye, Hanna Barbera etc.). Even the 15-minute timeslot is hearkening back to the original one-reel format of those toons. Three cheers for Bugs Bundy and his famous cartoons!

#adultswim2021 #adult swim #childrens hospital

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popculturebuffet · 3 months ago

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Next for Adult Swim, we are in the 2011-12 era, favorite character from: Eagleheart, Soul Quest Overdrive, China IL, NTSF:SD:SUV::, The Heart She Holler, The Eric Andre Show (which was inspired by the Space Ghost Coast to Coast show that started it all), Loiter Squad, The Restless Bell, and You're Whole? Notably, even more live action shows frequently in this set.

Skipping Black Dynamite since we covered that in the Cartoon Network Studios miscellaneous ask.

DYNAMITE, DYNAMITE... it's a reflex at this point. And yeah this was the era I mostly bowed out though transitoning to stremaing towards the end back before adult swim did next day helped. This also helps as a distraction during well.. you know. There's two standouts here, but being an adult animation fan there wasnt' much to chew on. I haven't seen SouL Quest Overdrive, The Restless Bell, and You're Whole?

Eagleheart: I love chris elliot but this... never clicked for me. Just not for me at all. Not terrible but not something I super cared about China IL: Frank. It used to be the Mayor but for obvious reasons that happened just after the show finished production, it's hard to like a character voiced by Hulk Hogan. But after some soul searching I raelized Frank is close.. .he CAN be annoying.. but he also gets some of the shows best moments. His trying to avoid "Debtor's Jail", his addiction to quickenings, and of course the best moment in the shows history

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China IL is a solid show and one I geninely like. It's not a faviorite of mine, but it has a great cast and despite being off the wall and random it has maybe one bit tha'ts mildy transphobic. Which for a show made in the early 2010's is impressive. The core four are mostly nicely fleshed out, the show has plenty of fantastic gags, see above, and Neely had this nice weirdly personal style, something all the best adult swim shows have. The networks at it's best when it feels like a home for weird as shit creatives, and this is a solid example of that. Not one of my all time faviorites, but one I still love.

NTSF:SD:SUV:: I haven't watched a ton of this one, but I did like it. While I haven't seen 24 and probably never will, I do fucking love Paul Scheer. Anytime. So I will watch most things with Paul Scheer and i'm glad he got this spinoff. Didn't watch a ton but man deserves more leading roles. As does his wife June Diane Rapheal.

The Heart She Holler: I tried to get into this one but just.. could not. A made up soap opera with some dark undertones seems like it might work for me but it did not.

The Eric Andre Show:

IT'S THE ERIC ANDRE SHOW

I had to. So yeah while I haven't refrenced this one nearly as much as i'd like, this is one of my faviorite adult swim shows. I have fond memoreis of binge watching it with my good buddy mars. Faviorite is Hannibal, though eric is a close second (Options are limited). Eric Andre was indeed inspired by Space Ghost and takes the basic concept, an egotistical moron who knows nothing and asks weird questions to uncomfortable guests, and has it drop some acid and smoke some crack. The result is a wonderful waking nightmare. Eric puts his guests through hell, himself through hell and hannibal.. just kinda stands there and does what he wants till he quits, just clone him. It's hard not to love eric's weird shit. You never know what to expect in the best way possible as while many a comedican has tried to make screaming random nonsense funny, Eric Andre has the creatvity and joke execution to pull it off. He's a pranking master and tries to push his guests as far as they can go... sometimes bearly getting beat up (or possibly entirely getting beat up). As a result we get comedy gold like Eric spinning a wheel for what's implied to be hours while an exausted sinbad eventuallys tops it himself "I'll do it i'll move ot north korea", a bear being interviwed with eric slowly realizing how dangerous this bit is in real time and of course

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Erik dosen't remotely try to make sense, yet makes just enough in how the jokes are excuted to be a genius. He's also willing to give as good as he gets, getting himself arrested at least once, going under radical body transformations for each season and likely hurting himself more than once. The man is a lunatic, and god bless him for it. The result is comedy gold, pure madness and one of adult swims best.

Loiter Squad: Adult swims other early 2010's prank show and one I didn't like nearly as much. Probably not bad, the timing was just off. I found eric andre years into his nonsense.

#the eric andre show #loiter squad #the heart she holler #ntsf #china il #eagleheart

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