#starbox and Cindy

[cartoonbudartz]

Happy 30th anniversary to one of the greatest cartoons of the 90s! Here’s hoping animanaics will one day grace our screens again.

[galactic-glamour-girl-posts]

Oh hey, Season 3's soundtrack is out!

It's on Spotify, YouTube, and other platforms so give it a listen if you're interested!

[callmerobinnn]

I fucking laughed so hard that i cried when watching him

[popculturebuffet]

Next up for Warner Bros Animation, favorite character from the 2019-21 era (which was also the point when they start pivoting to streaming and put most of their shows on streaming at that point, notable Max): DC Super Hero Girls 2019, Scooby Doo and Guess Who, Green Eggs and Ham 2019, Harley Quinn, ThunderCats Roar (currently the last show they produced for Cartoon Network, the rest either being on Adult Swim or premiering on Max first before CN reruns them), Looney Tunes Cartoons, Animaniacs 2020, Tom & Jerry in New York, and Jellystone?

Okay so we can take out Harley Quinn (I know suprising coming from me being a fan of both venture bros and dc comics), Thundercats Roar, Looney Tunes Cartoons and Tom and Jerry in New York (Again suprising coming from me but neither looked all that intresting.. through the day the earth blew up looks dope)

Dc Super Hero Girls: Diana, being enthusastic, adorable yet still herself. It helps they adapted her adopted mom in all but name Julia from the comics. The show itself is.. okay. I love the animation style, ti's vibrant and intresting and the main cast is likeable, Lauren Faust has a knack for that and picking a faviorite was indeed hard, revamping the characters as both more humorous but still layred and essentially following up Lauren Faust's shorts for DC Nation. And while I haven't seen the episode they did adapt my boy ted kord well. It's a nice female focused adaptation without feeling pandering for the most part. It lets our heroines be throughly huamn and throughly hilarous while also kicking plenty of ass.

That said there's that most part: some characters are made into just plain assholes. It works for Hal Jordan as Hal has some toxic masculinity in him, but you also get Clark being a bit of a showoff and Dick Grayson being a giant spoiled prick. I'm not askign for dickbabs, this series isn't about romance and Babs has romantic tension with harely instead in this continuity. We're good. But being a fan of dicks you don't have to make him the world's biggest asshole and even jason or damien wouldn't of really fit the snotty brat they try to make robin into. I haven't seen harely but it seems like they already did the robin as a brat thing better with damien. I"m also annoyed at wasting the rest of the titans. But that's a me thing and I get it if ti dosen't bother everyone. The show on the whole was solid, is something I hope streams again so I can give a second chance.

Scooby Doo and Guess Who: Morgan Freeman, who narrates his whole episode. The Last scooby doo series till last year and the last traditional one for now as both Velma and GoGo Mystery Machine! take diffrent routes. (The latter is just in concept art and announcment at the time of this but an anime take on scooby and shaggy riding with a new gag in japan isn't same as it ever was. It is awesome)

Guess Who is decent, keeping the wackiness from Be Cool, including Axl Rose being indiana jones, Billy Dee Willams running a cool school, the gang's own voice actors guest starring and of course as @jess-the-vampire likes to bring up Christan Slater being the monster to try and hook up with his high school crush in a musical episode. It's a fun series that can be forgetable bu thas more than enough good guest spots to be great. It's a bit of a step down from the last two, but still not bad at all. Though I do resent it trying to make hold the phone Fred's catchphrase. He used it a few times in other series but it's never going to be a thing fredrick!

Green Eggs and Ham: I revewied a few episodes of this and it was.. fine. The series just didn't do it for me as it felt like it was siding too hard against guy. It was still decent and i'm glad it got two seasons.

Animaniacs 2020: I talked about this before, and looks like I will again. Faviorites wise it's easily Starbox and Cindy, which not only has a great theme song, but is also a better version of buttons nad mindy, as Starbox gets abused a lot.. but is also trying to conquer earth, so a little girl blathering to him and putting him through stuff ifnnocently fits better than with Mindy's terrible mom or Elmyra from the sister show.

The show itself is.. fine. The problem is a lack of variety. The bulk of episodes are a warners segment or two, pinky and the brain then more warners. The segments aren't bad, the warners are still fresh and while some segments fail due to trying to hard to be topical in a medium where that's really hard to pull off if you don't have south park production times (Futurama falls into this trap a lot in it's two revivials, though the current hulu era is mostly better about it), with the trump jokes feeling tired. Especially looking back on them now after he went on a rant about immigrants eating dogs and previously this year called a fictional cannibal a fine human being with the assumption he's a real person. The new segments are great, but aren't used enough and the old ones are gone for reasons that aren't clear. While they might've been waiting on reception, that's a bad move when you don't have a ton of segments. Pinky and the Brain is great, and carriede i'ts own series, but gets tiring when binging, something they simply didn't think of and hurt the show. The shows fine but it's also a reboot that I liked at first but when season 2 iddn't bother ot evolve, just couldn't stick with.

Jellystone: Jabberjaw, whose a fantastic rework and while her gimmick of chasing men could get old, it's seen as an issue in universe and not a healthy thing, to the point of bein gthe focus of a season 3 episode. The show as a whole.. is amazing. one of the best reboots and one of the proofs youc an do a good one, mashing CH Greenblat's wacky tendencies with classic hannah barbera characters. PIcking a faviorite is tough from sardonic loopy loop, to the awkard voiced by greenblaht himself boo boo to doggy daddy whose apparently lived thorugh every disney movie. The series is packed with love for hannah barbera's rich history, cameos and great voice acting. It's hilarous, wonderful and well worth your time. I still need to finish season 3 but so far it's great.

[theriverdraws]

More quotes :D, probably the last bunch? We’ll see.

Edit: NONE OF THEM WERE OUT OF ORDER YOU SAW NOTHING!!!

[speakingvariety]

ANIMANIACS (2020-2023)

– S3E05: Dog Days

[abbieabbiepinksworld]

Soooo...i'm a HUGE fan of Starbox and Cindy! They're practically one of the most underrated segments of the reboot, and i like em alot! Some people think that it should be replaced by an old cast member (Like Slappy for example) but ths segment HAS potential! I mean, it only has TWO SEGMENTS soo far, and they're getting more in s3! So, i hope y'all could hopefully help me bring Starbox and Cindy into the limelight! By whatever fanart, ask blogs, and anything else you like. Then hopefully the OG Animaniacs fans shall understand that new can be good too!

Also, P.S. the art style is VERY unique, and also very colourful and nice! And thus, i hope y'all could finally give this underrated segment some love!!

[bunny-heels]

hulu please i need another season for animaniacs because if i dont see starbox and cindy again i will degrade your HQ like lava to civilizations please please pleasd

[weirdoyakko]

Starbox and Cindy!

Underrated duo

[irlwakko]

i’m not a huge fan of the Starbox and Cindy segments but Cindy does have so much autistic girl swag

[ifbrd]

Animaniacs crack theory that I just came up with and have no intention of doing any research for to prove or debunk it:

Cindy from the Starbox and Cindy segment is Dr. Scratchansniff’s daughter.

Evidence: they both have red hair.

That’s it.

That’s all I got.

[galactic-glamour-girl-posts]

Ranking the reboot's new characters

You'll know who the top 2 are if you've seen this post, but I haven't talked about a lot of the other characters here much, so this is an opportunity for me to do that. Plus season 3 gave me more to talk about regarding some of them. This will only rank the RECRURRING characters, so no Gigi, Future Brain, Jürgen, etc.

Least Favourite - Nils

I don't dislike Nils, he's fine and gets some good lines, but why wasn't he a one off? I don't see what made him so interesting compared to other "special friends" that he just had to appear more. He's cocky, mean and...an athlete I guess? That's about it. Yet I guess the writers wanted him to be the Warners' rival? The Warners already had a guy with a heavy accent as a foil-Dr Scratchansniff. If Scratchy wasn't in the reboot I guess I'd understand Nils being a recurring character...but he is, and his relationship with the Warners is more fun and interesting. Granted, he's in way more episodes than Nils (counting both the original show and the reboot since the reboot does act as a continuation) so maybe that isn't a fair comparison, but that doesn't make it any less true.

Plus he essentially does the same thing every time-he encounters the Warners, he provokes them, hijinks ensue for varying periods of time, the Warners win. Sure characters like Mr Director and Miss Flamiel came back, but their situations changed whenever they did. Next time we see Mr Director, his career's gone down the drain. Next time we see Miss Flamiel, she has a better handle of the Warners and manages to get them to behave marginally better in class. The only thing that changes with Nils is his gimmick (athlete, soda-obsessed, warrior, etc) but not his status or relationship with the Warners.

Although I'd argue the Warners don't even need a rival-or at least not a legitimate one. The closest thing they have to a "rival" is Ralph, but that's not taken seriously since the Warners easily dupe him, and as a recurring joke that works. Their whole thing is that they are (or at least appear to be) underdogs, yet despite the fact that they are children and a lot of their foes are adults who should have power over them, they win quite easily. Characters like the Warners don't need legitimate rivals because that kills the joke. They're extremely competent so there is no competition, and that doesn't make for a good rivalry. If they played it off as a joke, like if Nils took great pride in being their self-proclaimed rival but the Warners barely remember who he is every time they bump into him before figuratively (...maybe literally...) curb stomping him nonchalantly-I think that would be funny; but as is he's just another special friend who debuted in a very good segment before becoming a kinda pointless recurring character. I don't really mind that he was barely in season 3.

Egwind

I won't lie, Egwind basically just serves the same purpose as Larry (poking fun at the idea of adding a third mouse to Pinky and the Brain)...but Larry's not in the reboot (minus a voiceless cameo), so he automatically has more of a purpose than Nils! 😁

Starbox

Starbox is what Buttons should have been.

No, seriously.

The main reason I don't like the Buttons and Mindy segments, ironically enough, is because I LIKE Buttons. He's not a bad person, he's loyal and brave for what he goes through to keep Mindy safe. However he's not anthropomorphic like a lot of the other animals on the show, so when he constantly is on the receiving end of slapstick, then gets berated at the end of the segment, often to the point of him cowering and/or whimpering...it just looks like a dog-literally just a normal dog-being abused. Which isn't funny. If Buttons was established to be horrible (like maybe establish that he only saves Mindy in the hopes of getting rewarded, otherwise he wouldn't bother, maybe even have him be mean to Mindy to get this point across) and was anthropomorphic (not constantly walking on his hind legs, since he's a pet, but have him talk and maybe walk on two legs when Mindy's parents aren't around) so he'd seem more like a cartoon dog rather than just...a dog, it would make "Buttons and Mindy" A LOT more bearable.

Starbox is an anthropomorphic alien who wants to destroy the Earth. So yeah, he sucks...which is good! When he gets hurt, it feels deserved and can actually be funny. It means "Starbox and Cindy", as a segment, can actually work. Although between him falling for that doll and possibly warming up to Cindy at the end of their last segment of season 3, it seems he might have a softer side to him.

The Incredible Gnome in People's Mouths

His shtick is berating rude people. Very loudly. Which is fine. Take away the utterly bizarre premise of his segments and you're left with something that a little derivative of the Warners' or Slappy's segments, but he's still OK.

Benedict

He's dramatic!

...

Yeah that's about it really. Fun character, probably would've been higher if he was in season 3.

Cora/Flora Dora

I like that Cora was portrayed sympathetically towards the end of "My Super Sour Sixteen" and that she brought out Dot's more empathetic side. I know some people probably didn't expect her to make amends with the Warners at the end, given they usually just beat their "special friends" and that's the end of that, but remember the majority of the Warners' "special friends" are not other children. Cora was acting bratty, but she's a teenager meaning she still has some growing up to do. She's not gonna have the same level of maturity as an adult. The rest of the Warners' antagonists are fully grown adults. Sure, no one's perfect, but adults should know better than to act purposefully cruel, especially towards children. So to treat Cora as harshly as the rest of the Warners' antagonists wouldn't have been fair. Unfortunately she is kind of an example of the "angry Latina" stereotype for most of her screen time in her debut segment. I'm sure it wasn't intentional, but it's still unfortunate. Thankfully she's not portrayed like that in "23 and WB". She acts more disinterested than she does angry, which is a good change of pace for her character, and given the events of "My Super Sour Sixteen" it makes sense she'd try to act less bratty. Like Benedict, I wish she was in season 3.

I liked Flora Dora's bond with the Warners and even her bond with Ralph. She really does seem to value her family, even if she's more than willing to pit them against each other in competitions. I guess that's just her way of pushing them to be the best they can be? Hence Nora's phrase "It's the Norita way." Also it's just nice to see a member of Nora's family who DOESN'T have anger issues (I can't tell if Nora's sisters do given their lack of screen time, but they seemed mean). She doesn't do too much after she restores the status quo in "Season 3 and WB", so I decided to just put her and Cora in same rank. Cora's more developed as a character but Flora Dora doesn't fall under a harmful stereotype, so it balances out...I think.

Cindy

Cindy is very imaginative, and often just seems lost in her own thoughts. Hearing Cindy's constant rambling about random stuff in the background makes for a pretty funny running gag. Apparently a lot of her lines are improvised, and yeah that's not too surprising, it feels like she says any random thought the instant it pops into her head. She's also playful, cheerful, a self proclaimed "monster" (again, she's imaginative), and even though she tends to be careless, for whatever reason is really attached to Starbox.

So to recap she has a more than one personality trait, an adequate amount of screen time, has a reason to exist in the show, and doesn't fall under any harmful stereotypes (as far as I'm aware of), so...third place. Good for her.

Julia

In her debut episode, Julia was depicted as somewhat placid, thoughtful, outspoken and always willing to give a helping hand. One thing she wasn't was submissive-she was more than willing to go against' Brain's plans and call him out if she felt what he was doing was wrong. Brain, being Brain, didn't appreciate this, and had already installed an obedience chip her brain so he could mind control her. However, because of her resistance to its affects, Brain turned up the settings of the device too high, causing it to malfunction and seemingly fry Julia's brain, but she did break free Brain's control.

The next time we see her in “Reichenbrain Falls”, she's become an over-enthusiastic, crazy genius out for revenge. She was hilarious in that segment, but I still kinda wish she had a more nuanced portrayal than someone who's interested in organ harvesting and beats animals now, considering she is basically a trauma survivor. But I guess those things could just be attributed to her Kentucky Fried brain. Personally I like to believe that she wants to take over the world not necessarily because she’s hungry for power, but more because of sunk-cost fallacy (she was really close to succeeding before Brain tried to mind-control her, plus her exact words were “…because I deserve to rule the world!”). It would also be the perfect way to get revenge on Brain...aside from outright killing him, which she also plans to do. Fair enough.

I really like Julia! She's really funny and I can't help but root for her, what Brain did to her was wrong. Her leitmotif is an inverted version of the Pinky and the Brain theme song, which is a neat little detail. Her voice constantly switches from calm and collected, to giddy with energetic glee, to utterly enraged; it gives a good picture of her mental state. She’s kind of like Brain and Pinky combined, she has Brain’s intelligence and Pinky’s insanity. Julia breaks the formula the Pinky and the Brain. Despite starting out as Brain's ally she wasn't co-dependent like Pinky, unlike people who Brain had tried to hypnotize before she breaks free from his mind control on her own and not due to some external force or by being lucky enough to avoid it completely, and she serves as a lasting consequence of Brain being a control freak. Whatever him and Pinky get up to is usually swept under the rug by the end of an episode as they return to the lab for tomorrow night, but not this time.

She also seems to have a consistent interest in literature, given that she mentions getting into arguments on Goodreads and getting into the Iowa Writers' Workshop; even her computer program counterpart was working on a book proposal and planned to write about how well she's doing in a holiday card. So I guess her and Brain's...I'll go with "rivalry" is basically STEM vs Humanities lol.

Julia's a wonderful addition to the cast and one of the best things to come out of the reboot. I'm not at all surprised that she's become a popular character.

Favourite - Nora

Yep, my favourite's still Nora. Julia's great, but Nora has the advantage of being in more than just 3 episodes and not having an incomplete storyline.

Nora was established to be condescending, stern, and selfish. She was no-nonsense whereas the Warners always mess about, so she was like a foil to them. She also seems to care a lot about her physical appearance and health, given that she's seen exercising a lot. Now I liked her personality in season 1 but she didn't have much screen time, which was a problem because she was essentially Plotz's replacement, but he was a much more proactive antagonist who actively tried to control the Warners (demanding that Scratchansniff "de-zanitise" them, hiring a teacher for them, selling them to other studios, etc). Nora, on the other hand, didn't want anything to do with the Warners and would get them away from her as soon as possible. I'm glad she was never a carbon-copy of Plotz, but if she was gonna replace the person who was essentially the show's main antagonist, you'd think she'd act like she was the main antagonist. In season 1 she doesn't really...do anything. She's mostly just seen either exercising in her office or briefly being dismissive of her employees' needs.

Season 2 gave her more screen time and fleshed out her character, and that's great! We learn that she overcompensates for her lack of parenting skills by buying her daughter whatever she wants, and we find out her upbringing is why she's so competitive (side note you think Nora having a bad relationship with her two siblings was meant to serve as a contrast between her and the Warners? Again adding to the whole foil thing). But she also became angrier and more violent, which in hindsight I think was kind of a poor decision because, like Cora, it sorta seemed like she became the "angry Latina" stereotype at times. Yeah her freak out in "WhoDonut" did indicate she was secretly pretty crazy herself, so it's not like her having crazed outbursts came completely out of nowhere, but when this kind of thing is done with Latina characters all the time (not this show specifically, in all sorts of media) it eventually gets a little irksome.

Thankfully in season 3 they toned down her temper. It's still there, but less exaggerated most of the time. On top of that, she's actually acting like a proactive antagonist now, not just in "Season 3 and WB", but with her exploitation of Gigi, making her employees work on the day before Christmas, etc. She fulfils the role Plotz did but in a way where she's not just copying Plotz. She's a lot more competent and manipulative. Her knowing all the Warners' tricks in "Season 3 and WB" makes sense. Not only is she the CEO, she's been established to be a perfectionist, it's not surprising she'd have seen most of what Warner Bros. had to offer, and therefore could predict the outcome of their gags. They nailed it with Nora's characterization in season 3, which makes me all the more hopeful this isn't the last we see of her.

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Overall, I think the new characters introduced were pretty solid! Nora and Julia are some of my favourite Animaniacs characters in general, and even the worst ones are at least a little fun. I genuinely hope that if we get new Animaniacs content at some point in the future that at least some of them are included.

[rgbyshipper101]

From Warner Press Conference:

Drink too much coffee

-So I guess they become hyper and act like little kids? Maybe cause havoc. Ok.

Ruin a Sweet Sixteen

-Who’s? Katie Kabooms? (lol) Maybe a brat? An entitled kid? Ok.

Oliver Twist parody

-Never seen (read) Oliver Twist but based on the summary that sounds interesting. Maybe reusing the Little Orphan Warner concept movie that was originally about Oliver Twist. Sweet!

Maybe they’re doing the other movies as well?

Dot song

-Better be good. And educational. How about a Wakko song? Or all three?

From Season 2 Summary:

Pop Culture parodies

-I imagine this is sprinkled throughout. Maybe the Kardashians or something. Technology maybe. Better not make the kids obsessed.

Musical Showstoppers

-Yes

Takedowns of historical baddies

-Christopher Columbus is definitely one of them. It’s plural so there’s more than just him. Nice.

Important Safety Tips

-You remember the mini segments such as “Good Idea, Bad Idea?” That’s what this is I believe. I hope they’re great but mixed with a little comedy. Ok.

Warner Bros lot

-Maybe a Scratchy session (please). Or Nora Rita Norita or Ralph? Water tower shenanigans?

International Beauty Pageant

-Maybe Dot can show how bad they really are for kids. This can be a really good episode.

Outer Space

-This sounds like a PaTB episode. So if anything I hope that when it ends it ends well. Sometimes the ending just stopped or Brain gave up. As for the Warners, hm. Not sure. Kinda hope it’s not another Star Wars/Trek parody. Maybe the Golden Record can make an appearance. “Independence Day?”

Starbox and Cindy

-I actually liked their short. It’s my favorite of the three new ones. If you don’t think of PEaTB, then it’s a good concept (although I do love Elmyra). Remember Mindy and The Brain?

Rejected Animaniacs characters

-This can be 1993 or 2020. I said this in a previous post. But I’ll still put my thoughts here. They can play around with old concepts. It’s a variety show, after all. The Warners dealing with their prototypes sound fun, though. Doubt it but yeah. They’re already tinted yellow.

Edit: There’s gonna be Yakko songs and Pinky and The Brain moments. Sweet!

Maybe do Wakko as well?

[spockvarietyhour]

Starbox and Cindy

[whoiskasey]

Some more Animaniacs stuff- my favorite off-core short is Starbox and Cindy, and I was lucky to help develop the colors for the characters! I was given the direction "soft colored lines" and ran with that. These are my initial options vs the finals!

[thedreammweaver]

Looked up starbox and Cindy on here cause I enjoy it so much only to find out everyone hates it???!