Newscaster on TV-“In other news it seems the mad scientist, Dr. Strango, is back at it again with another crazy scheme. It seems this time he broke into NorthEastern High School to steal various chemicals from the school’s chem lab. Dr. Strango is a self proclaimed mad scientist that has committed minor crimes with his highly advanced technology all throughout the United States. These crimes are usually of the petty type ranging from bank robbery to stealing from Walmart. This time he’s targeted our town of Greenburg. His motive for why he snuck into the school are still unknown. This is his last mugshot...
Evan turned off the TV. No doubt about it, that was the man who attacked him. It looked just him. Evan tried to convince himself that it was still a dream, and this is simply coincidence. But the more he tried to convince himself, the more ridiculous his theory sounded. But what about the light? That was too crazy to be real. More importantly, if it wasn’t a dream, Dr. Strango had seen his face. What if he comes after him? He decided he didn’t want to waste his night worrying, and so pulled out his laptop and began a review.
(END)
"The show where the bad guys win and the good guys suffer....just like the poor saps that sat through this garbage."
Show-Allen Gregory
Episode Title-Pilot
Air Date-October 30th 2011
Season 1
Episode 1
Hello my name is Evan A.K.A. The Animated Critic. Fox animation is pretty hit or miss in my opinion. There's some good stuff in there. King of the Hill, The good Simpsons episodes, etc. Then there's stuff like the recent Family Guy episodes and probably the worst thing this company has ever put out. Allen Gregory. If you have heard of this show it's probably due to the negative reception that its gotten. If you haven't well then there's a good reason for that. It only lasted 7 episodes and quickly became one of the most critically panned cartoons on a mainstream network. The story of Allen Gregory begins with Jonah Hill, famous actor and comedian. Funny guy right?
Well, maybe that explains this show. All one sick joke.
He created it along with Andrew Mogel and Jarrad Paul. Why did they create this abomination? Don't know. The three seem to never want to talk about it. Fox doesn't really seem to want to talk about it much either. They've completely removed it from most streaming services. It's to the point where Allen Gregory is more or less like a bygone legend.
A crappy legend, that no one wants to remember.
Anyway today we're reviewing the pilot which was good enough for Fox to pick it up for one 7 episode season. After said 7 episodes aired, the show got axed. So while we watch today's episode lets try to see why Fox thought this show would be a good idea, and also maybe get an idea for why it failed so hard. Let's dig into the Allen Gregory Pilot and solve the mystery to this legend.
The episode starts off at a penthouse.
There, a celebration is being held. We see a party of sorts going on and meet Richard and Butt-monkey I mean Jeremy.
......
Nah, I meant Butt-monkey. His only purpose in this series is to be insulted, made fun of, and humiliated. Even though he did nothing to deserve that. We're just watching some poor sap get beaten on. Hey, cartoon writers, here's a tip. People generally don't like it when good guys get beaten on. It's something most of us don't really like seeing. So why would we laugh at it? If it was minor stuff that happened inconsistently then that's one thing, but it happens every time he's on screen. Listen, I don't want to sound like I'm against mean spirited humor, but this isn't how it's done. There's nothing remotely funny or creative with how they handle this butt-monkey compared to all the other ones that have ever existed in the world of animation. The two introduce their recently adopted daughter, Julie. She's also a butt-monkey.
Everything I said about Jeremy can apply to Julie as well. They're purpose is literally the same. To be punching bags. Once again, no creativity or thought was put into this character. In fact it should be a testament to the laziness of this production that they pretty much created the same "character" twice. To be fair though, Julie unlike Jeremy, does get some pretty funny comebacks in there. So I can enjoy her presence occasionally. Doesn't excuse the fact that she's a lazily made punching bag, but whatever.
And now it's time to meet the man of the hour. The whole reason this party is being celebrated. The whole reason this show also got the ax. Allen Fricking Gregory. Possibly the douchiest character ever put to animation.
Possibly the second douchiest character ever put to animation. God I HATE SCHOOL DAYS. It'll have it's time though. Soon.
Anyway let's meet the little twerp.
So he apparently won the Tony Award. He thanks the audience, but not before beating up the punching bag. Sorry should've specified seeing as how this show got too lazy to make unique characters and so stuck to recycling archetypes. I'm talking about Julie. He tells Julie to go to the back of the crowd, and straight up insults her to the entire crowd of people. Calling her the worst. Isn't it funny seeing douchebags beat up on the actual good guys. It's even more funny when you realize Allen Gregory is not supposed to be a villain and we're supposed to root for him and like him throughout this entire series. It gets even funnier though when you realize you haven't even known this man for more than three minutes and you already hate him. I did the math. Every episode of this show is about 24 minutes. Times 7, for the number of episodes this show has, is 168 minutes. Divided by 60 and we have 2.8 hours. That's almost 3 hours we have to deal with this stain on the face of the earth. I usually like children, but here's Allen Gregory's gimmick. He may be 7, but he speaks and acts like an adult. An adult that doesn't have any manners and treats everyone else like dirt, but an adult nonetheless. They say he's mature, but he's anything but. He's just a jerk.
After Allen's speech Richard and Jeremy tell him that he can no longer be home schooled as Jeremy is getting a job. Richard claims it's because he feels useless. Which Jeremy probably feels that way because just 5 minutes ago Richard literally called him useless in front of the whole crowd. However despite Richard's persistence that Jeremy feels useless it's heavily implied that it's because of financial troubles.
Because of this Allen Gregory has to go to a public school. God forbid. They also drop the news that Allen didn't actually win the Tony Award as apparently they don't give awards to plays put on in their living room, which to be fair is a funny joke. I wish there were more jokes like that. You see I feel Allen Gregory should be more like a 7 year old, but he has a very basic understanding of adult issues and adult things. A very limited understanding that only a naive 7 year old could have. But no, they go for the full on adult in a seven year old's body thing. Honestly I feel like having him still act and think like a 7 year old would be way more fun and enjoyable than this pile of crap that was handed to us.
Anyway if Allen didn't win then why did they bring a crowd there? Well they actually explain it by saying that they thought Allen wouldn't freak out in front of a crowd.
They were wrong.
Anyway that night Allen comes into Richard and Jeremy's room apologizing for the freakout. He claims Julie being alive affected him a lot more than he thought. Get it, the joke is he's beating on the punching bag. Hope you like that joke, because they tell it at least 100 times.....per episode.
Allen asks if Richard thinks the new kids will like him, in a vain attempt to establish some humility and likeability in him even though that's all thrown out the window at this point. Richard and Jeremy both say yes. Allen thanks Richard and then beats up on the other Buttmonkey in his life, Jeremy, because the joke isn't tired yet despite the fact they've used it at least 5 times in the span of less than 7 minutes.
So, the first day of school. A scary prospect for any kid. One that I can personally relate to. It should be an easy way to make Allen a bit more relateable.
So, how do they screw it up?
Well we start off by meeting Julie's two reject friends.
These two are funny enough, I guess.
Anyway enter Allen Gregory.
He enters his class room with teacher Gina Winthrope....and immediately begins acting like a douche. You know, I say that word too much. Maybe I should read a thesaurus. Anyway he completely disrespects the teacher, who definitely doesn't get paid enough to put with this crap, by insisting to call her by her first name and claiming their on the same level authority wise.
Bro, you're seven. Get your head out oF YOUR AS.....
He literally goes in front of of the entire school and apologizes for crapping his pants, and it seems to work despite the face that Bully and his entourage clearly saw Allen but whatever.
He created it along with Andrew Mogel and Jarrad Paul. Why did they create this abomination? Don't know. The three seem to never want to talk about it. Fox doesn't really seem to want to talk about it much either. They've completely removed it from most streaming services. It's to the point where Allen Gregory is more or less like a bygone legend.
A crappy legend, that no one wants to remember.
Anyway today we're reviewing the pilot which was good enough for Fox to pick it up for one 7 episode season. After said 7 episodes aired, the show got axed. So while we watch today's episode lets try to see why Fox thought this show would be a good idea, and also maybe get an idea for why it failed so hard. Let's dig into the Allen Gregory Pilot and solve the mystery to this legend.
The episode starts off at a penthouse.
......
Nah, I meant Butt-monkey. His only purpose in this series is to be insulted, made fun of, and humiliated. Even though he did nothing to deserve that. We're just watching some poor sap get beaten on. Hey, cartoon writers, here's a tip. People generally don't like it when good guys get beaten on. It's something most of us don't really like seeing. So why would we laugh at it? If it was minor stuff that happened inconsistently then that's one thing, but it happens every time he's on screen. Listen, I don't want to sound like I'm against mean spirited humor, but this isn't how it's done. There's nothing remotely funny or creative with how they handle this butt-monkey compared to all the other ones that have ever existed in the world of animation. The two introduce their recently adopted daughter, Julie. She's also a butt-monkey.
And now it's time to meet the man of the hour. The whole reason this party is being celebrated. The whole reason this show also got the ax. Allen Fricking Gregory. Possibly the douchiest character ever put to animation.
Possibly the second douchiest character ever put to animation. God I HATE SCHOOL DAYS. It'll have it's time though. Soon.
Anyway let's meet the little twerp.
After Allen's speech Richard and Jeremy tell him that he can no longer be home schooled as Jeremy is getting a job. Richard claims it's because he feels useless. Which Jeremy probably feels that way because just 5 minutes ago Richard literally called him useless in front of the whole crowd. However despite Richard's persistence that Jeremy feels useless it's heavily implied that it's because of financial troubles.
Anyway if Allen didn't win then why did they bring a crowd there? Well they actually explain it by saying that they thought Allen wouldn't freak out in front of a crowd.
Anyway that night Allen comes into Richard and Jeremy's room apologizing for the freakout. He claims Julie being alive affected him a lot more than he thought. Get it, the joke is he's beating on the punching bag. Hope you like that joke, because they tell it at least 100 times.....per episode.
Allen asks if Richard thinks the new kids will like him, in a vain attempt to establish some humility and likeability in him even though that's all thrown out the window at this point. Richard and Jeremy both say yes. Allen thanks Richard and then beats up on the other Buttmonkey in his life, Jeremy, because the joke isn't tired yet despite the fact they've used it at least 5 times in the span of less than 7 minutes.
So, the first day of school. A scary prospect for any kid. One that I can personally relate to. It should be an easy way to make Allen a bit more relateable.
So, how do they screw it up?
Well we start off by meeting Julie's two reject friends.
Anyway enter Allen Gregory.
He enters his class room with teacher Gina Winthrope....and immediately begins acting like a douche. You know, I say that word too much. Maybe I should read a thesaurus. Anyway he completely disrespects the teacher, who definitely doesn't get paid enough to put with this crap, by insisting to call her by her first name and claiming their on the same level authority wise.
Bro, you're seven. Get your head out oF YOUR AS.....
My apologies.
???-“You sound mad.”
Evan-“Why wouldn’t I....wait, who are you?”
???-“My name is Kevin.”
Evan-“Ok, Kevin, forgive me but I kinda need you to screw off right now.”
Kevin-“You could’ve at least said please.”
Evan-“Please screw off right now!”
Kevin-“Ok, sorry to bug you. Geez.”
Ok, don’t know what that was about. I apologize. Back to the crap.
So it's now lunch time for Allen. We meet Patrick.
He's like Patrick from SpongeBob only less funny. And yes, that includes Seasons 4-8 Patrick as well. Patrick asks if Allen wants to eat lunch. Allen tries to tell him if he wants to eat lunch with him he has to say he wants to schedule a lunch. Just to make him feel like a big man. Patrick doesn't do this though, and the joke drags on and on. For far too long. I understand filling in 24 minutes worth of content is hard, especially for an episode without some sort of B-Plot, but could you try to make it a little less obvious you stretched this part out for time. We meet the cliche bully who's so cliche I forgot his name. Not that it's keeping me up at night or anything. I feel like his clicheness was supposed to be played out as a joke, but they just weren't able to fully convince me that is the case. Considering how lazy the rest of this toon is would you be mad at me for thinking this is just another lazily thrown together archetype?
Also his voice actor's delivery bothers me. This show constantly resorts to having it's characters go into this half whisper kind of thing when delivering jokes. It's a funny delivery at first, but it gets old fast. This goes on through out the entirety of all 7 episode, and THIS pillock (thanks Thesaurus) is the worst offender of that. So the kids are not very fond of Allen's "matureness" and so make fun of him for it. Allen tries to act like he doesn't care, even though it's clear he does. Again, another vain attempt to make us like him. Don't get me wrong, I'm trying but it's so god dang hard with how unfunny and mean he can be. He's a real...um...a real....crap! Thesaurus!?
........
Mother Scratcher?
What the heck does that mean?
Should've figured.
Anyway Allen tries to enjoy his normal 7 year old lunch of sushi and alcohol.
When Ms. Winthrope pulls him into the principal's office. And here's the worst part of this entire episode. You may think it's been pretty harmless so far, but I assure you this here is awful.
We start with a butt shot.
Because Anime....wait a minute.
And then we see the owner of that booty.
Allen looks at it like he's gonna claim it for himself.
 |
| "I don't like where this is going." |
Allen then begins to have fantasies about the principal.
What.....what the f*** is wrong with you? This is the type of sick joke you and your friends would tell like once then immediately regret afterwards (well, except for that one sicko in your friend group that thrives off your pain), but not a joke that you should put on TV FOR MILLIONS OF PEOPLE TO "ENJOY."
Listen, I'm all for freedom of speech. I'm not saying they're wrong for writing this or putting it on TV. Especially since it's clear it's just a joke. Doesn't make it any more enjoyable or funny though. Why would you do this? As if this wasn't bad enough the next episode of this show is about Allen Gregory claiming he made a Sex Tape with this 70 something year old principal. Oh boy. Allen flirts *Gag*...excuse me. Flirts *Gag*....I can't do this. It's too much.
Kevin-"Don't give up now. The fans are expecting you to finish this review."
Evan-"WILL YOU STOP BUGGING ME!"
But he's rights. *Inhale* If this is what I want to do with my life I have to get through this. So Allen flirts with the principal, Mrs. Gottlieb, and she understandably gets upset. So she yells at Allen.
Who proceeds to crap himself.
Yep. We've reached that level of humor.
Shout out to the 5 year olds who found that joke funny.
Allen walks out in shame past the cliche bully squad from earlier.
Allen leaves and tells Patrick he's never coming back. He runs and gives this close friend he's only known for 10 minutes a hug and walks away.
We cut to the penthouse when Allen Gregory comes running in, bawling. Richard and Jeremy come in to comfort him. Guess where this is going. Yep, more Jeremy is a butt-monkey jokes. Those haven't outstayed their welcome yet. Allen explains the situation (and yes Richard is totally cool with the fact that his 7 year old son is hitting on a 60-70 year old.). Richard decides he'll fix the issue.
Enter Julie.
Julie convinces him to go back by feeding into his ego. She tells him the school needs him. Imagine if Julie didn't do this. I wouldn't have 6 more episodes of this garbage to deal with. I'm starting to see why people hate her now. Anyway it is sweet how she lies to Allen to make him feel better. I'm really glad they decided to just have a sweet moment here. You know it's perfectly Ok to take a break from the jokes just to have a nice moment, and here's a good example of that. I'm really glad they end this scene nicely instead of forcing in another joke about how Julie sucks except wait, because that doesn't happen and we get treated to more Allen Douchery.
We cut to Richard talking to the superintendent of the school about the situation. The superintendent tries to suck up to them due to their social and financial status. Even going as far as to say that if Gottlieb and Allen want to be in a relationship he'll look pass it. Gottlieb is not amused. Neither am I. So even after the pep talking and being told that everything got smoothed out with Gottlieb, Allen decides he still doesn't want to go to school. And because Richard isn't a good authoritative father he doesn't force anything on Allen and walks away. Instead Jeremy decides to have a talk with him.
Allen initially acts douchey, but Jeremy tells him the story about how he met his father. And you probably want to sit down for this one. Cause oh boy is it a story. So he was a rather fine middle class straight man working some unknown rather fine middle class straight job. He had a wife, kids and everything. Eventually Richard came in as a client, and kept hitting on Jeremy. No matter what, Richard was persistent. It didn't matter that Jeremy was straight, had a family, or even the fact that he filed restraining orders. So he was pretty much forced into this relationship he didn't want to be apart of, because everything in a butt-monkey's life has to be awful and terrible. No breaks. If we actually had him love Richard, like normal people, that might give him a break. So instead let's take him from his beloved family, I'm sure the audience will love that. After all people just find it so funny whenever the BAD GUY wins. And just to have one extra kick in the balls, this is the closest the show comes to having a sincere moment. This scene right here.
Oh crap. What am I doing.
Anyway, I don't know how that story helps, but it does. Maybe the lesson is if you can't make friends....kidnap them instead? Take them away from everything they ever loved? Crap if I know.
So Allen thanks Jeremy, and decides to return to school the next day.
You could've just had one nice moment. Just one.
Sorry. That night he breaks into Patrick's house to announce he's returning.
No doubt getting the only person who likes him in trouble. Not to mention breaking a valuable window in the process. So we see Allen return the next day. Everyone stares at him as he walks down the hall. The bullies come up and ask about that little accident he had yesterday. However Allen has a cover up.
Make the superintendent take blame for it.
In all fairness it is kinda funny how far he's willing to go to suck up to Richard.He literally goes in front of of the entire school and apologizes for crapping his pants, and it seems to work despite the face that Bully and his entourage clearly saw Allen but whatever.
And so our episode ends with Allen going up to Gottlieb.
He says they can make this work...even though "this" doesn't exist, and begins to slowly rub his hand across her face.
If you excuse me.....
This episode sucks. It's animation is hideous, everything about it is just lazy, and the characters are so unlikable. Specifically Allen Gregory. If they just wanted to tell some jokes with the douchebaggary of Allen then that's one thing. It still wouldn't be funny, but atleast I wouldn't feel like you're trying to make me like him. Except they don't do that. They try to make you like this...this....tosser (Once again, thanks thesaurus). And you just can't because he treats everything and everyone as less than dirt. It may not be too bad now, but it gets real irritating as the series progresses.
So why did Fox pick this show up? Well sometimes people make mistakes.
But besides that it does do a good job showing the basic concept of the show, and it does leave enough room for potential development for Allen Gregory from this monster to a more likeable person. Which I think is what they wanted to do if they were allowed more episodes. They just didn't start fast enough. And still, if you want us to sit through a character developing we have to like that character right off the bat. We got to like them enough to acknowledge their flaws, and still root for them to become a better person. Allen is just too much of a jerk to get behind though. I don't want see this kid's face for another 5 minutes no matter how good you were planning on developing him. Even then, the jokes are still weak and it's just no fun to sit through, which is the biggest crime of them all. There's like 3 good jokes in this "comedy" show episode.
Weak. Very weak.
Well that does it for now. Thanks for reading and I'll see you all next time. Peace.
Next Animated Critic-License to Milkshake (SpongeBob)
Next Evan Vs. Disney-Pinocchio
Next Anime Experience-Sweetness and Lightning
Chairman #1-“Mayor, the townsfolk are all in worry about what Dr. Strango is planning. We need to take action at a faster rate.”
Mayor-“What else can we do? We have our top detectives and police force trying to track him down, and we can’t find him anywhere here in town.”
Chairman #2-“He could’ve left. Maybe the chemicals were all he came for.”
Mayor-“So he’s gonna just cause problems in another town. That’s not any better.”
Chairman #2-“But if he’s in another town there’s nothing we can do. That’s their problem.”
Mayor-*sigh* “You make a point. Keep the police force alert though just in case.”
Chairmen-“Yes Mayor.”
The two Chairmen left.
Mayor-*Sigh* “What they fail to understand is, if one town gets affected we all do.” The Mayor sat down in his desk chair and began looking through the numerous letters of complaints people had. Only some related to Strango. He couldn’t stay focused on them though, worried about the future of what he considered a beautiful state.
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