Drawn Together

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Drawn Together

Behold, the very first ever reality show cartoon before Total Drama Island!

Genre:	Animated sitcom Comedy Animation
Running Time:	22 minutes
Country:	United States
Release Date:	October 27, 2004 – November 14, 2007
Network(s):	Comedy Central
Created by:	Dave Jeser Matt Silverstein
Distributed by:	MTV Networks
Starring:	Tara Strong Cree Summer Adam Carolla Jess Harnell James Arnold Taylor Abbey McBride Jack Plotnick
Seasons:	3
Episodes:	36

Drawn Together is an animated comedy, that aired on Comedy Central, from 2004 to 2007, with a direct-to-DVD movie, released in 2010. It is advertised as the first-ever animated reality show.

Plot

Television's first, "animated reality show", throws together eight cartoon archetypes, including a party-hearty superhero, a naive princess prone to singing, and a sexually ambiguous anime hero, in a house where cameras are on them all the time. As with most other reality shows, conflict ensues.

Why It's Drawn Together

The series uses traditional cel animation, albeit digitally colored, to give a retro, yet, rough look, courtesy of Rough Draft Studios
Each character is a caricature parody of various animated personalities:
- Princess Clara is a parody of certain Disney princesses, mostly Ariel from The Little Mermaid.
- Toot Braunstein is a parody of silent 1930's and 1940's era cartoons, and Betty Boop.
- Captain Hero is a parody of Superman, especially his DC Animated Universe version.
- Xandir is a parody of video game adventurers, like Link from The Legend of Zelda, or Cloud from Final Fantasy VII.
- Foxxy Love is a parody of Valerie from Josie and the Pussycats.
- Spanky Ham is a parody of Newgrounds flash-animated internet cartoons.
- Wooldoor Sockbat is a parody of SpongeBob SquarePants and Stimpson "Stimpy" J. Cat from Ren & Stimpy franchise.
- Ling-Ling is a parody of Pikachu from the Pokémon franchise.
Each character is animated differently to complement each style. For example, Princess Clara is drawn with a Disney-style animation, while Captain Hero is drawn like characters from the DC Animated Universe series, Toot Braunstein is drawn like characters from the 1930s and 40s cartoons and Spanky Ham is drawn like a Newgrounds flash-animated cartoon.
Rude and crude but very well-written humor, similar to South Park, another series that aired on Comedy Central.
A lot of the jokes, while rude and gross, are funny and clever.
Several sociopathic, yet likable characters such as Captain Hero, Spanky Ham, Princess Clara, Toot, Wooldoor, Xandir, Ling-Ling, and Foxxy Love.
It does controversial humor very well, and correctly.
A lot of the songs are funny, and well-written.
The concept of eight cartoon characters, sharing a house, in a reality-like setting, is very unique and creative.
Clever pop-cultural references to various popular shows, games, and films.
The series ended on a high note with, "American Idol Parody Clip Show".
The show uses bigoted humor, exaggeratedly, to satirize prejudiced behaviors.
Amazing voice acting by Tara Strong (Raven from Teen Titans, Bubbles from The Powerpuff Girls (1998) and Timmy Turner from The Fairly OddParents), Cree Summer (Susie from Rugrats), Jess Harnell, James Arnold Taylor (the titular character of Johnny Test), Adam Carolla, Abbey McBride, and Jack Plotnick.

Bad Qualities

Just like other forgotten shows such as: Firefly (the most infamous example), The Brak Show, Danny Phantom, Invader Zim, My Life as a Teenage Robot, Kick Buttowski: Suburban Daredevil and The Other Kingdom, this show ended way too fast, lasting only for 3 seasons and 36 episodes,
The movie, The Drawn Together Movie: The Movie!, was just horrible, and overall, killed the franchise.
Unrestrainable Trainable is considerably the worst episode of the series.
Too many gross-out gags and scenes that sometimes go too far.
- There are even gross close-ups, especially with Toots.
Some jokes can drag on too long at times, such as Spanky Ham farting for an entire minute.
The infamous scene where Spanky Ham is defecating in a melon, eventually became an internet meme.
While most of the main characters had some of their worlds explored in certain episodes, Toot, on the other hand, got pissed all in world-building, besides being a fat Betty Boop parody.
It can get too mean-spirited at times.

Trivia

The show has spawned several internet memes, especially in the Hispanic community.
James Arnold Taylor revealed in a December 2018 JATcast episode, that he got hired, before he was aware of the mature content, and said that "it makes South Park look like Mr. Rogers".

Videos

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