Sanjay and Craig
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Sanjay and Craig is an American animated television series that aired on Nickelodeon from May 25, 2013, to July 29, 2016, for three seasons and sixty episodes.
Plot
12-year-old Sanjay Patel never knows the meaning of "uncool" or "impossible", which means he never knows that fart jokes are uncool and impossible to get right if done all the time. The human boy has great curiosity and excitement about the world. That sends Sanjay on adventures that are always ridiculous, gross, or oddly sweet. Avoiding Sanjay is his best friend, Craig, a talking snake and master of disguise that can turn into just about anything or anyone. To most people, Craig seems like a normal snake; only Sanjay and his close friends can hear the reptile's warped words of wisdom. Keeping the secret is important to the pair, and the biggest threat is Mr. Noodman, Sanjay's neighbor, who fears snakes and is always on the verge of figuring outs that Craig speaks.
Unfriendly Qualities
- To get Craig out of the pet shop, the humor in the show consists of immature levels of either toilet or gross-out humor, mostly with jokes about either butts, farts, vomiting, or other kinds of gross-out humor. It also contains twerking, which is inappropriate for a series specifically for children.
- Many episode plots are completely random and very immature. The most infamous example is a disturbing episode called "Fart Baby", in which Sanjay literally becomes pregnant with a fart bubble.
- It was another failed attempt for Nickelodeon to make the "two idiot bros" in the same vein as both SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star from Nickelodeon's own SpongeBob SquarePants (Luckily, the 2 main characters, Sanjay and Craig, are not that much of idiots and kinda likable, unlike the two other idiot bros. Though it's not as bad as Kids' WB's Coconut Fred's Fruit Salad Island.
- Racist stereotyping for Indians, especially with Vijay Patel and Sanjay's father.
- Despite Craig being a snake, there are episodes where that one major detail ignored, and he could pretty much replace it as a human or make Craig becoming a human, and it wouldn't change.
- Many characters have inappropriate names, such as Mr. Noodman (whose name sounds like "nude man") and the Dicksons (whose names contain the word "Dick").
- Mediocre voice acting for many of the characters in the show.
- Several characters are unlikable, notably, Mr. Noodman, whose hatred of snakes gets rather annoying (although we learn in one episode why he hates snakes).
- The soundtrack is rather lame and annoying, except for the one that plays in the intro (if you listen to it without lyrics).
- The intro, though catchy, has a bad rhythm and is more of a "so bad it's good" type of song.
- At times, it tries way too hard to appeal to children. Notably, there are some references to viral videos and YouTube.
- Though the animation is decent, it does tend to go off-model. Also, the visuals are not interesting.
- The character designs look more like rejects from Bob's Burgers, especially Sanjay, who looks uncannily similar to Bob Belcher.
- When the show uses comedy besides gross-out, it only ends up being boring.
- There are many terrible episodes, especially in season 1. Seasons 2 and 3 are never safe from the worst or mediocre episodes, despite improving the series overall. And even if they are never disgusting, they usually are boring. This includes:
- Brett Venom M.D. (Episode 1, which was an awful way to begin the series)
- Stinkboy (Episode 7)
- Traciffical Island (Episode 9)
- Partybot (Episode 10)
- Release the Craigan (Episode 12)
- Unbarfarble (Episode 15, which counts as the worst episode)
- Laked Nake (Episode 17)
- Fart Baby (Episode 21, which counts as the 2nd worst episode)
- Road Pizza (Episode 23)
- You're in Trouble (Episode 25)
- Cup O'Universe (Episode 26)
- Old Farts (Episode 31)
- Shirts Off (Episode 42)
- Fartwerk (Episode 60)
- Ew De Hector (Episode 65)
- Romper Chomper (Episode 67)
- Street Dogg (Episode 77, which was a mediocre way to end season 2)
- Heartyface (Episode 85)
- Diaper Drinks (Episode 103, which is one of the worst episodes from season 3)
"Best Friends Hall of Fame" Qualities
- Decent animation by Saerom Animation Inc (despite the tendency to go off-model at times), backgrounds, and art style.
- The character designs are also passable, although they resemble characters from Bob's Burgers. This was because Jay Howell designed the characters for both series.
- The show did get slightly better in seasons 2 and 3, though not enough to get them on the good media category. Despite that, it shockingly got better as time went on, also called "Growing The Beard" or Reverse Seasonal Rot.
- During these seasons, the show took shots at its more juvenile first season in the episodes "Songjay" and "2 Tuff 2 Watch"
- Some characters are likable, such as Sanjay's parents, Sanjay himself, mostly Craig, and Belle.
- There are some very hidden morals according to your point of view.
- Some hilarious moments, such as one in "Brett Venom M.D." when Craig starts choking on Vijay's cereal.
- The show has some tearful and heartwarming moments, particularly later in the series. To quote the creators, "We wanted less fart, more heart.".
- A bit of the voice acting is passable from time to time, most notably from John DiMaggio, Nolan North and Grey Delisle Griffin.
- Some episodes were decent or even good, especially the ones that focus on little to no toilet or gross-out humor like:
- Hot Sauce Boss (Episode 38)
- A Tale of Two Slithers (Episode 39)
- Butts Up (Episode 47)
- Remington Tufflips' Spooky Trailer of Cartoons (Episode 50)
- Alien Craig (Episode 51)
- Glad to Be Sad (Episode 54)
- 2 Tuff 2 Watch (Episode 57)
- Galaxy Geeks (Episode 86)
- Huggle Day (Episode 92)
- The Sanjay and Craig Stunt School Special (Episode 99)
- Halloweenies (Episode 104)
- G.U.T.S. Busters (Episode 105)
- Songjay (Episode 107)
- Booyah For Bollywood (Episode 114, which was a decent way to wrap up the series)
- It's one of the few American cartoons with an Indian-American lead and usually strays away from stereotypes, which is decent representation, or at least better than nothing.
Episodes With Their Own Pages
Trivia
- Sanjay and Craig were unsuccessfully pitched twice to Nickelodeon before Trolf, Dirschberger, and Howell sought advice from Loren Bouchard, whom Howell had designed characters for while creating Bob's Burgers for Fox Broadcasting Company. Dirschberger said of the meeting that "[Bouchhard]" showed us the "Bob's Burgers" pitch packet, which was, like, four pages of beautifully executed writing and art, and that was it. So we combined what we had learned from the first two pitches and put it in this is a simple presentation."
- The series' usage of gross-out humor based on the fact both Howell and Dirschberger have mothers who are nurses, "and they've told us a lot of gross stories over the years", which also served as the basis for the character of Darlene. For development, Dirschberger changed Sanjay to a twelve-year-old boy "without a weird quirk or affection", and the premise during the second pitch was "four kids who lived in a garbage dump", providing the basis for Sanjay and Craig's friends Megan and Hector.
Reception
Throughout its run, Sanjay and Craig received primarily mixed-to-negative reviews from critics and viewers alike. It currently holds a 4.6/10 on IMDb.
Saberspark placed this at #9 on his Top 10 WORST Nickelodeon Cartoons.
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