WordGirl
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 "Word UP!"
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WordGirl is an American children's educational superhero animated television series on PBS Kids. The series initially ran as a set of shorts on Maya and Miguel, another PBS Kids series, and was broadcast as it's own show from September 3, 2007 to August 7, 2015.
Plot
Becky Botsford is an average fifth-grader who, when duty calls, is transformed into WordGirl. WordGirl flies to the rescue when there is trouble in The City, and this super heroine uses vocabulary to defeat outlaws. With the help of her monkey sidekick, Captain Huggy Face, WordGirl spends each episode defeating a quirky cast of misfit bad guys.
Why It Makes You Want to Word Up
- The show manages to teach children about vocabulary while also entertaining them with superhero action and crime-fighting.
- To assist in this, there are different sections that also aid in an amusing way, such as the in-universe game show entitled May I Have a Word?, and Captain Huggy demonstrating a certain word.
- Becky Botsford/WordGirl is a very cute tomboy-esque protagonist. The idea of giving her a monkey for a sidekick is also quite amusing.
- The animation, done in Adobe Flash, shows what the software is capable of, by using an appealing art style, and nicely made backgrounds.
- Plenty of cool villains, like Dr. Two-Brains, Tobey McCallister III, Chuck the Evil Sandwich Guy, Mr. Big, Granny May, The Butcher, Lady Redundant Woman, Victoria Best, Ms. Question, and Miss Power. They're also fleshed out to be likable and hilarious.
- Aside from Becky and the villains, there are other likable and hilarious characters such as Bob/Captain Huggy Face, Violet, Scoops, Tim and Sally Botsford (Becky's adoptive parents), TJ Botsford (Becky's adoptive younger brother; for those who don't find him annoying), Bampy Botsford (Becky's adoptive grandfather), etc.
- The theme song gets viewers hyped up to watch, with the singer being obviously invested, and a radical instrumental.
- It even got a movie called "The Rise of Miss Power", which for once created a villain that was actually threatening. It also shed light on how serious verbal bullying can be, which isn't often touched upon.
- Great voice acting. For example, Tom Kenny, the voice of SpongeBob and Ice King, is on this show as Dr. Two-Brains, and does a great job by hyping up his disturbed nature.
- The show is no stranger to funny moments. Some of these include the running gag of Exposition Guy trying to find the police station.
- The final episode where Becky and Violet reconcile and become best friends again after Violet ended her friendship with Becky after she found out that Becky was WordGirl is very emotional and well-executed.
- With that said, the final two-part episode, "Rhyme and Reason", was an awesome, emotional, and heartwarming way to end the show.
Bad Word Qualities
- WordGirl/Becky can be a Mary-Sue at times.
- Some of the elements of WordGirl/Becky rip-off Superman/Clark Kent and Supergirl/Kara. For example, WordGirl came to earth when she was a baby, much like Superman. She has to take a special alter-ego when she's not fighting crime, being Becky Botsford, much like how Superman has to disguise himself as Clark Kent.
- The citizens of Fair City can be really dumb at times, getting confused by certain words that, in the real world, are used frequently and are taught in grade school. They're also dumb at handing the villains, such as Becky's parents hiring Granny May as Becky and TJ's babysitter in "Granny-Sitter", despite her being a wanted criminal. Even with being manipulated by Granny May and the Birthday Girl countless times!
- Several wasted opportunities:
- Despite WordGirl originally coming from the planet Lexicon and arriving to Earth as an infant, where she'd eventually become the planet's savior, we never get a lot of intel about WordGirl's home planet or much information about the rest of her kind. As far as we know, Lexicon was never destroyed, so there's no way the rest of her kind's gone. What exactly was WordGirl's biological family like and why didn't her parents go searching for her?
- Despite Dr. Two-Brains being WordGirl's former mentor who turned evil due to a lab accident involving a megalomaniacal mouse, WordGirl rarely tries to view him as her ex-mentor and usually treats him like just another villain. You think there would be a storyline about her trying to find or even create a cure for his split personality. Even if it fails due to show's episodic nature, this would showcase that WordGirl didn't forget about Boxleitner.
- "Word Makes A Mistake" has Becky/Word Girl explain her origins about being an alien from Lexicon and her adoption to her (adoptive) father and TJ... but the two of them just chalk it off as her having a serious imagination, neither of them take her story seriously, and moment is never brought up again. It would have been incredible to bring Tim and TJ Botsford into the loop and have them (and possibly even Sally) be Secret Keepers. Then WordGirl would finally be able to stop lying and hiding secrets from her adoptive family all the time. But alas, the show doesn't go that route.
Reception
WordGirl was met with critical acclaim from critics, audiences, parents, and kids alike for its great educational lessons and tips about vocabulary, likable and three dimensional characters, decent animation, amusing comedy, and sharp writing. The show has a 4/5 star rating on Common Sense Media and a 7.1/10 on IMDb.
Trivia
- The show started as a series of shorts entitled The Amazing Colossal Adventures of WordGirl on Maya and Miguel, in which 30 were produced.
- This is the only PBS Kids show so far to have a TV-Y7 rating.
- The reasons behind WordGirl's cancellation after eight seasons was due to many PBS stations dropping the show from their schedule by December 2014, as well as the closure of Scholastic's animation unit Soup2Nuts (the company that made the show) in March 27, 2015. As a result, the then -newer episodes of the show could only be watched on the PBS Kids website or PBS Kids video app. However, when the national PBS Kids 24/7 channel was introduced, the previously web-exclusive episodes were added to rotation.
Videos
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