Destroy All Podcasts DX Episode 106 - Beavis and Butt-Head Do America
Hosts: Jeremy, Mike
This is about roadtrips, two morons getting their TV stolen, and peyote hallucinations to the tune of White Zombie. And Bill Clinton.
This is the fourth edition of our month devoted to MTV animation!
Click [HERE] to have a sweet '70s fight scene.
Here's the Beavis and Butt-Head Do America trailer.
And here's "Frog Baseball" the first Beavis and Butt-Head cartoon, when it was a simple underground animation like the others on Liquid Television.
Finally, here's the first episode of Beavis and Butt-Head where they chopped up "Frog Baseball" and spliced in the scenes of Beavis and Butt-Head watching music videos and making fun of them.
| Posted 24 August, 2009 - 03:25 by Destroy All Pod... |
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Comments
5 comments postedBeavis and Butt-Head has got to be one of the most misunderstood cartoons of all time. Often condemned for its material, I always thought it was genius in its subtlety. The funniest parts of the show were often the reactions of other characters to the boys. My favorites are the ones who are trying their best they can to ignore the boys, usually by quietly walking away.
When the ATF busts into the school and arrest Mr. Van Driessen, watch the guy who takes the guitar. He just starts disassembling and smashing it for no reason, plucking the strings out one by one. Hilarious stuff!
And of course, Robert Stack was at his best in this film. Funniest thing he's done since Airplane.
Never end a sentence with a preposition.
Now you're speaking my language! :) Excellent podcast. Although I remember liking this movie less than I had hoped to, it probably is due a revisiting, as you guys suggested. Of course, when I saw this in the theater, there was a long, depressing Sally Struthers/Christian Children's Fund commercial shown just before it. I think it was one of the first time I'd seen an actual commercial in a theater rather than a trailer and I remember thinking how it was totally not the thing to show before a COMEDY. it was liike at Mr. Burns' party when Homer had to do stand-up right after they announced that puppy got run over.
"This must be settled the way nature intended....with a vicious, bloody fight!"
Onyx Blackman
Principal, Flatpoint High
Oh, you guys were talking about the DVDs. Aside from the fact that there are certain episodes that Mike Judge simply will NOT release, a lot of the earlier episodes were censored permanently, removing all references to fire and other "illimitable" shenanigans. They literally cut the master tapes, so the only way you can ever see the early Beavis and Butthead material in its complete form is from people's VHS collections posted on YouTube.
Truly one of modern animation's greatest tragedies.
I don't remember whether I talked about this, but I do remember that while Beavis says "fire! fire!" several times, he never once says "fire is cool!"
Also, a kind of subtle joke at the end (or, well, subtle for "Beavis And Butthead" anyway.) When Bill Clinton is congratulating them at the end, he says "I'd like to extend my thanks to you both for serving your country". Except that there's a little emphasis at the last word, like "COUNT"ry. This is when Butthead says "huh-huh-huh, he said ...EXTEND."
(This is the bit at the end of the trailer, except without the "country" part.)
The show first aired around early '93 when I was just a freshman in high school, so the show was already up my alley when it first showed up.
The "Full Cavity Searches" line made by Robert Stack throughout the movie does get a little tiring towards the end (but loved the moment with Butt-head thinking he just did it with the women who was searching him in a van).
Since it was a movie, the animation obviously had to be far more than what you saw on a standard TV episode. The work was still done overseas of course but level was still there.
The "Love Rollercoaster" tune was quite cool in this film. It was the 90's of course and too often the need for a CGI scene of sorts was common to see in hand-drawn films of the time.
Beavis & Butt-Head though wasn't the start in that respect to animation, as there had been influences from others along the way. One good example I can think of was a film Wes Archer did in the 80's called "Jac Mac & Rad Boy Go!"
http://web.me.com/wesarcher/Site/Animation/Entries/2009/3/5_Jac_Mac_%26_Rad_Boy_GO!_______________________1985.html
Other such inspirations may include Spicolli from Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Bill & Ted from Bill & Ted' Excellent Adventure or perhaps Wayne's World on SNL.
At times I find it hard to really enjoy Beavis & Butt-Head, especially now as an adult as it can get rather painful on some accounts. The fact that everyone in town pretty much ignores them is pretty much a standard of the show and direction. That one guy you're trying to think of is named Tom Anderson whom was in the show and who Hank Hill is based on.
The original shorts were done by Judge on his own prior to being sold to MTV for Liquid Television. When it was approved as a TV show, an animation division at MTV was set up to produce that show and develop later ones like Daria and so-on.
Incidentally, you linked to the same short twice here (Frog Baseball), here's the other one called "Peace, Love and Understanding"...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhoQcxem7qY
The origins of Beavis and Butt-Head and meeting their dads was kinda interesting. In some books or other sources, they made it sound like B&B were living with unwed mothers who worked in bars or strip joints or something, so we never hear of their dads at all in the show other than their moms.
That episode you're talking of about Bill Clinton going to Highland High and answering Beavis and Butt-Head's question was "Citizen Butt-Head". It's of course the show was pretty nailed firmly in the 1990's with it's topical humor.
I first saw this film in the theaters around the end of '96. It was also the last year that any new Beavis & Butt-Head episodes were going to be made as Mike Judge was going on to do King of the Hill, and the show ended it's run in '97 besides lingering on a few more years in reruns on MTV.
The more recent DVD's of the TV show is actually censored in the episodes themselves (not the music), as some have stated Mike Judge had insisted on making cuts to some scenes in them (I guess you can call it a "creator's cut" if you will).
There is one thing I wanted to have happen at the end of the movie that did't happen, but thought it would've made for a silly way to end the movie. When they're finally back at their town, find their TV and walk down the street, they pass by the house that principal McVicar from their high school lives in. He comes out the door saying something about welcoming the new day or whatever, but then sees B&B going down the street, and immediately freaks out and runs back into the house, slamming the door ridiculously hard. Now that's an ending!
In ending my excessive rant, here's a deleted scene from the film I'm not sure if it's on the DVD or not, but it's pretty obvious why they didn't included it in the end...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg_1Llo9k0k
Also interesting, the guys showing up in their 70's threads for an MTV Video Music Awards ceremony around that time...
http://www.sanchi.ro/view_video.php?viewkey=e9185b04b3d2a9dc8fa2
OK, one more! In an interesting ploy in viral marketing, Beavis & Butt-Head appeared last year in an online ad promoting the film "Extract". Assuming Mike Judge was doing the voices of both characters, some thought Beavis didn't sound like the way he did back in the 90's or else he was being in character of an "Alistair Cooke" type.
http://www.slashfilm.com/2009/09/01/beavis-and-butt-head-return-to-promote-extract/