So, Disney Channel isn't all that great...at least when it comes to its live-action. But it's cartoons are well acclaimed, with both Gravity Falls, and Phineas and Ferb being incredibly popular. But Fish Hooks, while I think that Gravity Falls is the BEST of the three cartoons, is my personal favorite.
It focuses on fish in High School...which is a really weird idea, but it's worked. The main characters are Milo (played by Kyle Massey, who has been on Disney Chanel since he was a tot), his brother Oscar, and their best friend/neighbor Bea Goldfishberg. Guess what she is.
Milo is basically the "loud and disruptive kid who is floundering in his classes...haha, floundering, 'cuz fish". Oscar is the "nervous high strung nerd who excels in classes", and Bea is the crazy wanna-be actress.
I think it's a pretty cute show, personally, and I can see why it doesn't have a very big fanbase. The first few episodes are...pretty lame. Especially the first scene of "Fish Out of Water"...maaaan, that script was written weird.
I think what I like about the show is the nature of the characters. They've managed to take some very basic cookie-cutter characters, and then give them a punch-in-the-face twist.
My favorite is with "Shellsea" (you see a lot of name puns like this). She's pretty much your basic fashionista, pop-loving valley girl. Usually, you see these girls being dumber rocks. But Shellsea is flipping BRILLIANT. As Bea's best gal pal, she ends up being her anchor when she goes berserk and shakes her back into her senses. She shows this very strongly in Busy Bea: Rise of the Machines.
Another thing I like is that behind the goofiness of the characters, there are some really, really, HORRIFYING implications.
The homeroom teacher, Mr. Baldwin is a seahorse who didn't know he could get pregnant until it was too late. It sounds funny, but the situation is actually pretty terrifying. Here's why: He's middle aged, lives alone, has no social life, something horrible happened to him in 1986 that caused him to "stop laughing" and stop leaving his house on Friday nights, and seems to have (had?) mild depression. There wasn't a woman in his life until he started dating the school councilor (and she's a train wreck too!). So the question becomes: WHAT DID YOU DO!? I mean, this is a kid's show, but something really, really deep would have had to have happened. I assumed he didn't know because he was raised by another species (I say clownfish) and grew up in an area where he wasn't around a lot of other seahorses. But this still probably means that he doesn't know how the birds and the bees work for seahorses, so whatever happened, it must have gotten ugly. I can't find a perfectly reasonable explanation around it! What happened, Mr. Baldwin!? WHAT HAPPENED?!
Though, I do like that in spite of whatever his first thoughts were, that he's decided to raise his children. And I think it might be because he feels that it's a ticket out of the situation his life is in, and giving him ability to move forward in his life, or at least have some kind of desperately needed change. I just wish he'd get a different crib mobile over the bassinet in his bedroom.
And since I don't want to go through my favorite episodes right now, I'll just go through some of my favorite quotes
Oscar: Mr. Mussels [drama teacher], how do you write such powerful stuff?
Mr. Mussels: You see, one night I was eating dinner!
Oscar: Oh! Okay, that makes sense
(The musical was about a magic potato...and the opening song was based of "Tradition" from Fiddler on the Roof)
- Fish School Musical
Mr. Baldwin: Milo, how is a pregnant male seahorse and his sidekick going to chase down a healthy girl?!
I love how this can be taken out of context.
- Fish Lips Sink Ships (one of my favorite episodes)
Bea: (About Mr. Baldwin and Ms. Lips) Why wouldn't he want to tell her [that he has a crush on her]? They're perfect for each other! They're both single and they're both old...and they're both old.
And my mind is fried...I'll say more later.
