Ren & Stimpy "Adult Party Cartoon" is an animated television series created by John Kricfalusi for TNN / Spike TV. The series was developed as a more "extreme" revamp and spin-off of Nickelodeon's The Ren & Stimpy Show, which Spümcø produced the first two seasons. The series premiered on June 26, 2003, and was removed from the network on July 24, after airing only three episodes; the remaining episodes were released on DVD. During its run, Adult Party Cartoon was heavily panned by critics, audiences and fans of the original series. It has been referred to as one of the worst animated series of all time.

History

The original Ren & Stimpy Show premiered alongside Rugrats and Doug as one of the original Nicktoons on children's network Nickelodeon in 1991. The show's creator, John Kricfalusi, had many altercations with the network, eventually culminating in his termination. The series continued until 1995 at Games Animation, with issues prevalent during Kricfalusi's tenure still present; it eventually ended with a single episode airing on MTV in 1996. In 2002, about a decade after Kricfalusi's termination, Viacom (which owns Nickelodeon) contacted him to produce a new version of his series for an updated version of sister network TNN/Spike TV, which was devoted to programming for male audiences. Kricfalusi said that TNN wanted an "extreme" version of The Ren & Stimpy Show. TNN gave Kricfalusi greater control of the writing and contents of the episodes, and he produced six "new" episodes aimed at adult audiences; of the episodes only Altruists was not a leftover from the original series, being an original idea from Eric Bauza. As in the original series, Kricfalusi ran into problems with meeting production deadlines and budgetary limits, with only three out of the nine episodes ordered by the network being completed on time at the cost of the entire nine-episode budget initially allocated by Spike. Several alumni from the original series returned to work on the new episodes, most notably co-developer Jim Smith, director and writer Vincent Waller as well as production assistant and writer Richard Pursel. Animation studio Carbunkle Cartoons returned to provide animation services, with Bob Jaques serving as animation director. Most Ren & Stimpy alumni who had joined Games Animation in the wake of Kricfalusi's 1992 firing, most notably series developer Bob Camp, had become estranged from Kricfalusi and thus were not involved with the revival; Vincent Waller, having joined the studio after the original series ended, was an exception. Some of the original voice cast members returned, with the exception of Billy West, original voice of Stimpy and second voice of Ren and Mr. Horse, who turned down offers to reprise his role as Stimpy as he did not consider the series to be funny and felt that participating in it would damage his career. Eric Bauza was hired to replace West as Stimpy, while Kricfalusi reprised his roles as Ren and Mr. Horse. Cast members Harris Peet and Cheryl Chase also returned, and Kricfalusi's father Mike Kricfalusi and long-time childhood friend Tom Hay provided some voices. The new series began airing in June 2003 as part of an animation block also featuring Gary the Rat, Stripperella, and digitally remastered episodes of the original Ren & Stimpy series, subtitled "Digitally Remastered Classics". Kricfalusi directed the first episode, "Onward and Upward", based on requests from fans from the Nickelodeon era; Vincent Waller wrote the episode for the original series but was rejected. The episode portrayed the characters as bisexual. Advertisers objected to some of the new show's content, particularly that of the risqué episode "Naked Beach Frenzy", which did not air in the show's original run, causing trouble with scheduling. The show stopped airing after three episodes when TNN's animation block was "put on hold". The remaining episodes were set to resume in August 2004 along with the premiere of Spike's new animated series Immigrants (developed by fellow Nickelodeon partner Klasky Csupo) but both shows were pulled and never aired. Kricfalusi shut down Spümcø shortly on July 18, 2005, thereafter following a lawsuit filed by Carbunkle Cartoons for failing to pay the animation studio for their services. In 2005, he announced that all of the Adult Party Cartoon episodes that were fully produced were coming to DVD, which was released on July 18, 2006.

Episodes

All episodes of the series were directed by series creator John Kricfalusi, credited as "John K." for the first five episodes and "M. John Kricfalusi" for the final episode. A scrapped episode called "Life Sucks" was going to be on the DVD, but it was never produced on time. Only the first half was finished, while the other two acts remain unproduced. In the episode, Ren states his dislike of life, much to Stimpy's horror. After that, they have an extensive look at their lifes' past tragedies, such as Ren's experience with the Children's Crusade. According to John Kricfalusi, this was going to be the prequel episode to "Ren Seeks Help". This was the cause of Ren and Stimpy's argument, as it is never stated in "Ren Seeks Help" what Ren had done exactly. Production had begun on this episode, with some voice work and roughly a third of the storyboard completed at the time of the show's cancellation.

Broadcast and DVD release

The episode "Man's Best Friend" was originally set to air in the original series' second season, but the episode was rejected by Nickelodeon due to disturbing violence, a brief joke about feces and references to tobacco. The episode did not air on television until 2003.

Reception and legacy

Unlike its predecessor, "Adult Party Cartoon" was universally panned by critics and audiences, as well as fans of the original series. Rob Owen of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette described it as "just plain gross. ... They don't pay me enough to watch cartoon characters eating snot." Charles Solomon of the Los Angeles Times criticized the show as "'adult' only in the sense that you wouldn’t want kids watching them." Tucson Weekly and Exclaim! both labeled it "disastrous". DVD Talk praised the show's animation, "but the weak stories epitomize empty, heavy-handed shock value." Matt Schimkowitz of Splitsider opined that the show's intended audience was "the 16-year-olds who grew up on the [original] show and are ready to handle such hilarious topics as spousal abuse and eating boogers." PopMatters, however, was more favorable, writing: "With snot as side dishes and vomit as gravy, the foulness is overwhelming, yet also clever. Kricfalusi's satire may be obvious, but he's not just making puke jokes for nausea's sake." Thad Komorowski, a historian on the original series and this series, noted that the reboot's poor performance originated from too many factors at play, and its reputation as one of the worst animated series of all time as an exaggeration; he stated that the lack of involvement from individuals like Bob Camp and Chris Reccardi as well as its utilization of rejected episodes from the series contributed to its downfall.