Something about the idea of bringing the original creators and all the original actors from the cult 2004 indie film, Napoleon Dynamite, to an animated series caught my interest. Even enough to write about it in a post. As I stated in that short article covering my thoughts on the concept, I didn’t much care for the movie. It was mostly vapid with nothing much going on in the equally dull portion of the world known as rural Idaho, and while I saw the endearing bits within, I felt myself bored most of the time. The more quirky sensibilities of the characters I liked though, and I could see them working well in an animated series with only 30 minute snippets to allow them to get to a point and grow as those oddities. Now that the series has premiered as a part of Fox‘s Sunday-night line-up, does it hold up to my expectations?

While it appears that many critics are already either not liking it, not getting it, or fairly uncertain about it, I found myself pleasantly entertained. The things I liked most about the movie were the characters and a few of the quote-worthy lines they delivered. Virtually all of the cast has returned, as an introduction or reminder, we have: The geekiest kid around who thinks of himself as a ninja warrior and a hot piece of man, Napoleon (Jon Heder), his 32 year old brother that spends his time online looking for love, Kip (Aaron Ruell), their caring and crass Grandmother that raises them (Sandy Martin), their Uncle that is hung up on his High School football days, Rico (Jon Gries), Napoleon’s best friend and even more monotone Hispanic friend, Pedro (Efron Ramirez), Napoleon’s other main hanger-on that has a crush on him, Deb (Tina Majorino), and the overly aggressive and all around bad karate instructor, Rex (Diedrich Bader).

Napoleon Dynamite and crew get animated, in every possible way.

The crew of actors have also been reunited with the husband and wife team that wrote and directed the film; Jared and Jerusha Hess, and they have been paired with The Simpsons alum, Mike Scully to craft an animated show that reminded me a bit of equal parts King of the Hill in its monotone, real feeling characters and the homely animation design and Beavis and Butthead in that it takes those realistic bits and turns them on their head by exaggerating the settings and reminding viewers that the events are unrealistic because it is a cartoon. It also shares a bit of Beavis and Butthead’s gross out humor in two particular moments where we see Napoleon Dynamite try to pop a pimple in the premiere episode and where a school couple is seen spitting a smoothy into anothers open and waiting mouth in the second episode. I could have honestly gone without the gross-out humor, but at least they weren’t constant.

The animated series works for me, and I can see myself enjoying it as time goes on with the show. The premiere episode was a bit more absurd and certainly shown up by the second episode that aired right after, and I certainly hope the tone continues on the route of the second episode. The first episode dealt with Napoleon getting a zit infection after having a piece of three day old gas station chicken skin thrown at his head, this scene had a particularly funny flash-back to a baby Napoleon crying in Heder’s voice. It is a moment that immediately sets up that this is not going to be quite like the movie, it is going to throw reality out the window when it can, but allow the odd characters and the setting to ground the absurd stories and their situations. It is honestly the complete opposite of the movie, and I think that is why I liked it. The odd situation in the premiere episode comes when Napoleon gets the last tube of a zit cream that was just banned by, as the pharmacist says, “the FDA, DEA, and the WNBA.”

Napoleon and Kip fight over a crazy girl who loves bad boys.

The zit cream comes with the absurd physical side-effects of an increased pain threshold, lust, and fits of unbridled rage. While the cream doesn’t work at first on the zits, it does give Napoleon all the above side effects and leads to some subsequent scenes of him hitting on Deb, breaking a bathroom sink (a moment that included two lines I laughed at, “sweet! my rage has never been unbridled,” and “I never liked that sink.“), as well as Napoleon steamrolling over his fellow students in gym class when he was chosen as the deer in a game of ‘smear the deer.’ This particular scenario gets Napoleon invited into an underground fight-club that is possibly the worst kept secret club in the world called the PPC (Pioneer Punch Club). The side story is also pretty entertaining and includes a slightly entertaining side character. When Kip goes to see a girl he has been talking to online, he impresses her by using her love of bad boys by showing her his six pack abs (that was spray-painted onto his flat stomach by his Grandma), and then when she comes home with him she switches over to Napoleon when she sees him training for his match in the caged thunder-dome in a silo, then back to Kip when he steals the zit cream and fights Napoleon in that cage (“I love you Kip! Why am I so crazy!?“), and then finally to a rabid buff woman in an American Gladiators outfit.

The first episode was a bit too extreme and random for a premiere of a series based on a movie that was so realistic and grounded, that it came off as a bit jarring. While I enjoyed it, I wasn’t quite sure how I really felt. The extreme circumstances were far too distant from the film, and the characters acted a bit different from what we knew them as. So, I could see it dividing viewers more then a premiere should, even though some of the lines were pretty dang funny, this would have been much better episode to have left till later in the season.

Remember all the talk about a cage fight? Well, they finally get to be in one.

The second episode was far more successful as its stories had ridiculous moments, but focused more on the characters and their individual oddities, while keeping itself mostly more level. The students are paired up with each other via a scan-tron scanning machine that matches people up based on their answers (sort of like OK Cupid and other dating sites). The odd couplings led to plenty of funny moments, and while they all seemed to work out at first, the matches eventually self-destructed after Napoleon’s match of a Japanese exchange student, who is a samurai sword expert, disappointed him when she turned out to want to learn how to be an American girl in a satirical jab towards American teenage life when she said, “I want to make friends, and then say mean things behind their back. I want to go to the prom and throw up in a limo.” All of which made Napoleon reject her when he called her ambitions “lame!” Which I can’t help but to agree with.

The second episode also joked about the upper-middle class, plastic surgery, teenage love, and of course how science can never get a hold on what drives love. This is what I’d like to see more from the show, these odd and interesting characters that have their place in America’s youth are good foils to the animated scene. I also quite liked the ending bits of each episode that brought back a joke from the episode, and turned it on its head. I can see these moments competing with Community‘s classic credit scenes.

Kip gets his side story in the second episode as well, and just like before, it is pretty funny. Fushigi has always deserved a bit of teasing.

Final Call: Overall the two episode premiere of Napoleon Dynamite has me hopeful for the future of the series. While fans will likely not be sure how to take it, once it is accepted as a cartoon with characters they like (since those character’s personalities leave the transition mostly unharmed), I can see it being enjoyed. While the first episode was a bit of a mixed bag, the second episode was funny enough to leave me hopeful. The series needs to keep its few grounding points, but I do not at all mind the implausible cartoony moments that reminds us that this is an animated version of these characters and their setting.

Rating:

Episode 1

Episode 2

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episode 1, episode 2, jon heder, Napoleon dynamite, premiere, Review, television, the animated series, tv TV Reviews