Old MTV series "Downtown"

[Secef]

Does anyone remember this cartoon that was on MTV like... back in 1998 or so? It was about a comic book geek, his sister, and couple of friends of his (most memorable one is some pale looking, biker trash-type). I thought it was pretty funny, but they cancelled it oddly enough and I haven't seen hide nor hair of it since. Do you suppose there is any hope of the show appearing on Adult Swim, given that anyone can even remember the show I'm talking about?

[stanteau]

that show was awesome,had a character everyone could love,they made 12 episodes but only 8 were aired

[Moof]

It dosent seem like animated shows dont last veary long on MTV....

[Calhoun07]

It really makes me wonder why they even try. I guess they've been looking for the next Beavis and Butthead or Daria, but even those successful shows often got the shaft from MTV. It's like they want to do good animation, but don't want to give it any kind of dedicated time slot to find a good audience.

[Gundam_Warrior]

I think if TNN can buy rights to the Next Generation and Ren & Stimpy. I think CN could get Downtown which was one of the best shows MTV had after Beavis & Butt-Head got canned.

My fav line "If he dies, can I have all his Sailor Moon videos?"

[Melon109]

Downtown was my favorite animated MTV show. I also really liked Liquid Television when that was on. I think Daria has been the longest animated show on MTV. Undergrads and Spy Groove didn't last long either. There's supposed to be three animated shows coming this fall: Spiderman, Clone High , and The Freshmen . I think Gatecrashers is also coming to MTV sometime.

[Spooky05]

i LOVED downtown!! i think mtv.com still has a page for it..

now, OFF TO INVESTIGATE!!

[Mackenzie Rainelle]

Downtown was great. I have the theme song on my computer, and Jen was my favorite, 'cause we had so much in common when it came to personality.

[Lonestarr]

It feels so good to know that other people liked this show. MTV always - always - kills their good shows while letting the awful ones survive; Daria is the exception to the rule. I would love to see this show on DVD. Also, there used to be a page for this show at MTV.com, but it's as gone as yesterday.

[bassist]

Originally posted by Lonestarr
MTV always - always - kills their good shows while letting the awful ones survive;

So true... we all mourn the loss of Ren & Stimpy and Spongebob Squarepants to Nickelodeon... Even more sadly, we cry for the fact that they did away with Liquid Television in order to expand one of it's fabulous shorts into a less than fabulous Aeon Fulx series...

Still, we should be thankful for the decimation of such shows as Undressed, The Brothers Grimm (though it had it's moments), Club MTV (unfortunately resurrected as The Grind), and any show featuring the VJ of the year 1998, Jesse.

Of course, this would all be moot if MTV were really "music" television rather than "bad TV with music underneath screaming little girls who only want to hear crappy music the major record companies told them to like by paying radio stations to play them non-stop."

It started innocently enough with shows like Remote Control and The John Stewart Show. And sure, shows like Beavis and Butthead, Singled Out, and Headbangers Ball had their moments. But Real World, Road Rules, anything featuring Carson Daly, and Dismissed are just excuses to exploit our already underpriviledged children by sending them hypno-messages hidden in "OhmygodIcan'tbelieveshe'swearingthat!" shows...

It's sad when you're nostalgic for the day that MTV actually played videos...

-Big Ben

[Z_E_R_O]

As for TNN acquring rights, they're nothing more than part of the "MTV FAMILY", nobody "LOST" Ren & Stimpy except John K. This family consists of all the Viacom Networks. TNN, MTV, CBS(?), the Nick channels, et cetra. Viacom owns the rights outright to many shows they air.

As for MTV itself, Liquid Television was a classic. I loved that show as much as life itself at the time. The biker chick RRRUULLEEESSSS!!!!!!! Frog Baseball was another classic, the LT DVD is fun loaded into a shell ready to be blasted down your throat, & it's cheap.
Daria gets a good hand from them once a year, it doesn't seem to get many, many episodes. I find it hard to find the "better" reruns of it, like the musical special episode, w/Daria's dad driving/singing "GA! GA! DAMN! IT!" :p!
But I can't say they desert programs, although they've deserted many in the past(Blame Game, Oddities, Austin Stories), some of the shows you must dig through to find the real entertainment in. Although, most of it is garbage, in a way that Big Ben puts it down above, LOL!

.....and then there's Downtown. The show was "unoriginal" in more than a few ways, but it was like it was done right, somebody made a 'toon like that because all others before it(fanboy type 'toons) were not par.
I can remember a few people not liking it because of its' Clerks-like, "remember the time" story structure, which I can't/couldn't get enough of.
From what I understand, though, is the show had been designed entirely different, the characters we saw in the show were producers/consultants or something turned into actual narratyors/characters of the sories. The magic we saw "just happened". The people were real peeps, in real time, so to speak. We saw real shared stories of these people. I have a nice article in some book buried under piles of crap with an article about five paragraphs long about Downtown. Hopefully, somebody else knows.......
My guess is we never saw it again because alot of peeps were involved, it was probably hard to produce, but that's just a guess. I LOVE that story, the goth chick dude drooled over, his "guy" he wanted that the greedies had horded, the graffiti, his sister & the guy friends, I WANT IT ALL BACK!!!!!!! OMG THE COUCH!!!!!!!!

Anybody have any episodes saved?

[Looping]

I only saw one episode of Downtown and thought it was decent, though the characters seemed a little one dimensional (maybe you have to watch the whole series to see them fleshed out).

However, from what I saw, if CN isn't interested in Eltingville (and who knows what the logic behind that is), they probably wouldn't be interested in Downtown, either.

[[Z?] Mr Samsa]

it's good to know other people liked this show too! The voice acting in it was something awsome. I too was really upset when MTV took it off but MTV is stupid and they need more soft porn shows I guess. I like Goat the most. All the characters were cool. grrr... MTV.... die.. :mad:

[bassist]

Originally posted by [Z?] Mr Samsa
it's good to know other people liked this show too! The voice acting in it was something awsome.

If I remeber correctly, there wasn't any voice acting. Much like the recent film Waking Life, Downtown was filmed (or at least had the audio track recorded) live and the animation was set to real happenings. Waking Life took video and painted over it, but I believe that Downtown was animated separately.

Please correct me if I am mistaken.

-Big Ben

[stanteau]

That sounds pretty expensive

[Z_E_R_O]

....& when it's NOT expensive, it's harder than hell to do. The show DESERVES some kind of release, DVD or something. It's that rare kind of good.

I'm not sure of the exact details on how the show was produced, who was involved, any of that stuff. I suspect Big Ben is on to a little of it. They were REAL people, though. Other than that, the show was on for such a short time, I don't think we got to see everything that had been featured in the TV spots. Hypnotic stuff, I can't remember the character names, but '98 WAS just yesterday, it weren't THAT long ago.

BTW, I am 100% convinced MTV IS NOT even as little as a crappy shell of what it used to be. They obviously control some intrest in the materials they showcase/sell these days, a real 24hour commercial these days, lol. I awoke this morning, to have my MTV-X replaced by MTV-JAMS. MTV-JAMS is basically, MTV without commercials. MTV-X was 24hours of hard rock/metal REAL ROCK VIDEOS. No commercials, no VJs, no news, just rock videos, but they did away with it to give us another channel, lol, of the same crap they've been showing the past few years now I have 6 versions of it or something. That is one BUSINESS of a family of networks. The way they operate is SO strange:rolleyes:.......

They DO NOT know what to do with something, when they actually have something.......

~RIP MTV, et cetra

[Shnay]

I was just thinking about this show recently, and it's great to see that it hasn't been forgotten.

Downtown had an excellent animation style. I can't remember any show before it that looked like that (although that doesn't mean there wasn't one). Does anyone know if this "style" had been used before Downtown?

[Z_E_R_O]

Does anyone remember anyone involved? Seems like the guys name was Chris. From the looks of Downtown, those talents COUL NOT'VE dropped off the face of the earth, they must do SOMETHING.

BTW, Viacom MAY have done something right. NicktoonsTV is not half bad, lol. It doesn't make up for them destroying everything they feel like within the MTV/NICK world. I've already watched about three hours of Ren & Stimpy, plus Rocko's Modern Life is back. That Oh Yeah! Cartoons! show is pretty good, too. I enjoyed it as much as What a Cartoon Show! They've only been on since the first, too.

I should've recorded some Downtown while it was on;(.......

[Lonestarr]

Originally posted by Z_E_R_O
Does anyone remember anyone involved? Seems like the guys name was Chris. From the looks of Downtown, those talents COUL NOT'VE dropped off the face of the earth, they must do SOMETHING.

BTW, Viacom MAY have done something right. NicktoonsTV is not half bad, lol. It doesn't make up for them destroying everything they feel like within the MTV/NICK world. I've already watched about three hours of Ren & Stimpy, plus Rocko's Modern Life is back. That Oh Yeah! Cartoons! show is pretty good, too. I enjoyed it as much as What a Cartoon Show! They've only been on since the first, too.

I should've recorded some Downtown while it was on;(.......

Chris Prynoski created "Downtown". He has his own site: www.titmouse.net . Don't worry. He's still working; he did the animated sequence in Freddy Got Fingered, easily one of that film's few funny moments.

[Supreme]

Originally posted by bassist

Still, we should be thankful for the decimation of such shows as Undressed, The Brothers Grimm (though it had it's moments
-Big Ben

I think that you are referring to The Brothers Grunt (http://brosgrunt.virtualave.net/info.html)

[Z_E_R_O]

Thanks Lonestarr, a slight pressure has been lifted off my head. 'Zebras in America', good stuff in a movie I feel would have been the GREATEST 40 minute short comedy of all time. Problem was, Tom Green just HAD to blow it, so to speak. I see it as "performance art we're NOT supposed to understand by design", but since you've told me who the 'Zebras' were by, I just may actually watch FGF again:rolleyes:, sad isn't it;), the crap a man'll do to see a second or two of animation. 'Zebras' sounded SO dumb until the little 'toon rolled.

Now, I have a name to work with, and it's Chris Prynoski.

BTW, the Simpsons episode along the same premise as FGF was brilliant, with the webtoons & all.

~OUT!!!!!!

[bassist]

Originally posted by Supreme


I think that you are referring to The Brothers Grunt (http://brosgrunt.virtualave.net/info.html)

YEAH! That's the ticket!

-Big Ben

[Funk]

Yes, Downtown was a pretty cool show (mostly in the stylish animation and characters), and Liquid Television ROCKED. (I wish they'd make a second "best-of" DVD-- which would include:

1. the little girl scout going door-to-door selling cookies and blowing up houses

2. the honey-bunny skit, where the short guy's at the restaurant, and he keeps asking for "honey-bunny". Great, absurd stuff.

3. And more of the biker girl, whatever her name is. The DVD is sadly lacking her.


But in my opinion, the BEST animated series to ever land on MTV is The Maxx.

[Opaque]

I watched each episode of Downtown and almost cried when it was cancelled. that was one of the greatest shows to ever not be given the respect it so rightfuly deserved. thought there is little chance of the show coming to ASC anytime ever, its still a great idea.