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Description

This game is called "Watch Paint Dry"

  For those who are not in the know, I had a scorecard of the second season of Sanjay & Craig on my DeviantArt up until August 2019, where I took it down because despite the fact that I've seen this entire series and it was fresh in my memory, and that I also wanted to do scorecards for S1 and S3, I felt like I needed to do a proper binge to get all my thoughts together. In other words, it's another show that I should've made a scorecard on ages ago, and was desperate to, because it's a series that got so much flack in its early days, and people jumped ship just as it was getting good... great, even.

HISTORY: I first watched Sanjay & Craig back in January 2015, I saw promos for it where they used a lot of season 1 clips, particularly from the first two episodes. It wasn't the best impression, but I decided to give the show a look anyways, and I remember my first episode being Susan Loogie-- I liked that one quite a bit, but as I watched more episodes... my first impressions began to deteriorate. Episode after episode, I found myself disliking Sanjay & Craig, thinking the grossout was unbearable, ruining episodes that would've been fine without it, after which I decided that I did not like this show.

  But like several others, I did have a change of heart later on. I randomly caught some episodes of Sanjay & Craig in the midst of 2015, they were coincidentally the first two season 2 episodes, and I found myself liking them-- really liking them, and it made me question if the series had changed between the first time I saw it 6 months ago, and then. As I kept watching through season 2, I grew an appreciation and fondness for it, telling others online that the show had really changed and that people should give it a second look. Unfortunately, by this point in the run, Sanjay & Craig was cemented as a pale imitation of Regular Show with disgusting grossout to boot. I mean, if anyone saw an episode like Unbarfable, why would they ever want to see this show again?

  I kept up with this series until the day that it ended, and feeling pretty down once I saw the finale as it was such a fun finale, and by the end of the run, I could say that S&C was a good show... though far from perfect.

ANIMATION: Yes, Sanjay & Craig's character designs are akin to that of Bob's Burgers-- they literally had the same character designer of that show do this one, and it couldn't be more obvious. But if we're talking about the actual animation for this series, it's... fine. Really, I don't think the movements or expressions are anything extraordinary, it doesn't push the posing or expressions to interesting heights. Don't mistake this for the animation being stiff or lifeless, because it's far from that too-- it moves well enough, but that's about all can be said-- it's competent animation, and the only times where they do seem to push the expressions or posing is when they do the grotesque close-ups, and they can get really gross.

  In general, this show seems to put all of its efforts on its visuals, backgrounds, and aesthetic than the animation. For example, everything in this show is textured-- everything, it's a weird paint-splatter-like texture that you can see added on the walls and streets. It's hard to describe, but the best way I could describe is it if you took Regular Show's background textures and merged them with SpongeBob's texture method in which everything is painted, it's a unique design choice that I think gives this show its identity, even little things like the chicken wings in this show, have detail that cartoons wouldn't normally add, emphasizing the texture, sauce, and meat of the wings, and they look so appetizing.

  I also love the way this show looks like at night, they mostly use pinks and prussian blue (which is my favorite shade of blue) that blend into each other seamlessly, and the way the moon is designed makes it look like a supermoon, they went out of their way to add all these little details to it that I can't help but fawn over.

  This show also incorporates other animation styles, there are some episodes that briefly feature some 8-bit animation, particularly one of the segments in the season 2 Halloween special, some low-poly CGI in the Tufflips video game the two main characters play, but the lighting in it looks so crisp and vibrant. There's also some CGI in this show from time to time, it's always obvious when they do it, and I can see an argument for why it looks out-of-place, but they reserve it for characters' imagination sequences, so I think it adds a layer of charm and puts an emphasis on the kids' imaginations, since kids to tend to be drawn to CG. The finale briefly changed its animation style to a mixture between a cheap, paper mache style and puppetry (they literally traced the characters from their model sheets) for the sequence where characters travel to India, and I think it was both funny and a clever way to get to the main location faster.

  But I wouldn't say all of these aesthetics the show have are particularly gorgeous, as Sanjay & Craig can have strobing lights transitions that appear at random, and I don't think a person with epilepsy would take kindly to that, though I do believe they give this series an identity, along with the jingles and guitar riff interludes they randomly have.

tl;dr version: This section might come off as messy, or underdeveloped, but that's because the animation is the last thing to come to my mind when talking about S&C's strengths, it is good animation for what it is, but nothing spectacular. More effort was placed into the backgrounds, the details, and the transitions. Sometimes they do play with or incorporate other animation styles, and I think they look neat when they do that, but generally, everything is reserved for the gross-ups-- they tend to be more exaggerated and more detailed compared to everything else.

A ROUGH START: I'm not adding a characters section this time around because I'd rather incorporate that part of the review into this one.

  I'm not going to beat around the bush: Season 1 is the sole reason why this show's reputation in the cartoon community is so low, and it's understandable as to why, as I was never a huge fan of it. Granted, there are things that I do appreciate about it, but let's first mention where season 1 went wrong: the grossout.

  I've said this before, and I'll say it again: It is really hard to gross me out. I'm more unnerved by veins, snot, and injections (despite not having a fear of needles) than I am by farts, shit, and vomit. In other words, I find the grossout in season 1 to be tame, but so overbearing, because they go out of their way to add as many details as possible into the grossout. Imagine a gross-up from SpongeBob but then they went the extra mile to give them these features that make them look more revolting instead of comedic-- that is how I'd describe season 1's grossout.

  The worst part about it is that it can happen at random points that completely take you out of an episode's experience, and they're pretty frequent too. There's even an entire episode about it, Unbarfable, and it's the worst episode of the show because while I do not find the episode gross, it tries so hard and is most likely the reason why no one will touch this show with a ten-foot pole. Its intention is to be as disgusting as possible, and I can see people looking away from the screen by the 30 second mark of this episode, whereas I was generally unimpressed and appalled because the juxtaposition between this and what comes later is unfathomable.

  But even barring the grossout, season 1 can be rather juvenile. Butt and fart jokes are a dime-a-dozen and they're almost always eye-roll worthy, they come off as forced because toilet humor works when there's an element of surprise. If you have no surprise, you have no joke, and thus you're left with a wet fart of a joke. They took this idea to an extreme in the episode aptly titled Fart Baby, which is Stewie is Enceinte before that episode even happened... or Fairly Odd Baby. All three of these episodes are what I can only describe as awkward, but I give the edge to Enceinte because it made far more sense in Family Guy's universe and prioritized telling jokes over devolving into an awkward recreation of a marriage crisis plot, a pitfall that Fart Baby fell into. Fart Baby also tried to go for slapstick, but it's so slow and weak. Other episodes like Cold Hard Cash, Doom Baby, and Cup O'Universe can also be described as try-hard grossout. Come on, you're never going to live up to the genius (I say this unironically) of Ren & Stimpy's grossout, no show ever will.

  The characters were not helping matters-- the ones that actually seemed like functioning people such as Darlene and Tufflips were pushed to the side in favor of characters like The Dicksons, whose sole existence is to be as filthy as possible, and our main leads.

  Sanjay & Craig, the characters, are so generic-- they're another ripoff of the buddy-buddy dynamic seen in shows like Regular Show and Adventure Time, but instead of being endearing or funny, they're instead so obnoxious. Their main shtick is that they'll be attracted to anything ass-related, mainly farts-- that's what the entire first episode was about. Oh, but they like chicken wings too-- definitely NOT taking that from Regular Show. Oh, but Sanjay has a crush on a girl who doesn't even care for his existence... it's been done before.

  These characters are nothing deep, and I don't think they have to be, but the situations and the traits they do carry are so uninspired, and when they're not that, our characters are literally stupid. Blackout is an "Escort mission" type plot and I already went off about them in my Adventure Time review-- I criticized the episode "The Other Tarts" for turning Finn and Jake into idiots for the sake of cheap conflict. and it's the same thing here.

  There's also The Giving G, which I can't believe I ever used to like. The characters grow attached to an inflatable gorilla in the span of 2 seconds, and we're meant to believe that they have some kind of deep bond with it. I also hate how this episode takes itself so seriously-- it borders on parody-- the previous episode was filled with farts and vomit, and now this show wants to tell some kind of sweet story? I'm not buying it, all it does is tell me that our characters are brainless since they'll be impressed by just about anything, like they're 2 years old.

  But what about when the show isn't like this, with the bad grossout, overdone tropes, and obnoxious characters? Well, I think that is a revitalization of 90s Nicktoons. I did criticize the first episode a bit, but I can't see myself entirely disliking it because I can see it being a pilot to a 90s Nicktoon, just because the show opens with our characters sneaking into an unfamiliar location, getting into some shenanigans, and then coming out unscathed-- kinda like Big House Blues from Ren & Stimpy.

  I also think the imagination sequences this show has add to that 90s feel, as cartoons back then did have these moments to emphasize the fact the characters are kids. I found the anime-esque opening in Laugh Quake and the opening of Stinkboy fun because of that.

  In general, when we're watching these kids just be kids, the show becomes so much more enjoyable-- original too. Game On is about our two characters running around looking for a video game, finding themselves in different locations before a video-game style climax-- there's a constant frantic energy to it that keeps you watching, it's also pretty funny, and is one of two S1 episodes that have no grossout-- the other being Chill Bill, which is an outlier for how mellow and quirky it is. I also found Traffical Island charming since it's also about our characters having fun, they even have a little scuffle akin to how kids would make big deals out of minor problems. You can throw episodes like Heightmare and Susan Loogie into this camp too.

  I'll even give Flip Flopas credit for how it utilized grossout correctly, I mean... it is gross, but I can't say that it's unjustified. The episode takes such a twisted and unexpected turn by the final few minutes, and I think the video game sequence they had at the beginning covered up just how gross the food our characters were eating was, along with making the vomit rainbow-colored instead of green.

  So, in the end, I wouldn't say season 1 is particularly bad, but I also wouldn't argue if someone found it that way. I think there's a decently enjoyable show hidden underneath the pathetic wretchedness of the grossout and cliches-- there's definitely potential here, and I think the showrunners realized that people weren't a fan of what season 1 had to offer, so much so that they went into season 2 with the thought process of "less fart, more heart".

SEASONS 2-3 FUCKING RULE: I've always been an avid defender of S2-3, they're not the greatest things I've ever seen, far from it, but the juxtaposition between this and season 1 are hard to believe-- these two seasons are what I'd call consistently enjoyable and funny.

The biggest strength they carry is that they eliminated the grossout-- it's only sometimes present in season 2, but nowhere near to the extent that season 1 went.

  We can argue semantics about Barfy's Babies and Fartwerk, but I don't think the former episode was gross until the final few minutes, and even then it had an ending that made any grossout forgivable, and the latter one actually told a solid story, and I appreciate the references to Kraftwerk, even if I'm not all that famiilar with their music. Season 3 completely eliminated the grossout besides 1 episode, and even in And Justice for Durdle, it's done with more tact than both season 1 and 2, and it got a few chuckles at some points despite how linear and predictable the story was.

  But beyond the grossout, S2-3 overhauled the nature and structure of this show entirely, most episodes feature a surprisingly grandiose adventure, characters getting development, all the while you're simply watching these kids be kids. An episode like Alien Craig is a fun space adventure, in fact, I love all the space adventure episodes so much, but they can be legitimately sweet and cute too-- the space adventure in Alien Craig is Sanjay and his friends using their imagination to make a chore as mundane as taking out the trash into a whimsical journey. They don't make it to the dump on time, and they even get ratted out, but when they do, you feel legitimately bad for the characters since they didn't do anything to deserve it. I feel this way because our main characters' obnoxious traits, like being obsessed with farts, were eliminated entirely.

  Even something like Sanjay's crush on Belle, has far more nuance to it than the shallowness that season 1 had. In the episode Glad to be Sad, we see Sanjay not enjoying his date with Belle because his best friend's not with him, and we see him show remorse for his actions. The episode Beauty and the Beard has the two of them bond like normal people, something that's common in these seasons-- characters will just have heart-to-heart talks, and I love it when cartoons are able to settle down and have characters talk about their feelings. One of my favorite moments from this series is when Hector talked to Craig about something he was once attached to and had to let go of in the episode Rash Thrash, there's no bullshit jokes or anything like that, it's a moment you're able to take seriously because these characters are showing their vulnerable side, telling their experiences, being there for one another.

  It's really, really sweet, but my favorite example of them telling stories with more weight to them has to be The Snake Pit, this is the final 11 minute episode of this show, and it has a grand finale feel to it despite not being the finale, it puts Sanjay and Craig's friendship to the test and it ends with Craig moving out of Sanjay's room in a rather heartwarming ending, there were lots of references to past episodes too, and we learn more about Craig's story before he met Sanjay. And as for the actual finale of this series, it gives off a really good message about accepting changes, being able to look at the positives of them, and having your family to help you through them, all the while the subplot is a final confrontation with an antagonist from season 1. It ends with an awesome song and a funny, grand meta ending, it feels like a perfect send-off for this series all things considered.

  Not only did the storytelling get a massive upgrade, but so did the comedy. It leans far more into meta-humor and insult comedy, and I think they both work greatly, also another way of emphasizing the childlike nature of this series, as kids do tease each other a lot, and can be pretty self-aware. I can't really explain how the meta-humor is done since it'd give it away, but the moments where characters break the fourth wall or acknowledge tropes the show uses like the transition jingles, are always unexpected and thus funny when they happen, and you should definitely watch the episodes GUTS Busters and JJ and Greg since they revel in their meta humor and are hilarious because of that.

  I also never mentioned the characters, but I think Sanjay & Craig's characters have a lot of personality. Sanjay is a typical kid protagonist who just goes through the motions in life, I can't name anything that stands out about him, but like many bromances between characters in these kinds of shows, I like how he's willing to drop everything going on to help Craig when he needs it, even if it means getting a severe allergic reaction in the case of Rash Thrash. Craig is the more interesting of the two, since he has... an actual backstory? Never thought I'd see it, but over the course of the series, we learn about Craig's past life: while in the pet store, out in the wild, and even his relationship with his demented brother. There's also an explanation for why he's always dressed casually and why, in the first season, he never revealed to anyone besides Sanjay and his best friends that he can talk-- there's SOMEHOW a progression to be seen in this character... sometimes not for the better. There's a point where Craig develops a crush on Sanjay's mom, and this could've easily been used to set up cringeworthy episodes or jokes, but it's very sparse and admittedly the moments where it's brought up are... decently funny, actually.

  I find all the other characters to be just as interesting too. Sanjay's mom, Darlene, is a character that didn't get much screentime in season 1, which was a shame because she seemed like one of the brighter characters. That notion of mine proved to be correct, as her prominence in seasons 2-3 is one of their best strengths. There's a lot we learn about her in these two seasons, and I generally love the "stern mother" trope that cartoons like Gumball do.

  Tufflips is one of the most memorable characters on this series, not just because of his design and unique accent, but because of his general demeanor. He's so full of himself despite clearly being a washed-up celebrity, and many episodes involving him, even in season 1, tend to be some of the most eventful episodes of this series.

  I also think Noodman is another character that gives Sanjay & Craig its own identity, his voice delivery makes it sound like the voice actor is always unhinged, and every moment he's involved in has a funny moment around the corner-- I think he's a great straightman to his neighbors' antics, and I also found it cool how, like Darlene, we learn about his past. Oddly enough, the episodes Butts Up and Friend Card both tell us a lot about both Darlene and Noodman, and it's why they're as good as they are, even if the latter episode is heavily comedic and not taken as seriously as the former episode.

  The recurring characters in this series are also really memorable to me, like the Conquistador in episode with the same name, Chill Bill, the D.I.N.K, Huggle Bunny, and several others. I think all of these characters give this show a supernatural kind of vibe to it, as in the case of Huggle Bunny, there is an element of mystery as to who he is and what he represents. A detail or two is spewed about him here and there and it makes the moments where he appears eerily cool and, once again, makes this show have its own vibe and identity.

tl;dr version: Yeah, I'm one of those people that isn't big on season 1 but really really likes seasons 2-3, and even I can say season 1 occasionally had its merits when they strayed away from bad grossout. Seasons 2-3 are like an entirely different show, and I wish they didn't exist in the same world as season 1 because the feel and writing of both are night and day. Season 2-3 ditched the grossout, only sparingly being used and having better usage at that, in favor of telling stories with a greater weight to them, with some episodes developing characters in this series like Noodman and Darlene. The grossout humor was also replaced by "insult comedy" and meta-humor, meaning that there are episodes with lines that truly stick out. It overall became a funny and endearing show by the turn of season 2.

CONCLUSION: I really wish this show didn't lose relevance by 2016 because it still carries the reputation that it's a shit imitation of earlier 2010s cartoons, when it wasn't. Sanjay & Craig, to me, felt like the first true original Nicktoon in a long time, a lot of thought went into making this strange world with memorable and interesting characters, and a vibe that's reminiscent of the 90s. Season 1 tragically did a number on this series, and I can't blame anyone for feeling the way they do about it, some episodes are just so obnoxious with their grossout humor that they kill any good-will episodes had, and season 1 worked best when it wasn't doing that. In fact, underneath that grossout laid a show that was decently enjoyable, but didn't use its full potential. S2-3 DID find that potential, and used them to their greatest ability-- I highly doubt anyone could name me a problem episodes like Butts Up or Balzalderac! have.

It's also hilarious how the finale of Sanjay & Craig is way better than Steven Universe's, Adventure Time's, and Samurai Jack's finales. I would say that I wish the show didn't end so soon, but it ended on such a satisfying note that captured the spirit of what S2-3 were all about perfectly. Had it not been for season 1, I'd call this series great in a heartbeat, but GOOD is also good enough. I know this series is sadly irrelevant nowadays, but I'd highly recommend checking out at least a few seasons 2-3 episodes, I think they're definitely worth anyone's time. They had one thing that Adventure Time was sorely lacking for me: consistency. I like consistently enjoyable shows, and S2-3 fit that mold perfectly.

Description

This game is called "Watch Paint Dry"

  For those who are not in the know, I had a scorecard of the second season of Sanjay & Craig on my DeviantArt up until August 2019, where I took it down because despite the fact that I've seen this entire series and it was fresh in my memory, and that I also wanted to do scorecards for S1 and S3, I felt like I needed to do a proper binge to get all my thoughts together. In other words, it's another show that I should've made a scorecard on ages ago, and was desperate to, because it's a series that got so much flack in its early days, and people jumped ship just as it was getting good... great, even.

HISTORY: I first watched Sanjay & Craig back in January 2015, I saw promos for it where they used a lot of season 1 clips, particularly from the first two episodes. It wasn't the best impression, but I decided to give the show a look anyways, and I remember my first episode being Susan Loogie-- I liked that one quite a bit, but as I watched more episodes... my first impressions began to deteriorate. Episode after episode, I found myself disliking Sanjay & Craig, thinking the grossout was unbearable, ruining episodes that would've been fine without it, after which I decided that I did not like this show.

  But like several others, I did have a change of heart later on. I randomly caught some episodes of Sanjay & Craig in the midst of 2015, they were coincidentally the first two season 2 episodes, and I found myself liking them-- really liking them, and it made me question if the series had changed between the first time I saw it 6 months ago, and then. As I kept watching through season 2, I grew an appreciation and fondness for it, telling others online that the show had really changed and that people should give it a second look. Unfortunately, by this point in the run, Sanjay & Craig was cemented as a pale imitation of Regular Show with disgusting grossout to boot. I mean, if anyone saw an episode like Unbarfable, why would they ever want to see this show again?

  I kept up with this series until the day that it ended, and feeling pretty down once I saw the finale as it was such a fun finale, and by the end of the run, I could say that S&C was a good show... though far from perfect.

ANIMATION: Yes, Sanjay & Craig's character designs are akin to that of Bob's Burgers-- they literally had the same character designer of that show do this one, and it couldn't be more obvious. But if we're talking about the actual animation for this series, it's... fine. Really, I don't think the movements or expressions are anything extraordinary, it doesn't push the posing or expressions to interesting heights. Don't mistake this for the animation being stiff or lifeless, because it's far from that too-- it moves well enough, but that's about all can be said-- it's competent animation, and the only times where they do seem to push the expressions or posing is when they do the grotesque close-ups, and they can get really gross.

  In general, this show seems to put all of its efforts on its visuals, backgrounds, and aesthetic than the animation. For example, everything in this show is textured-- everything, it's a weird paint-splatter-like texture that you can see added on the walls and streets. It's hard to describe, but the best way I could describe is it if you took Regular Show's background textures and merged them with SpongeBob's texture method in which everything is painted, it's a unique design choice that I think gives this show its identity, even little things like the chicken wings in this show, have detail that cartoons wouldn't normally add, emphasizing the texture, sauce, and meat of the wings, and they look so appetizing.

  I also love the way this show looks like at night, they mostly use pinks and prussian blue (which is my favorite shade of blue) that blend into each other seamlessly, and the way the moon is designed makes it look like a supermoon, they went out of their way to add all these little details to it that I can't help but fawn over.

  This show also incorporates other animation styles, there are some episodes that briefly feature some 8-bit animation, particularly one of the segments in the season 2 Halloween special, some low-poly CGI in the Tufflips video game the two main characters play, but the lighting in it looks so crisp and vibrant. There's also some CGI in this show from time to time, it's always obvious when they do it, and I can see an argument for why it looks out-of-place, but they reserve it for characters' imagination sequences, so I think it adds a layer of charm and puts an emphasis on the kids' imaginations, since kids to tend to be drawn to CG. The finale briefly changed its animation style to a mixture between a cheap, paper mache style and puppetry (they literally traced the characters from their model sheets) for the sequence where characters travel to India, and I think it was both funny and a clever way to get to the main location faster.

  But I wouldn't say all of these aesthetics the show have are particularly gorgeous, as Sanjay & Craig can have strobing lights transitions that appear at random, and I don't think a person with epilepsy would take kindly to that, though I do believe they give this series an identity, along with the jingles and guitar riff interludes they randomly have.

tl;dr version: This section might come off as messy, or underdeveloped, but that's because the animation is the last thing to come to my mind when talking about S&C's strengths, it is good animation for what it is, but nothing spectacular. More effort was placed into the backgrounds, the details, and the transitions. Sometimes they do play with or incorporate other animation styles, and I think they look neat when they do that, but generally, everything is reserved for the gross-ups-- they tend to be more exaggerated and more detailed compared to everything else.

A ROUGH START: I'm not adding a characters section this time around because I'd rather incorporate that part of the review into this one.

  I'm not going to beat around the bush: Season 1 is the sole reason why this show's reputation in the cartoon community is so low, and it's understandable as to why, as I was never a huge fan of it. Granted, there are things that I do appreciate about it, but let's first mention where season 1 went wrong: the grossout.

  I've said this before, and I'll say it again: It is really hard to gross me out. I'm more unnerved by veins, snot, and injections (despite not having a fear of needles) than I am by farts, shit, and vomit. In other words, I find the grossout in season 1 to be tame, but so overbearing, because they go out of their way to add as many details as possible into the grossout. Imagine a gross-up from SpongeBob but then they went the extra mile to give them these features that make them look more revolting instead of comedic-- that is how I'd describe season 1's grossout.

  The worst part about it is that it can happen at random points that completely take you out of an episode's experience, and they're pretty frequent too. There's even an entire episode about it, Unbarfable, and it's the worst episode of the show because while I do not find the episode gross, it tries so hard and is most likely the reason why no one will touch this show with a ten-foot pole. Its intention is to be as disgusting as possible, and I can see people looking away from the screen by the 30 second mark of this episode, whereas I was generally unimpressed and appalled because the juxtaposition between this and what comes later is unfathomable.

  But even barring the grossout, season 1 can be rather juvenile. Butt and fart jokes are a dime-a-dozen and they're almost always eye-roll worthy, they come off as forced because toilet humor works when there's an element of surprise. If you have no surprise, you have no joke, and thus you're left with a wet fart of a joke. They took this idea to an extreme in the episode aptly titled Fart Baby, which is Stewie is Enceinte before that episode even happened... or Fairly Odd Baby. All three of these episodes are what I can only describe as awkward, but I give the edge to Enceinte because it made far more sense in Family Guy's universe and prioritized telling jokes over devolving into an awkward recreation of a marriage crisis plot, a pitfall that Fart Baby fell into. Fart Baby also tried to go for slapstick, but it's so slow and weak. Other episodes like Cold Hard Cash, Doom Baby, and Cup O'Universe can also be described as try-hard grossout. Come on, you're never going to live up to the genius (I say this unironically) of Ren & Stimpy's grossout, no show ever will.

  The characters were not helping matters-- the ones that actually seemed like functioning people such as Darlene and Tufflips were pushed to the side in favor of characters like The Dicksons, whose sole existence is to be as filthy as possible, and our main leads.

  Sanjay & Craig, the characters, are so generic-- they're another ripoff of the buddy-buddy dynamic seen in shows like Regular Show and Adventure Time, but instead of being endearing or funny, they're instead so obnoxious. Their main shtick is that they'll be attracted to anything ass-related, mainly farts-- that's what the entire first episode was about. Oh, but they like chicken wings too-- definitely NOT taking that from Regular Show. Oh, but Sanjay has a crush on a girl who doesn't even care for his existence... it's been done before.

  These characters are nothing deep, and I don't think they have to be, but the situations and the traits they do carry are so uninspired, and when they're not that, our characters are literally stupid. Blackout is an "Escort mission" type plot and I already went off about them in my Adventure Time review-- I criticized the episode "The Other Tarts" for turning Finn and Jake into idiots for the sake of cheap conflict. and it's the same thing here.

  There's also The Giving G, which I can't believe I ever used to like. The characters grow attached to an inflatable gorilla in the span of 2 seconds, and we're meant to believe that they have some kind of deep bond with it. I also hate how this episode takes itself so seriously-- it borders on parody-- the previous episode was filled with farts and vomit, and now this show wants to tell some kind of sweet story? I'm not buying it, all it does is tell me that our characters are brainless since they'll be impressed by just about anything, like they're 2 years old.

  But what about when the show isn't like this, with the bad grossout, overdone tropes, and obnoxious characters? Well, I think that is a revitalization of 90s Nicktoons. I did criticize the first episode a bit, but I can't see myself entirely disliking it because I can see it being a pilot to a 90s Nicktoon, just because the show opens with our characters sneaking into an unfamiliar location, getting into some shenanigans, and then coming out unscathed-- kinda like Big House Blues from Ren & Stimpy.

  I also think the imagination sequences this show has add to that 90s feel, as cartoons back then did have these moments to emphasize the fact the characters are kids. I found the anime-esque opening in Laugh Quake and the opening of Stinkboy fun because of that.

  In general, when we're watching these kids just be kids, the show becomes so much more enjoyable-- original too. Game On is about our two characters running around looking for a video game, finding themselves in different locations before a video-game style climax-- there's a constant frantic energy to it that keeps you watching, it's also pretty funny, and is one of two S1 episodes that have no grossout-- the other being Chill Bill, which is an outlier for how mellow and quirky it is. I also found Traffical Island charming since it's also about our characters having fun, they even have a little scuffle akin to how kids would make big deals out of minor problems. You can throw episodes like Heightmare and Susan Loogie into this camp too.

  I'll even give Flip Flopas credit for how it utilized grossout correctly, I mean... it is gross, but I can't say that it's unjustified. The episode takes such a twisted and unexpected turn by the final few minutes, and I think the video game sequence they had at the beginning covered up just how gross the food our characters were eating was, along with making the vomit rainbow-colored instead of green.

  So, in the end, I wouldn't say season 1 is particularly bad, but I also wouldn't argue if someone found it that way. I think there's a decently enjoyable show hidden underneath the pathetic wretchedness of the grossout and cliches-- there's definitely potential here, and I think the showrunners realized that people weren't a fan of what season 1 had to offer, so much so that they went into season 2 with the thought process of "less fart, more heart".

SEASONS 2-3 FUCKING RULE: I've always been an avid defender of S2-3, they're not the greatest things I've ever seen, far from it, but the juxtaposition between this and season 1 are hard to believe-- these two seasons are what I'd call consistently enjoyable and funny.

The biggest strength they carry is that they eliminated the grossout-- it's only sometimes present in season 2, but nowhere near to the extent that season 1 went.

  We can argue semantics about Barfy's Babies and Fartwerk, but I don't think the former episode was gross until the final few minutes, and even then it had an ending that made any grossout forgivable, and the latter one actually told a solid story, and I appreciate the references to Kraftwerk, even if I'm not all that famiilar with their music. Season 3 completely eliminated the grossout besides 1 episode, and even in And Justice for Durdle, it's done with more tact than both season 1 and 2, and it got a few chuckles at some points despite how linear and predictable the story was.

  But beyond the grossout, S2-3 overhauled the nature and structure of this show entirely, most episodes feature a surprisingly grandiose adventure, characters getting development, all the while you're simply watching these kids be kids. An episode like Alien Craig is a fun space adventure, in fact, I love all the space adventure episodes so much, but they can be legitimately sweet and cute too-- the space adventure in Alien Craig is Sanjay and his friends using their imagination to make a chore as mundane as taking out the trash into a whimsical journey. They don't make it to the dump on time, and they even get ratted out, but when they do, you feel legitimately bad for the characters since they didn't do anything to deserve it. I feel this way because our main characters' obnoxious traits, like being obsessed with farts, were eliminated entirely.

  Even something like Sanjay's crush on Belle, has far more nuance to it than the shallowness that season 1 had. In the episode Glad to be Sad, we see Sanjay not enjoying his date with Belle because his best friend's not with him, and we see him show remorse for his actions. The episode Beauty and the Beard has the two of them bond like normal people, something that's common in these seasons-- characters will just have heart-to-heart talks, and I love it when cartoons are able to settle down and have characters talk about their feelings. One of my favorite moments from this series is when Hector talked to Craig about something he was once attached to and had to let go of in the episode Rash Thrash, there's no bullshit jokes or anything like that, it's a moment you're able to take seriously because these characters are showing their vulnerable side, telling their experiences, being there for one another.

  It's really, really sweet, but my favorite example of them telling stories with more weight to them has to be The Snake Pit, this is the final 11 minute episode of this show, and it has a grand finale feel to it despite not being the finale, it puts Sanjay and Craig's friendship to the test and it ends with Craig moving out of Sanjay's room in a rather heartwarming ending, there were lots of references to past episodes too, and we learn more about Craig's story before he met Sanjay. And as for the actual finale of this series, it gives off a really good message about accepting changes, being able to look at the positives of them, and having your family to help you through them, all the while the subplot is a final confrontation with an antagonist from season 1. It ends with an awesome song and a funny, grand meta ending, it feels like a perfect send-off for this series all things considered.

  Not only did the storytelling get a massive upgrade, but so did the comedy. It leans far more into meta-humor and insult comedy, and I think they both work greatly, also another way of emphasizing the childlike nature of this series, as kids do tease each other a lot, and can be pretty self-aware. I can't really explain how the meta-humor is done since it'd give it away, but the moments where characters break the fourth wall or acknowledge tropes the show uses like the transition jingles, are always unexpected and thus funny when they happen, and you should definitely watch the episodes GUTS Busters and JJ and Greg since they revel in their meta humor and are hilarious because of that.

  I also never mentioned the characters, but I think Sanjay & Craig's characters have a lot of personality. Sanjay is a typical kid protagonist who just goes through the motions in life, I can't name anything that stands out about him, but like many bromances between characters in these kinds of shows, I like how he's willing to drop everything going on to help Craig when he needs it, even if it means getting a severe allergic reaction in the case of Rash Thrash. Craig is the more interesting of the two, since he has... an actual backstory? Never thought I'd see it, but over the course of the series, we learn about Craig's past life: while in the pet store, out in the wild, and even his relationship with his demented brother. There's also an explanation for why he's always dressed casually and why, in the first season, he never revealed to anyone besides Sanjay and his best friends that he can talk-- there's SOMEHOW a progression to be seen in this character... sometimes not for the better. There's a point where Craig develops a crush on Sanjay's mom, and this could've easily been used to set up cringeworthy episodes or jokes, but it's very sparse and admittedly the moments where it's brought up are... decently funny, actually.

  I find all the other characters to be just as interesting too. Sanjay's mom, Darlene, is a character that didn't get much screentime in season 1, which was a shame because she seemed like one of the brighter characters. That notion of mine proved to be correct, as her prominence in seasons 2-3 is one of their best strengths. There's a lot we learn about her in these two seasons, and I generally love the "stern mother" trope that cartoons like Gumball do.

  Tufflips is one of the most memorable characters on this series, not just because of his design and unique accent, but because of his general demeanor. He's so full of himself despite clearly being a washed-up celebrity, and many episodes involving him, even in season 1, tend to be some of the most eventful episodes of this series.

  I also think Noodman is another character that gives Sanjay & Craig its own identity, his voice delivery makes it sound like the voice actor is always unhinged, and every moment he's involved in has a funny moment around the corner-- I think he's a great straightman to his neighbors' antics, and I also found it cool how, like Darlene, we learn about his past. Oddly enough, the episodes Butts Up and Friend Card both tell us a lot about both Darlene and Noodman, and it's why they're as good as they are, even if the latter episode is heavily comedic and not taken as seriously as the former episode.

  The recurring characters in this series are also really memorable to me, like the Conquistador in episode with the same name, Chill Bill, the D.I.N.K, Huggle Bunny, and several others. I think all of these characters give this show a supernatural kind of vibe to it, as in the case of Huggle Bunny, there is an element of mystery as to who he is and what he represents. A detail or two is spewed about him here and there and it makes the moments where he appears eerily cool and, once again, makes this show have its own vibe and identity.

tl;dr version: Yeah, I'm one of those people that isn't big on season 1 but really really likes seasons 2-3, and even I can say season 1 occasionally had its merits when they strayed away from bad grossout. Seasons 2-3 are like an entirely different show, and I wish they didn't exist in the same world as season 1 because the feel and writing of both are night and day. Season 2-3 ditched the grossout, only sparingly being used and having better usage at that, in favor of telling stories with a greater weight to them, with some episodes developing characters in this series like Noodman and Darlene. The grossout humor was also replaced by "insult comedy" and meta-humor, meaning that there are episodes with lines that truly stick out. It overall became a funny and endearing show by the turn of season 2.

CONCLUSION: I really wish this show didn't lose relevance by 2016 because it still carries the reputation that it's a shit imitation of earlier 2010s cartoons, when it wasn't. Sanjay & Craig, to me, felt like the first true original Nicktoon in a long time, a lot of thought went into making this strange world with memorable and interesting characters, and a vibe that's reminiscent of the 90s. Season 1 tragically did a number on this series, and I can't blame anyone for feeling the way they do about it, some episodes are just so obnoxious with their grossout humor that they kill any good-will episodes had, and season 1 worked best when it wasn't doing that. In fact, underneath that grossout laid a show that was decently enjoyable, but didn't use its full potential. S2-3 DID find that potential, and used them to their greatest ability-- I highly doubt anyone could name me a problem episodes like Butts Up or Balzalderac! have.

It's also hilarious how the finale of Sanjay & Craig is way better than Steven Universe's, Adventure Time's, and Samurai Jack's finales. I would say that I wish the show didn't end so soon, but it ended on such a satisfying note that captured the spirit of what S2-3 were all about perfectly. Had it not been for season 1, I'd call this series great in a heartbeat, but GOOD is also good enough. I know this series is sadly irrelevant nowadays, but I'd highly recommend checking out at least a few seasons 2-3 episodes, I think they're definitely worth anyone's time. They had one thing that Adventure Time was sorely lacking for me: consistency. I like consistently enjoyable shows, and S2-3 fit that mold perfectly.