“Why on earth did you decide to give up any life you had and watched an old childrens show from 10 years ago?!” I hear nobody ask… because there’s nobody reading this… Well, it started with Facebook (of all places), and I saw that come channels were doing streams of Ed Edd n Eddy episodes, so I decided to give them a watch, and I really enjoyed it, it was a nice nostalgic trip! I had ended up watching all of the streams on Facebook.
In desperation for my fix of the tales of the Cul-De-Sac, I remembered that I had the DVDs for the first 2 seasons imported from the US, I was set!
After watching the DVDs, I decided to pirate borrow the rest of the seasons online, and watched those, and then the finale on Youtube. (I’ll buy the seasons on iTunes when I get money, I promise)
So what are my thoughts? Well, you have those shows that you remember fondly from when you were a kid, but as you watch them again, they either don’t age well, or just aren’t as enjoyable as an adult. There are other shows that are timeless, and are just as enjoyable as the day you first watched it. Others better, as there are innuendos and 4th wall breakings you didn’t get as a kid.
So what category does Ed, Edd n Eddy fall in? Definitely the last! The slapstick is just as funny as they were as a kid, and now that I actually pay attention to the dialogue, I’ve noticed there are quite a few 4th walls broken throughout the series!
For those unaware of the show, it follows 3 unlikely friends attempting to scam the fellow inhabitants of their cul-de-sac out of their quarters, in order to buy Jawbreakers… Jeez even the plot sounds whacky when explaining it!
The show ran from 1999-2009, making it the longest running Cartoon Network show of all time, and with good reason… well, it was good.
You have Ed, the biggest, oldest, daftest one of the 3. He is arguably the funniest character, thanks to all of his slapstick moments.
You have Edd, commonly referred to as “Double D” (or Daburu D in Japan!), he is the brains of the group, but kind of lacks much of a personality in comparison, although he is obsessed with cleanliness and wears a sock on his head? …Why does he wear a sock on his head? Nobody knows, it was never revealed what was under it.
Then there’s Eddy, the youngest and shortest of the 3, and is the leader of the pack, he’s the one coming up with all of the scams and tried everything in his power to get money from people!
There are other character of all sorts of variety in the cul-de-sac, but to be honest, I can’t be bothered explaining them all.
There are only 16 characters in the entire show, including a goat, a pig and a plank of wood… and nobody else appears in the show, no bystanders or background characters, nobody.
So I guess the show can be divided into 3 eras, Seasons 1-4 cover are set in the summer, with no school ever mentioned in the show. Season 5 takes place in Autumn, where the characters return to school. Season 6 would have taken place in the winter, from the looks of it. I say “would have”, more on that later.
I grew up watching the first 4 seasons, mostly. So I guess it’s my favorite of the 3, like many kids, I hate school, so the less I was reminded of it, the better! I had always wanted to try out half of the stuff they came up with, they made things like pretend TV shows, and roller coaster rides, and for what? To get 3 quarters… As an adult watching it again, I can’t help but think that it must have cost them more to build the scams… but then again, they probably just took the resources from their houses, who knows?
Seasons 5 and 6, I was a little weary getting into them, because I didn’t think a school-like environment would be fitting for the show, and I guess I was scared of change as well, but on the other hand, maybe change was good, perhaps the formula they were working with was getting stale, because at this point, it would have been 6 years of the same kind of thing.
Surprisingly, they made it work really well, the school environments seem to work just fine, and it’s amazing how well they managed to still only show the main characters, no teachers, no fellow students ever appear in the show!
Seasons 5 & 6 were nice breaths of fresh air, they taught their old dog new tricks, and that old dog still had life left in it.
Now about Season 6… it only has one episode… Well, technically 2, since 2 segments make up an episode… Why does it only have one episode? Well, the answer (or at least the version floating around online) is pretty upsetting.
From what I’ve read, Paul Boyd, the person who drew the title cards of the show, got shot dead in 2007, around the same time season 6 was being made, Danny Antonucci, the creator of the show, was really crushed by the news, and effectively cancelled the show afterwards, I’m guessing since they already had one episode made it, they thought they might as well release that.
It’s sad, especially since Season 6, like I said, seem to try and make things different still, in the episodes of season 6, it was snowing everywhere, so I’m guessing they were planning on making Season 6 the winter season, which was a good idea in my opinion.
So, anyway, let’s cover the grand finale of the show: Big Picture Show!
I won’t give out any spoilers. The movie is available on Youtube, so give it a watch yourself.
In my opinion, it was fantastic. It was very emotional and intense, it left me on the edge of my computer chair to find out what happened next, and I had already seen it before! As well as doing this, it also did managed to get come laughs out of me, only a true work of art can get several emotions out of people at the same time.
One of the mysteries that has been plaguing the show, pretty much from the very beginning, had been answered in the movie, though I’m not going to tell you which one.
I would include screenshots, but I watched through Youtube, rather than VLC, so I wasn’t able to take any screenshots.
“Ah”, I hear someone say, “What about the specials?”, well, I don’t feel it’s appropriate to watch season specials outside of the time that season is in, there’s a special for Christmas, one for Halloween and one for Valentine’s day. I only watched the Valentines day, as that didn’t pass by that long ago. It’s… cute… I guess… I don’t know…
There is, I suppose one other thing that is perhaps worth a mention, I found that there is a show a hardcore Ed Edd n Eddy fan is making, called the “Bro Show”, which is made to be a prequel, and it features Eddy’s big brother. The pilot is available on Youtube.
The actual pilot leaves a lot to be desired, in my opinion, but I think they’re on to something. If the idea for the show gets picked up and made into a real TV show, that would be awesome!
… and that concludes my thoughts on the Ed Edd n Eddy Saga. Should you watch the show again? Hell Yes! It is just as good now as it has ever been, and you’d be doing yourself a massive injustice if you don’t go out and buy the DVDs and watch the rest on iTunes right now!
It was one heck of a journey through time, and it’s sad that it has finally come to an end… It’s left me empty, wanting more… What now?
I have an idea, it’s practically the motherload of nostalgic children’s shows… 21 Series, nearly 300 episodes spanning over 20 years… Now, say it with me: To you…
Cobra!'s Retro Room 