Welcome to the Friday edition of the Daily Cartoon on Car JoeMez. We’ll be sailing into the weekend with this one today, but, as always, remember to check out the weekly show, The Car JoeMez Podcast, on iTunes, Soundcloud or wherever it is that you listen to the highest of quality podcasts.
I assume that nowadays, people think of Howie Mandel as the guy from Deal Or No Deal, but if you’re around my age, you know him for two things: always checking to make sure he’s not under your bed (I’m not explaining this. You either get it or you’re wack AF.) and Bobby’s World.
Bobby’s World was about the stories and imagination of 4 year-old (when the show first premiered) Bobby Generic and his dealings with the adults and siblings in his life. It originally debuted in 1990 and -shockingly, to me at least – lasted eight seasons. I remember it being a solid show that people liked, but nothing that took over the mainstream by any means. Like, yeah, I knew a bunch of people who watched it, but it was never the thing you couldn’t wait to talk about with your friends.
The show was created by Mandel and he even does the voices for both Bobby and his father, Howard. Supposedly, he’s spoken about the possibility of a revival for this show, but c’mon. There are plenty of things we need before getting new episodes of Bobby’s World. Just one man’s opinion. You don’t have to agree with it.
So, now that our background is out of the way, on with the show!
Bobby’s World: S.3, E.10: “Baby Brother Blues”
Originally Aired: November 14, 1992
Plot:
We open at the Generic house where Bobby is bothering his sister, Kelly, to shift through the mail to see if his Captain Squash (the primo superhero to all the kids) game has finally been delivered. The house is madness right now because Bobby’s mom, Martha, is primed to go into labor any minute and Howard – the pops – is nervous AF.
Bobby sees that his game was delivered, but it’s on the counter where he can’t reach and nobody will help him because they’re all catering to Martha who is obviously uncomfortable. The game gets tossed around a bit until it lands on top of the fridge. Bobby then goes into a fantasy segment where he’s a famous mountain climber trying to reach the peak of the frozen tundra where his hero, Captain Squash is trapped, frozen in a block of ice desperate to be rescued. It comes to an abrupt end, however, when Howard yells at Bobby for climbing on chairs, effectively breaking the fantasy. Bobby is already resenting the unborn baby because nobody wants to just give him his game so he’d shut the fuck up.
Bobby’s heated and decided to pack up and move so he doesn’t have to compete with the baby for affection. Where is he moving? To the French Foreign Legion, of course! Back to a fantasy sequence where Bobby is dressed like Napoleon and insults all the French soldiers because he hasn’t exactly mastered the language. He decides that the French are assholes, Lloyd, and runs to a waiting spaceship to take him to a different planet. When his brother Derek breaks the fan this time, Bobby decides to live in a blanket fort for his entire life.
Derek finally brings Bobby his Captain Squash game, but, of course, it’s fallen off the refrigerator and into a bowl of lentil soup and is broken. Bobby tries to get Howard to fix it, but once he’s again ignored, he smashes it on the floor. Howard gets fired up and tells him to go outside until he can behave himself.
Now, I don’t have kids, but if I did, I don’t know if sending them to sit outside like Dino from The Flintstones is quite the way to get a small child to realize the error of his ways. I don’t know! Maybe I’m completely wrong and you parents out there can tell me all about it. This just wouldn’t be my go-to punishment.
After a quick dream about going to a “Former Baby Brothers” support club, Bobby is rushed into the minivan because Martha’s going into labor and they need to get her to the hospital. After some time well spent in the waiting room, Howard emerges with the news that Martha’s had twin boys! Everybody’s excited except Bobby who doesn’t even want to go in the room to meet his new baby brothers. A nurse who resembles a black Betty Rubble says she’ll look after Bobby and takes him on a tour of the hospital that concludes with a visit to the nursery. Bobby sees his new brothers for the first time and just like Tazz, the mood changes.
He can’t wait to teach them everything he knows about being in the Generic family. We close up with Bobby being chased through the halls of the hospital by the entire family because he’s running around with the stroller carrying both newborns. What could possibly go wrong?
The show finishes with a scene of live-action Howie Mandel with his cartoon family in the hospital with an appearance by Paul Anka who sings “You’re Having My Baby”. What a moment.
Final Thoughts:
This show is fun. Nothing too serious, the characters are cartoony enough and the fantasy sequences for how a 4 year-old is interpreting his surroundings come off creative and imaginative.
I know I used to lose myself in fantasies like that all the time when I was a kid. I wonder is the same can be said for kids today, though. Sure, I don’t have them, but I have a shit ton of little cousins and whenever I see them, they’re all sitting quietly to themselves each holding a tablet or someone’s phone. They don’t even have interest in toys anymore and that kills me. Toys are the best.
More importantly, because kids don’t play with toys, it makes it more expensive for jerks like me since the toy companies have to make up those extra profits somewhere and I get hit with a bigger mark-up.
Yo. Fuck kids.
❤ Joe
Car JoeMeZ 