Pinky and the Brain
| Pinky and the Brain | |
|---|---|
Pinky (right) and The Brain | |
| Created by | Tom Ruegger Peter Hastings |
| Starring | Rob Paulsen Maurice LaMarche |
| Country of origin | USA |
| No. of episodes | 65 (plus 13 episodes of Pinky, Elmyra and The Brain) |
| Production | |
| Running time | 0:11 or 0:22 (depending on the episode) |
| Original release | |
| Network | The WB Television Network |
| Release | 1995 – 1999 |
Pinky and the Brain are cartoon characters from the animated television series Animaniacs. Later, they starred in their own spin-off cartoon show called Pinky and the Brain and even later in Pinky, Elmyra and The Brain. These latter series were produced by Steven Spielberg and Warner Bros. Animation, and aired from 1995 to 1998 on The WB Television Network, running for 65 episodes.
The two are genetically enhanced lab mice who reside in a cage in the Acme Labs research facility. Each week sees Brain come up with a new plan for the two (led by him) to take over the world, which ultimately ends in failure. In common with many other Animaniacs shorts, many episodes are in some way a parody of something else - usually a film. The cartoon's famous tagline is: "Gee, Brain, what do you want to do tonight?" "The same thing we do every night, Pinky: Try to take over the world!"
The series won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Class - Animated Program in 1999.
The series will re-run on Warner Bros. and AOL's new broadband internet channel Toontopia TV.
The Brain
The Brain bears a resemblance to Orson Welles, particularly in his vocal characteristics (he is voiced by Maurice LaMarche in the English version and by Kenichi Ogata in the Japanese dub). He was originally based on a caricature of WB animation staffer Tom Minton, a very dry wit of the writing crew. The Welles connection comes from LaMarche, who is a big fan of the actor/director. Brain is highly intelligent and develops Rube Goldberg plans for global domination. His tail is bent like a staircase(which he uses to pick the lock off the cage often), and his head is large and wide, supposedly housing his abnormally large brain. He appears to be coldly unemotional and speaks in a deadpan manner. Nevertheless, Brain has a very subtle sense of humor, and has even fallen in love once, with Billie (voiced by Tress MacNeille), a rather dippy girl mouse with a Queens accent (perhaps based on the Citizen Kane character Susan Alexander, in another Welles connection). Intellectually, Brain sees his inevitable rise to power as beneficial to the world rather than merely being greedy for power.
The characteristics of Brain would lead one to believe that he is more suited to be an antagonist rather than a protagonist, but the series tends to present him as a quixotic fellow striving for greatness against the odds, evoking sympathy from the audience and causing viewers to like him, despite his seemingly evil plans for world domination. Such a thing is typical of an anti-hero, which many consider Brain to be. The absurdity of a normally insignificant creature hungering for world dominance adds to the comical effect, and one senses a Napoleon complex within him, despite the gravitas of his Wellesian diction - highlighted when other characters inadvertently become as smart as or smarter than him. Unfortunately for the Brain, his schemes are inevitably doomed to failure by reason of one or more of a few common mishaps: Pinky doing something idiotic to ruin the plan, Brain gravely under/overestimating the masses' intelligence, or, simply, bad luck.
Brain's similarity to Orson Welles was made explicit in the episode "Yes, Always", which was based upon an outtake from one of Welles' television commercials, colloquially known as Frozen Peas, in which he ranted about the poor quality of the script. (LaMarche is said to recite part of this outtake at every recording session, so the script may very well have been inspired by his own obsession with it.) Strengthening the Welles connection was an episode in which Brain took on the mind-clouding powers of a radio character called "The Fog": a parody of The Shadow, a popular radio character for which Welles once provided the voice. Other episodes alluding to Welles included an episode entitled "The Third Mouse," a parody of The Third Man, in which Welles appeared, and an episode in which Brain, inspired by Welles' infamous War of the Worlds radio broadcast and the hysteria it provoked, stages an alien invasion on television, believing that this will cause humanity to turn itself over to his rule.
Pinky
Pinky (voiced by Rob Paulsen in the English version and by Hideyuki Umezu in the Japanese version) is another genetically modified mouse who shares the same cage at Acme Labs but is substantially less bright. He speaks with a heavy accent, possibly based on Dick Van Dyke's poor imitation cockney English or a character in a Monty Python skit (Paulsen is a fan). He frequently says nonsensical interjections like "narf", "zort","poit", and "troz" (the last of which Pinky started saying after noticing it was "'zort' in the mirror"), sometimes with a spontaneity resembling Tourette Syndrome. He also used "fjord" and "gnurf" on unique occasions. Rob Paulsen won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Performer in an Animated Program for this role in 1999. Pinky is based on former Tiny Toon Adventures writer and director Eddie Fitzgerald (who has also worked on Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures and Ren and Stimpy) who is said to have constantly said "Narf" around the Tiny Toons production office. Although Pinky is also an albino lab mouse like the Brain, he has a straighter tail, a severe overbite, and is taller than the Brain. Pinky is more open-minded than the Brain, and much more up-beat. He doesn't let troubles ruin his day, mostly because he's too scatter-brained to notice them. Pinky also works with Brain despite the fact that Brain hits Pinky on the head a lot and insults him. But Pinky actually seems to enjoy it laughing after every hit, Pinky is just happy spending time with his best friend The Brain.
Pinky has a number of unusual special abilities, something like 'magic' but caused by his genetic engineering. Most notably, he occasionally levitates, but also has been known to come up with incredible insights on the scale that one would expect from Brain, contrasting with his otherwise stupid appearance. The viewer might consider that Brain should be frustrated by the success that could have been possible if he'd listened to or asked Pinky about the situation and/or plan, but Brain rarely shows anything more than a confused or sarcastic face and sometimes a comment, and usually near the end of the episode. In at least one instance, Pinky had much of an episode centering around himself wherein he took on some of Brain's motivation for taking over the world. This episode has Pinky becoming extremely successful at ruling at least a town, but of course the whole thing is put through the wringer of Pinky's 'clockwork orange' view of things, hence Pinky's choice of naming the town: "I think I'll call it 'Shiny Pants', because everyone in there will want to wear shiny pants..." and goes on to describe his ultimate goal and the path to get there. Seeing Pinky's unexpected success, Brain is understood to wonder questions similar to many that have been asked for centuries: "why do people with such capacity for power seem to waste it on crazy things that work out somehow, but shouldn't?"
The following exchange occurs in each episode:
Brain: Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?
Pinky: I think so, Brain, but . . .
The elipsis is filled in each time with a unique non-sequitur. The result is always utterly nonsensical in the context given, indicating that Pinky was in no way pondering what Brain was pondering.
In one episode, Brain uses a machine that can increase or decrease intelligence, and uses it so that Pinky can become smart enough to understand that he is the cause of Brain's failures, due to research Brain conducted. (Brain will later discover he miscalculated his research, and that he himself is the cause of his failures.) Pinky, depressed over the fact that Brain doesn't like him when his is smart, uses the machine to make himself stupid, so Brain will like him again. However, Brain, realizing he has botched his own plans, and believing both of them to be better off with Pinky as the genius and Brain as a moron, uses the machine on himself as well. In the end, both of them are idiots, and thus, are too dumb to operate the machine and restore either of them to their intelligent selves. This is reflected in the episode's final lines.
Pinky: What are we going to do tomorrow night, Brain?
Brain: The same thing we do everynight, Pinky.
Pinky: What's that?
Brain: ...I have no idea.
Snowball
A reccuring character in the series is Snowball the Hamster, Brain's former friend (voiced by Roddy McDowall). The two were both subjected to genetic splicing, and thus both became super-intelligent. But while Brain wanted to take over the world for the good of humanity, Snowball wants control of the world for evil. Snowball builds a gigantic robotic body, Bill Grates, and takes control of Microsponge(a take off of Microsoft). Snowball uses Microsponge to buy 51 percent of the world, and thus, to Brain's limitless horror, Snowball actually succeeds in taking over the world! Brain retaliates by reactivating his own robot body, and fights Snowball. In the process, Snowball's robot body, ie, Bill Grates, explodes, resulting the in downfall of Microsponge and the end of Snowball's reign.
Brain's Plans
Brain has had many, many plans to take over the world. Following are just some of them.
- He has gone on the gameshow Gyp-parody (an obvious parody of Jeopardy), and attempted to win enough money to buy the world. At Final Gyp-parody, Brain can win the money he needs if he bets all his winnings and gets the Final Gyp-parody answer correct. Ironically, the Final Jeparody requires Brian to identify a quote that Pinky was constantly using that episode. But because he paid no attention to Pinky, Brain loses everything.
- In another attempt, Brain becomes a country singer who plays a hyponotic message in his video. His stage name is 'Bubba Bo Bob Brain', which Pinky cannot pronouce. Brain becomes the country's most popular singer (since he hypnotises his audiences to buy all his records), and on the night he does a nation-wide show, he plans to give the hypnotic command to obey him as the county's leader. But when set to give the command, Pinky once again calls Brain by the wrong name. A frustrated Brain snaps 'Just forget my name. And while you're at it, forget you ever knew me!'. The crowd obeys the command and forgets about Brain all together, foiling his plan once again.
- Brain has run for President of the United States. His running mate is Admiral Pinky (parodying Admiral Stockdale), who in his only television appearance states, "Zort, what am I doin' here?" Appearing to be charismatic and lovable, Brain rises in the polls, but never makes a public appearance. When he finally does the night before the election, the public is shocked to discover that Brain resembles a mouse because he is a mouse. Brain promptly loses the election.
- In a Christmas Special, Brain built a toy based on him called a 'Noodle-Noggin Doll', which had the power to hypnotise people. Taking a job as one of Santa's elves, and putting the doll on every Christmas list in the world, every household recieves a doll. Brain plans to use his hypnosis machine to order the world to obey him. But upon reading Pinky's letter to Santa (which sings his praises despite the fact he can't succeed, and asks Santa to give all of Pinky's presents to Brain), Brain burst into tears and orders the world to have a Merry Christmas, after which he smashes the machine.
- In a historical episode, Brain hears the offer that the man to travel around the world in 80 days will become the Prime Minister of Britain. Due to Brain's genius travel methods and Pinky's multi-lingual guidebook (one of the few episodes where Brain acknowledges Pinky's input on the plan), the two travel west around the world and reach New York, and only need to take a ferry to Britain to secure Brain's position as Prime Minister. But upon catching a cab to the pier, the driver only speaks 'New York Cabbie', the one language that Pinky's guidebook does not contain. Because the driver does not understand 'Take us to the pier', Brain is foiled again.
- Brain does a television similar to Welles' radio broadcast of 'War of the Worlds', hoping that, as happened in the radio broadcast, the country will panic and ensuing chaos would give Brain control over the world. The plan backfires simply because Brain's attempt to stage a televised alien invasion is incredibly cheesy, and the country is amused rather than scared.
A few rare episodes involve no attempt on the Brain's part to take over the world. One centers around his rival Snowball's plan (see above) to take over the world using Microsponge. Another involves Brain and Pinky using a machine to increase/decrease intelligence, resulting in both of them being stupid and thus, neither can remember what it is they do every night.
Incarnations
Pinky and the Brain originally appeared as a segment on Animaniacs, another show produced by Steven Spielberg and shown on first Fox and then the WB. On September 1, 1995, Pinky and the Brain were spun off into their own half-hour series, each consisting of one or more segments, including some of the segments from Animaniacs. On September 1, 1998, the series was retooled to the almost universally reviled "Pinky, Elmyra and the Brain", in which Pinky and the Brain were owned by Tiny Toons character Elmyra Duff, and is considered to be the reason for the show's cancellation. The show lasted for 13 episodes, 5 of which were shown whole and 6 of which were chopped into segments and aired as part of the "Cat and Birdie Warneroonie Pinky Brainy Big Cartoonie" clip show.
DVDs
Volume 1 of Pinky and The Brain is tentatively planned to be released on DVD on July 25, 2006 (volume 1 of Animaniacs is planned to come out on the same day). Second volumes of both Pinky & The Brain and Animaniacs are tentatively planned for December 6, 2006. [1]
==External links==
- Jaime J. Weinman's article on Pinky & The Brain
- Article on Pinky, Elmyra & The Brain
- Pinky and the Brain on TV.com
- Pinky and the Brain on the IMDb
- The Pinky and the Brain Christmas Special on the IMDb
- Pinky, Elmyra and the Brain on TV.com
- Pinky, Elmyra and the Brain on the IMDb
- Press release detailing Toontopia TV which will feature Pinky & The Brain
- The Complete Pondering List, by Richard Watanabe, a collection of answers to Brain's running gag question: "Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"