[7.4/10] I am 100% on board with giving Cricket his very own day in the limelight episode. It’s fun to see him have his own little adventure tangential to what The Gang had going on the last couple outings. But the execution here was a bit hit or miss, though still largely positive.
For one thing, I got a big kick out of the assortment of classic Disney references, from the opening riff of Aladdin, to homages to Beauty and the Beast, to pretty clear shout-outs to Lady and the Tramp, to what seemed to be an echo of The Shaggy Dog. It’s funny to contrast the sanitized struggles of down-on-their-luck cartoon characters with the no less exaggerated, but nevertheless much more disturbing struggles of someone like Cricket.
David Hornsby himself does a very nice job at showing a bit more range to Cricket enough to sustain a whole episode. The recurring parkour stuff is an amusing, out there bit. And the twist, that his whole “trying to go straight” routine is mostly a hallucination after he did, in fact, smoke PCP, is an appropriately out there swerve for IASIP
That said, the whole setup of Cricket trying to get his life together while he still gets roped into The Gang’s escapades proved kind of disjointed as a story engine. And the conflict with him and his family was pretty underwhelming. Also, the guy who played Cricket’s brother was a pretty bad actor, which hurt that too.
Overall, plenty of stuff to laugh at and enjoy here, especially the central performance, but some unrealized potential as well.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParent2018-06-19T22:14:41Z
[7.4/10] I am 100% on board with giving Cricket his very own day in the limelight episode. It’s fun to see him have his own little adventure tangential to what The Gang had going on the last couple outings. But the execution here was a bit hit or miss, though still largely positive.
For one thing, I got a big kick out of the assortment of classic Disney references, from the opening riff of Aladdin, to homages to Beauty and the Beast, to pretty clear shout-outs to Lady and the Tramp, to what seemed to be an echo of The Shaggy Dog. It’s funny to contrast the sanitized struggles of down-on-their-luck cartoon characters with the no less exaggerated, but nevertheless much more disturbing struggles of someone like Cricket.
David Hornsby himself does a very nice job at showing a bit more range to Cricket enough to sustain a whole episode. The recurring parkour stuff is an amusing, out there bit. And the twist, that his whole “trying to go straight” routine is mostly a hallucination after he did, in fact, smoke PCP, is an appropriately out there swerve for IASIP
That said, the whole setup of Cricket trying to get his life together while he still gets roped into The Gang’s escapades proved kind of disjointed as a story engine. And the conflict with him and his family was pretty underwhelming. Also, the guy who played Cricket’s brother was a pretty bad actor, which hurt that too.
Overall, plenty of stuff to laugh at and enjoy here, especially the central performance, but some unrealized potential as well.