02.06
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dumGj-qDlIs
Oh, this song. It is hard to ignore the popularity of this song, especially during the mid-90’s when Lion King mania was huge. “Hakuna Matata” is one of the most popular songs of the past twenty years just as The Lion King is one of the most popular movie in the past 20 years, so continuing to market the film for years after it‘s arrival seemed like a no brainer.
As much as audiences gravitated towards Simba’s story, it seemed like there wasn’t too much to do with him and his friends after the movie. Some creative members of the direct to video staff proved that life after Simba’s return to home can work after all, but for now, Disney needed something easier to come up with to work with. Since Timon and Pumbaa, the likable meerkat and warthog duo who were responsible for the aforementioned song, made a lot of kids laugh and sold their fair share of merchandise, it seemed like a good day to give them their own series.
The Lion King’s Timon & Pumbaa premiered in 1995, airing on both the CBS block on Saturdays as well as Fridays on the Disney Afternoon, taking over Gargoyles spot. The show stated on CBS for a couple of seasons and stayed on TDA for the following season on it’s own slot.
I’ll admit it now, I never watched most of this show. As much as I like The Lion King and the two main characters of the show, I couldn’t get into the actual series. Granted, “Hakuna Matata” is my least favorite of the songs that stuck in the movie, so that probably contributed with my lukewarm feelings towards the show. Watching some of it again for the first time in a while, I see why else I’m not so hot on it.
I haven’t found too much of the series to watch again, so this will probably be a pretty brief retrospective. Take the common idea of The Ren & Stimpy Show(two eccentric characters go through absurdly entertaining adventures on a daily basis, often in different environments), but tone down the titular characters so that there isn’t as much malice or gross-out humor in this one. Timon & Pumbaa can be called a tamer Ren & Stimpy, but something was lost in translation.
I don’t think that Timon & Pumbaa is very clever. Granted, Ren & Stimpy sometimes went too far with it’s “stupid to be stupid” mentality, especially when John K was taken away from his show, but the original Spumko episodes had enough wit in it’s absurdity to make it work. Many of Timon & Pumbaa’s story ideas seemed to come out of nowhere for the need to fill a season order. There is just something strange about a show that jumps from having the two characters stay in the jungle that we met them in for a batch of episodes than jump out to a mall set in the middle of suburbia the next week. Considering that these characters originated from a film where their home was definitely in the jungle, I’d prefer to have them stay there.
Timon and Pumbaa also just aren’t too great by themselves. They were fine as supporting characters in The Lion King because that’s what they were, supporting characters. At the end of the day, Timon is a hotheaded moron who has moments of greatness that are balanced out by some annoying comic bits, while Pumbaa is a walking gas bomb. Sometimes his sweetness lets him become a more likable character than he should be, but it’s hard to stick up for a guy whose flatulence is commonly where his laughs come from.
A lot of jokes rely on old cartoon stand byes of puns and visual humor, along with the expected weirdness and grossout humor. There are solid jokes to be found here, but usually it’s not worth sitting through a half hour of Nathan Lane impersonators try to talk their way to his audience.
I think the show works it’s best when other Lion King characters show up in the show. Rafiki and the hyenas are the most likely to appear, and they have their moments about as much as Timon and Pumbaa do. When Simba or Zazu show up though, then you know that things are going to get good. When Simba’s in the stories are bound to work better than usual and Zazu still has solid dialogue for the most part.
If I had to pick one episode that I thought worked in particular, it would probably be “Hakuna Matata U.”, in which the two decide to sell their proverbs off for a living as a college-like course. They pick two squares to be a part of this class; one of which tends to overanalyze everything he’s given, while the other takes “no worries” just a bit too far. It’s not an original premise, but the series is at it’s best when Timon and Pumbaa aren’t the most annoying people on the show, which the pupils here certainly are. We are given a lot of oneshot or odd guest star appearances throughout with this being the case, and “Hakuna Matata U” has one of the best examples of that episode idea
Really, if you want to see the two characters used to their full potential, watch the 2003 DTV The Lion King 1½. In it, we see why Timon leaves his clan of meerkats to find his best warthog friend. This was the before picture, as the after has the two go through many of the most memorable events of the original Lion King, as they give their commentary throughout. I don’t want to spoil for you how they affect the movie as a whole in this revisioning, but I will say that ”Circle of Life” might just be ruined by what happens when the two show up.
Parts of this movie get tiresome, but you probably won’t find Timon and Pumbaa in a funnier situation without going back to the original movie. If you love The Lion King and want more of it, I’ll definitely recommend that, as well as The Lion King II: Simba’s Pride, which is the most effective of the “child of the lead characters from the original go through their own adventure similar to their parents past” formula that Disney used for some of it’s sequels, especially since the Romeo & Juliet cues in it work perfectly with the originals‘ callbacks to Hamlet.
As for Timon & Pumbaa, I can’t say the same. If you’re a big fan of the two characters, it’s worth checking out, but I don’t think it’s too great. It’s around this point that Disney’s TV animation started to drastically decline, and for the most part wouldn’t reform back to where it was nearly a decade ago.
No episodes of the show were released stateside, and The Lion King films are trapped in the vault, so there’s currently no way for fans to buy any of the series on DVD.
Originally posted on Sunday, June 20, 2010.