Butch Hartman's shows

[Commode]

I remember a few years ago, the president of Nick said that even though they were two of their most popular shows, they couldn't sell FOP or Hey Arnold on a shirt. Makes me wonder why it's still on, then. The ratings are decent on the few times the show airs, but not that much better than some of Nicks other shows.

They sell Arnold shirts now, at Hot Topic.  I would buy one, except I don't like how garish and bright they are, the coloring seriously needs to be toned down.

[Avaitor]

I found one at JC Pennys myself. It was on sale for like $3, but I didn't really like how it looked, so I passed on it. They also had a vintage Nick logo and a couple of Double Dare shirts for the same price, but I also passed on those.

[Eddy]

Why can't they sell FOP shirts?

I mean, FOP had like a dozen video games based on the property, which is really just another way of merchandising it.

Hot Topic gets a lot of flak, but I don't really care what people say, they have some pretty awesome shirts there.

[Commode]

Oh yeah, Hot Topic does get some good merchandise in(my latest purchase was an awesome Iron Maiden shirt, which I love).  They really seem to base a lot of their merch off the hipster scene though(Zim, Nightmare Before Christmas, TMNT, Nintendo, Sonic, Scott Pilgrim, and old Nickelodeon shows have all been popular items in their stores), but I tend to like a lot of the stuff.  Like I said, my biggest issue with their offerings is how a lot of it is too bright or too colorful for my tastes.

[Avaitor]

Why can't they sell FOP shirts?

I think that was more of a statement saying that even though the shows did well in the ratings for them, they never had the big cash cow appeal that Rugrats and SpongeBob had. To be fair, I don't remember seeing a lot of Arnold or FOP toys, and when I did, those were normally discounted. And when's the last time you heard about a FOP game being made without other Nicktoons?

As for Hot Topic, I have a good amount of my shirts from there, as well as other random merch. I got a lot of Iron Maiden, Slayer, Led Zeppelin, Sex Pistols, Casualties, Nightmare Before Christmas, Marvel, Ed, Edd, n' Eddy, Dexter's Laboratory, Invader Zim, and You Can't Do That on Television stuff from there. Any place where you can get stuff for that kind of material isn't half-bad

[Eddy]

Oh, I get it. It's been a while but I remember seeing a good amount of FOP games for the PS2 and GameCube last gen. But you're right, most of the time it was in a crossover with other Nicktoons.

[gunswordfist]

They still make episodes of FOP?

[Avaitor]

Yeah. It's not exactly a highlight of the schedule anymore, but they still make them. This is probably going to be the last season, though.

[gunswordfist]

My God. I thought that Poof shit killed them. No show with even remotely the same format as FOP should be on the air that long

[Daxdiv]

You know there is a live action movie for FOP coming out, right?

[Avaitor]

And the less said about that, the better.

[gunswordfist]

I know about the movie but it's not like Nick has never made any questionable decisions

[Kiddington]

It's a little hard to call Butch Hartman the biggest hack currently working in the animation industry at the moment, only because this Noah Jones fella (guy behind Fish Hooks, that naked animal show on CN, etc.) just kinda popped up out of nowhere and made that claim himself. But damn it all, he comes in at a very close second.

One thing I've noticed; everything that he's ever worked on was far better when Steve Marmel was still involved. FOP was never really THAT good, but it was, at the very least, watchable at its highest peak (2001-2002 ish). Danny Phantom always sucked, but it sucked even more when Marmel left. He was the one guy that basically made these piles of excrement mildly entertaining; after he and Butch cut ties, it was all downhill from there. We've all seen FOP in its current state; it's absolutely ghastly, to put it as nicely as I possibly can.

...as far as TUFF Puppy goes, it's definitely his best work to date... as if that's really saying a whole lot, though. It's still prototypical Hartman, with all of the same glaring flaws as FOP; unfunny jokes being repeated wayyyyy too often, bad voice acting (sans Grey Delisle; she's great, as always), and characters THAT ALL TALK AS LOUDLY AS POSSIBLE. For whatever reason, he and his writing staff have gotten it into their heads that loud = funny. I'll never understand this mentality, and sadly, he's not the only one in the industry who currently feels this way (hello again, NZJ).

Long and short of it is, he kinda sucks, for the most part (as a series frontman, anyway; as mentioned earlier, he's fine as a second tier guy, such as he was on Dexter's Lab). It almost bewilders me how he continues to find work at the rate he does, considering the way he keeps churning out the same garbage with each new series deal. And you know what the real sad thing about him is? These shows don't even HAVE to be this bad. Just watch this for living proof that the guy isn't totally clueless, and can make a damn fine cartoon when he wants to. Why his work now pales so badly in comparison to the Pfish and Chip shorts (which are both great) is something I don't quite understand. I guess I could blame Nickelodeon, but, well... that's just too easy, at this point.

[gunswordfist]

SHIT, HE'S RESPONSIBLE FOR PFISH N CHIP?! That's the one short I wanted to become a full fledged cartoon that never did. I can watch the ugly bomb bit all day long. What in the hell happened?!

Also, I wish the major cartoon channels would do animated shorts shows and let the more popular ones become half hour cartoons. That would help fix this drought. Why was that format ever thrown away?

[Eddy]

"Loud = funny" seems to the general way of thinking around Nickelodeon these days. Have you ever seen an episode of iCarly or any of Nick's other insipid sitcoms? Those shows are full of characters overacting and SCREAMING REALLY LOUD.