Why rugrats began to fail.

[Lørd Tøny]

In 1991 a show called "Rugrats" appeared on Nickelodeon. After that it received a stuffload of praise and won 21 awards. It had 9 seasons and 172 episodes, it captured the imagination for any age. Adults became more in touch with their kid side and children got in touch with their creative imaginative side. What exactly went wrong after this?

Season 1: 1991-1992

The start of the season, which went extremely well.

Season 2: 1992-1993

Still no problems here.

Season 3: 1993-1995

Nothing wrong here either.

Season 4: 1996-1997

Slight decrease in ratings, not too noticeable.

Season 5: 1997-1998

The Rugrats Movie begins.

After this movie, it was the start of the Rugrats slowly going downhill.

At first it may not have seemed like this as the Rugrats' rating increased to a whole new level after Dil was born. This also became the start of the quality of the show declining. The babies starting having less adventures and the majority of the season became all about Dil and taking care of Dil.

Season 6: 1998-2000

Dil took the whole spotlight here, what can I say?

Season 7: 2000-2001

The Rugrats in Paris movie begins

As a desperate need to gain back the ratings they lost from Dil they made another movie to introduce more characters. They figured it worked well with Dil, why not add more characters this way?

When the movie was over and it was back to continue season 7 there were some problems.

Now you have to picture Chaz trying to have love with a woman way out of his league, ew.

Kimmy is down right annoying.

Chuckie won't shut the forget up, he says "no" constantly every five minutes.

_____________________________ _____________________________ _______

They also switched the format to three episodes per show. This drastically cut down even more creativity as they had to share three episodes in a 24 minute timeslot.

Season 8: 2001-2003

Even more desperate need for ratings. This is when they introduced the episode "All growed up" which increased ratings 10 fold as everyone couldn't wait to see what their childhood icons looked like as they got older.

This one particular episode made the original creators move onto a spin off which they thought would do equally as well, nope.

Season 9: 2003-2004

The most forgettable season ever, the season was stopped in mid production due to demand for continuing Rugrats All Grown Up.

Rugrats Go Wild! 2003

Knowing that they forgeted up they needed to gain what little they could get left. So they made a movie crossover with The Wild Thornberrys as the Rugrat's season finale.

It was box-office disappointment and a sign that Rugrats were beginning to hit rock bottom.

*On a coincidental note, The Wild Thornberrys series ended on June 11, 2004. The movie started on June 13, 2003 and their second last episode was April 4, 2003. It appears Rugrats Go Wild not only put The Thornberrys on a one year hiatus but they must have later canceled it because of how poor the movie went.

They ordered a proper season finale one year after the movie probably due to budget concerns.

All Grown Up! 2003-2008

Complete train wreck that should had never been made. I don't know why they thought it would had been a good idea to stop Rugrats to continue this crap.

Hey I got an idea, let's remove all the creative, imaginative aspects in the original Rugrats! Let's make them all adults and give them Adult stuff and Adult drama to appeal to the new generation!


Rock bottom, get.

[Ad Bot]

[Frostbyte]

This show was the stuff then it turned into stuff.

[Belogna]

Season one was the only good part of the series. 

[fred da kiko]

i started watching the show back in 1999 and i loved it.

[Muzzles56]

I remember hearing it start and just staring at it like a zombie

[Kingdaro]

i liked Kimmy :c

[Lørd Tøny]

It may just be coincidence but it seems like Rugrats Go Wild killed off The Wild Thornberrys series.

The movie being a box office disappointment, they probably needed what little profit they made for other things on Nickelodeon.

[steve5451]

I used to watch this stuff every day. :c

[Lørd Tøny]

i liked Kimmy :c

She always felt like an extra to me.

[Kingdaro]

She always felt like an extra to me.

That's how all new characters in pretty much every show I watch feel to me. :U

[Skorpion]

Nothing wrong with it. The movies are good but the original series is annoying. The grown up one was below expectations though, only due to the fact THE POINT OF RUGRATS WAS KIDS NOT loving TEENS.

[Aphtonites]

The rugrats were a great childhood TV show.
But yeah, "all grown up!" was made in the era when Nickolodeon believed children want "mature" shows based in highschool and stuff.

[SlayerZ99]

Chucky is the best. :C

[Butler]

This show was the stuff then it turned into stuff.

[MegaScientifical]

God, I HATED "All Grown Up!" It was the beginning of my realization that TV shows aren't some collection of awesomeness and otherwise crap, but the push for money no matter what the cost for what stuff it becomes. I remember trying my hardest to watch that show, and over and over again finding myself wondering how they'd allow such a loving abomination to exist. As you noted, it was simply a blatant misuse of the Rugrats brand.

Although you should really note the more extreme cases in a new topic. The new "The Looney Toons Show" sickens me. The only relations to Looney Toons are purely cosmetic, while introducing the stuffy elements Cartoon Network has lent itself to in the past few years. An example would be the weird ass music video sequences. Of the two I've caught, neither made any loving sense. The grilled cheese one literally made me want murder everyone involved in its making, as it was random misuse of Elmer Fud's likeness for what made no sense to his character. The other video followed suit. But what I hated from the moment I saw full commercials for this show was that Bugs Bunny's female counterpart was turned into handicapped comic relief. I remember watching Space Jam over and over and over, and NEVER getting the impression she'd EVER act so loving handicapped. She was supposed to be one of the only characters more cool and awesome than Bugs, not some debt to him.

Then there's the most extreme case: the strenuous milking of Scooby Doo since it's conception. As noted in the most recent case, a spontaneous love affair between Velma and Shaggy, apparently to round out the other relationship in the group. Never mind that they ignore any character development throughout the years. Movies like Scooby Doo on Zombie Island actually attempted this, and I fond it quite reasonable. But as the years went on, they back tracked to the stuff they have today.