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August 14, 2004
Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends
(Yes, this is anime. In that the term means animation.)
"Foster's Home" really is one of the most charming things to come out of Cartoon Network lately. Basically it's about a little boy, Mac, who's forced to give up his imaginary friend (a blue thing called - well, Blue) because he's 8 years old and his mother thinks that his immaturity, represented by the presence of Blue, is the reason his brother is picking on him. (Adults. 
) Then Blue sees a late night TV commercial about Foster's Home, and persuades Mac to take him there. However, Foster's Home is really a kind of imaginary friend shelter, where imaginary friends await adoption by kids not creative enough to make one up. Everybody at Foster's are really nice people, and feel really bad about this, but Blue can't be an exception... or can he?
At this point I'm not sure if it's going to be an anthology of kids and imaginary friends, or if it's going to stay about Mac and Blue. I'm guessing Mac and Blue will continue to be the focus. Which is fine. Mac's a good kid and Blue's very cute. Older siblings may object to the portrayal of Mac's older brother, but hey. I thought that it perfectly captured exactly how older siblings look like to younger siblings. So deal.
It looks kind of like Jay Ward's Fractured Fairy Tales, with the curly backgrounds, but it's from Craig McKracken, the real Professor X of the Powerpuff Girls. Lots of in-jokes of course (MOJO JOJO!!!), and you really feel an affection for the cartoons of yesteryear coming through.
THe only thing wrong with last night's episode is that it felt like it dragged on too long (it was, actually, a 90-minute pilot movie). If this were a Japanese anime series they would well have cut it up into 3 parts with no problem, but I guess attention-challenged American kids just can't deal with that kind of waiting. 
Posted by Innocent Sidekick of Evil at August 14, 2004 09:05 AM | Posted to Anime, American Style
