It was supposed to be ABC’s triumphant return to prime time animated sitcoms in nearly thirty years, a new marketable hit that could compete with the kind of satirical and outrageous humor that the Simpsons were taking over the world with in the early 90s. Sadly, Capitol Critters would up being a major flop, and is now mostly remembered for the Simpsons savagely flexing on them with tombstones in their Treehouse Of Horror special (along with CBS’s Fish Police and Family Dog). So what went wrong with this rodent-led Steven Bocho-produced series that caused its launch to fail so hard?
A post Doogie Howser and pre-HIMYM Neil Patrick Harris plays Max, a field mouse who travels to the nation’s capital after his mouse family is tragically gassed to death, and it’s *brutal* for even 1992 prime time. His mom’s reaching out to him from behind a grate as they’re being consumed by extermination fumes and Max is screaming in horror. This show actually had Burger King toys, with Jaws, Kid Vid, Boomer and the whole BK Kids Club crew selling you Capitol Critters swag, and this is the first thing that millions of families across America see. Kudos to NPH’s performance, but yeah, we’re already off to a jolly start, aren’t we?
He moves in with his hippie activist mouse cousin Berkeley, voiced by Jennifer Darling. She’s constantly arguing with Charlie Adler’s Jammett, a rudely sarcastic and gluttonous rat who reluctantly warms up to Max, intially seeing him as kind of a goody-goody. They all have a variety of misadventures with Bobcat Goldthwait’s Muggle, a lab mouse prone to randomly exploding, and Dorian Harewood’s Moze, a cockroach who dresses like he’s in his early twenties or late teens- except for whatever reason Harewood (who was around 40 at the time of his casting) gives him this creaky, old man voice. This makes him come off like a bug who really doesn’t want to grow up and is compensating by trying to be as totally radical as possible.
Plot wise the series is a blend of comedy and drama, but it’s not aggressively topical. There’s not any Desert Storm jokes or anything like that, mostly the cast is foraging and avoiding the presidential cats who hunt them throughout the White House. Occasionally there’s stories that take advantage of the premise, like Max falling in love with a Japanese mouse during a foreign dignitary’s visit, or discovering the truth about a corrupt bribe-taking senator. Other times the stories are more random, like when Max, Jammett and the Midlife Crisis Bug are put on trial after misconduct during a baseball game.
When the show tries to tackle a tougher topic like gun violence (in said episode, Jammett is driven to shoot one of the First Cats with a revolver after one of his friends becomes lunch) or drugs (a series of events gang of animal dealers force-feed Max pills to overdose him- jeez, give this boy a break already), it’s mainly for character development purposes as opposed to taking any sort of serious stance. Sometimes Jammet is entertaining as a more loutish counter to Berkeley’s idealism, but they don’t push their relationship any sort of Archie Bunker vs. Mike Stivic levels. I don’t necessarily ship them (though some do), but had the show continued, his developing chemistry with Max could have really elevated some of these episodes.
So here’s an important question I constantly ask myself whenever I watch this series, because it’s a factor that I feel could have completely changed the psychology and trajectory of Capitol Critters. It’d be a totally different and funnier show if it could answer this one thing, and that is: What. Does. Max. Like?
The show never goes into too much detail on what makes this kid tick. We know he’s good at picking corn, we know he had an overly idealistic view of how Washington allegedly worked, we know he’s sweet and compassionate towards all species, and that he’s grieving for his family. Okay, those are good starts to build a dynamic character off of. But what are Max’s particular interests, his *goals*, dreams? I’m certainly rooting for the poor little guy when I watch the show, they do a nice job establishing him as a “woobie” in the vein of Fievel or other Don Bluth mice who deal with heavy trials. There’s a small Capitol Critters forum where fans claim “when Max cries, I want to brush his tears away. He’s so cute it hurts!”
But for a show that sets itself for what would supposedly be mostly social-political based gags, the series has a hard time balancing that stuff between its usual Tom and Jerry style chase antics (aside from a couple of storylines where the rodents and bugs can’t get along). Now if Max’s goal was to find a new family, that was established in the pilot. Perhaps he could try to help the Washington animals with their food situation through farm knowledge, that’d be something to work from. Bart Simpson’s objectives often depend on the storyline, but we sure as hell know what he enjoys and what motivates his character. If nothing else, he’s constantly on a mission to be Bart Simpson as much as possible.
Given his diabolically bad cover of Bruce Springsteen’s Born In The USA, we also know Max can’t sing for swiss cheese. Maybe if he was totally deluded and though he had a George Michael quality voice, like a Jillian Hall type gimmick, that could have provided a ton of potential comedy. His doll also comes with a skateboard, but perhaps maybe the writers felt that was too close to Bart? Oddly enough, Jammett in his supporting role gets more development, like him realizing how much he cares about Max , and later becoming heartbroken after a girl dumps him in what’d turn out to be the show’s last episode.
All in all, Capitol Critters was a sitcom that really couldn’t decide what direction to head in, and it’s a pity because on paper it’s a charming idea. If it had a more daring writing team behind it and not so much of a focus on being so…well, grimdark in it’s first impressions, I highly doubt it could have upended Simpsonsmania, but it could have squeaked out another season with a stronger focus on pointing out the childishness and eccentricities of our elected leaders.
I’m not asking for the show to become super-wonky or didactic, that’d be an even bigger turn-off more than likely. But it slips up by not utilizing its main concepts enough as it probably should have. In spite of some strong performances, there’s good reason why this early 90’s relic gets snagged in a mousetrap.
Still, it’s too sweet for me to flat-out *hate*. Overall, I’d just define the show as very “mid”. Some cute moments, but you can’t put mid up against early Simpsons (and not even peak Simpsons, but what Matt Groening was putting out was pretty revolutionary). This had no chance. It’s like Jerry Flynn vs. Goldberg- Flynn has some cool moves, but it’s frigging Goldberg so it doesn’t matter, you’re gonna die. I’d still suggest checking out the episodes on Youtube to decide for yourself if you’re curious about it.
If you have seen it, let us know your take as always at FAN’s Twitter and Facebook!