Animaniacs - Episode 1

Before viewing the first episode of Hulu's rebooted Animaniacs, I did go back and do a refresher on the original by viewing the original premiere from 1993. I hadn't watched an episode of the 90s series in several years, but a single viewing brought by the crazed wackiness of the first Animaniacs. Perhaps because so much of the first episode is centered around the idea of a reboot, or getting various characters caught up the present, "Episode 1" didn't have quite the level of insanity of the original. On an Animaniacs wackiness scale, this was hit maybe a 7 (out of 10). That said, there's plenty to enjoy here with the opening Jurassic Park parody and the return of Pinky (Rob Paulsen) and the Brain (Maurice LaMarche) - my two favorite characters from the original - along with, of course, Wakko (Jess Harnell), Yakko (Paulsen), and Dot (Tress MacNeille) - all voiced by the original actors.

One final note, and I mention this only because the series was created for and shown exclusively on Hulu (a fact written directly into the script multiple times). Viewing the original show, I had no trouble at all. However, viewing the first episode of the reboot I was troubled by constant buffering issues (nine times the show came to a complete halt of varying lengths). I'm not sure if this had to do with the number of people using their service on Black Friday or if Hulu has larger buffering issues than other streaming platforms (where I don't see this kind of issue), but since that's the only way to view the cartoon it is something worth taking note of. Since I don't have much experience with Hulu, here's hoping this was just an isolated incident and not a systemic problem with the platform's newer and more popular shows.