Mountown

Mountown is a an American animated sitcom created by Taj Asbury for the '''Columbia Broadcasting System. '''The main characters are a satire of a working-class family, consisting of Jay, Melanie, Alex and Ed. The series lampoons many aspects of places that are consistently cold throughout the year like Maine, Vermont, Montana and Wyoming.

The series was first aired in 1998 on CBS, which was cancelled after 1 season in 1999. In 2007, all of the episodes was reanimated and reaired in HD. A revival was going to be made by CBS Television Studios and Warner Bros. Television, which was quickly cancelled. On April 13, 2020, Taj Asbury revealed that there will be a Mountown revival coming to CBS All Access in 2021. Then on July 27, he also revealed that the official release date for the revival was May 16, 2021.

History
One day, Taj was at the trampoline park. While he was jumping on a trampoline, he thought of a series about a town with four mountains which caused a cold climate all year long. He used the mountains because he realised then it would be a rip-off of South Park, which the network would cancel his show quickly.

He liked cartoons in which two kids could work together, so he added them in as protagonists. Then he thought of two adults who could be protagonists as well, so the series wouldn't be boring. He named them Jay and Melanie and added them in.

He got together with Paramount Television to produce the series. Paramount aired their shows on NBC, MTV, Comedy Central or CBS, but Taj ruled out MTV because he thought their network was declining and he didn't Comedy Central because his show wasn't going to be that raunchy and also South Park aired on that network so Taj didn't have many options. He liked CBS a lot more so he went to them first, which they said yes.

Executive Producers
Al Jean and Mike Reiss had recently got their show The Critic cancelled, so Taj figured out that that he could get them to come to Mountown. During the production of The Simpsons episode Lisa's Sax, They told Mike Scully that they were going to Mountown. Mike wanted to come too, so they asked Taj, and he said that he could come but only as a Co-Executive Producer.

Writers
While he was doing the show, Al Jean wanted more to do, so Taj let him be a writer for 4 episodes. The episodes that he wrote had the highest ratings, so from the 16th episode Taj let him become a permanent writer. The other episodes were written by Mike Scully and Matt Selman.

Episode Production
The production of episodes takes about 4 months each. It goes through the executive producing, the animating, the acting before its ready on CBS. The reanimating procedure took two months because they only had to remove the black bars and reanimate there, which the middle that had already been animated was left untouched. It took about 5 months to do for the revival because of the COVID-19 pandemic, in which everyone had to do it from home, with the exception of the episodes that were produced in 2011 which took the normal four months, and the live action episode which took about three and a half, even know the filming was done in 2021 because of the producing could be done from home.

Protagonists

 * Alex (voiced by Taj Asbury) is one of two main protagonists, along with Ed. He is 9 years old and the son of Jay and Melanie. He is 4'1.
 * Ed (voiced by Monty Smith) is one of two main protagonists, along with Alex. He is 9 years old and the son of Jay and Melanie. He is 4'3.
 * Jay (voiced by Taj Asbury) is one of two side protagonists, along with Melanie. He is 41 years old, and works at a gas station for 10 hours 4 days a week. He is also the father of Alex and Ed. He is 6'4.
 * Melanie (voiced by Mia Asbury) is one of two side protagonists, along with Jay. She is 37 years old and the mother of Alex and Ed. She is 5'8.

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Setting
The show mainly takes place in the fictional town of Mountown, which is the coldest town in the US. The state that it is set in North Dakota. The town is at the edge of the US, and one of the mountains is owned by Canada.

Opening
In every episode, there is the same opening with three versions. One of them has the full opening, the second goes from the town zoom in to the last scene which has the title of the show, And the third one goes from the zoom in from the town to the episode.

The start of it had origami which makes the town, and it zooms in. Then there is a song which sings about what happens in the town, like it having icy cold winters and avalanches in winter. Then while everyone waves at the audience, It says "If your a fan of the cold, come to Mountown! Come to Mountown! Come to Mountownnnnnnnn!" During the second "Come to Mountown" it fades to The Mountown logo.

United States

 * CBS (1998-Present)

Canada

 * CTV Comedy Channel (2002-2004, 2008)

Mexico

 * Canal 5 (2000-Present)

United Kingdom

 * Channel 4 (2004-Present)


 * Sky One (1999-Present)
 * CBS Comedy (2000-Present)

Ireland

 * Comedy Central (2001-present)
 * Sky One (2003-2007)

Russia

 * Channel One (2000-Present)

Italy

 * Canale 5 (2001-present)

Spain

 * Cuatro (2007-present)

Japan

 * Tokyo MX (2020-present)

Australia

 * Nine Network (1999-2003)
 * Channel 10 (2007-2011)


 * 10 Peach (2011-Present)

New Zealand

 * Three (1999-Present)

Singapore

 * Channel 5 (1999-Present)

Seasons

 * Season 1


 * Season 2 (revival)

Episodes
See List of Mountown episodes.

On August 15, 2020, Taj revealed that their will be a live action episode in with the revival.

Streaming

 * CBS All Access


 * Hulu

Reception
The show has positive reviews by critics. IGN gave it a 9/1.10 for the comedy of the show and that it was one of the first cartoons to start using digital animation, compared to The Simpsons, which started in December 2002. IMDB gave it a 9.4 out of 10 and said that it was one of the best cartoons of the 90s for it being funny and looking good, even if it only lasted for one season.

Books
In 2000, a book based on the episode "Survive the Criminal Granny" was released by HarperCollins. It was a 15 page book that made people think the show was coming back after its cancellation in 1999, but Taj Asbury revealed it wasn't true.

Merchandise
In 2009, a DVD for the first season was released by Paramount DVD in all territories. To celebrate the 2021 revival of the series, Pop! Funko released seven figurines of the characters. There was Jay, Melanie, Alex, Ed, Zac Hell, Crazy Person, and the Mayor. They were all released on July 29, 2020.
 * Region 1 - June 27, 2009
 * Region 2 - June 16, 2009
 * Region 3 - July 9, 2009

Video Games
In 2007 to celebrate the reanimated episodes, Activision decided to release a video game called Mountown: Attack of the Underground exclusively for the Wii.

Ratings
Every episode of Mountown in the United States is TV-PG, and in the UK, 23 episodes are PG, but 2 of them are rated 12. In Australia and New Zealand, all episodes and the DVD is PG. In Brazil, all of episodes are rated 12, and in Argentina they are rated Atp.

Trivia

 * Taj likes the 4:3 original version better than the reanimated one.
 * On episodes 2 and 6 of Season 2, the Paramount Television Studios logo is not there, and replaced by the 2009 CBS Television Studios logo with a ViacomCBS byline. This is due to them episodes being produced in 2011 and cancelled before its airing.
 * The Warner Bros Television logo is absent from the CBS All Access version of the episodes produced in 2011.