Terrible Timmy (film)

Terrible Timmy is a 2023 American animated comedy television film based on the comic strip of the same name by Brandon Greene. It was produced by Warner Bros. Animation and Cartoon Network Studios and directed by J.G. Quintel. The film features the voices of Sean Astin, William Salyers, J.G. Quintel, Kristen Schaal, Ben Giroux, Sam Marin, Mark Hamill, Alyson Court, Seth MacFarlane, and Busta Rhymes. The film follows the title character, a mischievous, but likeable troublemaking slacker, who finds a magic pencil and must use it to stop his crazy and evil drawings from taking over the world. The film premiered on November 24, 2023 on Cartoon Network. The film was released digitally on September 5, 2023, on DVD on October 10, 2023, and ultimately had its premiere in Canada on January 1, 2024.

Due to its success, the film was spun off into an animated television series of the same name, which premiered on September 2, 2024.

A live action/CGI film based on the series titled "Terrible Timmy: The Movie" was released in theaters on July 4, 2031. After ten seasons and 261 episodes, the series concluded on January 16, 2034, with the one-hour finale "An Terribly Awesome Finale".

Plot
While moving to Garland City, Timothy "Timmy" Davis and his older brother, Spencer find a newspaper ad posted by Vincent desperately wanting groundskeepers, so they answer the advertisement to Pete ,who gives them the job and brought their talking dog, Bailey. They get their bedroom (which is empty at the time), and drink two cases of soda while bringing in a pile of old clothes, a blanket, a pillow, and an alarm clock. When they wake up the next morning, they go downstairs to eat breakfast, only to realize that there's only one clean bowl and spoon left for cereal. They play punchies for it. Due to Timmy's lack of muscle, Spencer wins the bowl for cereal and the spoon. Pax offers balloons for a kid's birthday party, but Taylor, Timmy's first born sister refuses, causing Pax to be carried away by his balloons as he sulks. After that Timmy races her sister, Avery to the car for school. He asks his big sister Stella, a musician, to play a little tune for him on his travels and she obliges. His younger sister Carrie, a gloomy gothic girl, wants to read him a poem, but Avery tells her to wait until she beats Timmy. His older sister Danielle, a comedian, tries to squirt him with her trick flower, but Lincoln ducks in time, knowing that trick all too well, but Luan squirts water from a flower on her shoes into his mouth. Suddenly, his older sister Sam, a sports jock, comes careening down the hall on her motorbike, while playing sports in the house. She gets out of the way in time, just before she crashed into something. Just then, his little sister Anna, a pageant queen, wants him to play "Fashion Photographer" with her. If he doesn't, she'll tell their mother that he was playing video games on the roof in his underwear again. Not wanting their mom to know and wondering how she knows that, he accepts and takes some photos while Anna strikes poses. Just then, Anna's twin sister Alice, who is a bit more of a tomboy, and a handyman, comes by to show Timmy her mud pie. But Avery passes by Timmy and he bolts for the car. Carrie checks to see if he's ready, but he says he's not. He leaps over his little sister Emma, a 4-year-old genius, and reminds her to carry the 1 in her mathematical formula she's writing on the wall. Timmy's older sister Ellie, a stereotypical dumb blonde, is trying to figure out how to turn on the vacuum and manages to do so while sucking up the mud pie off of his shirt in the process. Avery beats him to the car and Spencer drives them to school.

Once Timmy enters his classroom, the teacher, Mrs. Clerk, introduces him to the other students. She then asks if anyone would like to show Timmy around, right before we hear a horn off-screen. Flap picks this kid, who introduces himself to Timmy as Leonard Phillips, for the job. Timmy at first found him really annoying. After school, Leonard asked him if he wants to hang out. But he said he's not interested in hanging out with weirdos. After saving him from a gang of skateboarders they became friends. Timmy introduces Leonard to Bailey, Spencer, and Avery. They ate at The Donut Hole and do fun stuff whatever they want such as jumping on the furniture, running up the down escalator in the shopping mall, and pranking the neighbors. The next morning, Timmy and Bailey woke up with a hangover.

Back at the park Timmy, Bailey, and Spencer see Vincent and Avery come in, carrying old stuff from the attic and they follow them outside to see it. Vincent tells them that they're being thrown away. However, Timmy sees a pencil and he wants it. Timmy and Bailey take it inside and start to doodle with it. They soon come to discover that whatever they draw with the pencil is brought to life, and thus dub it the "Magic Pencil". Mischievously fiddling with the pencil and some paint to make a three-dimensional self-portrait, Timmy accidentally creates a shadow figure. The drawing starts destroying the park and even killing the special entertainment and attacking the children.

With help from Vincent- who is angry that Timmy didn't throw away the magic pencil - the gang form a giant arcade graphics robot designed to fight the shadow figure in which each of them are controlling one body part. As the rest battle the stick figure shadow, Timmy apparently erases the it by throwing paint thinner onto it, but spills more paint on the model in the process. Upon seeing Avery and Leonard approaching, Timmy quickly tries to clean up the mess, but in his haste, spills thinner onto the paint spillage as they flee back to the house, while the shadow figure, having not only survived Timmy's attempt to destroy it, but enters through a portal created by the paint/thinner mixture (taking a jug of thinner with him) and takes control of the real world.

After that mayhem, Timmy and the others find themselves at Sketchtopia where they are captured by the military stick figures led by General Stickney, Timmy explains the situation and revealed Stickney revealed that the shadow figure Timmy tries to destroy is named Malachor the Destroyer of World who plots to take over the real world. When questioned for details, Spencer explains Stickney created the magic pencil because he's trying to keep someone from tampering with the real world and his world. Vincent tries to convince everyone the whole thing is a hoax until Mitch finds Professor Madness' plasma shotgun and blows up Vincent's car with it.

After preparing for the mission, the employees rallies Timmy's friends and classmates to build intergalactic star space rocket ships from the Stickland amusement park rides to travel to Killkus and stop Malachor from taking over both the real world and the doodle world.

Upon arrival, Skids, Mitch and G.H. stay behind to repair the ship's engines while Vincent and Pax follow Timmy, Bailey, and Spencer to get the magic pencil back. But they are captured by shadowlings, who tells them that the people of the real world are to be sacrificed to the Pit. He shows the gang how Timmy caused the wasteland, thanking him for helping him find suitable Dimension for their ritual, before having them locked up in their cells, while Bailey escapes.

With Timmy feeling guilty over the fact that his actions led to causing the wasteland in the first place, his classmate and rival next door girl named Trina Daly convinces him to buck up and make things right with everyone. Timmy then thinks of an escape plan. After breaking out with the help of Bailey and Stickney, Timmy draws a portal back to the real world to a martial arts class called Death Kwon Do, to prepare for battle. Despite the class being intended for self-defence, all Timmy wants to use the moves for is to stop Malachor, which the Sensei does not appreciate. Because Timmy isn't pure at heart, the Sensei won't give him the Death Punch page that he wants. After an argument over the Sensei's mullet, Timmy steals the death punch from the book and runs off.

Back in the doodle world he learned that he needs a mullet and cutoffs to execute the Death Punch and becomes an expert. He frees his friends and in accordance with Timmy's plan, manage to stop Malachor and his drawings from getting into the real world. Everyone escapes aboard the ship, but Wilson follows them in his ship at the head of the Stick fleet. With the exception of Wilson's ship, all of the Stick ships are destroyed when Vincent baits them into flying too close to the sun.

Timmy, Bailey, Spencer, Vincent, and Pax attempt to use the rocket to reach Malachor, but end up crashing into the Dark Castle after Malachor absorbs the rocket's paint. The Group make their way to the top of the castle, where they defeat Malachor's remaining minions before being swallowed by itself. The five successfully manage to destroy Malachor, eliminating his exterior with pencil-laden fireworks on Dark Beauty Castle, and rescue the magic pencil from the inside. Timmy is delighted to that they won, but distraught that they are going to die in their pit, which is rapidly filling with lava. Spencer has two moves that can get themselves out of the lava pit: the Death Dump and the Death Jump. They choose the latter and escape from the pit.

The four reunite with the others and head back home as well as regenerating both the real world and doodle world. As they leave Stickney orders his troops to sink the magic pencil to the bottom of the ocean and seal the Mirror Portal so no one will get their hands on it ever again.

The next day back at Garland City, as Vincent catches them out of the park, the trio race back in the stickship from The Donut Hole with Bailey saying they'll "never be late again" before using the ship to travel back in time to the point before Vincent catches them.

Voice Cast

 * Sean Astin as Timothy "Timmy" Davis
 * William Salyers as Bailey
 * J.G. Quintel as Spencer Davis, G.H. Baron
 * Kristen Schaal as Avery Davis
 * Ben Giroux as Leonard Phillips
 * Sam Marin as Pax, Vincent, Mitch, Death Kwon Do Sensi
 * Mark Hamill as Skids
 * Alyson Court as Trina Phillips
 * Seth Macfarlane as General R. Lee Stickney
 * Busta Rhymes as Malachor (The Destroyer of Worlds)
 * Tim Curry as Professor Madness
 * Candi Milo as Sean Days
 * Carlos Alazraqui as Charlie
 * Tom Kenny as Sam Davis Sr., Norman, Man #2
 * Jill Talley as Riya Davis
 * Catherine Taber as Taylor Davis
 * Liliana Mumy as Ellie Davis
 * Nika Futterman as Stella Davis
 * Cristina Pucelli as Danielle Davis
 * Jessica DiCicco as Sam Davis Jr., Carrie Davis
 * Grey Griffin as Alice Davis, Anna Davis, Tammy Davis
 * Lara Jill Miller as Emma Davis
 * Kate Micucci as Katie
 * Matthew Moy as Liam
 * Kathy Najimy as Mrs. Clerk
 * Parker Simmons as Sal, Blob figure #1, Stick figure #1
 * Dee Bradley Baker as Peterjack, Male appleheaded stickperson
 * David Kaye as Death Kwon Do student, Man #1, Stickfigure #2
 * Bob Goen as Bob Sketch
 * Mary Hart as Mary Heart

Writing
The idea of the film started with Brandon Greene working on two comic strips: Stix and Terrible Timmy. The plot generally begins with a basic problem that the characters must overcome. While the protagonist works on his task, a magical, supernatural, or strange element appears and complicates the initially simple problem. The writers decided to follow this narrative structure to take advantage of the animation. Greene stayed at Cartoon Network for a while to make an animated short based on the Terrible Timmy comic strip on the tv series "KaBOOM TOOnS!". By the time the show ended, Terrible Timmy was still buzzing around Greene's head and approuched to the studio to make into an animated film.

It was originally going to be an animated theatrical film but was moved to the small screen. Greene wanted to direct the film, but was busy with his Disney Channel series, Zippy and couldn't find the time. So he gave the project to Regular Show creator, J.G. Quintel.

The film is rated TV-PG-V. Cartoon Network told Quintel early on that they wanted to "age it up from the TV-Y7 stuff we'd been doing in the past". This direction led the crew to use adult-oriented humor with reminiscent animation to the classic Tex Avery and Chuck Jones cartoons, as well as the Hanna-Barbara cartoons. One of the program's storyboard artists, Calvin Wong, said that he enjoys the limitations set by writing for the show since the adult-oriented jokes that are approved are satisfying.

The plots of the episodes are influenced by the writers' and Quintel's personal experiences, such as performing prank telephone calls or accepting an eating challenge from a restaurant. The show often references 1980s culture, using music and electronic devices from that era because many factors from the decade left a positive influence on Quintel. The show also makes references to modern social trends such as viral internet videos.

The plot of the film is inspired by Epic Mickey, Scribblenauts, and the Spongebob Squarepants episode, "Frankendoodle".

Voice Cast
The voice acting of the series is relatively low-key, and the intention was to make most of the characters sound natural and conversational. Quintel wanted to make the show listenable and given contrast to most other cartoons, which often are difficult for adults to listen to. The main cast consists of voice acting veterans Sean Astin, who portrays the title charcter, Mark Hamill, who portrays Skids and Kristen Schaal, who plays Avery. William Salyers plays the voice of Bailey, Ben Giroux portrays Leonard and Quintel's former CalArts classmate Sam Marin voices Vincent, Pax, and Mitch. Quintel portrays Spencer and G.H. Baron. Members of the Nickelodeon show, The Loud House have voiced some characters from; these include Catherine Taber, Liliana Mumy, Nika Futterman, Cristina Pucelli, Jessica DiCicco, Grey Griffin, Lara Jill Miller, and Jill Talley. The Terrible cast record their lines together in group as opposed to individual recording sessions for each actor; this is to help the show's dialogue sound natural. The film regularly uses celebrity voice actors for other characters; these guests include Seth Macfarlane, Tim Curry, Tony Hale, and rapper, Busta Rhymes.