The Woodland Creatures (1997 sitcom)

The Woodland Creatures is an American adult animated TV sitcom created by animator. The show is produced by Gracie Films and Universal Cartoon Studios, airing on between 1997 and 1998, being later moved to Adult Swim in September 2001 for the rest of the series after a two-year hiatus since the last two seasons were produced from 1997 throughout 2000.

Premise
The show focuses on two best friends and roomates: Mike Fox and Rocky Raccoon. Its location took place in the forest of New York City.

Main

 * Mike Fox (voiced by Michael J. Fox in the show and Billy West in the video games) - One of the two main protagonists of the show. He is a red fox caricature of his voice actor. He is currently 23 years old.
 * Rocky Raccoon Jr. (referred to as Rocky Raccoon or just plain Rocky, voiced by Rob Paulsen) - A Brooklyn-accented friend of Mike Fox. He is 23 years old like his best friend. He is shown to be a liar and a cheater, and is the sneaky type for a raccoon. But deep down, he still has a soft spot for his best friend. Being a money-grubbing cheapskate and would do anything to get rich with his money-making schemes, he is paired with Mike in comic everyday situations while leaving Mike in the role of "straight-man".
 * Edward P. Grizzly (AKA Mr. Grizzly, voiced by Brad Garrett) - Mike and Rocky's short-tempered neighbor in the show. He is the owner of the Woodland Burger fast food restaurant.
 * Marilyn Fox (voiced by Tara Strong) - Mike's love interest on the show. She works at the Woodland Coffee Shop.
 * Bonnie Raccoon (voiced by B.J. Ward) - Rocky's love interest.
 * Vincent 'Vinny' Coonini (voiced by Tony Sirico) - Rocky's Italian-American twin cousin. His personality is the opposite of Rocky's money-grubbing and con-man ways.
 * Edwin G. Bearington (voiced by Dan Castellaneta) - a wealthy British-accented loud-mouthed bear who likes to talk about his life experiences and posessions. Mike seems to have respect from him and vice-versa, but Rocky finds him annoying. He is the major focus in the episodes' subplot.
 * Emily Bearington (voiced by Tress MacNeille) - Edwin's beautiful wife.
 * Philip Bearington (voiced by Seth Green) - Edwin and Emily's teenage son. He was born in Canada, however. He has a Canadian accent.
 * Jillian Bearington (voiced by Drew Barrymore) - Edwin and Emily's (23-year old) ditzy young adult daughter and Phillip's older sister. She was born in the United States long before her brother in Canada.
 * Reverend Beaver (voiced by William Salyers) - The town's resident pastor of the Woodland Church, a laid-back, caring yet lonely and sexually frustrated man whom Mike looks up to for advice. Later on, he shares a healthy relationship with his formerly unknown interspecies soulmate, Charlene (whom he originally hit on), a punk-rocker who owns a sex shop.
 * Charlene (voiced by Britta Phillips) - One of the few humans to appear on the show. She was Reverend Beaver's former interspecies soulmate. She still continues to be a rock and roll star. After reuniting with her interspecies soulmate as friends, they shared a close friendship with one another.
 * Purebred Poodle (voiced by Becky Thyre) - One of the domestic animal characters to appear on the show. She is the leader of "The Purebreds" and is considered the most beautiful and popular poodle girl in the forest, even though all of her friends are identical. She often treats the middle-class people with cruelty.

Supporting

 * Rocky Raccoon Sr. and Bertha Raccoon (voiced by Maurice LaMarche and Kath Soucie, respectively) - Rocky's parents. The mother is caring, good-natured, and has compassion and understanding. The father's personality is identical to that of his son, as his son follows in his father's footsteps.
 * Marshall and Miriam Fox (voiced by Jeff Bennett and Candi Milo, respectively) - Marilyn's parents.
 * Bluebeard Grizzly (voiced by Tim Curry) - Mr. Grizzly's pirate grandfather.

Development
The series marks the first time that Universal Cartoon Studios developed a sitcom, following the steps of rival studios such as 20th Century Fox. In the mid-90s, the studio's major hits were the television adaptions of Back to the Future, An American Tail, Earthworm Jim (which was rebooted by Universal's rival studio Paramount ten years later for its run on Nickelodeon) and Casper the Friendly Ghost. By the time that the series started its development, a Rocky and Bullwinkle-esque show featuring the famous Walter Lantz stars Woody Woodpecker and Chilly Willy (later reworked as The New Woody Woodpecker Show, starring Billy West as the voice of the title character, premiering in 1999) was also pitched to the studio. The idea was dropped for some reason as if it felt like ripping-off the beloved characters.

All of the characters, including Mike Fox and Rocky Raccoon, were originally intended to be humans and the show's name was originally intended to be Mike and Rocky. But the characters were later changed to be woodland creatures with human characteristics during pre-production.

Writing
Some of the writers came from the Disney animated series Bonkers, such as John Behnke, Rob Humphrey, Jim Peterson, Kevin Campbell, and Mark Zaslove. While others came from DiC's Super Mario cartoon series trilogy such as Rowby Goren, Matt Utiz, Doug Booth, Michael Maurier, Sean Roche, David Ehrman, Perry Martin, Phil Harnage, and most notably Jeffrey Scott and even a few writers from The Simpsons came to work on the show, which was actually John Swartzwelder and Jon Vitti.

The show was rated TV-PG with occasional episodes rated TV-14 likely due to dark themes, humor and content.

Voices
Michael J. Fox was chosen to play his self-inspired character, Mike Fox. Rob Paulsen was the voice of his best friend, Rocky Raccoon Jr.

Animation
All of the episodes are animated at Toon City Animation in the Phillipines, both Rough Draft Studios and AKOM Production Company in South Korea, and Wang Film Productions in Taiwan, respectively. Like The Spooktacular New Adventures of Casper, this show uses digital ink and paint for the entire series.

The opening title sequence was animated by Tokyo Movie Shinsha (TMS Entertainment), which had a similar animation style to their work on Tiny Toons Adventures and Animaniacs.

Music
In order for the show to feel more like a real sitcom, the music for the series have to deviate from the standard for animated cartoons, which traditionally followed the works of Carl Stalling. The show's music was composed by Ron Jones and Walter Murphy.

Episodes
See List of episodes

Voice cast

 * Michael J. Fox as Mike Fox
 * Rob Paulsen as Rocky Raccoon

Broadcast history
The show premiered Sunday, November 2, 1997 on Fox, but failed to find an audience. On May 17, 1998, Fox aired "TBA", the eighth episode produced, as the season finale, leaving five episodes unaired. Despite the show being cancelled, two more seasons were produced in an successfull attempt to return the series to television. Reruns of the first eight episodes, and the five unaired episodes, including the last two seasons later aired on Cartoon Network's late night programming block, Adult Swim. Reruns of the series still continue to air on Adult Swim and as well as Netflix.

Home media
The show was released on DVD by Universal Studios Home Entertainment, complete with beautiful color correction and restoration done overseas at TBA.

Trivia

 * The show is influenced by The Simpsons, Ren and Stimpy, Beavis and Butt-head and Rocko's Modern Life, being also considered as a predecessor to Regular Show and The Looney Tunes Show.
 * Gags and a few storylines were recycled from Taylor's previous show, Bonkers.
 * Vinny's voice and mannerisms would be later recycled for a homonymous character on Family Guy (also voiced by Sirico), who served as Brian Griffin's temporary replacement.