Family Dog (TV series)
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| Family Dog | |
|---|---|
 Complete series Laserdisc box set | |
| Genre | Animation |
| Created by | Brad Bird |
| Voices of | Martin Mull - Skip Binford Molly Cheek - Beverly Binford Danny Mann - Family Dog Zak Huxtable Epstein - Billy Binford Cassie Cole - Buffy Binford |
| Theme music composer | Danny Elfman |
| Country of origin |  United States  Canada |
| No. of episodes | 10 (5 were aired) |
| Production | |
| Executive producers | Steven Spielberg Tim Burton Dennis Klein |
| Producer | Chuck Richardson |
| Production companies | Amblin Entertainment Warner Bros. Television Universal Television Nelvana |
| Original release | |
| Network | CBS |
| Release | June 23 – July 21, 1993 |
Family Dog is the story of an average suburban family, the Binfords, as told through the eyes of their dog. It first appeared as an episode of the TV show Amazing Stories, then was expanded into a very short-lived series of its own.
Original episode
In the original Amazing Stories episode, which aired in the show's second season in 1987, a dog (simply called "the dog", played by a Bull Terrier) is the main character, portrayed in three stories: The first story involves general misadventures in the house, with him being both ignored and somewhat mistreated by his owners. The second part is a "home movie" showing their Christmas (in which the family narrates), that culminates with the dog eating the turkey. In the third, final and enlongated segment of the episode, a couple of robbers break into the family's house twice (the first time was when the Binfords had to go out to see a movie at a movie theater, and the dog was given one more chance before the second time), so the father sends the dog Gerta LaStrange's Dog Obedience School, so he can learn how to become a "quivering, snarling, white-hot ball of canine terror" in order to fend off the robbers. However, when they return to try to rob the house the third time, they run away from it to try avoid and escape from the dog, but when they return to their hideout, which is full of their stolen stuff (they came back with nothing from their third robbery), the second, shorter-bodied robber discovers the dog attached to his arm, with his teeth. Time passes, and the dog is still stuck to his arm. A policeman investigating the robberies approaches the door, burst in and the dog attacks him. The villains soon praise the dog, who later decided to use him a weapon for their biddings and soon a crime spree (featuring the dog and his attacks and robberies) insues. Later, while this was already occurring for not a little too long, the humiliated robber threatens to get a cat when the newspaper refers to them as "The Dog Gang". Already angered by this annoying humiliation, the dog becomes too much for the robbers to take, as he turns on them, causing an auto accident in which the robbers hit a cop car and are busted. The dog is returned to the Binford family, who consider him their hero (The story shortly ends with a catch-up gag, with the father stuck outside the house, as he tries to whisper to his wife to let him in but he fails to do so, he then sneaks behind the house into the backyard, only to be attacked, beaten and wounded by the still-quivering, snarling, white-hot ball of canine terror!).
Written and directed by Brad Bird (who also did the voice of the dog), with music by Danny Elfman and Steve Bartek, it was one of the most popular episodes of the Amblin/Universal Television weekly anthology television series, Amazing Stories. The story was animated by Dan Jeup, Ralph Eggleston, Chris Buck, Sue Kroyer, Gregg Vanzo, David Cutler, Rob Minkoff, Alan Smart and Darrell Rooney from an animation production design by Tim Burton. The animation production was outsourced from Hyperion Pictures.
- Skip Binford (the father) was voiced by Stan Freberg.
- Bev Binford (the mother) was voiced by Annie Potts
- Billy Binford (the son) was voiced by Scott Menville.
- Buffy Binford (the daughter) was voiced by Brooke Ashley.
- Gerte LeStrange (the dog trainer) was voiced by Mercedes McCambridge.
- The two robbers were voiced by Marshall Efron and Stanley Ralph Ross.
- Plus, an additional voice was given to Jack Angel for the security guard of the dog school.
The first half of the special was attached to another Spielberg-produced project, The Land Before Time, because of the film's short length of over-an-hour.
Historical note
Although it may seem strange to the modern reader, Spielberg's choice to make the episode using animation – especially combining the expense of high-quality animation with well-known voice actors – was considered risky and bold at the time. By the mid-1980s, animation was generally relegated to "cartoons for kids", with most animation (and virtually all animation for television) done as cheaply as possible, with low quality production and no-name actors. In retrospect, "Family Dog" is often considered to be a landmark production that, combined with films like Oliver & Company (1988) and The Little Mermaid (1989), led to the 1990s rennaissance in animation (see also: Modern animation in the United States). "Family Dog" is also notable as Spielberg's first animated project; he has followed up with projects like "Tiny Toon Adventures", The Prince of Egypt, and CGI projects like Shrek.
CBS series
Seven years after the success of the original Amazing Stories episode, a CBS series was produced by Steven Spielberg and Tim Burton (who was involved in the original episodes contributing the story's production and character designs), written by Dennis Klein, and distributed by Nelvana, but notably lacking the involvement of the original writer and director, Brad Bird. Largely hyped due to the involvement of Spielberg, the series suffered various noted production delays that plagued the show, including that it did not get past its original network order of 13 episodes, with plus an additional 5 scripts that have already been written. Only 10 episodes were finished and sent back from the Wang Film Productions animation house in Taiwan but the producers were dissatisfied with the results, so they halted production on the final three episodes and outsourced the ten episodes to Nelvana for "fixes and completions". Also, at one point, the series was scheduled to debut on March 20, 1991 (and it was heavily promoted during the February 1991 broadcast of the Grammy Awards), but the animation production wasn't completed in time for this premiere, so the series was ultimately pushing back its debut until 1993. Meanwhile, Frederick Coffin was originally cast as the voice of Skip Binford. But Spielberg decided to replace him with Martin Mull, after animation was completed on the first three episodes. When the show had finally debuted, it was roundly panned for its crude scripts and cheap production values, both of drastically lesser quality than the episode which had spawned the series. After the first five episodes aired, it was pulled from the CBS schedule. Remaining episodes were sold to local markets as program filler. The entire series was later released as a Laserdisc box-set, and various episodes of the show were released on videocassette around the same time. Universal, as of December 20, 2009, has yet to announce any plans for a DVD release.
Episode list
| Episode # | Title | Description | Air Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Show Dog | The dog's family enters him in a rodeo showcase of the stars! His family believes
him to be specially talented, but as we all see, the magic is in the making. || 23 June 1993 | |
| 2 | Hot Dog at the Zoo | When the Binsfords take a trip to the zoo, their pooch tags along and causes plenty of trouble. | 23 June 1993 |
| 3 | Doggone Girl is Mine | The dog falls hard for a recently-divorced neighbor's pet. Meanwhile, Skip fears Bev might leave him. | 30 June 1993 |
| 4 | Enemy Dog | When the pretentious Mahoneys pick up a mammoth police dog from an auction, the Binfords force their pooch to interact with it. | 7 July 1993 |
| 5 | Eye on the Sparrow | The dog cares for a sparrow who's unable to fly. | 7 July 1993 |
| 6 | Call of the Mild | The family dog dreams of cavorting with the neighborhood strays, but he soon discovers he doesn't have what it takes to run with the pack. | 14 July 1993 |
| 7 | Dog Days of Summer | When the Binsfords head to the beach, they're forced to contend with a trashy family and their ferocious bulldog, Scud. | 21 July 1993 |
| 8 | Party Animal | After hosting the neighborhood block party, the Binfords' house catches on fire. | 21 July 1993 |
| 9 | Family Dog Gets Good and Sick | The family dog becomes ill after being bitten by a mosquito that was feasting on toxic waste. Meanwhile, a neighborhood dog is killed by a car. | 28 July 1993 |
| 10 | Family Dog Goes Homeless | The family dog befriends a homeless woman. | 28 July 1993 |
The video game
The show was later turned into a quirky Super Nintendo game about the life of an everyday family dog. The player has to go places such as a beach and a dog pound to defeat stereotypical obstacles and enemies like dog catchers and cats.