Richie Rich, I slowly realized, is a streamable hate crime.
April 23, 2015 10:20 PM Subscribe
The things Netflix will buy always astound me. This sounds like a new low, though.
posted by kafziel at 10:40 PM on April 23, 2015
posted by kafziel at 10:40 PM on April 23, 2015
That poor little rich boy. :(
posted by mazola at 10:40 PM on April 23, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by mazola at 10:40 PM on April 23, 2015 [4 favorites]
Holy shit, this sounds almost as horrible as that "Little Boy" movie.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 10:52 PM on April 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 10:52 PM on April 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
THere's something about this that makes me think of the DreamWorks' Face.
posted by benito.strauss at 10:55 PM on April 23, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by benito.strauss at 10:55 PM on April 23, 2015 [2 favorites]
I was really hoping that this was Chris Sims. He was great at mocking the show before the recent unpleasantness.
posted by Charlemagne In Sweatpants at 11:11 PM on April 23, 2015
posted by Charlemagne In Sweatpants at 11:11 PM on April 23, 2015
“Desperation is the mother of ingenuity.”—Don Dunn, Producer, Richie Rich
posted by ob1quixote at 11:31 PM on April 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by ob1quixote at 11:31 PM on April 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
That maid... on a kids show. Why?
posted by Justinian at 11:38 PM on April 23, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by Justinian at 11:38 PM on April 23, 2015 [4 favorites]
I watched a couple of episodes, just because I was curious about whether anything could be as bad as this article suggests, and it really is that terrible. It might actually be more terrible, even. I know that's hard to imagine.
Even the laugh track on this show is weirdly lacking. It sounds like there are about four 6-year-olds in a closet providing the whole track. If your fake studio audience doesn't think your show is funny...
posted by jacquilynne at 11:47 PM on April 23, 2015
Even the laugh track on this show is weirdly lacking. It sounds like there are about four 6-year-olds in a closet providing the whole track. If your fake studio audience doesn't think your show is funny...
posted by jacquilynne at 11:47 PM on April 23, 2015
This reminds me of a show in the 80's called "Flamingo" something that was a soap opera with children, it was heavily promoted but I never saw it. A friend saw the one episode and it looked like it had been filmed in one take the day before.
posted by boilermonster at 11:55 PM on April 23, 2015
posted by boilermonster at 11:55 PM on April 23, 2015
It's at least possible that Netflix got Richie Rich "for free" as part of a bundle of shows is was licensing. Sure, they could have just held off from making it available... but here we are talking about some people who've watched it. More minutes streamed = more value (most of the time).
I don't feel compelled to verify how bad that show was. I tried that with Airwolf and still regret it.
posted by pkingdesign at 12:02 AM on April 24, 2015
I don't feel compelled to verify how bad that show was. I tried that with Airwolf and still regret it.
posted by pkingdesign at 12:02 AM on April 24, 2015
pkingdesign: "I tried that with Airwolf and still regret it."
Pistols at dawn, sir. My 13 year old self and you.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 12:06 AM on April 24, 2015 [17 favorites]
Pistols at dawn, sir. My 13 year old self and you.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 12:06 AM on April 24, 2015 [17 favorites]
Season 2 starts in May. I just saw that on one of the monthly "what's coming to netflix next month" articles.
posted by fluffy battle kitten at 12:15 AM on April 24, 2015
posted by fluffy battle kitten at 12:15 AM on April 24, 2015
Nothing in the article convinces me that this is any worse than most other things that have been on television for the last forty years.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 2:27 AM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by Sing Or Swim at 2:27 AM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
Yes. My daughter watches a bunch of current Disney sitcoms when we let her. They are very, very bad. WRT this article, it merely confirms that the plate of beans is no longer edible.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 4:53 AM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Kirth Gerson at 4:53 AM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
If you're wondering why Richie doesn't get it on with the robot maid, well, let's just say that Cadbury found out the hard way that she's also a pencil sharpener.
They better pay me union scale if that makes it into season 2.
posted by dr_dank at 5:47 AM on April 24, 2015 [6 favorites]
They better pay me union scale if that makes it into season 2.
posted by dr_dank at 5:47 AM on April 24, 2015 [6 favorites]
This reminds me of a show in the 80's called "Flamingo" something that was a soap opera with children, it was heavily promoted but I never saw it. A friend saw the one episode and it looked like it had been filmed in one take the day before.
It was "Swan" something, I think.
posted by Sys Rq at 6:22 AM on April 24, 2015
It was "Swan" something, I think.
posted by Sys Rq at 6:22 AM on April 24, 2015
Metafilter: a rough town; even the victories are often failures.
posted by Renoroc at 7:06 AM on April 24, 2015
posted by Renoroc at 7:06 AM on April 24, 2015
This show is sort of like every network sitcom was in the 1980s. The horror of the writer tells me that she has watched few or no network sitcoms from the 1980s.
posted by blucevalo at 7:15 AM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by blucevalo at 7:15 AM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
The only way that trailer would be more unsettling would be if someone replaced the voiceover and music with some Penderecki.
posted by rabbitroom at 7:23 AM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by rabbitroom at 7:23 AM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
This reminds me of a show in the 80's called "Flamingo" something that was a soap opera with children, it was heavily promoted but I never saw it. A friend saw the one episode and it looked like it had been filmed in one take the day before.
It was "Swan" something, I think.
You both must be referring to "Swan's Crossing," which I remember watching sometime over the summer in the early 90s. It starred a very young Sarah Michelle Gellar as an Erica Kane-type character. Good thing she left that town for Sunnydale.
posted by thadman at 8:01 AM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
It was "Swan" something, I think.
You both must be referring to "Swan's Crossing," which I remember watching sometime over the summer in the early 90s. It starred a very young Sarah Michelle Gellar as an Erica Kane-type character. Good thing she left that town for Sunnydale.
posted by thadman at 8:01 AM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
Just for contrast, I looked up the Richie Rich cartoon on YT. To my surprise, he has both a mother (who immediately leaves for the opera as soon as she's introduced) and a robot maid. The writing for both series is basically the same.
posted by thadman at 8:03 AM on April 24, 2015
posted by thadman at 8:03 AM on April 24, 2015
... starred a very young Sarah Michelle Gellar as an Erica Kane-type character
Just in case anyone didn't know, Sarah Michelle Gellar actually played Erica Kane's daugher, Kendall Hart.
posted by jjwiseman at 8:14 AM on April 24, 2015
Just in case anyone didn't know, Sarah Michelle Gellar actually played Erica Kane's daugher, Kendall Hart.
posted by jjwiseman at 8:14 AM on April 24, 2015
"I tried that with Airwolf and still regret it."
Pistols at dawn, sir. My 13 year old self and you.
It really is a lot worse than you remember...
posted by Naberius at 8:24 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Pistols at dawn, sir. My 13 year old self and you.
It really is a lot worse than you remember...
posted by Naberius at 8:24 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Oh man, yeah. There was some Disney Channel sitcom on at a restaurant I was at (the owner's kid was watching it) called Jessie or something, and literally the only enjoyment of any sort to be derived from it was the fact that the butler character appeared to be played by White Uncle Phil. Everything else was the worst kind of '90s: the canned laughter, the dialogue consisting of nothing but insults until someone needed to say something that moved the plot forward, the fact that the kids all talked like (fairly poorly written) adults, etc.
posted by DoctorFedora at 8:25 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by DoctorFedora at 8:25 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
This show is sort of like every network sitcom was in the 1980s. The horror of the writer tells me that she has watched few or no network sitcoms from the 1980s.
Kids today, they just don't know. If you cut your teeth on Three's Company and Love Boat and reruns of older stuff like F Troop and Gomer Pyle, why, you developed a tolerance for crap. Mostly because there was nothing else.
So I would probably find this boring, but not horrifying. I lived through the era when everything was dreck. The era that produced the Star Wars Holiday Special and Small Wonder. Richie Rich is nothing.
posted by emjaybee at 8:41 AM on April 24, 2015
Kids today, they just don't know. If you cut your teeth on Three's Company and Love Boat and reruns of older stuff like F Troop and Gomer Pyle, why, you developed a tolerance for crap. Mostly because there was nothing else.
So I would probably find this boring, but not horrifying. I lived through the era when everything was dreck. The era that produced the Star Wars Holiday Special and Small Wonder. Richie Rich is nothing.
posted by emjaybee at 8:41 AM on April 24, 2015
>It really is a lot worse than you remember... yt<
Bazookas at dawn then,
posted by twidget at 9:09 AM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
Bazookas at dawn then,
posted by twidget at 9:09 AM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
When I saw the trailer for this show I thought it was a joke, and poking fun at these types of shows by being so overtly screwed up. Is this not the case?
posted by gucci mane at 9:40 AM on April 24, 2015
posted by gucci mane at 9:40 AM on April 24, 2015
Ok, now that I've read that, I finally, completely, honest-to-god do not want to live on this planet anymore.
When I was a kid, I read Richie Rich, the comic book, with some reasonable regularity. It was kinda neat, really -- ha ha, a kid my age who's fabulously wealthy and has his very own butler! That was sort of quaint in the 1970s. In our new plutocratic age, it suddenly seems a hell of a lot less amusing.
posted by holborne at 9:44 AM on April 24, 2015 [6 favorites]
When I was a kid, I read Richie Rich, the comic book, with some reasonable regularity. It was kinda neat, really -- ha ha, a kid my age who's fabulously wealthy and has his very own butler! That was sort of quaint in the 1970s. In our new plutocratic age, it suddenly seems a hell of a lot less amusing.
posted by holborne at 9:44 AM on April 24, 2015 [6 favorites]
When I was a kid, I read Richie Rich, the comic book, with some reasonable regularity. It was kinda neat, really -- ha ha, a kid my age who's fabulously wealthy and has his very own butler! That was sort of quaint in the 1970s. In our new plutocratic age, it suddenly seems a hell of a lot less amusing.
Recommended reading.
posted by Sys Rq at 10:06 AM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
Recommended reading.
posted by Sys Rq at 10:06 AM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
"Wouldn't an updated version of Silver Spoons be absolutely relevant to America today?" is something that no one ever has, or ever will have asked, ever.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 10:11 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 10:11 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
So, canonically, where does the Rich money come from? Because this whole deal where Richie has made his own fortune doesn't seem right.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:19 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Chrysostom at 10:19 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Human trafficking.
posted by box at 10:26 AM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by box at 10:26 AM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
It really is a lot worse than you remember...
posted by Naberius at 11:24 AM on April 24 [+] [!]
This is my new favorite metaphor for so many things. Need GIF stat.
posted by echocollate at 10:56 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Naberius at 11:24 AM on April 24 [+] [!]
This is my new favorite metaphor for so many things. Need GIF stat.
posted by echocollate at 10:56 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
So, canonically, where does the Rich money come from? Because this whole deal where Richie has made his own fortune doesn't seem right.
Grit.
posted by mazola at 10:56 AM on April 24, 2015 [13 favorites]
Grit.
posted by mazola at 10:56 AM on April 24, 2015 [13 favorites]
When I saw the trailer for this show I thought it was a joke, and poking fun at these types of shows by being so overtly screwed up. Is this not the case?
I think that this is the attempt that show makes, but just completely blows past self-parody and into... whatever this is. But it really is just super crazy bad and nonsensical. Like, I don't even know. It's literally insane.
posted by cmoj at 11:05 AM on April 24, 2015
I think that this is the attempt that show makes, but just completely blows past self-parody and into... whatever this is. But it really is just super crazy bad and nonsensical. Like, I don't even know. It's literally insane.
posted by cmoj at 11:05 AM on April 24, 2015
Horribleness of the show aside, I can't help but be a bit shocked that the author casually mentions that she's a divorcée and infertile in the first paragraph (of a TV review). Is this sort of blithe oversharing something I'd have to be a millennial to understand?
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 11:20 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 11:20 AM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
No, I'm older than you and I'm not shocked. Didn't even think about it when I read it, in fact. It's probably not generational, but rather some other cultural difference.
posted by benito.strauss at 11:26 AM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by benito.strauss at 11:26 AM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
FWIW, I also did a double take at the infertility thing. The divorcee thing I thought made some sense in the context of the article, and wasn't as weird.
posted by holborne at 11:37 AM on April 24, 2015
posted by holborne at 11:37 AM on April 24, 2015
For reasons I can’t quite fathom, I had to wait until halfway through the sixth episode for a character to say “YOLO.”
Perfect. Also...
Metafilter: For reasons I can’t quite fathom, I had to wait until halfway through the sixth episode for a character to say “YOLO.”
posted by greenland at 11:44 AM on April 24, 2015
Perfect. Also...
Metafilter: For reasons I can’t quite fathom, I had to wait until halfway through the sixth episode for a character to say “YOLO.”
posted by greenland at 11:44 AM on April 24, 2015
One of my kid's favorite YouTubers is some guy who reviews really awful recent movies and screams about how bad they are (it's kinda like MST3K with loudness in place of jokes) and of course I'm sure he's a literal billionaire from ad revenue like all the intolerably obnoxious YouTubers she loves are, so I'm starting to think that cranking out shit media products like this is part of some long game where the sheer badness gets it recycled downstream into something that yields more profit than its original iteration
Seriously, there have to be people out there drafting serious marketing plans based around the idea that hatewatching is a thing that Millenials enjoy, etc
posted by prize bull octorok at 12:16 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Seriously, there have to be people out there drafting serious marketing plans based around the idea that hatewatching is a thing that Millenials enjoy, etc
posted by prize bull octorok at 12:16 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
and of course I'm sure he's a literal billionaire from ad revenue like all the intolerably obnoxious YouTubers she loves are
My favorite is the lady who's made zillions and zillions of dollars from opening Disney-licensed toys and oohing and aahing over them. Yet another reason I really am through with living on Earth as we know it.
posted by holborne at 1:20 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
My favorite is the lady who's made zillions and zillions of dollars from opening Disney-licensed toys and oohing and aahing over them. Yet another reason I really am through with living on Earth as we know it.
posted by holborne at 1:20 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Bart: Well, you know what I think? I think Casper is the ghost of Richie Rich. (shows comics of Casper & Richie Rich)
Lisa: Hey, they do look alike!
Bart: Wonder how Richie died.
Lisa: Perhaps he realized how hollow the pursuit of money really is and took his own life.
posted by Ratio at 1:28 PM on April 24, 2015 [12 favorites]
Lisa: Hey, they do look alike!
Bart: Wonder how Richie died.
Lisa: Perhaps he realized how hollow the pursuit of money really is and took his own life.
posted by Ratio at 1:28 PM on April 24, 2015 [12 favorites]
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(See also, My Humps.)
posted by Naberius at 10:31 PM on April 23, 2015 [4 favorites]