Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Things I Would Remake: Yogi's Gang

Ok, I'm resigned that they are going to CGI my childhood memories straight to hell.  Lorax, you have won.  But I won't go down without a kick or two.  Since I've gone by the theory that only failed things should be remade I humbly submit that "Yogi's Gang" should get the next 100 million dollar CGI treatment.  It's only fair.

So, what is Yogi's Gang?  Well it was made in the seventies and it was a serious MESSAGE cartoon.  I mean really it screamed MESSAGE.  It was like a whole half hour built on that little one minute "Because knowledge is power," segment at the end of most cartoons.  It was pious, it was pompous, and after a bit it became too funny for words.  Their earnestness turned it to the anti-message which made the whole thing funny on a super sad scale.

The actual plot had Yogi gathering the entire hanna barbara animal characters into a flying ark so they can all do good.  Each week they faced a villain like the Greedy Genie or Lotta Litter who's crime tended to be on the level of epic bad sportsmanship or doing enough littering to make the navajo nation cry.  The characters would tend to get sucked into the charisma of the villain of the week before learning their lesson doing right and then flying off.

Now let's tick off what's good about this concept.   First, every hanna barbara animal character under one roof.  That has amazing comedy potential (not that the cartoon ever touched that)  Imagine Yogi and Snaggletooth plotting.  Peter Potomas and Augie Doggie hanging out.  It is a rich situation.  Also I think it would be good CGI.  Look when you do a film like Yogi Bear and you have one or two main characters done CGI they stick out like sore thumbs.  Now do a film like Yogi Ark with the ratio inverted and it's much more natural.  It would be slick instead of sick.

As for plot, I'd have three or four of their old villains get together to stick it to our heroes.  This could be a casting heaven with comedy actors doing both voice work and work as the villains.  I can see Chris Walken in here somewhere.  It would be perfect!

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