Mr. Meaty

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Mr. Meaty
Josh (left), Parker (right)
Genre	Puppet comedy
Creator(s)	Jason Hopley Jamie Shannon
Country of origin	Canada
No. of episodes	12 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive producer(s)	Jack Lenz
Running time	12 minutes for episode segment (approx. 24 minutes altogether)
Broadcast
Original channel	Canada: CBC U.S.: Nickelodeon
Original run	September 22, 2006 – present
Links
Official website
IMDb profile
TV.com summary

Mr. Meaty is a Canadian children's television series, airing on CBC Television in Canada and Nickelodeon in the United States. It aired on the American Nicktoons Network on March 10, 2007. The show features somewhat sexually confused puppets working at a fast food restaurant called Mr. Meaty (a parody of McDonald's and other fast food chains) located inside the Scaunchboro Mall (the name based on the Ontario city of Scarborough). The show began as a series of shorts featured on CBC's The Void and in between Nickelodeon shows. A 15 minute pilot aired on December 30, 2005, which used one of the shorts and part of the episode. On September 22, 2006, the series premiered on American television with two 15 minute episodes. The original shorts can still be found on iTunes and TurboNick. Mr. Meaty has been featured in the August and September issues of Nick Magazine. It's been rated as "Crap of The Year" by TV.com.

[edit] Characters

Main article: List of Mr. Meaty Characters

Josh: The cashier at Mr. Meaty. Josh enjoys dating girls, even though most girls he talks to don't like him. Some girls he talks to (like Goth Girl) like him at first, but they always ditch him eventually. He severely dislikes his job, and his dream is to make a horror movie (with ninja-zombies) with his friend, Parker.

Parker: The fry cook at Mr. Meaty. He speaks with a small but noticeable lisp and has a bit of a weight problem, explaining why he is sometimes referred to as "Porker". He hates this nickname, as shown in "The Fries that Bind." Josh describes him as having a "farting problem". Parker appears to be something of a sci-fi geek and unlike Josh, he loves his job.

Ashley: She is a regular at Scaunchboro Mall and is part of a group of three girls. She is usually the one that speaks for her group and sometimes flirts with Josh. She is obsessed with her looks and once had Josh whip up a nuclear concoction to vaporize a zit on he nose.

Britney: She is the second girl in Ashley's group. She usually plays a minor role in the show but alot of times she is the voice of reason for Josh and Parker.

Ashley 2: She is the third girl in Ashley's group. She doesn't talk very much, if at all, in most episodes. She is sometimes referred to as "Ashley T" or "Ashley Two" but is mostly just called "Ashley." She too is obsessed with her looks and when she got a zit on her forehead, she held a magic crystal near her forehead to make it disappear. When she is depressed, she will do weird things like eat her own hair.

Doug: He is the mall's mall cop. He is actually a pretty good cop but alot of time he is goofing off or helping Josh and Parker with something. He loves to eat and will constantly be ordering food from Mr. Meaty. He always wears sunglasses and has a shaved head.

Chip 2.6: He is a robot only showed in the half-hour special "Model Employee." He originally was a robot that took any order Josh gave him, including sawing a microwave in half. Parker was very skeptical about Chip though, claiming that he was after their jobs. Parker then ordered Chip to take himself apart and throw himself away. He then rebuilt himself but his brain was scrambled. This became obvious when he said, "Every Chip is 40% potato." He then brought Parker under his control but Parker regained control of himself when Chip said that the model employee never eats and kills Chip by impaling him with one of his guns, and throwing him into the deep fryer's oil, which electrocutes Chip.

Mr. Carney: He founded Mr. Meaty over 100 years ago and was cryogenically frozen, but was released from his chamber a year before the current episodes take place; he was shown being released only in a flashback. His appearance is ghastly; he has an oversized head and his skin is medium blue in color. He is southern and uses a wheelchair with a large set of bronco horns behind the headrest. He is considered by all his employees to be evil and will harshy punish and slip-ups by his employees.

[edit] Episodes

Main article: List of Mr. Meaty episodes

[edit] Parodies

Mr. Meaty features very little parodies, often spoofing typical teenage interests, including video game systems and franchises such as Star Wars and Star Trek. Some examples of these parodies include:

• Mr. Meaty is a spoof of McDonald's and other fast-food restaurants.
• "Duke Starkiller" from "Space Raiders", spoofing Luke Skywalker and Star Wars respectively. In addition, Skywalker's last name in the original script of the first Star Wars film was Starkiller.
• The "Game Craze 720", a video game system mentioned in the episode "Suburb of the Apes" (the title itself a spoof of Planet of the Apes), is almost the exact design of the XBOX 360.
• The series makes reference to Star Trek, mentioning a "Kalingi" (Klingon) prophecy and a "Romuloid" (Romulan).
• The way Chip is destroyed in "Model Employee" is similair to the destruction of the T-1000 in Terminator 2.

[edit] Trivia

• The franchise number is 655762 as noted in "The Model Employee".
• The restaurant apparently also serves Haggis as shown on one of the boxes in "My Eddie".
• One of the drinks at the soda fountain is called Agent Orange, after the controversial defoliant used heavily in the Vietnam War. The logo even features an army helmet.
• The video camera that characters Josh and Parker use to make a horror movie is a Campax by Moyo.
• Sky's phone number is 555-4444
• In the episode "Nosferateens," while Josh and Parker were fighting the vampire, one can see Hamish in the freezer.
• Eddie, Parker's Yeti is not to be confused with Eddie the Mean Old Yeti, a character from Donkey Kong Country
• In "My Eddie" when Parker is watching Asian TV you can see Master Kindu next to the TV.
• In "Parkerina" and "Wedgelor", one locker has the name Chip, a reference to Chip 2.6 from "The Model Employee".
• The main characters, Josh and Parker, performed their own version of Crazy Car, but instead of the puppets being voiced by their normal actors, they are voiced by Nat and Alex Wolff, respectively.
• Mr. Carney's name comes from the Spanish term "carnoso" which means "meaty".
• In certain episodes, you can see the 3 "tanks" that hold food that can be prepared using the main control panel. They are labeled "Beef", "Chicken", and "Other".

[edit] External links

• Official Mr. Meaty website
• Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's Mr. Meaty Page
• Nickelodeon's Mr. Meaty Page