Squidbillies

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Squidbillies
Image:Squidbilles.gif
Early Cuyler
Genre Animated Comedy
Creator(s) Jim Fortier
Dave Willis
Starring Unknown Hinson
Daniel McDevitt
Dana Snyder
Bobby Ellerbee
Country of origin USA
No. of episodes 20 (List of episodes)
Production
Running time 11 1/2 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel Cartoon Network
Original run October 16, 2005 – present

Squidbillies is an animated television show produced by Williams Street Studios, currently being written by one of the creators of Aqua Teen Hunger Force on Adult Swim. The animation is done by Radical Axis. The background design is by Ben Prisk. The show follows a family of hillbilly squids that live in the north Georgia mountains. The show revolves primarily around two squids, Early Cuyler and his son Rusty Cuyler, living in abject poverty, and trying to reconcile their relationship following Early's fifteen year incarceration for armed robbery.

Contents

Cast

Crew

  • Animation Supervisor - Craig Hartin
  • Animation Coordinator - Harriss Callahan
  • Supervising Animator - "Sketch" Quinn
  • Original Character Design - Todd Redner
  • Animators (Season One) - Amber Boardman, Eric Cerda, Marji Fortin
  • Animators (Season Two) - Brian Ellis, Hanna Bliss, Lars Edwards, Marji Fortin, Justin Hamrick
  • Story Editor - Haruki Murakami

Story as Presented

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The setting is a quiet town nestled in the North Georgia Mountains off of I-575. The characters include the Sheriff, who smokes cigarettes, has an affinity for dancing, sometimes dresses like Elton John, and, as we are told, will die in 3 years from emphysema. The next character is a giant snake named Snake Man who sports a red mullet haircut and is usually seen killing or devouring anyone he meets. Space Baby has yet to appear in an episode beyond this first introduction. Billy Morton is the star of the local football team, who has no working limbs save for sticks duct taped to his body, and is subsequently run-over in the street chasing after his football. Dan Halen is the owner of "Dan Halen Sheetrock International" which is a conglomerate that dominates the local economy and who specializes in sheetrock, sheetrock mud, sheetrock screws, pharmaceuticals, petroleum, global mass media, third world covert military operations, and tools for infanticide. The Dan Halen corporate logo resembles the logo of the rock band Van Halen.

While the show tells the story of most of the people in the town, we are told that it's mainly about Early Cuyler. Fifteen years prior to the present day, Early Cuyler twice robbed a store to obtain gifts for his ill-mannered, philandering, and extremely obese human girlfriend, Crystal, who refuses to let Early touch her "front-butt" until he can procure "one of them sport radio things with the ear-buds and auto reverse." After the second robbery, in which he goes back to obtain a cassette tape to put in her "flippin' tape cassette player", Early is arrested and sentenced to the next fifteen years in prison. Unbeknownst to him, in his absence, Crystal leaves him for Snake Man, gives birth to their son, Rusty, and abandons him to be raised by Early's sister, Lil.

Rusty becomes a ward of the state after the discovery of a crystal meth lab in Lil's hair salon, and is placed in his grandmother's care, but flees out of boredom of her stories of Jesus being president when she was a girl. Depressed and dejected, Rusty attempts to take his own life before he is saved and raised by a family of Wolves, and is torn apart by them many times before filling his body with 300 lbs. of nitroglycerin and blowing them to pieces which, fortunately for the wolves, is only a dream. At the end of his father's sentence, the two reunite, and now live with Lil. Rusty sports a red mullet haircut while Early has gone bald over time. Both Early and Rusty appear to have a complete and utter lack of any formal education, are fairly ignorant and have trouble pronouncing multi-syllable words. They are fans of NASCAR: both like Dick Trickle and Dale Earnhardt Jr.; Early has been known to have borrowed Bill Elliott's nickname "Awesome Bill From Dawsonville" as an illegal alias. Early also tends to wear ever-changing, sometimes topical, sometimes rudely funny, trucker hats.

Initially after his release from prison, we find Early having difficulty staying employed. This is attributed to his penchant for overbearingly sexual salesmanship, outbursts of brutal violence (throwing knives, beating people to a pulp, etc.), and complete lack of reliability. This makes him the perfect candidate to eventually be hired by Dan Halen as the new CEO of his sheetrock company. In part to comply with federal Equal Opportunity Employment standards, but mainly to deflect liability from Halen, whose business faces many lawsuits resulting from its increasingly dangerous products. Early is completely oblivious to Halen's machinations and is unaware that he will hopefully be scapegoated into prosecution for the company's offenses.

The Sheriff becomes worried that if the board of education ever finds out about Rusty's lack of schooling, they are going to come to town to "kick His ass and then he's going to have to kick Earlys ass." They decide not to send him down to the county school because if they continue "segregating, it's going to be nothing but bathrooms." So it is decided it would be best for Early to homeschool him instead. Rusty is taught that there are all kinds of rocks, there's rocks that you can throw and rocks that you can get hit by. Also he learns that "scribblin's on a bathroom stall" may speak of being "repressed by an Orwellian overlord" and about "lashing out with Guerilla style poetry".

Also, at times, the entire Cuyler clan is overtly racist, especially towards white people which they refer to as "Chalkies", although they consider the Sheriff to be "one of the good ones." The family holds weekly "Hate White" rallies which include activities such as burning skis ("tools of their wicked recreational activities") and other symbols of the white man's power such as "metal-y money" (coins).

Spoilers end here.

Behind-the-Scenes Controversy

The show was announced in late 2003 with the first episode promoted extensively to air November 7, 2004, but Adult Swim aired the pilot of Perfect Hair Forever in its place. Perfect Hair Forever was followed by a panel discussion of the episode; this panel included Space Ghost, Meatwad from Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Early Cuyler, and Sharko from Sealab 2021. This prompted many fans of AdultSwim to believe Squidbillies to be nothing more than an elaborate hoax, but a pilot for the show was in the works, and segments of it aired on April 1, 2005.

The nearly year-long delay was the result of multiple problems that occurred between the shows commission and its scheduled debut. A very early pilot episode was scrapped in early 2004 and more writers (up to 6) were brought on board to help flesh out characters and comedy direction for the series. The writers were eventually whittled back down to two along with a few of the early characters for the show being cut (one being Rusty's older brother who was discharged from the Army). During this time the series original 20 episode order was reduced to 6 due to the aforementioned production problems and time constraints. Many began to wonder if there was ever going to be a series, including those residing in the offices of Williams Street.

Finally without much fanfare or promotion the final pilot aired on October 16, 2005, after appearing on a very early version of the Adult Swim Fix two days earlier.

Music

  • The original four line opening theme song is performed by Outlaw country artist Billy Joe Shaver. It was recorded in Austin, TX, September 2005. There are at least two additional versions, also each four lines and performed by Billy Joe Shaver. All express deep personal strife and despair.
  • During Season Two, in several of the episodes, the opening sequence is constantly changed, or adding on a little, as is the case with other Adult Swim shows such as Home Movies.
  • Original music in the show is composed and played by David Lee Powell.

Georgia References

The Trucker Hats of Early Cuyler

-This is a brief list of the lines/images that are found on Early Cuyler's trucker hats.

  • "Free Hat Limit 1"
  • "World's Greatest Illegitimate Daddy"
  • "May I Help You, My Child?" (as seen on a combination pope/trucker hat, when Early still had his job at Mattress Christ)
  • "Breathe If You're Horny"
  • "Here's The Beef"
  • "I Love Cock Fighting" (with the word "Fighting" appearing much smaller than the other three) {Seen in School Days, Fool Days} .
  • "Groom"
  • "Remember 9-111 - Irregular"
  • "Goal Bandit"
  • "2005 Prom King" {Seen in School Days, Fool Days}
  • "Booty Hunter"
  • "David Allan CEO Live In Macon" (worn when Earley became CEO of Dan Halen Industries, a reference to outlaw country singer/songwriter David Allan Coe )
  • "GLUG" (the name of a blindness-inducing alcohol created by Early and brewed by Dan Halen)
  • A squid drawn in the shape of the Pontiac Firebird logo
  • A stylized American Flag with a bald eagle's head superimposed. (Seen in Chalky Trouble.)
  • Four aces drawn such that the ace of diamonds is on top and the rest (clubs, hearts, then spades) are fanned behind it.
  • A buck (male deer) with scribbles, used as a résumé to obtain employment at Dan Halen Sheet-rock Inc. The hat said "Can skin a buck, run a trout–line, and all my rowdy friends are coming over tonight," according to Dan Halen, the character in charge of the interview. These are references to the Hank Williams Jr. songs "Country Boy Can Survive," and "All My Rowdy Friends Are Coming Over Tonight."
  • "Support Our Troops" (American flag design with a yellow ribbon). After he is struck by lightning it reads "Support Our oops."
  • "Sonny LIED!!!" (Written on a Confederate battle flag designed hat). This is the motto of the opponents of Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue who won his office in part due to his promise to have a referendum on whether to return the Confederate Battle Flag emblem to the state flag but the option to use the "St. Andrews Cross" was not given, he adopted a less controversial design based on the more obscure first national flag of the Confederacy.
  • "Tricky Two" (Written on a gold hat underneath a hand making the peace sign)
  • "God's Good Buddy" (Written underneath a semi truck with a cross on it driving out of the heavens.) Seen during a Squidbillies bump and Giant Foam Dickhat Trouble.
  • "Swayze Crazy" (Written in red lettering on a pink hat with Patrick Swayze flexing right arm.) Seen on an Adult Swim website ad.
  • "John Beer" (A play on John Deere, with the logo shown as a silhouette of a drunken anthropomorphic deer sprawled out among beer cans).
  • A bill connected to a donkey with a very obscene protrusion (censored) that offends everyone including Squid Jesus.
  • "I ANT WON JAK A LOT FROM THE SQUATTERY THLE LOTTERYS SHOULD BE THE JACK SQUATTERY CAUSE I AYNT JACK SQUATTING A LOT Y THEY SHOULD RENAME THE LOTTERY TO THE JACK SQUATTERY CAUSE THAT'S ALL I EVER WIN IN IT!!!!!", written in pen by Early and presented to Dan Halen as an idea for a novelty hat.
  • "Damn I'm Good"
  • "Do It To It" (catchphrase of Plumber Bubba in the Bubba Trubba episode)
  • "Hooked On Jesus" (Jesus being in the fish symbol on a fishing hook)
  • "Hooked on Darwin" (Darwin being in the fish symbol with little legs on a fishing hook)
  • "I'm Going Nucking Futs"
  • Two fish symbols, one eating the other. The larger fish has the word "Truth" in it, while the smaller fish that is being eaten has the letters "Dar" visible from the "Hooked on Darwin" hat
  • A big beast with the word "Science" in it devouring a smaller beast with the letters "ith" from Faith visible
  • A big beast with the word "Science" in it being slayed by an arrow coming from the word "Faith"
  • A spaceship with the word "China" in it abducting the word "Faith"
  • Two wolves, one howling and the other just a close-up. The wolves are in a forest at nighttime with a American flag waving behind the howling wolf.
  • "I love Daddy", as part of a computer-printout-transfer picture of Rusty (the style popular in the 1980's)
  • "Gynaecologist Saturday Nights Only" (never actually seen, but stated to be owned by Early in "Terminous Trouble" during his trial)
  • "Best Nightmare" (Seen in a picture drawn by Thom Foolery on the WebCam)

Trivia

  • In Episode 9, "Double Truckin' the Tricky Two" Jesus & Satan appear as squids.
  • In "Government Brain Voodoo Trouble", when Early describes the sheriff crying he references a tourist attraction located in Chattanooga, Tennessee called Ruby Falls.
  • In "Double Truckin' the Tricky Two" Dan Halen's reading from The Lottery are the verbatim lines of Shirley Jackson.
  • Early's "Weekend Hat" was won by Granny showing her Tee-Ta's down on PC Beach in 1992.
  • Terminus was an early name for the City of Atlanta.
  • In episode 6, "Office Politics Trouble" Crystal is listening to a cassette tape of the Georgia Phonebook, the first number read starts with 678 which is an actual area code in the state of Georgia.
  • The transition of voice actors for the Sheriff (Charles Napier to Bobby Ellerbee) was handled through a subplot where the Sheriff meets an identical doppelganger. The doppelganger knocks him out in "Double Truckin' the Tricky Two" and in "Bubba Trubba" the Sheriff tries to escape but is quickly subdued once again by his double, who drags him away and threatens to club his brains out. This fit well into an earlier subplot which implied an alien race breeding an army of Sheriffs on Earth.
  • The episode "Asses to Ashes, Sluts to Dust" revealed that Granny's true ancestry to Early is unknown. Several characters uncertainly call her Early's "ma" and/or "grandma". The episode also reveals that the squid seen in an earlier episode is likely Early's brother, which would mean Granny is indeed Early's mother.
  • In Episode 6, Early's resume states (as dictated by Dan Halen), "I can skin a buck and run a trout line and all my rowdy friends are coming over tonight," a combination of lyrics from two Hank Williams Jr. songs. However the actual lyrics to A Country Boy Can Survive are, "I can skin a buck and run a TROT line."
  • Though uncredited in the show, Marji Fortin and Lars Edwards have both acted as Supervising Animators on Season 2 of the show.

Episodes

Main article: List of Squidbillies episodes


External links

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