The Great Outdoors is the 15th episode of the second season of The Ren & Stimpy Show that aired on the Nickelodeon network on 27 March 1993.

Plot

Ren and Stimpy go camping in the woods. The two go skinny-dipping at night, only to joined by Old Man Hunger and his mother, the Fat Lady. Ren tries to start a campfire, but only burns himself instead. Ren is drained dry by mosquitos. Ren contacts Beaver Fever from drinking dirty water, which causes to grow a beaver tail which he uses to attack Stimpy with.

Cast

• Ren-voice of Billy West
• Stimpy-voice of Billy West
• Old Man Hunger-voice of Billy West
• Fat Lady-voice of Billy West

Production

The episode was started by the Spümcø studio in 1992. ^[1] The production was delayed, and the lay-out stage was done at the Rough Draft Korea studio in Seoul instead of at the Spümcø studio was usual as a cost-saving measure. ^[1] Vincent Waller was in South Korea supervising the lay-out stage for The Great Outdoors when the Spümcø studio when learned on 21 September 1992 that Spümcø studio had lost the contract for The Ren & Stimpy Show, and that someone else would be finishing The Great Outdoors. ^[1] Ken Bruce of the Games Animation studio was sent out to replace Waller.. ^[2]

Reception

The episode was met with a very negative reception in 1993 with many critics condemning Billy West's voice acting as Ren while the general feeling being that John Kricfalusi played Ren much better. ^[3] The American journalist Thad Komorowski wrote that The Great Outdoors was a weak episode with no real plot, and that the episode "lacked finesse" as the artists at Games Animation were clearly not interested in the story. ^[4]

Books

• Dobbs, G. Michael (2015). Escape – How Animation Broke into the Mainstream in the 1990s. Orlando: BearManor Media. ISBN  1593931107.
• Komorowski, Thad (2017). Sick Little Monkeys: The Unauthorized Ren & Stimpy Story. Albany, Georgia: BearManor Media. ISBN  978-1629331836.

References