Man's Best Friend (Ren & Stimpy)

"Man's Best Friend" is an episode of Nickelodeon's The Ren & Stimpy Show that was produced for the 2nd season of the show, but it never aired in the original run of the series. It was aired later on Spike TV as the first episode of Ren & Stimpy "Adult Party Cartoon". In this episode, Ren and Stimpy are adopted by George Liquor, who wants to make them champions.

The episode was indeed the most controversial episode of the series; it was infamous for the violent scene where Ren beats George with an oar. In order to make the show "family-oriented", Nickelodeon—who didn't like the episode or the scene—fired series creator John Kricfalusi and his production company Spümcø.

Plot

Ren and Stimpy are adopted as pets by George Liquor. George introduces them to their new home and begins to train them. After a series of high-strung back-and-forth interactions, George dons a padded suit, and urges Ren and Stimpy to attack him. Stimpy refuses because George is his "kind and beloved master", but Ren, who is fed up with their treatment by George Liquor, picks up an oar and savagely beats him. George praises Ren and produces cigar-shaped treats for all three of them. The episode ends with the three of them dancing with the cigar-shaped treats clamped between their teeth.

Production and controversy

Produced from the show's second season, the story for the episode was by Vincent Waller and series creator John Kricfalusi who also served as the episode's director and was scheduled to air on Nickelodeon in 1992, but the channel refused to air it due to one violent scene (Ren beats up George with an oar), as well as references to tobacco. Following the episode's ban, Nickelodeon fired John Kricfalusi and the rest of Spümcø in order to make the show appropriate for younger viewers.^[1] Following this also, Games Animation handled the show starting with its third season, with Billy West, Stimpy's voice actor, replacing Kricfalusi's role as the voice of Ren.

However, Kricfalusi was hired for Viacom years later, creating the short-lived Ren & Stimpy "Adult Party Cartoon" for the Spike TV network as part of its animation block, releasing the banned episode on the channel.

The episode was released on Ren & Stimpy's first and second season boxset, as a bonus feature, and was later released for The Lost Episodes DVD.

References