31st Anniversary of Rocko's Modern Life by AndoAnimalia on DeviantArt (original) (raw)
Rocko's Modern Life! Rocko's Modern Life.
31 years ago, one of Nickelodeon's timeless cartoons premiered on TV! It centers on the surreal, day-to-day life of a Rocko (Carlos Alazraqui), an immigrant wallaby from Australia (wallabies ARE from Aussie obviously). He lives in the fictional town of O-Town with his pet dog, Spunky. Despite living an ordinary life in the 90's, Rocko encounters various dilemmas and situations regarding otherwise mundane aspects of life. His best friends are Heffer Wolfe (Tomy Kenny), a fat, gluttonous, and enthusiastic cow, er I mean, steer, and Filburt (Doug Lawrence), a neurotic turtle who often feels awkward or disturbed. Living next door to Rocko is a middle-aged couple, Ed Bighead (Charlie Adler), a cynical and cantankerous toad who despises Rocko, and his compassionate and more friendly wife Bev Bighead (Adler). All of the characters in Rocko's Modern Life are anthropomorphic animals of varying species, the vast majority of whom are mentally unstable. Creator Joe Murray matched personalities of his characters to the various animals in the series to form a social caricature. Other characters include Dr. Paula Hutchison Shellbach, or Hutch, a female cat who works multiple medical jobs, has a hook for a hand, and is Filburt's wife; Rachel (formerly Ralph) Bighead, cartoon creator of the popular show, "The Fatheads"; Chuck and Leon Chameleon, two Scandinavian chameleon brothers who run odd jobs with exclusive admissions; Really Really Big Man, the town's local superhero; Heffer's Wolf family; Flecko, an annoying fly who usually irritates Rocko; Mr. Smitty, Rocko's mean-natured toad boss at Kind of a Lot o' Comics (almost as bad as Ed Bighead); Mr. Dupette, the CEO of Conglom-O, O-Town's megacorporation, and Ed's boss, and many more.
Rocko's Modern Life is one of my top favorite Nickelodeon cartoons; I also have its complete DVD set. This fast-paced, squash-and-stretch cartoon with its wild visual humor, eye-popping sight gags and wacky wit was always a great watch since my family and I got cable. Not to mention, Stephen Hillenburg - the creator of SpongeBob SquarePants - was involved in this great series. Several years after getting cable and becoming a fan of Rocko's Modern Life, Joe Murray made Camp Lazlo for Cartoon Network, and even before watching that show, I already fell in love with it due to its similarities with its Nickelodeon predecessor. Rocko's Modern Life will always be one of the best Nicktoons, along with SpongeBob, CatDog, and The Angry Beavers. I'm glad that it got a special digitally released on Netflix, Rocko's Modern Life: Static Cling. This incredible cartoon will always live on in my heart.
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My first Rocko's Modern life fanart ever! I know I'm actually a day late (it premiered on September 18th, 1993), but I was busy with a different project, and I was unsure about making it. But then, I decided that since I already made anniversary projects for CatDog and Angry Beavers, I chose to finally make the pic, even though it would be pretty close.
When working on Rocko's vector, I traced from screenshots from the last seasons for the updated designs. It wasn't a simple walk in the park, but at least it wasn't impossible. I was originally going to have him wave, but I felt like this was good enough. The background is from the opening. Tracing it was time consuming, but it turned out nicely. I traced the title just to arrange it differently for this pic. I'm really glad that @ButlermationsArt made Rocko's Modern Life fonts. They're really right on the nose.
And that's all. Now to be honest, I don't really know if I'm going to make more Rocko fanart in the near future, but I'll think about it. Until then, here's to everybody's favorite wallaby from O-Town!
Rocko's Modern Life created by Joe Murray and owned by Nickelodeon
Rocko's vector by me
Background by me
Font by
Happy 31st Anniversary, Rocko! Thanks for 31 years of laughs and reminding us that "garbage day is a very dangerous day."