Harvey Street Kids, or Harvey Girls Forever!, or whatever Netflix and DreamWorks wants to call it isn't a bad show, its pretty much the best thing done with Harvey Comics characters in quite a long time actually(Not really the most glowing of endorsements sure but yes it is), however it never really becomes anything more than 'what you see, what you get' with pretty predictable jokes you can see coming from a mile away. The modernizations of classic characters like Audrey, Dot, and Lotta are fine but lack the charm of their original counterparts.
The show has its merits, but it often comes across as basically a more consumer friendly version of Cartoon Network's 'Ed, Edd, 'n' Eddy' but without the over-the-top animation and creativity; the animation is pretty basic and flat, the jokes are pretty safe and pretty forgettable for the most part. This series could be great and liked as much as your My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic if DreamWorks and Netflix make the following adjustments to the production,
- Let go of some people, i.e. Brendan Hay; one look at his social media illustrates that he is simply not the best choice to be involved in such a program based on his history of unprofessional remarks and strongly divisive political and religious views. Look to bring in people like Sherri Stoner, DeAnna Oliver, Paul Rugg, Randy Rogel, and Tom Ruegger from Animaniacs, Freakazoid!, and Tiny Toon: Adventures on the writing staff. Stoner and Oliver did great with Casper, indeed the animated spin-off of the 1995 feature film that they co-wrote has held up very well and is still funny to this day.
- Bring in more experienced animation directors like a Dan Riba and increase the budget by a little to bring in a more dynamic animation quality.
- Expand upon the world more, don't keep the characters stuck in a single town and bring in more characters from Harvey Comics lore.
- Be less predictable with the humor and move at a quicker pace story wise.
- Be more timeless than 'in the present', cut down on the pop culture references just a bit and settle down on the modern tech usage.
There you go, you're welcome.
