Almost Naked Animals

Small-time illustrator Noah Z. Jones happened upon a minor miracle of having two animated series made within a small timeframe of five years with his name attached as creator for both. Out of these curious events came Fish Hooks, which was picked up by Disney, and this series, loosely based upon a concept of his called Almost Naked Animals.

The show centers on a hotel called the Banana Cabana populated by almost naked animals — furless animals wearing only underwear. The cabana is managed by a dog named Howie and his ragtag bunch of misfit friends as the expository theme song explains. Minor villainy comes up through Howie's sister Poodle who owns another competing (and much swankier) hotel named the Chateau Chattoo.

Almost Naked Animals debuted on YTV on January 7, 2011, and premiered later on Cartoon Network in the United States on June 13, 2011.

Not to be confused with the trope Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal

Tropes used in Almost Naked Animals include:

• Accessory-Wearing Cartoon Animal: Generally, underwear.
• The Ace: Howie to his sister's eyes.
• Appease the Volcano God: Fiddler crabs try to do this to Octo in "S.S. Banana Cabana".
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Octo's worst fears are the dark, heights and Brussels sprouts.
  • In another episode, he mentions fears of Earth spinning off its axis, the sun falling out of the sky and getting stuck in a rocking chair.
• Art Shift: The ridiculously highly detailed Episode Title Cards, depicting a random moment from the episode.
• Bad Liar: Howie always twitches when he lies.
• Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: Octo never saw Howie check in a guest, or clean anything, or clean a guest who was checking in.
• Bring My Brown Pants: Octo inks himself when he's scared.
• Butt Monkey: Octo.
• Casting Gag:
  • This is not the first time that Julie Lemieux has voiced a male bat.
  • David Berni (Duck's VA) had appeared in Pearlie, where a duck plays the role of The Ditz (but Berni didn't voice him).
• Character Blog: Narwhal and Duck both have Twitter accounts. Howie, Narwhal, Bunny and Duck all have Facebook pages as well.
• Chef of Iron: Master Ferret.
• The Chew Toy: Batty.
  • Octo also has a fair amount of abuse thrown his way.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Duck and Howie.
• Cutaway Gag: "Or maybe we just need to stop leaving the remote in such weird places!" Cut to Howie taking the remote from the edge of a volcano.
• The Ditz: Duck. When Howie says that Duck is his hero, Duck thinks it means he's going to be made into a hero sandwich.
  • "It tickles when you bite!"
• A Dog Named "Dog": Everyone but, oddly enough, Howie the dog.
• Dogged Nice Guy: Octo and Sloth.
• Everything's Squishier with Cephalopods: Octo.
• Exposed Animal Bellybutton
• Fan Boy: Howie is a major Dirk Danger fanboy.
• Feather Fingers: Duck's wings and Narwhal's fins.
  • Tailfin Walking: Narwhal.
• Fur Is Clothing: Almost taken to its literal extreme; even animals who lack fur wear some form of underwear.
• Gonk: Duck.
• Goofy Print Underwear: Pretty much everyone wears it.
• Gross-Out Show: With that name and character designs, what do you expect?
• Here We Go Again: In "S.S. Banana Cabana", Howie installs new superpowered toilets that set the hotel afloat and crash it on an island. By the time they get the hotel back in place, he installs new showerheads that do the same thing.
  • Same with "Jellyhead". After a Jerkass jellyfish gets stuck to Octo, it tries to control him. By the time he gets the jellyfish off, a starfish has latched itself to him.
• Hulk Speak: Piggy is somewhere between this and some weird mashup of a Russian/French accent, most often in the form of "Piggy [infinitive verb] [noun]."
  • More easily defined as a fragmented foriegn accent.
• Idiot Hero: Howie is excitable, impulsive and not that bright, but he's still the leader.
• Imaginary Friend: Howie gets hit on the head and reunites with a childhood imaginary friend named Platymoose.
• It's All About Me: Narwhal, particularly in the episode when he laments having lost his number-one fan.
• Jerkass: The jellyfish in "Jellyhead" who takes control of Octo's life.
• Keet: Howie.
• Lovable Coward: Octo has a lot of fears.
• Man Child: Howie, what with his short attention span, hyperactive movements, obliviousness to Sloth's love, and love of things usually associated with younger people (one source even describes him as being like an 11-year-old in an arcade).
• Mind Over Matter: Happens in the episode of that same name. Howie gets a remote stuck to his head, and gains telekinetic powers after it gets wet in an attempt to remove it.
• Mix-and-Match Critters: Howie's imaginary friend is a platymoose.
• The Nicknamer: Piggy has nicknames for everyone, including "dog thing" for Howie.
• Non-Mammalian Hair: Also taken to its extreme. Species that wouldn't normally have hair, or at least not a full coat of it, still have the "shaved" appearance.
• Non-Mammal Mammaries: A rare male variant, as Duck has visible nipples.
• Nose Nuggets: Howie's head-sized booger at the end of "Ear Wax Elf".
• Paste Eater: Duck in "Gone Banana".
• Retcon: The old website shows Bare and Piggy, two very similar characters who were apparently merged into Piggy. Also, Octo was originally Octopus.
• Safety Worst: "Better Safe and Sorry" has Octo trying way too hard to install safety measures for the rest of the Cabana crew.
• Seldom-Seen Species: A Sloth and a Narwhal. The original website shows several more, including a dugong and anteater (who often appear as background characters).
• Shown Their Work: Background characters include a furless tiger with faint stripes imprinted into his skin and a furless bear with black skin and whitish hair strands all over his body.
• Sibling Rivalry: Howie/Poodle. She manages a rival hotel and constantly tries to get Howie to make a fool of himself or go out of business so their father will give ownership to her. Howie, however, is completely oblivious to her antics.
• Space Whale Aesop: Eat your vegetables or they'll eat you!
• Spit Take: Happens with Dirk Danger when drinking "creative juices" made by Howie from Dirk's original costume.
• Stealth Pun: In the puking episode, we learn that Howie has puked on everyone in town a dozen of dozen times. What's a dozen of dozens called? A gross.
• Super Zeroes: Howie meets one with a toaster on his head, and another with toothbrushes on his hands. They use toast and toothbrushes/toothpaste, respectively, to solve problems.
• Tan Lines: Howie. And only Howie.
• Thematic Theme Tune: A few lines about the Cabana.
• Theme Tune Cameo: Howie whistles it in "Imaginary Fiend".
• Too Dumb to Live: Howie who is a hyperactive idiot and Duck, a brain-dead idiot who is definitely dumber than Howie.
• Toothy Bird: Duck.
• Tsundere: Bunny's biography says that she is this, but she seems to be on the tsuntsun side. This becomes a plot element in one episode, where Howie bets that, if Bunny can go a day without being angry, she won't have to dress as the cabana's mascot.
• Unrequited Love: Sloth loves Howie, but he seems oblivious.
• Who Is Driving?: Happens to a speedboat in the imaginary friend episode.
• Widget Series: Seeing as the whole concept was borne of little more than shaved animals in funny underwear, it's hard to consider it anything else.
• World of Funny Animals: And even outside the Cabana, they're almost naked.