Greg the Bunny
We're Just Like You!
Greg The Bunny was a Sitcom set in a world where humans and puppets coexist as sentient races and interact freely. Greg the Bunny is the starring puppet of a Alternate Company Equivalent to Sesame Street; the show focused on back-stage shenanigans. In this case, Greg and the others in the cast are much less innocent offstage than on, contrasting with both The Muppet Show and other puppet shows fully on the cynical end of the Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism. (The series was something like Who Framed Roger Rabbit?.)
Extra drama was created because Greg is a relative newcomer to the cast - he replaced another rabbit because he was much cuter.
Despite the relative cynicism, this show did have heartwarming moments and good spoofs thereof.
This show was greatly respected by critics, but didn't get enough of an audience. It did one season on FOX and two on the Independent Film Channel...
Greg and the crew return in the new MTV show Warren The Ape.
- Adult Child: Dottie's public persona; Her actual personality bounces between this and an average girl frustrated by Typecasting due to uneven characterization.
- Affectionate Parody: Made up almost the entirety of the IFC series.
- Alternate Company Equivalent
- Buried Alive: Greg gets nightmares about Rochester burning him alive in his on-set rabbit hole after replacing him.
- Captain Ersatz: Several, the most obvious being Count Blah, a parody of the Count from Sesame Street (whom Blah accuses of stealing his act and his chance to be a regular on Sesame Street).
- In the first episode Alison lampshades Greg's parallel role on Sweetknuckle Junction to Elmo's on Sesame Street, hoping to garner similar appeal when hiring him.
- Chekhov's Gun: Sammy Davis Jr.'s eyeballs in "The Jewel Heist."
- Dirty Old Man: Count Blah.
- The Ditz: Tardy the Turtle. So much so that you can say Tardy the Turtle's non sequiturs in Ralph Wiggum's voice and it wouldn't seem out of character.
- Tardy's also an Ensemble Darkhorse.
- Engineered Public Confession
- Executive Meddling: In-Universe
- Out of universe also. The network insisted on toning down the show's edgier aspects, making it much more "sitcommy" than the creators wanted.
- Fake Nationality: Count Blah accuses Count von Count of this//
Count Blah: He's not even Romanian, he's freaking Italian, and he knows it, blah!
- Fantastic Racism: Greg the Bunny mentions in the first episode that puppets ("Fabricated-Americans") have trouble finding work and dating outside of their species because of their appearance. In fact, a lot of episodes (particularly "Sock Like Me" and "Greg Gets Puppish" on the FOX series) hammer this point home.
- Fantastic Slur: "Sock" has the same racially offensive weight as, say, the n-word for black people. Greg at one point explicitly compares his usage of it to Richard Pryor's usage of the n-word.
- Friendly Neighborhood Vampire: Count Blah
- Furry Confusion
- Heterosexual Life Partners: Greg and Jimmy
- Human-Focused Adaptation: The FOX series, thanks to Executive Meddling.
- Jerkass: Warren
- Loud of War: This is how Greg convinced Jimmy to help him get the job at Sweet Knuckle Junction.
- Mooning: Count Blah in a clip shown as part of the opening credits.
- Nice Character, Mean Actor: Both Junction Jack and Warren have traits of this, being friendly and jovial on-screen but being far less so off-screen.
- Nice Guy: Greg, while not as sweet and innocent as his Sweetknuckle Junction on-screen persona, is still the nicest, least cynical person on the show, bordering on Wide-Eyed Idealist at times.
- Noodle Incident: Several with Greg and Jimmy. Frequent references and flashbacks only giving snippets of what might have happened to their lives before and even during the show.
Jimmy: You're the king of phases, Greg. Remember that time you tried Bhuddism?
Greg: I achieved enlightenment, didn't I?
Jimmy: Yeah. And then you traded it. For a clarinet.
- On the episode featuring Guest Star Corey Feldman, upon discovering himself chased by cops in Warren's car, he panics and states "I cannot be caught with puppet porn again!"
- Oh Crap: The look on Warren's face when he bends over and hears the distinct sound of tearing.
- Operation: Jealousy: Jimmy attempts this by flirting with Susan (while female, similar in build and voice to Sweetums from the Muppets) to hopefully get Alison's attention. It doesn't work quite like he expected.
- Paintball Episode: "The Jewel Heist"
- Paste Eater: Tardy the Turtle has eaten everything from crayons, to drumsticks (the musical kind), to paintballs.
Tardy: "The green ones make me horny!"
- Said quote is a Shout-Out to an Urban Legend about green M&Ms.
- Really Gets Around: Dottie certainly has this reputation, though it's probably exaggerated.
- Real Men Wear Pink: on the episode, "Surprise!" Junction Jack comes to his own surprise party dressed as a woman after a fellow member of his gun club recommends cross-dressing to him as a way to be a better gunman.
- The Roast: At Rochester's funeral.
- Shout-Out: By the truckload, but most notable is the Reservoir Dogs bit in "The Singing Mailman.
- Show Within a Show: Sweet Knuckle Junction. We don't see much of it, but we're not missing much; it's just a saccharine kiddie show.
- Small Name, Big Ego: Warren De Montague.
- Smelly Skunk: In the episode "Father & Son Reunion", Blah gets sprayed by a puppet skunk.
- Verbal Tic: Count Blah, blah.
- Tardy makes a squeaking sound at the end of his sentences.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: Jimmy shows shades of this in his more vulnerable moments.