The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy[b] is an American animated television series created by Maxwell Atoms for Cartoon Network. Set in the fictitious town of Endsville, the series follows the titular two children named Billy and Mandy who, after winning a limbo game to save Billy's pet hamster, gain the mighty Grim Reaper as their "best friend forever". Grim, who is reluctant to serve the two children, has access to supernatural items, spells, and other abilities that often lead Billy and Mandy to interact with otherworldly environments, characters, or situations.
The series' main characters. From left to right: Billy, Mandy, and Grim.
The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy takes place in the fictitious town of Endsville and is known for its grimmer and unhinged surreal atmosphere. The series centers around the exploits of Billy (Richard Steven Horvitz), a dimwitted happy-go-lucky boy; his friend Mandy (Grey DeLisle), a cynical cold-hearted girl; and their best-friend-by-obligation Grim (Greg Eagles), a begrudging Jamaican-accented Reaper. After Billy and Mandy cheated at a limbo match against Grim (in retaliation for putting the limbo rod too low for them to go under), he is enslaved in an unwanted permanent friendship with the children.[1] Grim is miserable in the first days of his servitude, at times taking pleasure at the fantasy of killing them, but gradually adapts to the new life and even grows to care for Billy and Mandy, if only somewhat. Despite this, he desires to break free from his servitude.
Billy and Mandy use Grim's supernatural abilities and powers to venture into supernatural locations or environments, such as the Underworld, or the Netherworld, inhabited by an assortment of grotesque monstrous beasts. The duo also use Grim's enormously strong supernatural abilities or ties with a number of beastly characters to achieve goals or desires for themselves, often with twisted results. Famed fictional monsters including Dracula, the Wolfman and the bogeyman are also comically depicted in the series.
Supporting characters include Irwin (Vanessa Marshall), Billy's nerdy best friend who has a crush on Mandy; Harold (Richard Steven Horvitz), Billy's initially apathetic father who shares his son's stupidity in later episodes; Gladys (Jennifer Hale), Billy's loving yet mentally unstable mother; Mindy (Rachael MacFarlane), the snobby, stuck-up, and spoiled queen bee of Billy and Mandy's school; Sperg (Greg Eagles), the local bully who has a sensitive side; Hoss Delgado (Diedrich Bader), an overly-intense "spectral exterminator" who hunts supernatural creatures; Nergal (David Warner/Martin Jarvis), a friendship-seeking demon who later marries Billy's aunt and bears a son, Nergal Jr. (Debi Derryberry); General Skarr (Armin Shimerman), Billy's ill-tempered next door neighbor who originated in the Evil Con Carne animated series; Eris (Rachael MacFarlane) the Goddess of Chaos who causes trouble for her own amusement; and Jeff (Maxwell Atoms), a giant spider constantly trying to win the approval of the arachnophobic Billy, whom he sees as his father.
The series lacks continuity for the most part, as many episodes end with characters killed, exiled, or stuck in a situation. Characters sometimes display awareness of some events from previous episodes, but there are no clear character arcs or coherent plot lines tying the show together.
The genesis of Billy and Mandy occurred in 1995, when Maxwell Atoms, then a junior at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, made a two-minute short film for his thesis project. Titled Billy and Mandy in: The Trepanation of the Skull and You, the film focuses on Mandy explaining trepanning to Billy in an advertising manner before he agrees to do it and is subsequently rendered unconscious. It was not shown publicly until 2016 at the first TromAnimation Film Festival.[2] After the screening, Atoms uploaded the film to his YouTube channel, albeit in a deteriorating state after years of storage.
While working on the first season of Cow and Chicken, Atoms was approached by Hanna-Barbera executives for ideas for new short films. Among the ideas he presented to Hanna-Barbera was "Milkman", centering on an anthropomorphic, superhero milk carton who saves the missing children depicted on his back. Though the idea was rejected, executives were interested in Billy and Mandy, two characters that were to be featured in the project.[3] Atoms was prompted to devise a series centering on the two children. Feeling that the characters Billy and Mandy would not be enough to carry a show, he began devising a third character to round out the main cast. He was always fascinated by the idea of a little girl befriending the Devil or the Grim Reaper, but eventually settled on the latter, as Cartoon Network did not approve of depictions of the devil after Cow and Chicken. Atoms pitched the Billy & Mandy concept to Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon, to which Cartoon Network approved the production of a short film 6 months later (which would become the short/pilot "Meet the Reaper").[3]
The show was put into full production after the result of a viewer poll event by way of telephone and the Internet called Cartoon Network's Big Pick which was held from June 16 to August 25, 2000.[4][5] The three final choices were The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy, Whatever Happened to... Robot Jones?, and Longhair and Doubledome.[4] Out of the three, Billy & Mandy attained the most votes with 57%; Robot Jones came in second place at 23% while Longhair and Doubledome received 20% of the vote.[4]
Originally part of Grim & Evil, Billy & Mandy served as the main show. In each episode, an Evil Con Carne short was put between two Grim shorts.[5] An original Evil Con Carne short was produced in 2000 after Meet the Reaper, but Cartoon Network wanted to combine the series, to have a "B cartoon" as a middle segment.[3] The series premiered on August 24, 2001, during the Cartoon Cartoon Fridays Big Pick Weekend.
Another 13 half-hour episode order was produced for Grim & Evil. On June 13, 2003, the network separated the two segments and gave each their own half-hour program.[5] The split came as a result of Cartoon Network wanting to move away from three 7-minute segments and focus on two 11-minute segments instead.[3] After both series aired their respective new seasons, the network gave Atoms a decision to continue one series and drop the other from production. Atoms opted to continue Billy & Mandy and accepted the network's decision, as he considered running both shows stressful.[3]
Evil Con Carne characters occasionally appear on The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy. General Skarr was introduced as a recurring character in season 2, where he became Billy's new next-door neighbor.[6] Another episode shows Ghastly, Hector, Boskov, and Stomach restarting their evil organization and convincing Skarr to rejoin them.[7]
Atoms, who had been diagnosed with Asperger syndrome in adulthood, stated that the series' three main characters harken to the autism spectrum. He compared Mandy to "the cold, rational way [he] learned to view the world in order to survive", Billy to "the fun and joyous inner-world where [he] likes to spend [his] time" and Grim as "the moral mediator between the two."[8]
On March 20, 2022, Craig McCracken revealed that years ago Cartoon Network had plans for a spinoff series titled Cheeseburger featuring Fred Fredburger and Cheese from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, but the idea never gained traction.[9]
The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy aired in reruns on Checkered Past from 2023 to 2025.
Grim, Billy, and Mandy appeared in the Jellystone! special Crisis on Infinite Mirths, with Eagles,[10] Horvitz and DeLisle all reprising their roles.
Reception
Common Sense Media gave the show a 3/5 star rating and stated that it has "goofy punchlines and obscure cultural references" and recommends the viewer age be at least 9 years old.[11]Entertainment Weekly ranked The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy number nine on its list of "10 Best Cartoon Network Shows" in 2012.[12]
Awards and nominations
The series has won one Annie Award and two Emmy Awards and has been nominated nine times for various awards.
Billy & Mandy's Big Boogey Adventure (2007)[18] sees Grim stripped of his powers by the underworld, and Billy, Mandy, Grim, and Irwin must race the Boogey Man and his crew of monster pirates to capture a powerful artefact capable of making whoever wields it into the scariest being alive.
Billy & Mandy: Wrath of the Spider Queen (2007) When Grim's past comes back to haunt him, Billy and Mandy must join forces with their greatest enemies Jeff the Spider and Mindy respectively, to save the day from evil spiders trying to take over the whole world. And to do that, Billy must conquer his fear of spiders
Underfist: Halloween Bash (2008) focuses on Irwin, Jeff, Hoss, Skarr, and Fred inadvertently coming together to defeat an invasion of chocolate bar monsters, led by an evil marshmallow bunny, on Halloween night.[19]
The first season was first released on DVD by Warner Home Video on September 18, 2007. Collection 2 released February 11, 2010, in Australia and New Zealand and contains the next 13 episodes in the series.
The entire series is available on iTunes and Amazon Prime in six volumes, with the exceptions of Billy & Mandy Save Christmas, Billy & Mandy's Big Boogey Adventure, and Underfist: Halloween Bash.
On January 1, 2021, The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy was added to HBO Max in United States.[27]
↑ Atoms, Maxwell (September 21, 2021). "Sparagmos Industries". Tumblr. Archived from the original on April 9, 2024. Retrieved March 24, 2022. So yeah. Mandy's probably on the spectrum. As are Billy & Grim. Mandy is the cold, rational way I learned to view the world in order to survive. Billy is the fun and joyous inner-world where I like to spend my time. And Grim is the moral mediator between the two. It's really Id, Ego, and Superego to some degree. I haven't thought about that in a long time, but that was purposeful.
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