Father of the Pride | The Strangest Animated Show of the 2000's? 

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On the Double Toasted podcast, the host Korey Coleman, who was an animator in the 90s - 2000s, told a story when around the time this show came out. His friend said he was working on a DreamWorks show with John Goodman and Carl Reiner. Korey said “Cool! What’s it about?” His friend began describing it as “what happens to Siegfried and Roy’s lions when the show stops and they have normal lives?” Korey said his friend stopped mid sentence and said “Now that I say it, this is the dumbest idea ever.”

this is the type of show that randomly pops into my head every so often. i'm like "yeah they made an animated show about a family of lions living in Vegas. what was up with that?"

RIP Siegfried (1939-2021) and Roy (1944-2020), as well as Carl Reiner (1922-2020).

I recall when Father of Pride was on the air and have no memory of the lions belonging to Sigfried & Roy, which demonstrates how effective the marketing was for the show.

I have very, VERY vague memories of the episode where they kidnap Donkey's stunt double. I never forgot the "you kidnapped the wrong jackass... jackass!" line, for some reason.

It's ironic how scared NBC was about this failing so they put in a bunch of obnoxious celebrity cameos and product placements ensuring it would fail. That Donkey episode actually sounds pretty fun tho.

Father Of The Pride has some really hilarious one liners, but they were usually in the middle of 22 minutes of groan worthy dialogue

I watched this as a child under the misconception that it was animated and therefore family friendly. Most of the jokes flew completely over my head. I remember looking confusedly up at my father , wondering why he kept snickering so much.

Oh god. The Shrek/Donkey real life inclusion is like the whole St. Elsewhere situation where every other popular sitcom of that time became an accidental interconnected universe with so many implications.

Okay the line ‘we have to get to lunch before Phyllis Diller touches all the bagels!’ Got a genuine laugh from me

The irony that John Goodman sings Viva Las Vegas and then The Flintstones' sequel that didn't have his involvement comes out as Viva Rock Vegas.

This feels like the type of show Netflix would make nowadays.

I love hearing John Goodman’s voice. He’s my third favorite Blues Brother.

RIP the historic mirage hotel as well in Las Vegas, it’s closing its doors this week

Fun Fact: I used to watch this show every week. I quoted it the other day to my SO. Had no idea this video was coming! As a response to the criticism, I'm a little baffled by it. The early ads for the show (which you could not escape) kept referring to it as a new "adult comedy." They even showed stuff like one of lioness's asses getting slapped. Every ad made it very clear this eas not for kids. NBC taking out an entire slot of non-commercial air time for the pilot showed that they were willing to bank on this concept. My favorite episode was the one with Donkey, but even the DVD release wisely played this aspect down so as not to confuse consumers who thought this was a Shrek show.

Larry even looks like kinda John Goodman.

BOY did that "Non-Threatening Good Looks Matt Lauer" gag age like milk...

12:31 A couple months after this episode aired, Shrek the Third’s release got pushed to 2007 lol. Everything about this show seems cursed

My mother, brother and I watched the show as it aired. We bought the DVD when it came out. The second disk was damaged and wouldn't play a couple of the episodes properly. This show has never left my mind and I remember it regularly, despite the fact that I haven't tried to rewatch it for something like nineteen years, and wasn't even able to finish said rewatch.

I was pumped for this show. I mean it had John Freaking Goodman

I remember when this show was advertised in the DISNEY ADVENTURES magazine, a publication aimed exclusively at kids. The excuse for this was that the article was an interview of Daryl Sabara (who voiced the lion son Hunter), who was known for playing Juni Cortez in the SPY KIDS movies. In hindsight, this is baffling not just because of the adult content of the show, but because this was in the early 2000s when Dreamworks and Disney were in bitter competition.

I honestly thought I was the only one that remembered this

2004 was a strange time in my life. This passed me by and has apparently has been off my radar ever since. Now I have to go and track it down!

"What if The Simpsons, were LIONS!?" I used to watch this on the now defunct UK channel FTN.

....I completely forgot this was a thing until right this moment

The series made an eerie prediction that either Siegfried or Roy would be attacked by their tigers.

You should also look over game over, a weird short lived cg animated show also from the Early 2000's

The Zoo basically being a suburban neighborhood is so funny to me for some reason

This show has lived rent free in my head since it aired for some reason.

I strongly believe the biggest weakness was not having Sieg and Roy know that the cats are intelligent but also trying to work together to make each other's lives more comfortable. I feel like hiding their intelligence from the crowd could've been a consistent joke to always use.

I remember when this came out, the Disney/Pixar vs DreamWorks rivalry was at its peak, and considering that "Monster's Inc." was only about three years old, casting John Goodman as the lead felt like a deliberate attempt to get under Disney's skin. Yes, John Goodman has had a pretty prolific VO career, before and since, but just given the timing and the bad blood, it was like Katzenberg was flipping the Mouse the bird. Again.

The only thing I remember about this show was an exchange Siegfried and Roy had with a convenience store clerk who was reluctant to leave the store in their care: "You haven't been trained to use the register." "Is it impossible?" "...No." "That is too bad - Siegfried and Roy are masters of the impossible."

Its implied Siegfried and Roy built the houses in the zoo. It's even implied they bought the animals furniture.

Been yearning for this one since discovering your channel. Fun Fact: the show featured the duo in a convenience store just like a series of commercials at the time.

I vividly remember this show premiering when I was 8. My parents and I remember recording the first episode's airing up till the episode where Donkey appeared. I vividly remember seeing the two pregnant zebras in one episode which I didn't get the joke until 20 years now.

Heck with the Olympics just around the corner, you should totally do other shows cross promoted with them on NBC.

Wow, the only think I remember about this show is the Donkey cameo, and I heard about that in a different retrospective a few years ago

Would you ever consider covering their other animated show with their name attached? Siegfried & Roy: Masters of the Impossible which was surprisingly action packed fantasy adventure. Alas I doubt a high quality version of it exists.

The celebrity reference "jokes" feel like Gex one-liners. That's not good.

4:35 “hey that’s Criss Angels act!!”

I liked this show, honestly

Donkey told us in Father of the Pride Shrek 3 would release in 2006. Boy were we wrong.

My family never got cable and we never got streaming services, all we had were random movies and TV shows on DVD or VHS. For whatever reason we happened to have the complete Father of the Pride DVD set and was one of the only shows I ever bothered to rewatch multiple times. I have totally forgotten this show until now, I wonder if our DVDs are still in the attic. In hindsight, this was certainly not a TV show I should have been watching lmao. Idk why my parents allowed us to watch it, I wonder if the marketing fooled them. I was born in 1998 for context. Great video!

Donkey from Shrek 2 did a Crossover Episode with this show that will never not be funny to me and they play the episode like here is a real life actor so was Shrek an animated dress up as a orge or a human dressed up as Shrek because in the Universe of father of the Pride animals can't talk to humans 😂

My A.D.D has remembered the Siegfried & Roy theme 20 years later

Lol at the montage of adult humor, I remember this show getting a ton of bad reviews under the dreaded "too adult for kids, too childish for adults" umbrella

I’ve been waiting for you to discuss this for ages! Well worth the wait!

I remember being 12 back then and NBC just shoving this show down everyone's throats during its premiere. I must have seen as many ads for it as I did Shrek 2 and Shark Tale combined that year.

I never watched any promos when this came out. I saw it in a TV guide during the upcoming TV season. And they had sections that had "Must Sees" and "Deep Digging". And then there was the "Not Lasting Long" section which had Til Death AND Father of the Pride.

Now you gotta cover the cbs reality survival show, KIDNATION

I actually remember this show.

Dreamworks was also going to outsource the animation to some of their films to Imagi, starting with their elephant movie Tusker. This obviously didn't happen as Imagi closed down not too long after the failure of the 2009 Astro Boy movie. Taking Tusker, several other movies, & some adaptations of various famous Japanese anime & games with them.

I remember this show, but it felt like a fever dream, like a fake show that a character in another sitcom would work on.

Anything in which John Goodman sings is worth watching . . . even Blues Brothers 2000

One thing always tick me about cartoons of "aware animals" is they act like toy story toys, i mean unless you were dumb why you would be under control of another species in this case humans (ye ye i know it's cartoon that ain't gonna stop me)

Also fortuitous timing for this video - the Mirage (where Siegfried & Roy & these tigers apparently called home) in Vegas is closing this week!

I catched a glipse of an episode when i was in college which after a 30 minute search, found the name of the show and the episodes in full in RU-vid. One binge watch later, i looked at why they had stopped making episodes cause i wanted to see more xD But sigfried had been in that accident with his lion so there was no chance that it was coming back. Honestly it was both of the characters of sigfied and roy that made the show so funny to me 😂🤣😂

1:37 has it really been 20 years?! Of course, Joe, your timing is right too with *The Mirage* closing 🌋😭

My family used to watch this, when it came out on dvd, my dad bought the series.

Y’know, I *faintly* remember this show. Only because I remember a show that had lions (that wasn’t Lion King related) and Donkey showing up. I might’ve watched it with my parents or something, because I remember watching Futurama, KOTH, and WWF/E, so it wasn’t too unlikely for me to have come across it. But now that I’m an adult, I kinda wanna watch it because I love dumb 90s/2000s humor and I do performance magic with my husband (no big cats involved, sadly) so I think it’s right up my alley in a strange way.

I actually loved this when it was on.

I’m not sure if it was intentional, but starting the talk of the mauling with a clip from NBC’s Las Vegas affiliate was just *chef’s kiss*.

Criminally underrated show with an all star voice cast. Sadly only available on a double-sided DVD.

I think they did try to explain that the fully-furnished homes were BECAUSE of Siegfried and Roy, but it was a very fleeting mention. So I understand the confusion.

This show deserves a comeback with a new Season streaming on Peacock

This show was a guilty pleasure of mine. I never saw it back in 2004, but Teletoon began re-airing it in 2008 and that's how i saw the show. I do definitely remember the Kelsey Grammer episode... Speaking of which, Grammer was the voice of Rothbart in Barbie of Swan Lake, which i finished watching a few minutes ago... *(beat)* Why are you looking at me like that?

Sad that there's not that many sitcoms that take place in Las Vegas. I think that would be an interesting backdrop for a show with a family. Maybe they move from a differnt place and immerse into the Vegas culture. I lived there for a year and a half and it was a lot of fun.

Joe, I strongly disagree with your assessment about the Siegfried & Roy segments of the story. All the clips you showed with them had me in stitches, or at least got a chuckle outta me. I do agree that their dynamic with the lion family wasn't fully thought out tho. Maybe with more seasons that could have been remedied, but we'll never know. lol

Does anyone know what happened to his video about the blazing saddles sitcom? I cant find it anywhere

Thanks, Joe. I never heard of this series, but now I have.

The Mirage hotel where Siegfried and Roy performed just closed this week, so this is an extremely timely video.

Dreamworks first entry tv animation

Keep in mind, the show was just prototype Madagascar before that film came out a year later

Great show! Siegfried and Roy were the best part.. I still quote this show often

Yeah I caught the Donkey episode once and wondered what the hell was going on

I need to know under what circumstances did Siegfried and Roy become friends with Dick Cheney.

holy shit you just read my mind, I was JUST thinking family guy when you mentioned the incessant celebrity suckage

The lions living in fully furnished homes made perfect sense because of how ostentatious Siegfried and Roy were.

My memories a touch fuzzy on particulars but I remember S&R's wacky antics story were a lot more entertaining than the animals, who mostly felt like they were doing a less interesting version of "Dinosaurs". I think they really should've leaned into the two of them with the animals as more an occasional aside but I guess the accident complicated that.

Never heard of this show in my life, but doesn't matter. If Joe is doing a video on it, I'm watching.

They spent 2 million dollars per episode for a show I haven't thought about in 20 years.

Between this and the Telehell podcast I went from having no idea this existed to knowing entirely too much about it lmao

Also thanks to the Earth Day Special of 1990 including Weekend Update which is technically set in real life then that means that The Muppets, The Cosby Show, Cheers, Doogie Howser M.D, ET, Murphy Brown, The Golden Girls, Ghostbusters and Back To The Future are all documentaries which just raises more questions.

The Secret Gardens are closed now. I was there in 2022, 3 weeks before the male dolphins passed away. The cats were not in good shape but at least they don't have to be on display anymore.

At least Eddie Murphy came back as Donkey for one episode.

Please do a video for fish police and spicy city!!

0:36 Technically it was actually their second animated TV series, after Steven Spielberg's Invasion America in '98. Bit of a overlooked gem, that one

I remember watching this almost in spite of myself. _"Eh, maybe THIS episode will be genuinely good"_ It's not like it was terrible or anything, but it was just watchable enough to convince me to keep watching on the hopes that it'd improve. Then it just stopped and I never thought of it again. There were reruns of the episodes, but I never watched them.

Thanks for unlocking a core memory of my past. I remember watching this show and the only thing that I’ll never forget is the episode featuring Donkey from Shrek.

@12:44...laughing my ass off. No pun intended.

Fox seems to be the only broadcast network to make prime-time animation work. Also, the Matt Laurer episode did not age well.

This might've been better served if it wasn't a primetime comedy, but I could just be giving it more sympathy than it deserves because I enjoy John Goodman's animated performances. If nothing else, he did a fine job singing "Viva Las Vegas" for the theme song, which makes sense given that he had some Broadway experience at the start of his career.

We have this on dvd and absolutely love it! It's so funny!

You unlocked a core memory. I randomly tuned into this show back in the day and remember the episode of the John Goodman lion having to lose weight. Neat!

This is actually a show i'd see on Adult Swim, The brothers are my favorite lmfao. Thanks Hats! I will now watch this while stoned.

Can you please review the Police Academy movies?

3:17 - For anyone who wants to skip the sponsor at the 2:06 mark

I loved this show. I was 12 when it was on.

15:28 - 15:37. Yet Untamed and Uncut, Weird True and Freaky, and Infinity Train have not gotten either physical releases or stayed in streaming. Thanks WB Discovery and Zaslav.