Because the leaves flip and the crisp autumn chill seeps into the air, one factor turns into crystal clear: It is Over the Backyard Wall season.
That is true yearly, however particularly in 2024, which marks the tenth anniversary of Patrick McHale’s beloved Cartoon Community miniseries. So whether or not you are new to the sequence or are a loyal re-watcher, think about this your reminder to tune in. Plus, on Nov. 3, you possibly can rejoice additional with the discharge of a brand-new stop-motion Over the Backyard Wall particular, courtesy of Aardman!
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In 2015, Over the Backyard Wall received the Emmy for Excellent Animated Program, and for good motive. All through its 10 beautiful episodes, the sequence captivates you with two brothers’ odyssey via the unusually stunning (and fantastically unusual) land often known as the Unknown. There, they uncover curious communities, remedy urgent mysteries, and ally themselves with essentially the most sudden of associates. The one factor they can not seem to discover is their means dwelling.
What makes Over the Backyard Wall the best fall watch?
Ain’t that simply the way in which.
Credit score: Cartoon Community
You’ll be able to undoubtedly get pleasure from Over the Backyard Wall at any level within the yr, however its palette of orange-hued timber, golden sunsets, and darkish nights simply hits more durable within the fall. Plus, the present is the right mixture of autumn’s coziest and spookiest components. Falling leaves, piping sizzling consolation meals, and a complete slew of seasonal pumpkins seem alongside treacherous spirits, witches, and an encroaching entity recognized merely because the Beast (voiced by Samuel Ramey). Once you’re within the Unknown, you do not know for those who’re about to be comforted or creeped out — or some unusual fusion of the 2.
Our entry factors into the Unknown are teenager Wirt (voiced by Elijah Wooden) and his youthful stepbrother Greg (voiced by Collin Dean). They’re misplaced on this new world and have not a clue tips on how to get out. Fortunately for them, the denizens of the Unknown are completely happy to assist. Effectively, most of them are, anyway. A mysterious Woodsman (voiced by Christopher Lloyd) gives Wirt and Greg with shelter, whereas a speaking bluebird named Beatrice (voiced by Melanie Lynskey) gives to take them to a smart lady named Adelaide who may deliver them dwelling. Among the many remainder of the Unknown’s charming ensemble are a city of pumpkin folks, a schoolteacher devoted to educating animals, and a pub filled with character archetypes just like the Tavern Keeper, the Tailor, and the Highwayman.
Whereas these characters know precisely the place they match into the Unknown’s ecosystem, Greg and Wirt are outliers. Greg, along with his cheerful disposition, is endlessly enthusiastic about discovering extra of the Unknown. He’ll discuss to anyone, attempt something. He is received a teapot on his head, a pet rock that spouts Rock Details, and pants filled with sweet — he is like strolling childhood whimsy.
Against this, Wirt is a bundle of teenage angst and fried nerves. He approaches each scenario with a heaping quantity of trepidation. Pair that along with his annoyance with Greg, and also you’re taking a look at two essential characters who’re glorious foils for one another. Each Greg and Wirt’s reactions to being someplace as new and weird because the Unknown are legitimate — but neither fairly understands the place the opposite is coming from. Their ensuing journey brings them collectively in masterful but shocking methods. In reality, the identical could possibly be mentioned of the remainder of Over the Backyard Wall.
It’s possible you’ll suppose you realize the place a sure plot goes, however the sequence usually performs along with your expectations: A sinister outdated lady is probably not as evil as you’d suppose, or a lovely ghost could also be one thing else solely. What you suppose you see is rarely the total image.
Mashable Prime Tales
Over the Backyard Wall is a lovely, nostalgic experience with darkish undertones
The Woodsman and his lantern.
Credit score: Screenshot: HBO Max
Despite the fact that Over the Backyard Wall got here out in 2014, it has a timeless high quality to it. You realize you are watching one thing produced within the twenty first century, but it surely may simply as simply match into the panorama of mid-Twentieth-century animation.
That timelessness is due largely to the present’s beautiful animation, which evokes hand-drawn, hand-painted kinds that we hardly ever see in trendy animation. Visible inspirations vary from classic Halloween postcards to the work of animator Max Fleischer to the Nineties board recreation “Game of Frog Pond.” The Unknown is a fantastically crafted world that you will wish to get misplaced in time and again, simply so you possibly can catch all of the present’s beautiful visible particulars.
Including to Over the Backyard Wall‘s appeal is its soundtrack, a group of folksy, jazzy songs by McHale and The Blasting Firm. “Potatoes and Molasses” is a pleasant earworm, whereas “Over the Garden Wall,” carried out by the late Jack Jones, who voiced a frog within the present, has the texture of a basic love tune.
The standout quantity is the present’s title theme, “Into the Unknown,” additionally sung by Jones. A lone piano accompanies him as he croons concerning the arrival of autumn and pretending goals can come true. Like Over the Backyard Wall, “Into the Unknown” is haunting but stunning. In listening to it, you have gained one thing particular. However on the identical time the tune acknowledges a loss — of spring, of reminiscences, of easier occasions.
A lot of Over the Backyard Wall considerations itself with these sorts of loss. For each Greg and Wirt, this can be a coming-of-age story, and subsequently, entails a lack of innocence. For lots of the characters they meet, this can be a story about overcoming grief. The reason for a lot of that grief, in addition to a big a part of Greg and Wirt’s emotional journey, is the Beast.
Antlered, wreathed in darkness, and sporting a deep, operatic voice, the Beast looms massive over the woods of the Unknown. Encounters with him — and with a number of of the Unknown’s spookier residents — are genuinely scary. From demonic canine to hungry ghosts, Over the Backyard Wall does not pull its punches with its scares. Nor does it shrink back from any of the existential dread such explorations of loss can evoke. The sequence balances this darker, extra mature content material with lighthearted moments and musical bangers, guaranteeing that folks of all ages and leisure preferences will discover one thing to like right here.
Over the Backyard Wall clocks in at ten 11-minute-long episodes, so you possibly can binge it during or unfold it out and savor it. Whichever possibility you select, you will really feel such as you’ve stepped out of time and into some long-lost Halloween particular.
I like to recommend bundling up in a blanket, grabbing a mug of tea or apple cider, and leaping proper into the Unknown alongside Greg and Wirt. There is not any higher solution to spend your fall. And that is a Rock Truth!
Over the Backyard Wall is now streaming on Hulu.
UPDATE: Nov. 1, 2024, 5:00 a.m. EDT This text was initially printed on Oct. 21, 2022. It has been republished and up to date to incorporate references to “Over the Garden Wall”s tenth anniversary and the upcoming quick movie spinoff.
