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{{short description| 1992 animated short directed by Joe Murray}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=October 2024}}
{{Infobox television episode
| series = [[Rocko's Modern Life]]
| image = Trash-O-Madness (Rocko's Modern Life pilot title card).gif
| caption = Title card
| season = 1
| episode = Pilot, 10b
|
|
| airdate = {{Start date|1992|10|29}}
| length = 8:19
| next = A Sucker for the Suck-O-Matic
| episode_list = List of Rocko's Modern Life episodes
}}
'''''Trash-O-Madness''''' is
▲'''''Trash-O-Madness''''' is a 1992 animated short (which began production in 1991) created by [[Joe Murray (animator)|Joe Murray]], who, prior to this point, had made several independent animated shorts (including ''The Chore'' and ''My Dog Zero''), as well as a [[MTV]] ID, and it was the pilot episode for what became [[Nickelodeon]]'s 4th [[Nicktoons|Nicktoon]], ''[[Rocko's Modern Life]]''. During the series' first season, a new version of the pilot, that was extended for the purposes of including it as a regular episode, was produced. The new version was paired up "The Good, the Bad, and the Wallaby" as the 10th episode to be produced, and aired as the 6th. In addition, that episode featured an extended end credit sequence to accommodate the names of production crew behind "Trash-O-Madness". On February 7, 2012, the original pilot version found its way onto [[Shout! Factory]]'s season 2 [[DVD]] as a special feature. In ''[[Rocko's Modern Life: Spunky's Dangerous Day]]'', the second level is named after this episode.
==Plot==
=== Original cut ===
The sun rises over O-Town as Earl, a dog who escaped from a [[laboratory]] wakes up, growling and barking crazily, biting off the lid to the trash can he resides in, and drinks weed-killer, and gazes at a house behind him. In the house, a dog and his owner are asleep. The dog, named Spunky has his stomach rumbling, awakening his owner [[Rocko]]. Noticing his dog's stomach bump, he yawns and tells Spunky that he's "too hungry to dance'. He glances nostalgically at a family photo, remarking that they never had a real breakfast since they migrated from [[Australia]]. Rocko dresses up and clips his toenails while promising Spunky a good meal. Suddenly, he hears a noise and finds a Hill-O-Stench garbage truck driving erratically and crushing someone's car flat. Rocko realizes that it's garbage day, and that the garbage men have never been by for around six months, and figures out that their license has been reinstated. Rocko frantically attempts to gather the large hoard of trash in his house, Spunky quickly eats Rocko's toenail clippings out of hunger.
Downstairs, Rocko puts multiple piles of garbage while Earl sneaks around the house while peeking through the windows occasionally. Rocko plugs in his [[vacuum cleaner]], the Suck-O-Matic, while Spunky stands in front of the sucking tube. Spunky's tongue is stuck in the vacuum, which sucks a comically big amount of things from his nose, including screws, nuts, bolts, a small wedge of cheese, and a fish, before being sucked in whole. Rocko saves Spunky by flicking a switch to reverse the vacuum function, but not before Spunky expands like a balloon and gets blasted onto the ceiling.
In the kitchen, Rocko frantically throws out all garbage in the fridge. He opens a container implied to be [[emergency rations]] (a sign reads "Buy [[War bond|War Bonds]]" is on it, only to find a slime ball being what's left in it, disgusting Rocko. He empties the container as the slime ball is disposed of. Spunky, amused by the ball, attempts to play with it, only for the ball to reveal itself as a living creature and squirts black ink onto Spunky.
Rocko silently instructs the dog to spit that back out into the can. The dog hesitantly tries, not only to realize that it's also sticky, but while running out the window, the garbage men are coming closer. Rocko puts the rest of the trash out onto a now-huge pile of garbage. Spunky digs himself into the pile before Rocko carries it out to a [[trash compactor]], the Compact-O-Matic, which is in the kitchen. Rocko compacts the garbage into the size of a [[American Chinese cuisine|Chinese restaurant]] [[take-out]] box, not realizing Spunky is in the pile of garbage. He notices the garbage men are getting even closer (and crushing more cars), and Rocko hurryingly attempts to carry the now take-out-box-sized garbage out to the front lawn's trash bin, only to be jump-scared by Earl. He quickly shuts the door, and looks out the peephole. He nervously chips off his fingernails with his teeth.
Atop the roof of his house, Rocko ties the trash and dog to a fishing pole in order to lure Earl into the garbage truck, only to realize that Spunky had in fact been compacted in that pile of garbage. He reels back and Earl follows, swallowling the compacted trash cube and Spunky. Rocko lets go of the pole in shock, causing Earl and the pole to plummet to the ground. Rocko follows Earl and attempts to reason with him, only to be punched in the face. He leaves and returns angrily with a steak, which did not work on Earl. Having been forced to his breaking point, he launches at Earl's face and screws it up, pulling the line from the fishing pole, then wrestles with the tough dog, and socks him straight into the snout then pulling it back out, realizing that he angered the dog. Rocko fights with Earl after Earl spits the cube out.
A battered Rocko emerges victorious and attempts to revive Spunky by kneading him into shape and inflating him, only for Spunky to wake up.
At night, Rocko takes a bath with Spunky, apparently able to take out the trash in time and expressed his gratefulness for Spunky's companionship, only to realize that Spunky had the slime ball in his mouth the whole time. The slime ball explodes after coming in contact with water.
==Production==
Joe Murray originally wrote "A Sucker for the Suck-O-Matic" as the pilot episode but the executives decided that [[Heffer Wolfe]] might be "a little too weird for test audiences." Murray, instead of removing Heffer from "A Sucker for the Suck-O-Matic," decided to write "Trash-O-Madness" as the pilot episode.
Murray co-produced the pilot episode with George Maestri, Marty McNamara, and Nick Jennings at Joe Murray Studio in Saratoga, California, United States. McNamara assembled a cadre of animators. Murray animated half of the pilot, and several San Francisco Bay-area animators such as Robert Scull, Maestri, Jennings, and Timothy Björklund animated the other half. Jennings created all of the production backgrounds.
Murray then hired a camera company. Once the plan fell behind schedule, Murray, Nick Jennings, and George Maestri modified a [[35
The team completed the film on schedule; the crew later expanded the film to 11 minutes for use in the series. Murray describes the animation of "Trash-O-Madness" as containing "variations in the Rocko models" and "a lot more stretch than usual" in the animation.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.joemurraystudio.com/tv/rocko_factoid4.shtml|title=Joe Murray Studio - Little Known Rocko's Factoids|date=23 May 2010|url-status=dead|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20100523061442/http://www.joemurraystudio.com/tv/rocko_factoid4.shtml|archivedate=23 May 2010}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.title14.com/rocko/contributors/murray.html|title=The Rocko's Modern Life FAQ - Joe Murray Interview|website=www.title14.com}}</ref>
==Differences between the original pilot and the
* The music, sound effects, and some of the voices were completely different. Marshall Crutcher composed the music for the pilot,
* The pilot featured a completely different opening, that began with a photo album, showing Rocko through the years, and then showed clips from the pilot episode, along with sketches of Rocko with Ed and Bev Bighead, and Heffer. The
* Rocko was originally yellow, but was changed to beige
* The original pilot was 8 minutes long. In the
==References==
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{{Rocko's Modern Life}}
[[Category:American television
[[Category:Rocko's Modern Life]]
[[Category:Films directed by Joe Murray]]
[[Category:
[[Category:Animated films about dogs]]
[[Category:1992 animated short films]]
[[Category:1992 American television episodes]]
[[Category:1993 American television episodes]]
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