Everybody Loves Raymond's Brad Garrett Starred In A Forgotten Series With Mark Hamill

Cartoon Network's early period saw a lot of experimental shows that established the vibes of the channel, and those sensibilities continue to be felt in the modern-day output on the cable network. Part of that experimentation was getting strange shows into rotation and not worrying about what names were attached. It's not uncommon for famous actors to play a part in animation now, but sometimes, those delightful voices can crop up before the big break that defines the rest of their careers. Brad Garrett is beloved by audiences who experienced the heyday of "Everybody Loves Raymond," but he also had a starring role in a short-lived cartoon called "2 Stupid Dogs" in the early '90s. This absurd comedy also managed to snag some guest appearances from Mark Hamill, as the "Star Wars" veteran is always down to bring that signature voice to the recording booth.

"2 Stupid Dogs" is an animated series that follows the misadventures of Little Dog and Big Dog, with Mark Schiff as the smaller pup and Brad Garrett's unmistakable voice coming out of the shaggier dog. Hanna-Barbera Cartoons were still cooking up new projects in the early 1990s, before they were absorbed into the Warner Bros. Animation infrastructure, and "2 Stupid Dogs" is reflective of the time period in TV animation. Series creator Donovan Cook was inspired by two strays that roamed his apartment complex around that time, and his pitch resonated with Hanna-Barbera brass like Fred Seibert. It's silly, surprisingly abstract for a kids' cartoon, and undoubtedly modeled on something like Viacom's runaway success with "Ren & Stimpy."

Schiff is in overdrive from the word go on "2 Stupid Dogs" as his excitable character is always chasing after a ball or getting caught up in some scheme, but the real standout is Garrett's deadpan delivery of almost every line. Big Dog doesn't talk very much, which makes anything the shaggy canine has to say extra emphatic despite Garrett's tone staying mostly even-keeled. As with most cartoons of the era, there's gross-out humor as far as the eye can see, but Garrett letting loose, yelling, yields some of the biggest laughs in the show.

Another factor that makes "2 Stupid Dogs" so interesting is the fact that the series found a home on TBS. The Turner Broadcasting System was much more of a factor in the entertainment landscape back in the early 1990s, where an animation studio like Hanna-Barbera Cartoons was still imagined as a core brand for the multimedia conglomerate. So, with Cartoon Network not quite out of the stratosphere yet over at the Turner Mothership, TBS stepped in as a natural home for a kids' cartoon that had wild undertones that adult viewers could enjoy. As mentioned up top, "Ren and Stimpy" feels like a logical forebearer for something like "2 Stupid Dogs," and TBS makes a lot of sense for a "cusp" kids cartoon like this show in 1993.

By the time Cartoon Network picked up the show, the small-time cable channel was already developing an identity centered around offbeat shows like "2 Stupid Dogs." Things were decidedly experimental with shows like this one paired with "The Banana Splits" and "The Flintstones" reruns in a mix that makes a lot of sense now. These older programs had to work on different levels for viewers, young and old. Despite the animation not being as "impressive" as the modern era, there was a lot of wiggle room for creators to write jokes that skirted through on the strength of plausible deniability. It's interesting to think about how that Hanna-Barbera style would go on to inform a lot of the programs people instantly associate with Cartoon Network years later.

Yes, "SWAT Kats" and "The New Adventures of Captain Planet" came out of Hanna-Barbera during that nascent period, but the brand is more closely associated with Cartoon Network mainstays of the mid-'90s for a lot of Millennial viewers. Just a couple of years after "2 Stupid Dogs," we got "Dexter's Laboratory" and "Johnny Bravo," which still serve as standard-bearers for the brand to this day alongside "The Powerpuff Girls."

Cartoon Network nostalgia lives on in multiple forms on the Internet, with "Toonami" still going strong, and "Checkered Past" allowing a younger demographic a window into what Cartoon Network used to be like. Both of these programming blocks repurpose older animations that used to run on the network for varying audiences now, and that's a role that "2 Stupid Dogs" filled back in 1993. TBS had animation blocks, sure, but they weren't the only place to catch those shows, as Cartoon Network would come calling. In the first years of extended cable networks, executives were loath to spend money on original programming for a channel that might not be around for a long time.

Repurposing existing media libraries became crucial for all kinds of offshoot networks. Take MTV Hits playing music videos on a loop with advertisements, AMC using old video libraries to create a new generation of film lovers, and of course, Cartoon Network mining the newly-acquired Hanna-Barbera catalog for everything under the sun! Without that push to throw as much onto the channel as possible, there's a scenario where Cartoon Network doesn't make it past five years on-air. Now, shows like "2 Stupid Dogs" stand as a reminder of that time in TV and what it seems like we've lost as a collective viewing audience, because a goofy little show like this probably doesn't get made now. It's better to live in a world where Garrett gets to play a shaggy dog for a couple of years than one where it doesn't happen at all.