Dexter's Laboratory
In 1997, Bill Ward of the "Star Tribune" named "Dexter's Laboratory" to his Critic's Choice list, recommending it for the "young of all ages". In a 2012 top 10 list by "Entertainment Weekly", "Dexter's Laboratory" was ranked as the fourth best Cartoon Network series. In 2009, "Dexter's Laboratory" was named 72nd best animated series by IGN, whose editors remarked, "Aimed at and immediately accessible to children, "Dexter's Laboratory" was part of a new generation of animated series that played on two levels, simultaneously fun for both kids and adults." In his 2015 book "Animation: A World History Volume III: Contemporary Times", Giannalberto Bendazzi called "Dexter's Laboratory" "visually and verbally innovative". He considered the series to be a groundbreaking work of pop art, likening its visual style to both street art and the designs of Takashi Murakami. David Perlmutter wrote in his 2018 book, "The Encyclopedia of American Animated Television Shows", that all three segments of "Dexter's Laboratory" (the main scenario, along with "Dial M for Monkey" and "The Justice Friends") elevate stereotypical ideas through an approach that contains "verve and originality". Perlmutter called the series more "complex" than it first seems. He praised the staging of action sequences throughout the series and wrote that "Dexter's Laboratory" is "much more effective (and funny) than it would have been under a director less committed to the project [than Tartakovsky]."