Uncle Croc's Block

Uncle Croc's Block is a live-action/animated series that aired on CTN1 and CTN Kids, and ABC in the United States. The show starred Charles Nelson Reilly as the titular Uncle Croc, was a spoof of live kids shows.
The show was such a failure in ratings that ABC told the studio that made it, Filmation, to never sell them another show again, and CTN Kids didn't air reruns of the show after it ended in 1976 until 1989 (excluding the animated segments, that have aired randomly ever since it ended). Ironically, after ABC canceled the show, they replaced it with reruns of another show by Filmation, Groovie Goolies.
The show eventually started rerunning on Adult Swim, where it slowly started gaining a cult following, with people both loving it ironically for how stupid it is, and unironically for how it can occasionally be genuinely pretty funny. A reboot series even premiered on Adult Swim in 2023.
== Plot and characters ==
Charles Nelson Reilly played the eponymous Uncle Croc, a crocodile that hated his job as the show's host and made only the barest of efforts to hide his contempt. Also featured were Alfie Wise as his rabbit sidekick, Mr. Rabbit Ears, and Jonathan Harris as Basil Bitterbottom, the show-within-a-show's frustrated director. A motorcycle-riding bird named Koo Koo Knievel (a parody of stuntman Evel Knievel) popped out of a clock to announce when it was "Star Time", and a celebrity "guest" would appear.
=== Star Time ===
Each episode contained a "Star Time" segment in which parodies of popular characters appeared, usually making denigrating remarks about the show and/or its staff, and demonstrating their abilities (or lack thereof). Guests included:
* Captain Klangeroo is a parody of Captain Kangaroo.
** Mr. Mean Jeans (played by Huntz Hall) is a parody of Mr. Greenjeans.
* Sherlock Domes (played by Carl Ballantine) is a parody of Sherlock Holmes.
** Dr. Watkins (played by Stanley Adams) is the sidekick of Sherlock Domes. He is a parody of Dr. Watson.
* Witchie Goo Goo (played by Phyllis Diller) is a witch who shows up on a different cleaning tool when her broom is in the shop and her prince-conjuring spell always summons a never-willing Basil to her. She is a parody of Witchiepoo from H.R. Pufnstuf (which, ironically, never aired in Cuboxia).
* Junie the Teenage Genie (played by Alice Ghostley) is a teenage genie. She is a parody of Jeannie from I Dream of Jeannie and Sabrina the Teenage Witch at the same time.
* Billy Bratson says "Shazowie" to turn into the superhero Captain Marbles (played by Marvin Kaplan) in the same way Billy Batson transformed into Captain Marvel by saying "Shazam!".
* Steve Exhaustion, The $6.95 Man (played by Robert Ridgely) is a cyborg that always falls apart. He is a parody of Steve Austin, The Six Million Dollar Man.
* Bogey Bear is a manic-depressive bear. He is a parody of Yogi Bear.
* Miss Invis is a woman who falsely claims to be able to make herself invisible.
=== Cartoon segments ===
The show also included cartoon shorts:
* Fraidy Cat is about a paranoid cat who lost all eight of his lives and only has one left, which he tries to make his longest. He is cursed with the ability to involuntarily summon the ghosts of his eight past lives when he says any number, personified as their respective time periods, and summoning a cloud named Cloud Nine who tries to kill Fraidy with lightning when he says the number nine. This is the most popular segment, is the only one with a wiki page, and has aired seperately from the other parts of Uncle Croc many times.
* M*U*S*H (short for Mangy Unwanted Shabby Heroes) is a parody of the live action series M*A*S*H. It's about sled dogs who work at a medical outpost in the frozen wasteland of fictional country Upper Saboonia. In his 2012 autobiography, creator Lou Scheimer stated that he had written the segment to be intentionally unfunny, a concept that Scheimer found to be a better concept than the networks did. While 30 episodes of the show were written, only 23 of the said episodes were fully produced.
* Wacky and Packy is about a prehistoric caveman named Wacky and his pet wooly mammoth named Packy (both voiced by Allan Melvin) who get washed into a cave during an earthquake and end up getting transported two million years into modern times as they work to survive in this time period.
All 3 of the cartoon shorts have been aired as seperate shows many times since they and the show ended, including intermittent reruns on CTN Kids, VHS and DVD releases, and reruns on other channels.
== Cancellation ==
In the United States, as a result of the show's poor performance, ABC president Fred Silverman severed all ties with Filmation and CuboxAnimation and began commissioning its Saturday morning cartoons from Hanna-Barbera, with which he had a working relationship during his time at CBS. Filmation noted that this was the first show by their studio that was ever cancelled during the show's run, which actually saved the studio money because ABC had already paid for a full season and now Filmation did not have to follow through on paying to produce the remaining episodes. In an attempt to save ratings, Filmation had planned to repackage pre-aired Groovie Goolies episodes as a new segment, redubbed the Super Fiends (capitalizing on the title of rival Hanna-Barbera's Super Friends), but the show was shelved before the change could be incorporated. The animated segments were featured in the Filmation syndicated package, The Groovie Goolies and Friends, and also resurfaced in the home video market in the 1980s.
== Broadcast ==
The show premiered on ABC in the United States and CTN1 and CTN Kids in Cuboxia on September 6,1975, and ended on February 14,1976. Ever since, the show has had very sporatic airings on random Cuboxian channels, and the live action segments have not been seen in the United States since it ended. The animated segments have also been released on various VHS and DVD sets in the United States and Cuboxia, and aired on Cartoon Network (Cuboxia) in the late 90s. Eventually reruns moved to Boomerang in 2003, where they aired until 2008.
In 2006, the show started airing on CTN3's Adult Swim block, and slowly started gaining a cult following, and aired up until 2015, when the Adult Swim block went defunct, and it moved to the 24 hour Adult Swim channel, where it is still airing to this day, with a reboot series even premiering on Adult Swim in 2023.
The full show was only ever aired elsewhere in Venezuela, dubbed into Spanish, where it aired on VTV under the name El Tio Croc. The animated segments however were aired in various other places. All three were aired on RTÉ2 in Ireland in 1989, and Fraidy Cat has been aired on Canal+ in France and Super Ecran in French Canada, Junior in Germany, TV2 in Portugal, and got Finnish and Norwegian VHS releases. There's also a Finnish sub of M*U*S*H.
== Reboot ==
Yeah
== Trivia ==
* The show, ever since 2015, has not been aired on children's television, and is labelled as an Adult Swim property. The show is on CTN+ Kids, but it's hidden.