The Great North

It's a straightforward family-sitcom dynamic, loaded up with endearing eccentricity. ... These are rich characters in absurd situations full of quotable dialogue. ... The Great North could be one of the norths. Greats, I mean, greats!

It’s not the superficial links that make “The Great North” a worthy successor to “Bob’s Burgers”; it’s their shared sense of compassion.

You won't need a matchmaker to find the greatness within North. [15-28 Mar 2021, p.11]

The Great North is comfort viewing of the highest caliber, a glass of the same hot beverage before seeing the same friends at the same place, feeling lovingly ensconced by it all.

A winning, offbeat animated comedy.

With an all-star voice cast and eccentric sense of humor, this is another strong offering from the Bouchard team, even if it doesn’t start as brilliantly as “Central Park” did last year.

The Great North has some work to do to get to the level of its cousin shows, Bob’s Burgers and Central Park. But with a great voice cast and Bouchard overseeing things, it should get there eventually.

I think the biggest problem with the Great North is it's connection to Bob's Burgers. I suppose given the directors, I was just going to assume the Great North was going to have a similar brand of humor, spoiler alert: it doesn't. While most of Bob's Burgers comedy comes from a sense of relatability in the way the characters talk or interact with one another, it feels very natural, like a conversation you could have in your own home, the Great North's brand of humor feels very forced, we have this family of "wacky" characters, a Father who refuses to accept their Wife left them and instead makes up a story of being eaten alive, a teenage girl who has an imaginary friend with a mind of their own, a younger child who is always wearing little bear PJ's, two older brothers, one of which is engaged. A lot of the jokes fall flat for me; I know they are supposed to be funny, but most of them don't even manage to elicit so much as a smirk from me. I understand that the intent of all of the jokes made at the Father's expense are supposed to be funny, like having a shrine to his ex wife, but it really isn't - Haha, the Father is sad, loney and probably a little insane. What a gut buster. It is probably too early to judge the Great North all that well, I have only seen one episode, but I hope they find their stride soon, because what I saw wasn't all that good, I often found myself just wishing I was watching Bob's Burgers.