User Reviews

There was a big hubbub about Clerks being cancelled after 2 episodes. The same fate befell this show and nobody cared. This was an absolute gem of a show and I was the only American guy who watched it. The Perfects are so damn funny. A lot of the humor is so stupid that you can't help but laugh. The funniest is when the donkey explodes for no reason at all. PUT THIS ON DVD!!!!!!!!!!

A fantastic cartoon, with brilliant voice acting, about Eric who is a rather stressed out man trying to make his way through life.

It probably didn't do as well in America as the humour is quite British and has me in stitches. Poor Eric suffers one thing after another and never has a good day.

If you'd like to see Eric on DVD (and who wouldn't?) please sign the online petition as at the moment there is no intention of a DVD being produced :o(

Let's get Eric back! http://www.petitiononline.com/eric0607/petition.html

If you don't like the Butt Monkey Trope, you won't like this show.

I know I've been harsh on Klasky Csupo, but I do realize why the studio has a fanbase. Sure, I still don't like most of their shows, like with Rugrats, Wild Thornberrys, Rocket Power, Santo Bugito even, As Told by Ginger, or even All Grown Up!, but they're not the worst animation studio in the world. Yet they really need to stop doing NFT artwork. That said, while As Told by Ginger may be the studio's worst looking in terms of their style, Stressed Eric (even if they only did season one) is the studio's worst show yet.

And for good reason. It's a show about a man who constantly gets tortured for no reason. If the Loud House now would be a throwback to any show by Klasky Csupo, it would definitely be Stressed Eric.

I felt so bad for Eric. Why was this on NBC?? Even Klasky Csupo fans hate this show. And I don't blame them. The characters are uninteresting, the animation sucks, the style is lame, the writing is too sadistic, and nothing is funny. Don't watch it!! Even if you love the studio's works, I don't recommend this one!

A TV programme which doesn't seem to have got the recognition it deserves, which is a pity, as it is the best original creation for years. The series is based around Eric Feeble, 40-year-old divorced father who, as the title suggests, is forever under strain. At home he has to cope with his alcoholic au pair, autistic son and a daughter who is allergic to just about everything. Added to that are Eric's hippy ex-wife who keeps turning up when he least expects it, and next-door neighbours the Perfects, who seem to make it their business to out-shine Eric at every turn. At work things are no easier. The quite irritatingly handsome and wonderful Ray Perfect is a highly successful executive at Eric's place of work, Eric's secretary is forever on the telephone organising her social life, and the boss. P.P. (who is incidentally my favourite character in this series, apart from Eric himself) rules the business with an iron rod. Other regular characters include Eric's psychiatrist Doc (an age-ing swinger) and elderly neighbour Mrs Wilson, who's trips out to post a letter always end in disaster.

There is plenty of biting humour and some great comedy moments. Storylines include a nativity play, an old flame of Eric's turning up, a desperate hunt for a potato, a parents V pupils cricket match and many more. What makes this series stand out is the fact that comedy is combined with darker undertones, reflections on the pressures of modern-day life and the cast of interesting, genuine and often not unsympathetic characters. A second series was broadcast in 2000. Let's hope for a third.

Stressed Eric is the very definition of a sadist show. Why do other people compare this show to The Simpsons? It is nothing like The Simpsons, that does not keep torturing a character with their own life like this show does unless you're thinking of Frank Grimes in the episode Homer's Enemy. Is Stressed Eric meant to be satire like The Simpsons? If so, then it's still not funny to see Eric suffer no matter how you slice it. The only people in the show who like him are his daughter Claire and the old lady with the green envelope named Mrs. Wilson. Everyone else hates him or is indifferent and careless. The worst character of all is Liz because she has no empathy for Eric, has a voice that is very painful to listen to, and thinks Eric Feeble is being selfish and petty for not doing what she keeps asking him to do because she is too self-centered to realize she is the more selfish one who does not care about their kids' needs or whatever is causing Eric misery this time. Maybe it's only compared to The Simpsons because Hank Azaria from that show voices Eric in the American re-dub. This could have worked if Eric was a jerk, but they make him as sympathetic as possible. They also want to torture the viewers of this show almost as much as Eric with obnoxious sound effects, yelling, and bickering.

The Hospital episode where Eric gets injured the most is the 2nd worst episode reviewed by Mr. Enter in the 3rd year of his channel and this show was #3 in the Top 10 Worst Cartoons of the 1990s. 30% of all of Mr. Enter's Animated Atrocity videos that aired 1998 or later took influence from Stressed Eric on purpose or by accidental coincidence from having cruel jokes like the ones depicted in this show. If this show's sadistic sense of humor is how it typically is in the United Kingdom, then it doesn't work for us in the United States, and this is the first animated British sitcom made for American audiences. If Stressed Eric did so badly that it couldn't make it past 13 episodes in the United Kingdom, then the jokes were too cruel and predictable even for its own audience. That serves it right because it's the saddest comedy ever. Only Phineas and Ferb (2007) knew how to make Stressed Eric work for both American and British audiences, because we should root against Candace for punishing Phineas and Ferb for being creative, and that series has a much bigger variety of jokes than everybody else making Candace's life miserable by acting stupid or inconsiderate.

Dan vs. (2011) and Milo Murphy's Law (2016) are both cartoons from the United States that knew how to make Stressed Eric's concept work in different ways. However, Stressed Eric also influenced a lot of bad episodes of cartoons in the US and Canada after 1998. The Powerpuff Girls, Pinky, Elmyra and the Brain, Ed, Edd n Eddy, Family Guy, SpongeBob Squarepants, The Cramp Twins, Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, The Fairly Odd Parents, My Gym Partner's a Monkey, Sidekick, The Amazing World of Gumball, Rocket Monkeys, and even Star vs. The Forces of Evil have some Animated Atrocities episodes that try and fail to make Stressed Eric's sadistic brand of humor work. Clearly Stressed Eric is the awful go-to show for when you're out of better ideas. If gross out is the worst trend in 1990s animation, then cruel British humor-torture porn comedy is the worst trend in 2000s animation. Mr. Enter might not know it, but Rocko's Modern Life probably made an even worse trend of the 1990s than Ren and Stimpy in regards to comparing Stressed Eric with Mega Babies to see which is worse. The second season is less cruel and predictable than the first season, and at least has more variety than all of the first season episodes being about meeting a work-related deadline, but they always disappoint you at the end. I can see why even the UK didn't want this show to keep going. The closest we got to a series finale with a bright spot is Au Pair.

If you are reading this, do yourself a favor and DO NOT try to imitate Stressed Eric, unless you know how to make the target a jerk who deserves what they get from nicer people or make the target an optimist who actually succeeds in overcoming these obstacles. This cruel comedy trend might be an even worse trend in animation history than the grossout trend. I wouldn't be surprised for this to be in anybody's list of the most despised media of all time, Norm of the North, Ghostbusters 2016 and The Emoji Movie included, and even all 3 of those combined are funnier than this sadistc sitcom. I can only recommend this show to you if you want something to make you cry, make you feel better about your own life, or teach you what shouldn't be done in a comedy, because those are the only reasons of which I could think for anyone to watch Stressed Eric these days. I doubt I will miss Stressed Eric at all, but it's my most favorite kind of bad because I am never going to forget it for teaching me what type of show no one should make unless they are marketing it exclusively to sadists.

A main character who gets treated like dirt all the time may be a format you have seen before, such as Duckman, another show produced by Klasky Csupo. So perhaps Stressed Eric could work, right? Nope. If you have seen one episode of Stressed Eric, then you have seen it all. Past reviewers here have stated the show's humor flew past the heads of American audiences, when that's not necessarily true. Stressed Eric's fatal flaw is that it never bothers giving Eric a break at all. Eric accomplishes absolutely nothing; even when things turn out right for him, there will always be a short twist that completely botches it, and I can name one example in particular.

The episode, "Potato", revolves around Eric inviting his boss over for dinner in hopes of getting a raise, and Paul suggests making a lot of potatoes as he invites the. Chairwoman of the Potato Development Board. After going through a lot of unbelievable struggles to buy one potato, the table is organized, the food is freshly prepared...and Paul nonchalantly says the chairwoman actually can't stomach potatoes. Do you see how that makes absolutely no sense? How was anybody supposed to see that coming?

With that, the show's formula is very repetitive, giving The Loud House a run for its money: Eric starts his day with everything already going wrong, Maria pukes, Claire goes through an allergic reaction, Brian does something dumb, Eric goes to work, a problem arises, he goes home for a bit to do something about the conflict in question, he passes by the old lady trying to send mail, everything works out for him for a few seconds, there's a cruel twist, and Eric dies.

All of the characters besides Eric are either incredibly stingy or incompetent morons. Maria only cares about alcohol and the money Eric is paying her. Claire always ignores her father's warnings about eating anything she's allergic to. Brian cares about nothing other than eating whatever's in his field of vision. Paul will happily demote Eric to the lowest rank possible. Eric's coworker never contributes to anything. The Perfects are nothing more than the generic 'spoiled rich family'. Eric's ex-wife constantly gaslights Eric.

So how would I improve this series? There are two ways:

1) Make Eric a character who deserves what's coming to him. With characters like Squidward Tentacles or Daffy Duck, they deserve their bad luck because they're egomaniacs who overestimate their talents, intelligence and maturity, constantly talking down to the people around them. With Eric, he does nothing to deserve his bad luck as he's a normal guy fighting through a harsh life, and you're always rooting for him to win by the end of the episode, but it just never happens.

Or 2) Have Eric win once in a while. This show is way too unfair, and while there may be some people who welcome its pessimistic tone, it's nothing more than a detriment here. I don't mind cartoons that are way too cruel, but the ones that are at least give a reason for the world to be so terrible. There is nothing to brighten the mood in Stressed Eric, because as I said, all of the episodes are just a sequence of miserable events aimed at a character who doesn't deserve it. I don't see where I'm meant to be laughing, especially when the situations that cause Eric to lose are forced and predictable, spoiling any attempts at comedy.

There's no logic to anything in Stressed Eric. There are no jokes or satisfying payoffs to make up for the show's depressing tone. If you're having a bad day, Stressed Eric is not the show to watch because all it will do is remind you of how unfair things can be. If Eric was a character who either deserved to be miserable or managed to score success every once in a while, I'd be more than happy to give it some leeway, but unfortunately, neither of those are the case here.

When I first saw this show in the UK I thought it was about time someone in Britain made a decent animated show. Watched it on the BBC till it was over. But then when I moved out here I was very disappointed to hear that the American network that was broadcasting it had decided to re-dub Eric's voice, not only that but to my memory the also decided to put a laugh track to it. Sure Hank Azaria is a great person for voices but thats on the Simpsons, leave the British to do what we do good. And that includes grammar

Unfortunately, this BBC-2 show was picked up by NBC who, like most networks, have a tendency to take a show from abroad and tweak it into useless American drivel. NBC felt that Americans had no desire to see a British guy getting upset. Hank Azaria was brought in to perform the voice of Eric. The opening sequence was changed from the original British version. Music and all. The new opening shows a montage of Eric (the American) moving to England, marrying, and having kids. In addition to dramatically changing the lead character NBC also dropped 4-5 minutes from each episode to accommodate for its commercial spots. The show was by no means brilliant, but it did contain some good gags, and occasionally exceedingly clever dialog. Eric's home life consisted of a psychotic ex-wife fighting for everyone/things rights, a hyper-allergenic daughter, a son who puts everything in his mouth, a sex-crazed (and often missing) nanny, a constantly enraged boss, and his aptly named next door neighbors the Perfects. The show is worth watching, but it's placement in NBC's "Must See TV" prime-time line-up was a bit misguided. This show would be better placed in the Fox Sunday night line-up. It would likely have found a home.

This is a class program. It was all everyone talked about when it was on, but I am dismayed to hear that Eric's wonderful London/middle class accent was dubbed for the American version! Plum, forgotten plum, but a plum never the less!!!

I have never seen the U.S. version with Hank Azaria, but the original is pure genius, very much like The Simpsons, but with that irreverent twist of British humor. I have rarely laughed so hard! I am sorry that American viewers missed most of that thru the Americanization of the show. (What's next -- Monty Python dubbed into American English?) I am sure that American viewers are perfectly capably of understanding British humor, as there have been numerous successful British comedies shown on U.S. television that were understood without translation. Hopefully there will be a DVD edition of this show one day -- maybe they will let viewers choose languages between "British" and "American"!

Ok, so this doesn't even compare with the genius of the Simpsons or South Park, but it still does the job. I didn't like the bleakness, and some of Eric's stress rubbed off on me. This cartoon seemed to be made for America.. I dunno, something about the accents, the words... maybe its my imagination. But I'm still shocked that the voice of Eric was redubbed for America. These sort of things make me sooo angry! All the American imports that come into Britain don't have to be 'Englished', so why do you need to ruin our exports!? I really hope that the Americans don't think that this is all we are capable of (this and Monty Python), because the richness and variety of modern British comedy surpasses most of the American equivalents. Most English people don't even like Python!

When I first saw the advertisements in the t.v. guide,it said "Bad than Bart"and"Spicer than South Park".When I saw the first episode,it was boring.This was another cartoon that failed trying to beat The Simpsons.Also,this show lasted for a few weeks.Also,the show was unfunny as well.I suggest that you watch The Simpsons to see jokes that do make ou laugh out loud.

just so Lee47 isn't the only one to make a comment, I decided to voice my opinion about dear ole Eric aswell. This series is truly brilliant, the humour is warped as hell and the animation is fanrtastic. It follows the life of Eric, a harrassed single father, with a normal curious young daughter and a slightly less than normal young son who tends to eat anything that isn't nailed down. The au pair is superb, a totally neurotic girl, who goes out gets drunk, takes drugs etc etc. The story lines are great with Eric usually ending up, as the title suggests, stressed out, no matter what he does to avoid it. Watch for the old granny who tries and fails to post her letter each week.

This series comes a very close second to an animated film that's just come out called Ogri, if you get the chance see either of them they are both brilliant.

One London critic asked "Is there anybody who finds this programme in the least amusing?" Shockingly, the answer's yes. Then again, there are people who think Macy Gray is prettier than Cindy Crawford.

This painful series debuted in 1998 on BBC2 in prime time with hype on the scale of that given to the Millennium Dome and with much the same results - the British answer to "The Simpsons"? Yes, if "The Simpsons" was stuffed with mono-dimensional characters (including the title character), had such non-clever ideas as calling an all-around wonder man Peter Perfect (the Perfect Family, geddit?), sported pretty poor animation, and was tedious and unfunny to boot. I made it through two full episodes of the first series before giving up, and I was amazed that the BBC commissioned a second series two years later.

The first series was a blot on the otherwise spotless record of Klasky/Csupo, and I was glad to see they had nothing to do with the new series - but it hadn't advanced a jot. We still had the useless Eric stumbling through life without arousing any sympathy, we still had the lineup of unappealing characters, we still had the slow-as-molasses stories...

That American guy was right. BORING.

This show was so stupid. the whole plot was watch some American living in England getting stressed till his blood vessel choked him. In all three episodes. I guess people in England think it's funny to see people from America getting mad by complete dips#$ts.

Why did NBC cancel this work of art? It was one of the funniest cartoons ever made and they cancelled it, who runs the channel, a bunch of chimpanzees? I hope they realize what a terrible mistake they've made.

Brilliantly observed satire on the pitfalls of everyday life, with all-too-familiar scenes bringing the absurdity home. Mark Heap (graduate of the University of Chris Morris) combines with a host of excellent voices, including one or two guests that creep into the odd episode. But whatever happened to the second series??

..because of it's English content. I'm not against English programming (as a fan of Doctor Who, the Prisoner, etc) but why NBC picked this up only to redub the lead's voice (yet not the plots: as an American I have no idea how the UK's health care system works) was a sign of desperation to compete with "The Simpsons." Which, after two measly episodes, was shown to be nigh-impossible.

Not a bad show, but the basic plot is very predictable: Eric gets in a pickle, Perfect Family shows up to best him, and Eric freaks out by having a vein in his head explode or something. Sad, really, but not that bad of a show.

Eric Feeble has a daughter who longs for a pony, a son who isn't quite right and an au pair I sure wouldn't leave a kid with. He is further tormented by his perfect neighbors, his boss, and oh, heck, pretty much everything.

The three episodes aired in the US made a big impression on me and my coworkers at the post office. We often have those moments where a vein in our temple blows up and strangles us. If they put this on DVD, I promise to buy three copies- one for me and one for each of my colleagues working at the window.

It was wickedly funny. I don't suppose the fourth episode that never aired was the one entitled "Sex"? I seem to recall reading the synopsis for that upcoming episode and really looking forward to it. Who ever made the decision to yank it: Shame. On. You.