Daria 74411 224917541 2008-07-11T00:10:11Z Lightbot 7178666 Units/dates/other {{tooshort|date=July 2008}} {{otheruses4|the animated series|St. Daria|Saints Chrysanthus and Daria|the name Daria|Daria (name)}} {{infobox Television | | show_name = Daria | image = [[Image:Daria-FallDVD-Cover.jpg|180px|center]] | rating = {{TV-14}} | format = [[List of animated series|Animated]] [[Situation comedy|sitcom]] | runtime = 22 – 23 minutes (episodes), 66 – 75 minutes (TV-movies) | creator = [[Glenn Eichler]]<br>Susie Lewis Lynn | starring = [[Tracy Grandstaff]]<br>[[Wendy Hoopes]]<br>[[Julián Rebolledo]]<br>Amy Bennett<br>Alvaro J. Gonzalez | country = {{USA}} | network = [[MTV]] | first_aired = [[March 3]], [[1997]] | last_aired = [[January 21]], [[2002]] | num_seasons = 5 | num_episodes = 65<br>2 [[Television movie|TV movies]] | list_episodes = List of Daria episodes | imdb_id = 0118298 |}} <!-- FAIR USE of Daria-FallDVD-Cover.jpg: see image description page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Daria-FallDVD-Cover.jpg for rationale --> '''''Daria''''' is an American [[List of animated television series|animated television series]] that aired from 1997 to 2002 and was created by [[Glenn Eichler]] and Susie Lewis Lynn for [[MTV]]. The series was a [[Spin-off (media)|spin-off]] of MTV's animated ''[[Beavis and Butt-head]]'' (1993-1997). ==History== Daria's first appearances were as an occasional character in ''Beavis and Butt-head''. When this series was in its last season, MTV representatives approached [[story editor]] Glenn Eichler, offering a spin-off series for Daria. A short pilot, "Sealed with a Kick", was created under Eichler and ''Beavis and Butt-head'' staffer Susie Lewis. MTV gave a [[greenlight]] for a full series order of 13 episodes. Eichler and Lewis became executive producers.<ref>''Daria'' Frequently Asked Questions at [http://www.outpost-daria.com/faq.html Outpost Daria]; accessed [[December 6]], [[2007]].</ref> The first episode of ''Daria'' aired on March 3, 1997 (about nine months before ''Beavis and Butt-head'' ended its original run). Titled "Esteemsters", it featured Daria's previously unseen family, the Morgendorffers, settling into their new hometown of Lawndale (having moved from Highland, the setting for ''Beavis and Butt-head''). Now given center stage, Daria's [[Cynicism|cynical]] and often abrasive personality became stronger. In May 1997, Ted Drozdowski of the ''[[Boston Phoenix]]'' praised ''Daria'' for having "taken up the torch," since ''Beavis and Butt-head'' had become "reduced to self-parody of their self-parody."<ref>"[http://bostonphoenix.com/archive/tv/97/05/TEN_REASONS.html Eye pleasers]," ''[[Boston Phoenix]]''</ref> The series ran for five seasons with 13 episodes each, and two TV movies. The first movie, "[[Is It Fall Yet?]]", aired in 2000. MTV requested a sixth season (reports vary as to its length), but at Eichler's request this project was cut down to a second TV movie, "[[Is It College Yet?]]", which served as the [[series finale]] in January 2002. ==Plot and setting== As a running television series with mostly self-contained episodes, ''Daria'' had very few running plotlines, relying mainly on a familiar established premise to build episode-length stories upon. The basic premise was that of an overtly-cynical teenage girl dealing with day-to-day life in her American suburban town, Lawndale. All that is known about the town's location is that it is somewhere in the continental [[United States]], with [[California]], [[Texas]], [[Maryland]], [[New Jersey]], [[upstate New York]], [[Virginia]] and [[Connecticut]] being popular fan guesses of its exact area. According to show creator Glenn Eichler in an interview with fan Kara Wild, "I thought the Morgendorffers lived in a mid-Atlantic suburb, outside somewhere like [[Baltimore]]. They could have lived in Pennsylvania near the [[Pennsylvania Main Line|Main Line]], though." For comedic and illustrative purposes, the show's depiction of [[Suburbia|suburban]] American life was a deliberately exaggerated one. Daria's hometown of Lawndale was filled with stereotyped personalities of all kinds, and Daria herself served as the series' observer. The show follows Daria through her high school years, ending with her graduation and acceptance into college. Daria and her best friend [[Jane Lane (Daria)|Jane Lane]] share their droll observations about their school's flaws. Though Daria initially has a crush on Jane's brother [[Trent Lane|Trent]], her attraction remains unrequited, as she never reveals this to him. Trent, on the other hand, doesn't make it entirely clear whether or not he regards Daria only as a friend. At the end of season 3, they have a conversation that functions as an implicit acknowledgment that it wouldn't work out if they tried dating. The dynamics among the characters change during season 4, when Jane begins a relationship with Tom Sloane, son of one of the town's richest families. Though Daria is hesitant to accept Tom at first, she and Tom find themselves becoming closer, culminating in a kiss in the final episode of season 4. The emotional and comedic turmoil among Jane, Tom, and Daria largely fuels the remainder of the series' stories as well as formed the centerpiece of the movie "[[Is It Fall Yet?]]". [[Image:Dariatitle.jpg|thumb|right|From left to right: Jake, Helen, Quinn, Daria, and Jane.]] ==Characters== {{main|List of characters in Daria}} ''Daria'' featured a large ensemble cast. [[Daria Morgendorffer]] was the show's eponymous protagonist. Her [[List of characters in Daria#The Morgendorffer Family|immediate family]] and best friend Jane Lane all appear in nearly every episode. ==Music and licensing== ''Daria'''s theme song is "You're Standing on My Neck", written and performed by all-female band [[Splendora]].<ref name="splendora1">An extended version is played in the closing credits of the ''Daria's Inferno'' [[video game]].</ref> The band later created original themes for the two ''Daria'' TV movies, "Turn the Sun Down" (for "Is It Fall Yet?") and "College Try (Gives Me Blisters)" (for "Is It College Yet?"), along with some background music. Notably, however, the show itself had no regular score. Though elements from Splendora's theme were used on occasion, ''Daria''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s incidental music was taken from [[pop music]] songs. Most of these were very recent (lending some credibility to the show's airing on MTV), inserted over exterior shots and some scenes, with rarely any story relevance or awareness from the characters. For example, one episode depicts characters dancing to [[Will Smith]]'s "[[Gettin' Jiggy wit It]]" mere weeks after the song's release, whereas the sequence itself was designed and animated months in advance. Some story points were built around specific songs, such as in "Legends of the Mall", where [[Cyndi Lauper]]'s "[[Girls Just Want to Have Fun]]" became a major plot point for a fantasy sequence. The ending credits also featured a licensed song on all but a few occasions. (These choices often did comment on some aspect of the preceding episode.) Though a spectacle for its time, the use of so many songs by different recording artists has created countless licensing problems in making ''Daria'' available for home video much like the problems concerning the classic series ''[[WKRP in Cincinnati]]''. As early as its 1998 and 1999 [[VHS]] releases, incidental music was replaced by no-name filler, and the end credits rolled over "You're Standing on My Neck". The same strategy was used for the bonus episodes of the program that were featured on the [[DVD]] releases of the program's TV movies. Further complications have arisen with the market demand for "complete" editions of [[Television program|TV show]] seasons. As ''Daria''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s run spanned the period immediately before the boom of [[Television|TV]]-on-[[DVD]], this problem could not have been foreseen during production, and is a testament to the show's status as pre-[[Internet generation|iGeneration]]. Unauthorized [[Bootleg recording|bootlegs]] circulate among collectors and are sold on some websites. ==Production details== * Many of the voice talents for ''Daria'' were recruited from among MTV staff (including [[Tracy Grandstaff]] as Daria) and from high schools and colleges in [[New York City]]. * After the show had become popular, rumors circulated stating that actress [[Janeane Garofalo]] provided the voice for Daria. Garofalo later stated that she was flattered to be considered "cool enough" to be the voice. She played upon this, and her similarity in appearance to Daria, when she hosted a half-hour "behind the scenes" MTV feature about the production of the show that aired during the fourth season. * Production of each half-hour episode took ten months to a year, from concept, story, voices, and design (at MTV's New York offices), to generating the animation (at a [[Korea]]n company), to post-production. * No other characters from ''Beavis and Butt-head'' made an appearance on ''Daria''. Glenn Eichler, in an interview conducted after the series' run, explained: {{cquote|B&B were very strong characters, with a very specific type of humor and very loyal fans, and of course they were instantly identifiable. I felt that referencing them in ''Daria'', while we were trying to establish the new characters and the different type of humor, ran the risk of setting up false expectations and disappointment in the viewers - which could lead to a negative reaction to the new show and its different tone. So we steered clear of B&B in the early going, and once the new show was established, there was really no need to hearken back to the old one."<ref name="glenninterview1"> {{cite web |url = http://www.the-wildone.com/dvdaria/glennfollowup2.html |title = DVDaria Blog - Follow-up Questions with Glenn Eichler}}</ref>}} * The series' only direct reference to the characters of Beavis and Butt-head was made in a promotion spot for the first cablecast episode. Daria states, in voice-over: {{cquote|After leaving Highland, and ''those two'', we moved to Lawndale.}} * In the TV movie "Is It Fall Yet?", several celebrities provided guest voices. Talk show host [[Carson Daly]] played Quinn's summer tutor, female [[punk rock]] [[singer]] [[Bif Naked]] played Jane's art camp companion, and [[Rock music|rock]] [[musician]] [[Dave Grohl]] played Jane's pretentious art camp host. The band [[Foo Fighters]] (for which Grohl is frontman) featured several songs on the series. ==Satirizing popular culture== One of the show's primary objectives was to exaggeratedly portray and subsequently mock general [[popular culture]]. This was done by surrounding the character of Daria, who embodied cynicism, an intellectual bent, and anti-social feelings, with extreme stereotypical personalities, reflective of the culture of a teenage generation (see characters [[Quinn Morgendorffer|Quinn]], [[Kevin Thompson (Daria)|Kevin]], [[Fashion Club#Stacy Rowe|Stacy]]). Specific aspects of pop culture that were satirized include cultural obsessions with [[self image]] and [[fashion]], the favoring of [[sport]]ing achievement over academic or artistic accomplishments, and the general conformist mentality of Daria's peers and even the upper middle class suburban community she lived in. Though the show's satirical nature was omnipresent, ''Daria'' would rarely directly reference specific facets of pop culture, such as particular TV shows or bands (apart from the musical underscore, which deliberately consisted of nothing but pop songs). After each episode, credits would roll on one half of the screen, and the other would display series characters drawn out of character (termed by fans as "alter egos"). They ranged from Tiffany as a [[Pokémon]], to Quinn's constant followers (Joey, Jeffy, and Jamie) as the three main characters from the movie ''[[O Brother, Where Art Thou?]]'', to Jane as the [[Statue of Liberty]]. Nearly all the episode titles are puns, such as on common phrases ("[[Pinch hitter|Pinch Sitter]]"), on famous TV shows or films ("[[It Happened One Night|It Happened One Nut]]"), or, in one case, on a band's name ("[[Jane's Addiction|Jane's Addition]]"). The only TV program Daria is shown to watch regularly is ''[[Sick, Sad World]]'', the ''Daria'' team's spoof of sensationalist oddity programs. Usually, only a preview or commercial-break bumper for ''SSW'' was shown before Daria turned it off or other action ensued. In "Just Add Water", Daria and Jane were shown trying to watch an all-night ''SSW'' marathon. Occasionally Daria zaps from one channel to another, which are showing common TV shows. For example, a clip meant to satirically suggest the series ''[[Charlie's Angels]]'' is shown in "Murder, She Snored", before a dream sequence begins (which itself satirizes various famous series). ==Airing information== ''Daria'' was first shown on MTV in the United States. Reruns were carried from 2002 to 2006 on the teen-oriented cable channel [[The N]]. Many American ''Daria'' fans have reported that these reruns were edited for content, often making remaining portions confusing, or removing much of the satirizing, subplots, and [[subtext]]. A [http://www.outpost-daria.com/ts_iify.html detailed report] is available of the removal of single words to entire scenes from "Is It Fall Yet?". Some episodes were added to The N's rotation in 2005, described as "The Lost Episodes," but several others were never shown. The rights to show ''Daria'' have been bought by many broadcasters outside the U.S. [[MTV Two]] and [[The Music Factory]] show it in the [[United Kingdom|UK]], as does the [[Australian Broadcasting Corporation|ABC]] in [[Australia]] (formerly on [[MTV Australia|MTV]] as well). ==Videos and DVDs== Seven VHS tapes have been issued, all of them in [[PAL]] format, but only the first two of them in [[NTSC]] format. The first tape, titled simply ''Daria'', includes the animatic pilot. Two DVDs are available, of the ''Daria'' TV movies "Is It Fall Yet?" and "Is It College Yet?". Each DVD includes two episodes from the series, but these episodes have all of their music removed except for the opening theme. The "College" DVD uses a shortened second-showing MTV version (by about seven minutes), not the originally cablecast version. It does, however, include a short clip of a Daria appearance on ''Beavis and Butt-head'' as a hidden "[[Easter egg (virtual)|Easter egg]]". These DVDs were ostensibly [[DVD region code|coded for Region One]] ([[North America]]), but found by purchasers to be region-free. More information is available on [http://www.sylvesternet.freeserve.co.uk/members/books/daria/video.htm this page]. A viewer [http://www.dvdaria.info campaign] has been made over several years for a DVD release of every episode, uncut. As of [[February 27]], [[2008]], 4,584 people had voted for ''Daria'' at [http://www.tvshowsondvd.com/showinfo.cfm?showID=323 TV Shows on DVD] (registration required to view), bringing the show to third in the list of most-wanted unreleased TV-show DVDs. In July 2004, fan Michelle Klein-Hass reported that MTV was investigating options for a DVD release of more ''Daria'' episodes.<ref name="alt.tv.daria1"> {{cite web |url = http://groups-beta.google.com/group/alt.tv.daria/msg/149bca9a47a14448 |title = Posting on alt.tv.daria, "Hold onto your hats, this is big ..."}}</ref> She quoted co-creator Glenn Eichler as saying: "[T]here's no distributor and no release date but what there is, is very strong interest from MTV in putting ''Daria'' out, and steady activity toward making that a reality."<ref name="alt.tv.daria1" /><ref name="dvdrelease1"> {{cite web |url = http://www.outpost-daria.com/daria_on_dvd.html |title = Outpost Daria - Daria on DVD}}</ref> ==Books== * ''The Daria Database'' by Peggy Nicoll; MTV 1998 ISBN 0-671-02596-1 * ''The Daria Diaries'' by Anne Bernstein; MTV 1998 ISBN 0-671-01709-8 These books, by two of the most prolific writers of ''Daria'' episodes, have comedic and satirical material based upon the show as aired, but (apart from character guides in ''Diaries'') are not reference works. ==Games== * ''Daria's Sick Sad Life Planner''; Pearson Software, 1999 * ''Daria's Inferno''; Pearson Software, 2000, later distributed by Simon & Schuster Interactive ==References== {{reflist}} ==External links== {{wikiquote}} ====Websites==== * [http://www.mtv.com/onair/daria/ Official site] at MTV, no longer updated or maintained. * [http://www.outpost-daria.com/ Outpost Daria], the longest-running and largest fan-created site (since 1998), with archives of essays, media coverage, fan fiction, and fan art. * [http://www.lawndaleonline.com/index.php Lawndale Online], with news and information about the series and its fandom. Visitors can comment on any material posted on the site. * [http://www.dariawiki.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page DariaWiki], the Daria Fandom Wiki, mainly about creations of and personalities among fans. * ''[http://www.bcdb.com/cartoons/Other_Studios/M/MTV_Productions/Daria/index.html Daria]'' at the [[Big Cartoon DataBase]] * {{ imdb title | id=0118298 | title=Daria (1997-2001 TV-series) }} * {{ imdb title | id=0250440 | title=Is It Fall Yet? (2000 TV-movie) }} * {{ imdb title | id=0285627 | title=Is It College Yet? (2002 TV-movie) }} ====Blogs, forums and news sources==== * [http://www.dvdaria.info DVDaria] (prospects and actions for a full-series release on DVD) * [http://thepaperpusher.net/forum/index.php Paperpusher Message Board] (series and DVD news, discussion forums, fanworks) * [http://dariablog2.blogspot.com/ Daria Fandom Blog II] (fandom news, fanworks updates, commentary, large related-links list by category) {{Daria}} [[Category:1990s American television series]] [[Category:2000s American television series]] [[Category:1997 television series debuts]] [[Category:2002 television series endings]] [[Category:Animated television series]] [[Category:Beavis and Butt-head]] [[Category:Daria]] [[Category:MTV cartoons]] [[Category:Teen dramas]] [[Category:Television spin-offs]] [[cs:Daria]] [[da:Daria]] [[de:Daria (Zeichentrickserie)]] [[es:Daria]] [[fr:Daria]] [[hr:Daria]] [[it:Daria]] [[he:דריה (סדרת טלוויזיה)]] [[nl:Daria]] [[pl:Daria (kreskówka)]] [[ru:Дарья (сериал)]] [[fi:Daria]]