Given "Mac Daddy"'s fame and significance in the
Foster's library, I sometimes feel a little bad for not liking it more than I do; maybe that's why I find myself watching it so often, but still never quite getting it. The first half of the episode is great, I must say; the opening scene is one of the funniest ever, yes, but what I like about the first ten minutes or so is that it's mostly focused on the other characters talking about and reacting to Cheese, with the man himself hovering in the periphery like a particularly insane background detail. After that it gets a little too Cheese-centric for my tastes; his mumbly deadpan moments are very funny (I really like his default blank stare, as well as his "okay" and his "hi, bunny"), but they're largely outweighed by his random screamy moments, which I'm less keen on. Bloo does get a few good character moments later on, for sure, but I do prefer "Bloo's The Boss" as an exploration of the "Bloo takes responsibility" theme...I guess I find Chuck the cat easier to cope with than Cheese.
This one's still OK, but having rewatched them all again, I still find myself in the minority who rate "The Big Cheese" as Cheese's best outing. I mean, I know he was probably even screamier in that than he was here, but my favourite aspect of Cheese episodes is watching the other characters trying to interact with him; where "The Big Cheese" excelled was in the ingenious way it made those interactions the basis of the whole plot, creating a scenario in which their attempts to deal with Cheese became both the cause of
and the solution to all of their problems. Shame that "Cheese A Go-Go" couldn't build on that clever work...still, "Mac Daddy" remains a hugely important episode, so I have to give it its dues.
