Beavis and Butt-Head

Beavis and Butt-Head is an American animated series created and designed by Mike Judge. The series originated from "Frog Baseball", a 1992 short film created by Judge originally aired on Liquid Television. After seeing the short, MTV signed Judge to develop the concept. The Beavis and Butt-Head television show first ran from March 8, 1993 to November 28, 1997. It was revived in 2011 and new episodes began airing on MTV from October 27, 2011 to December 29, 2011. Later, reruns aired on other Viacom properties, including MTV2, Comedy Central and UPN. In 1996, the series was adapted into the animated feature film Beavis and Butt-head Do America. On July 1, 2020, Comedy Central announced that it was teaming with Mike Judge for a second reboot series, slated to premiere in the third quarter of 2021.

Plot
The show centers on two socially awkward, rock-loving teenage wanna-be delinquents, Beavis and Butt-Head (both voiced by Judge), who live in the town of Highland, Texas. They have no apparent adult supervision at home, and in one episode ("Scientific Stuff") they say that they're not sure if they have the same father or not. They are dim-witted, under-educated and barely literate, and both lack any empathy or moral scruples, even regarding each other. Their most common shared activity is watching music videos, which they tend to judge by deeming them "cool", or by exclaiming, "This sucks!". They also apply these judgments to other things that they encounter, and will usually deem something "cool" if it is associated with violence, sex or the macabre. Despite having no experience with women, their other signature traits are a shared obsession with sex, and their tendency to chuckle whenever they hear words or phrases that can even remotely be construed as sexual or scatological.

Each episode features a handful of interstitial scenes in which the duo view and comment on music videos, with their commentary being improvised by Judge. The rest of the episode would usually depict them embarking on some scheme or adventure. They attend Highland High School, where their teachers are often at a loss as to how to deal with them. In many episodes they skip school altogether. Their actions sometimes have extreme consequences, but often for others, for which they themselves show no remorse whatsoever.

Characters
Beavis (voiced by Mike Judge) — Beavis has an underbite and a fixed countenance, which is almost always shown in 3/4 view. Like Butt-head, Beavis compulsively laughs and grunts. He also has a habit of picking his nose. He is the more excitable of the two; despite his obliviousness to what should be obvious, he is prone to moments of insight. He is more polite and more optimistic than Butt-Head. He often suffers physically in the show, either at the hands of Butt-Head or various other characters or situations. He usually takes the beating and screams in pain before quickly reverting to his trademark laugh. Before controversy erupted, he smoked and he exhibited an obsession with fire and his trademark phrase was "FIRE! FIRE!" which he would utter with a maniacal gaze in his eye. One episode depicted him as having voices in his head, which told him to engage in destructive activities; however, generally he has a passive demeanor in contrast to Butt-Head's more dominant personality. Beavis also wears a blue Metallica shirt with gray shorts. (Beavis's shirt in trademark posters, T-shirts and other merchandise reads "Death Rock".) When Beavis consumes large amounts of caffeine or sugar, he transforms into his hyperactive alter-ego, Cornholio.

Butt-head (voiced by Mike Judge) — Butt-head has squinty eyes and a drooping nose with prominent nostrils. He has a prominent overbite, speaks nasally with a deep voice and wears braces, giving him a slight lisp. He begins almost every statement with "Uhhhhhh..." and ends with his short trademark laugh, "Uh huh huh huh". Calmer, though cockier, older and marginally more intelligent than Beavis, Butt-Head is oblivious to subtlety of any sort and is usually completely confident in everything he says and does, no matter how ridiculous or frivolous it is—unless it has to do with girls, in which case he either wavers or comes on too strongly. His trademark phrase when approaching women is "Hey baby." As the more dominant personality of the duo, he seems to derive pleasure from regularly abusing Beavis. Butt-Head rarely gets perceptibly angry about anything, his usual expression of dissatisfaction being a resigned "This sucks! huh huh huh." He also frequently has to try to calm the more mercurial Beavis down, either telling him to "settle down, Beavis! huh huh huh," or in more drastic cases, slap him. Butt-Head also wears a gray AC/DC shirt with red shorts. (Butt-Head's shirt in other media reads "Skull.") Judge has stated he got the idea for the name "Butt-Head" from two people he knew during his childhood called "Iron Butt" (who encouraged people to kick him in the butt to demonstrate his strength) and "Head-Butt."

Episodes
Beavis and Butt-head originally had a total of 200 11-minute segments spread over 8 seasons that were produced from March 1993 to November 1997. Each half-hour episode contains 2 separate Beavis and Butt-head segments. The series was revived in 2011, for an eighth season, consisting of 22 segments, bringing the total number of segments up to 222.

The series also had four holiday specials, including: The Halloween special, titled "Bungholio: Lord of the Harvest" (Butt-O-Ween), a Christmas special "A Very Special Christmas With Beavis and Butt-head", a second Christmas special "A Beavis and Butt-Head Christmas," and the MTV Thanksgiving Special "Beavis and Butt-Head Do Thanksgiving".

Feature Film
In 1996, a full-length film featuring the duo titled Beavis and Butt-Head Do America was released in theaters. The film features the voices of Bruce Willis, Demi Moore, Cloris Leachman, Robert Stack, Eric Bogosian, Richard Linklater, Greg Kinnear (in an uncredited role), and David Letterman (credited as Earl Hofert). It gained mostly positive reviews from film critics and a "two thumbs up" from Siskel and Ebert. The film earned over $60 million at the domestic box office, a strong return for a film that cost only $5 million to produce.

Daria Spin-off
In 1997, a spin-off series based on Beavis and Butt-head's classmate Daria Morgendorffer, titled Daria, was created. Mike Judge was not credited as a producer of this series and has said he was not involved with it at all, except to give permission for the use of the character. The Daria character had been created for Beavis and Butt-Head by Glenn Eichler and originally designed by Bill Peckmann of J.J. Sedelmaier Productions, Inc. Eichler then became a producer for Daria. In the first episode of Daria, she and her family move from Beavis and Butt-Head's hometown of Highland to Lawndale—the only references to the original show is a single mention of Highland in the first episode, with Daria saying Lawndale can't be a second Highland "unless there's uranium in the drinking water here too".

2011 Revival
On July 14, 2010, a spokesperson for MTV Networks informed a New York Post reporter that Mike Judge was creating a new Beavis and Butt-Head series, that Judge would reprise his voice-acting roles for the show, and that the animation would be hand-drawn.

As in the old series, Beavis and Butt-head are high school students who, among other things, criticize contemporary music videos. In an interview with Rolling Stone, MTV president Van Toffler said that the duo will also watch Jersey Shore, Ultimate Fighting Championship matches, and amateur videos from YouTube, as well as give movie reviews. "The biggest change is obviously the updated references, it's set in modern day, and there's going to be a movie review segment," Linn said. "Otherwise they're still true to their prior passions."

John Altschuler, formerly a writer for King of the Hill, told a Rolling Stone reporter that he saw signs that Mike Judge was thinking of reviving Beavis and Butt-head. On more than one occasion, Judge told the writers that one of their ideas for an episode of King of the Hill would work well for Beavis and Butt-head; eventually he concluded, "Maybe we should just actually make some good Beavis and Butt-head episodes." Later, a Lady Gaga video convinced Van Toffler of the tenability of a Beavis and Butt-head revival: "I felt like there was a whole crop of new artists—and what the world sorely missed was the point-of-view that only Beavis and Butt-Head could bring."

As part of a promotional campaign for the new series, cinemas screening Jackass 3D opened the feature film with a 3-D Beavis and Butt-head short. Months later, in a media presentation on February 2, 2011, MTV announced that the series would premiere in mid-2011. On July 21, 2011 Mike Judge spoke and fielded questions on a panel at Comic-Con International. A preview of the episode "Holy Cornholio" was also shown. Judge told Rolling Stone that at least 24 episodes (12 half-hour programs) will definitely air.

The new episodes debuted in the United States and Canada on October 27, 2011. The premiere was dubbed a ratings hit, with an audience of 3.3 million total viewers. This number eventually dwindled to 900,000 by the season's end, mainly due to its challenging time slot pitted against regular prime time shows on other networks. From April 24, 2012 to May 1, 2013, the show remained on the bubble for renewal. No official decision had been made. According to Mike Judge, MTV's modern demographic are females 12–14 years old, and the network is looking for other networks to ship the show to.