Evil Con Carne, The Grim Adventures of Billy, Whatever Happened to Robo, What a Cartoon!, Time Squad
Grim & Evil is an American animated television series created by Maxwell Atoms for Cartoon Network, and the 11th of the network's Cartoon Cartoons. It consisted of two segments which were eventually spun off into their own series, The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy and Evil Con Carne.
The series' existence is largely the result of a viewer poll. An Internet and call-in event called the Big Pick was held from June 16 to August 25, 2000. The three final choices were Grim & Evil, Whatever Happened to... Robot Jones?, and Longhair and Doubledome. Out of the three, Grim & Evil won the poll with 57% of the vote and became its own series. The first season appeared on Cartoon Network to kick off the "Cartoon Cartoon Fridays Big Pick Weekend" on August 24, 2001. Whatever Happened to... Robot Jones? would later be made into a full (though short-lived) series despite losing; Longhair and Doubledome would reappear with another pilot episode in another Big Pick-style show in 2002, only to fall short once again.
In 2003, the network separated the series into The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy and Evil Con Carne, effectively giving both a full-length series. The short-lived Evil Con Carne series was cancelled once all the already-made episodes were aired. In 2004, Evil Con Carne was given another short-lived run with the newly created intro and end credits, only to be canceled again. Grim & Evil, in its original form, has not been seen on TV since 2003 (although the theme song has been seen on The Cartoon Cartoon Show and reruns appear on Cartoon Planet). Some characters from Evil Con Carne, usually Skarr, occasionally appeared on The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy. Skarr was a co-star in Underfist, the TV film set in the shared universe of the programs.
The series aired again in October 29, 2010, for the first time in seven years, but the title sequence did not play at all and all of the cartoons were three Billy & Mandy cartoons from the Grim & Evil era.
The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy
The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy is a series about two neighborhood kids, moronic yet enthusiastic Billy and emotionless Mandy who force the Grim Reaper to be their best friend forever after defeating the Messenger of Death in a game of Limbo. This is the main segment, as two The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy episodes are wrapped around an episode of Evil Con Carne (or, on rare episodes, vice versa).
Evil Con Carne
Evil Con Carne is a series about an aspiring dictator obsessed with taking over the world, whose disembodied brain is transplanted onto the head of a slowwitted circus bear. This is usually the backup to The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy as Evil Con Carne is put between two The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy cartoons. On occasion, the format is reversed, with a two-part Evil Con Carne cartoon sandwiching one The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy cartoon.
The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy
The Grim Reaper (voiced by Greg Eagles): He is over 137,000 years old (as his early childhood took place during the Stone Age) and speaks with a Jamaican accent. The continuity of how Grim got his reaper status and powers jumps around quite a few times and it is unknown which way he really got his powers (For example, in The Spider Queen, he was elected to his position as the Grim Reaper while he was in middle school; however, in "A Grim Prophecy", it is shown that he was the Grim Reaper since his childhood with his parents forcing him to be the Reaper, which is revealed to be all a dream and further contradicted in a later episode where he is seen stumbling over his scythe to become Grim Reaper). His scythe is the source of his powers and possesses many magical qualities; although he is still capable of using magic without it, these instances are quite rare.
Billy (voiced by Richard Horvitz): He is an 8-year-old happy-go-lucky child with an extremely low IQ of −5. He was outperformed by a shovel and a candy necklace on an IQ test. He has an extremely large, pink nose, wears a blue and white striped shirt, and covers his orange hair with a red hat. His main affiliations are Grim and Mandy. Mandy is Billy's best friend, though she treats him more like a servant than a friend. It has been hinted several times that Billy may have underlying feelings for Mandy that even he (in his stupidity) may not fully realize. Billy is definitely kinder to Grim than Mandy is, and while he may go against the Reaper's advice and use him as a plaything, he appears to genuinely like him. Of the two children, Billy is the one who most often tells Grim that he's his "best friend".
Mandy (voiced by Grey DeLisle): a girl about Billy's age who has (mostly) a morbid, cynical and merciless attitude. However, unlike Billy, she is more stable, sane and intelligent. She hates everything, especially unicorns. She'll punch or otherwise injure (physically, emotionally, mentally or any combination of the three) anyone who gets in her way. She is Billy's "best friend" regardless of the awful way she treats him. She is known for rarely smiling; the one occasion on which this happens, it causes reality to fall apart. She orders Grim and Billy to do chores for her, among a slew of other grunt work. She is naturally hostile and cynical and is shown in one episode to have physical difficulty saying the word "please". She never smiles, except in "Meet the Reaper", "Opposite Day", "Look Alive!", "A Dumb Wish", "Something Stupid This Way Comes" and "Dream A Little Dream" where she does crack a smile.
Evil Con Carne
Hector Con Carne (voiced by Phil LaMarr): He is a dynamic, evil playboy type, reduced to an anthropomorphic brain and a stomach after a gigantic explosion. Somehow, the stomach has taken on a life of its own. He is often frustrated by the difficulty of taking over the world in its current state.
Major Dr. Ghastly (voiced by Grey DeLisle): A mad scientist, Ghastly is the brains behind all Hector's plans. Ghastly does not really seem to be intent on taking over the world; she is more interested in inventing things and getting closer to Hector.
General Skarr (voiced by Lance Henriksen, then by Armin Shimerman): Con Carne's paramilitary leader. He is a cold-hearted, hateful and harsh man, with a scar on his face, and one eye. He tends to be more evil than Con Carne himself, many times trying to overthrow his leader. He has made several appearances on Maxwell Atoms' other show, "The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy", as Billy's next door neighbor. He has also starred in the Billy & Mandy spin-off, Underfist. Skarr seems to resemble Fearless Leader, Herr Starr and General Armin Skull. It has been stated that he quit working for Hector Con Carne after they were "bought out" by the cartoon industry because they didn't want the competition in world domination.
Boskov (voiced by Frank Welker): A former Russian circus bear, Boskov carries Con Carne's brain and stomach on his body, via metal plates on said spots. He is usually controlled by Con Carne and seems to care for everyone around him. He is sometimes difficult to control due to his animal instincts and lack of intelligence.
Stomach (voiced by Armin Shimerman): This former stomach of Hector Con Carne will only talk if it's about food.
