Cartoon
The Life and Times of Juniper Lee

Animal
titular main character

Outfit: blue jeans / green belly-shirt / HAIR JUST LIKE MY WIFE

Tagline: "Hi, my name is Judd Winnick and I only have two life experiences: marrying an Asian lady, and knowing a gay guy with AIDS."

Plot summary: Described repeatedly as "Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets The Simpsons," writer/cartoonist/stranger Judd Winnick's Juniper Lee is an eleven-year old Chinese girl picked to live in a house chosen to be Te Xuan Ze, tasked with maintaining the balance between the human and magic worlds. The show is similar to Buffy the Vampire Slayer because of the familiar concept (young girl is "chosen one" who must fight monsters), familiar plots (missed birthday parties, having to choose between fun and destiny), and familiar characters (Juniper is watched over by an older teacher, her best friend is the smartest girl in school). The show is similar to The Simpsons because it is a cartoon, and because Judd Winnick is on crack and it is nothing like The Simpsons. (more)

User Comments: If comic books these days weren't written exclusively by guys who'd have Sluggo date raping Nancy if they were put in charge of the Sunday comics, Judd Winnick would be the worst comic book writer ever. I wasn't kidding up there when I said he only had two life experiences. After failing at maintaining a successful comic strip (about a clown who OFTEN ACTS RUDELY!) and failing at maintaining a successful comic book (about a 10-year old super genius who OFTEN ACTS RUDELY!), Judd found critical acclaim from people who mattered by writing about the friendship he'd made with Pedro Zamora, his roommate on the San Francisco season of MTV's The Real World (the same place he met his wife, who is Asian-American). Pedro was gay, and had AIDS, and those are two subjects that hadn't really been (and still haven't really been) humanely covered by comics. It was new, and brave. So Judd got a job writing superhero comics!

Since then he has:

- written Green Lantern. Had Green Lantern's 17 year old assistant come out of the closet and be brutally beaten in a homophobic assault. Two GLAAD awards.
- written Green Arrow. Had Green Arrow's 17 year old assistant reveal that she was HIV positive. Was interviewed on CNN.
- written Batman. Brought Jason Todd, the second Robin who died 15 years previously because fans hated him and whose death became a very important part of Batman lore, back to life for no reason. This is gay and has AIDS.
- written a mini-series called "Blood & Water" about a young man with terminal illness (you're kidding) whose two friends reveal to him that they are vampires, and that they wish to save his life by turning him into a vampire himself. This is almost exactly the same plot as "Lie to Me," the 1997 episode of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."
- created a cartoon about an Asian-American girl who is exactly the same as "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."

Thankfully, Cartoon Network put Juniper Lee on hiatus to make room for more shows about kids surrounded by thick black lines who act stupid alongside mythical creatures. Don't worry about Judd's career, though. Check him out in this month's issue of The Amazing Spider-Man, wherein the webslinger must deal with Doctor Octopus putting his robo-tentacles in the peanut butter.

User Rating: 2.2/10 (4,060 votes)