Regular Show: The Movie

Regular Show: The Movie
Premiere date:	August 14, 2015 (Downtown Independent) September 1, 2015 (Digital) October 13, 2015 (DVD) November 25, 2015 (TV)
Running Time:	68 minutes
Production
Produced by:	Ryan Slater
Directed by:	J.G. Quintel
Written by:	Sean Szeles J. G. Quintel Calvin Wong Andres Salaff Mike Roth Benton Connor John Infantino Owen Dennis Toby Jones
Story by:	J.G. Quintel Matt Price John Infantino Mike Roth Michele Calvin Sean Szeles
Screenplay by:	J.G. Quintel Sean Szeles
Music by:	Mark Mothersbaugh John Enroth Albert Fox
Relevant articles

"Save the universe from yourselves, or you're fired" -Tagline

Regular Show: The Movie is an animated movie based on Regular Show. It had its television world premiere on November 25, 2015, on Cartoon Network.

The movie first screened on August 14, 2015, at the Downtown Independent in Los Angeles, where it screened for a week.

Production

The movie was confirmed in the Cartoon Network 2015 Upfront in February. It's a feature-length film and was released during November 2015. The film had a budget of $6 million and the box office is $44 million, making it a box office hit before one year of Sausage Party directed by Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernan.

The 68-minute animated feature became available for digital download on September 1 on electronic sell-through platforms (iTunes, Google Play Movies & TV, Amazon Instant Video, Xbox Video, PlayStation Video, VUDU, and others). The DVD was released by Warner Home Video on October 13, but bonus content is available in both the digital download version and DVD.

Synopsis

After a high school lab experiment goes horribly wrong, and accidentally creating a Timenado, the universe is on the verge of being destroyed and it’s up to Mordecai and Rigby to go back in time and make the things right, battle an evil volleyball coach in order to save the universe — and their friendship.

Plot

Future

Rigby leads a rebellion squadrent (consisting of Benson, Skips, Hi-Five Ghost, Muscle Man, and Pops) against an evil cyborg named Mr. Ross and his army when he is erasing time. When Rigby and his team reach Ross himself, he reveals himself to be in possession of a weapon, the future version of Mordecai, who is a cyborg himself and has discovered a transgression Rigby did to him in the past and attempts to kill him. When the team gets incapacitated, Benson sacrifices himself in order for Rigby to get to a space ship/time-machine to head to the past to stop the chaos. Just as Rigby is about to travel back in time, Mordecai shows up and shoots Rigby when the latter hit the time travel button.

Present

In the present Mordecai and Rigby barely keep themselves from being fired when they run late for work. When the space ship from the future shows up and crashes into the ground, future Rigby appears and tells the employees that when Mordecai and Rigby were in high school, they created a time machine that backfired and destroyed, but created a tornado called the "Timenado" and that they got expelled for blowing up the science lab. Also, the future Rigby reveals that Mordecai shot him, shocking the park residences that Mordecai and Rigby have receded their relationship. Then future Rigby tells his younger self to not do the same mistake he did before he died

Back in the house, the guys ponder over what could have caused Mordecai and Rigby's breakup as friends and they conclude that they would just have to go with the plan and head back to the past to set things right. After preparing, they board future Rigby's time ship and head back 4 years earlier while Mordecai and Rigby were still in high school.

Past

The group manage to get to the past (6 years in to be exact) but wind up damaging the engines in the process. Skips, Muscle Man, and High Five Ghost stay behind to fix the ship while Benson and Pops follow Mordecai and Rigby in finding the time machine. They succeed in slipping in but are forced to split up when they confronted by the volleyball team. With no other options, Mordecai and Rigby are forced to get help from their past selves, who have access to the science lab because Mr. Ross, who was feuding with Rigby after his antics cost the team the championship, was forced by Principal Dean to allow Rigby to do an extra credit assignment in order to pass. The extra credit assignment was the time machine Mr. Ross was creating. He was creating it for two reasons: go back in time and win the volleyball state championship and to "get revenge". After successfully convincing past Rigby to create a model volcano instead, the past selves leave the lab, giving the present pair enough time to destroy the time machine. Pops and Benson arrive late to the carnage, all beaten and bruised after their volleyball jock encounter.

The group, assuming the work was over, head back to spaceship/time machine only to find the repairs stalled due to an encounter with Muscle Man and High Five Ghost's past selves. Complicating matters further is that temporal ruptures begin appearing just as the repairs are finished. Rigby, who had slipped away earlier, alerts them to the fact that past Mordecai and Rigby are heading to the high school to finish a second time machine Mr. Ross planted. The employees race back to the science lab but are quickly incapacitated by Mr. Ross and future Mordecai, allowing past Mordecai and Rigby to botch the time machine and create the Timenado. Mr. Ross then forces Rigby to admit the truth: he never got into College U but Mordecai did and he faked Mordecai's rejection letter in order to maintain their friendship. Mr. Ross then tries to kill Mordecai in the confusion, but future Mordecai intervenes, taking a heavy wound and forcing Mr. Ross to retreat.

Furious over the duplicity, Mordecai ends his friendship with Rigby by yelling at him and hurting his feelings, forcing Rigby to run off with the spaceship/time machine. Before dying, future Mordecai gives his present version his ship (which is also a time machine) and tells him to patch things up, saying what Rigby did was no excuse to side with Ross. As the group tries to rebound, a distress call from future Gene the Vending Machine prompts them to help out. Meanwhile, after a failed suicide attempt to drive into the sun, Rigby encounters Father Time, who is falling apart due to the Timenado and is convinced to apologize to Mordecai. Rigby heads to the future and races back to the Timenado but gets intercepted along with Mordecai by Mr. Ross at the crystal core. With Techmo's help, the duo manages to decapitate Ross and, after Rigby and Mordecai repair their friendship, destroying the Timenado. They later convince past Rigby to apologize to past Mr. Ross before he's arrested, thus ending the issues between them and altering the future.

Back in the present, Mordecai and Rigby agree that, despite how cool their future selves turned out, they won't let their friendship degrade to them trying to kill each other, thus erasing their future selves from the timeline. The next day, as Benson catches them away from the park, the pair race back in future Rigby's spaceship/time machine with Rigby saying they'll "never be late again".

Cast

• J.G. Quintel as Mordecai and High Five Ghost
• William Salyers as Rigby
• Mark Hamill as Skips
• Sam Marin as Benson, Pops, and Muscle Man
• Jason Mantzoukas as Mr. Ross
• David Koechner as Principal Dean
• Minty Lewis as Eileen
• Roger Craig Smith as Francis Jablonski, Frank Smith, Fast Food Guy
• Ali Hillis as Ship Computer, Rigby's Mom
• Kurtwood Smith as Gene
• Eddie Pepitone as Sherm
• Paul F. Tompkins as Gino
• Fred Tatasciore as Father Time, Security Guard, Timenado Mechanic, Willy, Reporter
• Steve Blum as Techmo, Brit, Commander, TV Game
• Janie Haddad as Margaret

Release

Theatrical release

The movie first screened at the LA Downtown Independent on August 14, 2015, and continued to screen until August 20, 2015. The movie also screened at select Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas across the United States and it had a select showtime at the SVA Theatre of New York and at the Cinema Montrereal CANADA during October 2015.

Television premiere

• After its premiere in France on November 22, 2015, Regular Show: The Movie premiered on November 25, 2015, in the United States on Cartoon Network and premiered on Cartoon Network in the United Kingdom and New Zealand on November 28, 2015. The film premiered in Asia (including the Philippines) on November 30, 2015. The film premiered in Central and Latin America on December 7, 2015. The movie premiered on Cartoon Network in Canada on November 25, 2015.
  • This is the first Cartoon Network Movie to be premiered on another channel of another country before the United States.

Home media release

The film was released to digital on platforms such as iTunes and Google Play Movies & TV on September 1, 2015. The movie was later released to DVD by Warner Home Video on October 13, 2015. The movie has grossed $85,395 in domestic DVD sales.

Characters

• Mordecai
• Rigby
• Benson
• Muscle Man
• Hi Five Ghost
• Skips
• Pops
• Mr. Ross
• Gene
• Techmo
• Father Time
• Eileen
• Principal Dean
• Rigby's Parents
• Future Mordecai
• Future Rigby
• High School Mordecai and Rigby
• Gino
• Future Benson
• Future Skips
• Future Pops
• Future Muscle Man and Hi-Five Ghost
• Past Muscle Man and Hi-Five Ghost
• Past Pops (cameo)
• Past Skips (cameo)
• Past Benson (cameo)
• Security Guard
• Francis Jablonski
• Fast Food Guy
• Timenado Mechanic
• Willy
• Reporter
• Guardians of Eternal Youth (cameo)
• Margaret (cameo)
• Frank Smith (cameo)

Trivia

• This is the first movie based on a Cartoon Network series since "Ed, Edd n Eddy's Big Picture Show" in 2009, and the first one to be released theatrically since "The Powerpuff Girls Movie" back in 2002, but was only shown on a limited number of theatres.
• This is the first Cartoon Network movie to premiere in another country before the United States.
• According to J.G. Quintel, they started production on the movie when they finished writing Season Five and finished it when they began writing Season Eight.
• The original cast reprised their roles in the movie.
• A trailer was first shown at Comic-Con on July 10, 2015.
• On June 11, 2015, J.G. Quintel announced via Twitter that the film had been completed.
• Quintel has also confirmed that the movie is canon and is set in the middle of season six and season seven.
  • Despite this, Mordecai and Rigby are apparently still 23 years old, as 6 years ago they were in their senior year of high school.
• The movie includes three more real-life songs, "March of the Swivel Heads", "The Future's So Bright, I Gotta Wear Shades" and "Pale Blue Eyes".
• The animation of the movie is the same as the show, although CGI was used for the moving spaceships, the Timenado, the time beams, Father Time, as well as the hallway inside the Timenado.
• The real-life show, "Everybody Loves Raymond" is mentioned.
• West Anderson High School may be a reference to the filmmaker Wes Anderson.
• Mordecai and Rigby's designs as teenagers are the same from "A Skips In Time", although Mordecai does not have braces.
• Also, another real-life media referenced by Ross (but not exactly mentioned) in the movie is "Back To The Future".
• The response Mordecai said to Past Mordecai when he asked him if he gets into College U is a callback to the episode "Mordecai and the Rigbys".
  • In the episode, "Wouldn't want to ruin the surprise," is the same response Future Mordecai (the one that turned into a rockstar) said when Mordecai asked about future events. If he got together with Margret to be precise.
    • In each scenario, the phrase meant no. 
• The following is a list of episodes that are seen when Rigby go around the time portals: "Limousine Lunchtime", "Rigby in the Sky With Burrito", "The Real Thomas", "Temp Check", "Death Punchies", "The Power", "Lunch Break" and "Mordecai and the Rigbys".
• This entire movie revolves around destroying the Timenado, which first appeared in "A Skips in Time".
• Originally the movie was supposed to be a 40-minute special, but J.G. Quintel refused and acknowledged Cartoon Network to make it a full movie and both agreed.
• The movie was on the short-list for becoming nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, although it did not get nominated. This also marks it as the first Cartoon Network Feature to come into the Academy Award.
• The movie revealed that Mordecai and Rigby been best friends since they were toddlers.
• The movie focuses more on Rigby than Mordecai.
• Although Rigby is the main protagonist of the movie, ironically, it is Hi-Five Ghost who is the first one to note that strange things were happening, because he tells the others when future Rigby's ship crashed into the park.
• Despite teenage Mordecai and Rigby getting expelled for blowing up the science lab, Mordecai is shown to have still graduated and received a diploma in "More Smarter". It's likely Mordecai's grades were good enough to receive his credits and qualify for graduation, just not attend school or the graduation ceremony. Mordecai also states that he went to a junior college instead.
• A tune similar to Tears for Fears's "Head Over Heels" plays when West Anderson High School first appears, making this sequence a slight reference to the cult movie Donnie Darko.
• When Mordecai and Rigby rush to the park, the situation is a reference to "Ferris Bueller's Day Off". In Fact, the Music was taken directly from the aforementioned movie.
• The movie's future timeline is foreshadowed in some Season 7's episodes, which is soon happening in the finale of that season and all part of the Season 8's storylines. Except it is now in a brand new timeline, retconning some of the previous timeline's fate of Mordecai and Ross' future, thanks to Rigby's atonement.

Goofs

• Muscle Man wants to go to the restroom when he and Hi Five Ghost are guarding the spaceship. When they enter the restroom, Muscle Man's clothes are sucked by the toilet and he gets naked. After they go out of the spaceship, Muscle Man seems not to be naked. But when Muscle Man and HFG go out of the bush, Muscle Man is naked again.
• During the scene in that Mr. Ross forced Rigby to reveals the truth to Mordecai, their past selves were seeing the confession of the present Rigby, yet the past Mordecai and past Rigby were unfazed for the revelation about the lies, leaving a strange plothole because the past Mordecai don't get angry with the past Rigby to learned about his lies of the university, and also, the past Rigby wasn't nervous to see as his lies were being exposed by his present self in front of his best friend.

Reception

Critical response

Regular Show: The Movie received positive reviews from both critics and audiences alike. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film received an average rating of 4.1/5. It also earned a 7.5/10 on IMDb.

Ratings

The movie was watched by 2.17 million viewers and received a 0.5 rating in adults 18-49.

International premiere dates

Country	Airdate	Channel
France	November 22, 2015	Cartoon Network France
USA	November 25, 2015	Cartoon Network USA
Korea	November 25, 2015	Cartoon Network Korea
Portugal	December 26, 2015	Cartoon Network Portugal
UK	November 28, 2015	Cartoon Network UK
Latin America	December 7, 2015	Cartoon Network Latin America
Turkey	December 25, 2015	Cartoon Network Turkey
Central and Eastern Europe	January 16, 2016	Cartoon Network CEE
Germany	January 17, 2016	Cartoon Network Germany
Poland	January 17, 2016	Cartoon Network Poland
Spain	March 20, 2016	Boing Spain
Italy	March 14, 2016	Cartoon Network Italy
Sweden	July 15, 2019