Brian A. Miller Movies

A former cop goes to work at a mafia strip club after being released from prison, and races to solve a vicious crime before he takes the fall in this hard-hitting action thriller starring WWF brawler Dave Bautista (aka Batista). Ray (Bautista) used to uphold the law; now he's fallen on the wrong side of it. But he's served his sentence, and he's content just taking things one day at a time. In order to earn a little extra income, Ray takes a job as the head of security at The House of the Rising Sun, an underworld strip club that also houses an illicit gambling den. When a savage gang of thieves strike fast and hard, the police finger Ray as the mastermind of the violent robbery. Now, in order to regain his honor and avoid ending up back in prison, Ray must catch the real culprits, before the police catch up with him. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

The brainchild of Rocko's Modern Life creator Joe Murray, the half-hour animated series Camp Lazlo was set at a summer camp populated by goofy-looking anthropomorphic animals. Most of the "Bean Scouts" at Camp Kidney were willing to follow orders and toe the line, which was just the way that Scoutmaster Lumpus, a egocentric, control-freak moose, preferred to have things. Unfortunately for Lumpus, he had to contend with the rule-bending shenanigans that went on in the camp's "Jelly Cabin". Ringleader for the troublemakers was Bean Scout Lazlo, a mischievous monkey; his best friends and co-conspirators were Raj, an adolescent elephant, and Clam, a pygmy rhino. To counteract the hijinks of Lazlo and his buddies, Lumpus kept a pair of obnoxious snitches at his beck and call: Slinkman, a nerdish banana slug; Edward, a snotty, anal-retentive Platypus; and Edward's own flunkeys, the dung beetles (Chip and Skip). Some of the episodes focused on the great rivalry between Camp Kindey and the all-girl Squirrel Scouts in the camp on the other side of Leakey Lake. Foremost among the Squirrel Scouts were Gretchen the alligator, Nina the giraffe, and Patsy the mongoose, who had a crush on Lazlo (and frequently crushed him in her enthusiasm!) A good, old-fashioned exercise in harmless cartoon nihilism, Camp Lazlo premiered July 8, 2005, on the Cartoon Network. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The title character of this half hour animated series was a gigantic reconditioned robot. Young coach potato Coop had rescued the robot from a junkyard where it had been rusting away for 60 years, then retooled the pile of metal to create the world's largest plaything. At this point, young Kiva, a visitor from the future, appeared before Coop and demanded that he surrender Megas XLFR to her. According to Kiva, the robot was essential in saving the "present" universe from the villains of the future, headed by evil alien Glorft. Trouble was, Coop had so extensively modified Megas that he was the only person able to control the robot. Thus it was that Coop found himself in the unenviable position of potential savior of the universe, a burden he tried to share with both Kiva and his best pal Jamie. Created by George Krstic and Jody Schaeffer, Megas XLR had originally been titled LowBrow,but was rechristened on the eve of its Cartoon Network debut on May 1, 2004. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The most adorable little superheroines in all of Townsville make the jump to the big screen in this feature-length animated adventure based on the popular Cartoon Network series The Powerpuff Girls. Brilliant scientist Professor Utonium (voice of Tom Kane) is performing an experiment in his lab when Jojo, a monkey trained to assist the professor, accidentally drops a bottle of hyper-powerful Chemical X into a mixture of sugar, spice, and everything nice. To the professor's surprise, what should emerge from the subsequent chemical reaction but three little girls: bright and practical Blossom (voice of Cathy Cavadini), sweet and sunny Bubbles (voice of Tara Strong), and tomboyish Buttercup (voice of Elizabeth Daily). Professor Utonium discovers that the girls have remarkable powers and super-human strength, and he hopes they'll be able to improve life in the crime-infected City of Townsville. However, after their first day at Pokey Oaks Kindergarten with Ms. Keane (voice of Jennifer Hale), the girls learn that having super powers can be both a blessing and a curse. Rejected by their classmates and quite unhappy, the girls are easily swayed when Mojo Jojo (voice of Roger L. Jackson), a superintelligent monkey in a turban, asks them to help him with a campaign to save the city. What the girls don't know is that Mojo Jojo is actually the monkey who once assisted the Professor; now he's embraced evil and hopes to use the Powerpuff Girls as part of his criminal scheme to wrestle control of Townsville away from the dense but well-meaning Mayor (voice of Tom Kenny). The Powerpuff Girls Movie was directed and co-written by Craig McCracken, who created the original television show as well as writing most of the episodes. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Season One of the wild and crazy cartoon series SpongeBob SquarePants dishes up 20 half hour episodes, each containing two to three short storylines. The opener relates how cheerful invertebrate SpongeBob SquarePants lands a job at the Krusty Krab restaurant (his lifelong goal!), how he shoos a pesky clam shell away from the front lawn of his pineapple home, and his first meeting with Sandy Cheeks, a cute land squirrel who resides in a nearby biodome. All, this, plus a musical performance by Tiny Tim. In later episodes, SpongeBob goes into business teaching his friends how to blow bubbles; the evil Plankton attempts to steal the closely-guarded secet recipe for Krabby Patties; SpongeBob's grouchy neighbor Squidward tries and fails to drive a wedge (or a wedgie?) between SpongeBob and his best friend Patrick; a simple pizza delivery turns into an "Apocalypse Now" moment; former McHale's Navy costars Ernest Borgnine and Tim Conway make their first voiceover "appearances" as testy retired superheroes Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy; SpongeBob celebrates "Opposite Day", almost as if there really were an "Opposite Day"; Squidward invokes the name of Allen Ginsburg during a talent show at Krusty Krab; the legendary Flying Dutchman makes one of his rare TV appearances; a peek into the future reveals that they'll always be a few million SpongeBobs around to aggravate Squidward; and the long-suffering Mrs. Puff gives SpongeBob his first driving lesson, and lives to tell about it. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The first of Cartoon Network's World Premiere Toons one-shots to become a series, Dexter's Laboratory stars the young Dexter, a diminutive genius whose passion for science has led him to create an enormous secret laboratory under his typical suburban home. There, he creates and experiments with robots, shrink rays, and bionic appendages under the adoring eye of his central computer. Or rather, that's what he would do if his older, carefree sister Dee Dee wasn't always interfering by dancing, jumping around, and just being a girl (eww!), destroying everything in sight and ruining all of his experiments. Created by Genndy Tartakovsky, Dexter's Laboratory shares the same production team of CalArts alumni behind 2 Stupid Dogs and The Powerpuff Girls; as such, expect the same kind of graphic design, riffs on pop culture, and homages to animé, comics, and science fiction. Dexter's Laboratory also features the "Dial M for Monkey" and "Justice Friends" as series-within-a-series. "Dial M for Money" focuses on the adventures of Dexter's lab monkey, who is secretly a super-powered agent for a government organization; the Justice Friends are a parody of Marvel Comics' Avengers, complete with all-American hero Major Glory. ~ Emru Townsend, Rovi