The series focuses on Cricket Green, a mischievous and optimistic country boy who moves to the big city (simply called Big City) with his family. Cricket’s curiosity and enthusiasm leads his wildly out of place family onto epic journeys and into the hearts of his new neighbors.
In mid-Season 3, the Greens leave Big City and return to their old hometown, Smalton, after Bill Green re-purchases their old house, and try to get adjusted to their former life.
Emmy Award-winning director Rob Renzetti (creator of Nickelodeon's My Life as a Teenage Robot and supervising producer for Gravity Falls) serves as executive producer and the Houghton brothers serve as co-executive producers.[1]
The intro was first shown at San Diego Comic Con on July 21, 2017.
Big City Greens Main Title Comic-Con 2017 Disney XD
Big City Greens Main Title
Disney Channel Summer 2018 - Disney Channel GO Fan Fest
Meet the Greens Big City Greens Disney Channel
Big City Greens This Season On Comic-Con 2018 Exclusive Disney Channel
Sneak Peek of Cricket's Future! Big City Greens Disney Channel
Trivia[]
Big City Greens materialized following the failure of the Houghton Brothers attempt to pitch an animated series based on their comic book Reed Gunther to Amazon. They attempted to pitch it at Disney where it too was not picked up. Disney offered that they pitch another show which was Welcome to Simpleton. When that failed, they came up with Country Club which would transition into becoming Big City Greens.
Among the creative influences for the show, Chris Houghton has mentioned Calvin and Hobbes, Life With Louie, The Simpsons, Family Matters, Tom Sawyer, Malcom in the Middle, and numerous others.[2]
Cricket is the only character who has appeared in every episode of the series.
Cricket and Tilly, however, do not appear in all the shorts.
Tilly was completely absent from "Date Night" and "Starter Pack", whereas she technically does not appear in "Time Crisis" as her imaginary future counterpart appears instead.
The episode title cards appear on items seen throughout the show.
All of the episode titles are approximately one to two words long.
According to the creators, the series is mostly set on weekends, weeknights and vacations such as summer break, which explains why Cricket, Tilly and their friends their age have not been seen attending school yet. [citation needed]
The show is animated traditionally through pencil, ink and paper, as opposed to other contemporary shows that animate via digital ink.[3]
A punk rock group going by the name Big City Sue-zers, created a mini album titled Earworm that features music based on the show. Chris Houghton provided artwork for the album and vocal samples as Cricket along with Marieve Herington as Tilly.[4]
This is the latest animated Disney series to feature a male protagonist, as most series after featured female protagonists.
While the show is meant to be episodic, it slowly evolves into a continuity-driven show with newer seasons, and has a handful of story arcs. Season 3B briefly shifts the show to a serialized format showing the Greens moving back to the country.
So far, the show has had two double-length episodes every season except the third, which had four (one for the premiere, one marking the midseason, one as a Christmas special, and one for the finale).
One episode of each season except the first had an episode focusing exclusively on the animals.
Season 3 is the only season that is shorter than 30 episodes and has no major villain.
Season 2 shifts the series to a slightly darker tone that focused on the Greens trying to protect their farm from Chip Whistler.
This is the first Disney Channel animated series in history to reach a fifth season during its original run.[5]
Technically, it is also the second Disney Channel animated series to gain a fifth season overall, with the first being Phineas and Ferb for its revival.
In 2024, Big City Greens was nominated for a Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Award for "Favorite Cartoon";[7] marking the first time in 8 years that an animated Disney series was nominated for a Kids Choice Award, the last one being in 2016 with the nominees being Phineas and Ferb & Gravity Falls.
As of 2024, Big City Greens is currently the 3rd biggest series by Disney Television Animation to have the most amount of episodes produced for it, following behind DuckTales (#2) & Phineas and Ferb (#1).