About once a year it crosses my mind how truly weird it was that they made a children’s cartoon show centered around Ed Grimley. For those who don’t know, Grimley was a demented and resonant creation of Martin Short in his SCTV days, and after Short brought the character intact to his SNL stint during the 1984-1985 (an excellent season by the way) Grimley became a minor hit, one of Lorne’s beloved recurring characters, alongside Billy Crystal’s Fernando character. In principle, Grimley was pretty darn annoying—it’s a testament to Short’s sheer talent and likability that the little dude could achieve any kind of purchase among the American TV-watching public. Watching him on YouTube, what he really seems like is the dark side of Pee Wee Herman.

In attempting to describe Ed Grimley, one must admit that Wikipedia’s account possesses a certain panache, describing him as “an excessively cowlicked, hyperactive manchild who is obsessed with banal popular culture, particularly Wheel of Fortune and its host, Pat Sajak. He also loves to play the triangle, which for him consists of playing a recorded musical piece, striking the triangle once, and then wildly dancing to the recording.” He punctuated every other sentence with the phrase “doncha know” and his obsessive little monologues would shift suddenly in pitch. Grimley was a surfeit of tics: his hair was shaped into a spike and his pants were worn way too high and he always worried about getting too “mental”—he was a decent sort if you know what I mean…. Only Martin Short could make it all work, and truly, when he’s on his game, Martin Short is hard to touch.
 

 
The whole point of Grimley was that he was a lonely outsider, like Harvey Pekar’s pal Toby Radloff. The 1980s are thought of as this time of relentless moneyed conformity, and there’s something to it, but it was also the decade of Revenge of the Nerds, Eddie Deezen, and (at least in origin) Wayne’s buddy Garth Algar. Grimley, in short, was a “spaz,” a common figure of the time, but it’s difficult to think of too many others of his tribe (Anthony Michael Hall’s “Farmer Ted” from Sixteen Candles, perhaps?)—although certainly Ace Ventura’s energy and hairdo owe a great debt to Grimley.

It’s still hard to believe it all happened. Especially when you look at the clips.

First, Grimley on SNL—one has to start with pure undiluted Grimley in his natural state, as embodied by Short as he negotiates one of his legendary triangle performances:
 

 
Here’s a chunk of his animated series The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley:
 

 
Here’s “The Nutty Lab Assistant” from SCTV, unfortunately heavily edited. The mind still boggles. The sketch is punctuated with a big slab of commercial 1980s rock (in the form of “Jack and Diane”) for those who’ve repressed what that was all about. Whose idea was it to haul John Cougar in there? (He hadn’t changed back to his real name Mellencamp yet.) Why John Cougar of all people? One must admit he did a creditable job. A Jekyll-and-Hyde concept with Ed Grimley and John Cougar…. the 1980s did on occasion certainly deliver wonders.
 

 
Martin Short on creating Ed Grimley:
 

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
The Plasmatics blow shit up on SCTV’s ‘The Fishin’ Musician’