Some ramblings on why I don’t like that Channel Chasers’ ending is canon, and why Butch expanding the ending storyline is a bad idea.
Enjoy my unpolished long rambling on why I don’t like this decision.
Context: Fairly OddParents fans, after watching a new video of Butch Hartman explaining the Channel Chasers timeline, became confused and frustrated by his interpretation that Timmy and Tootie live with Vicky and no longer remember her, yet she ends up babysitting their children. This is especially controversial because Vicky was the one who ruined their childhood and tormented them, so many fans feel this explanation creates inconsistencies and undermines the original story.”
No, they are not forgetful about Vicky, and even if Timmy's memories were erased after losing Cosmo and Wanda, he would only forget the magical experiences and activities. However, the emotional experiences and lessons learned from those events would still remain.
The problem here is that Butch tries to answer a question that was never intended to be answered, which leads to too many inconsistencies and breaks the illusion of the symbolic ending of Channel Chasers by adding unnecessary logic.
The ending of Channel Chasers was never intended to be a canon ending to the series. It was never the canon ending of the show’s production plans or long-term intentions; it was simply a special designed to explore the theme that growing up is okay. Channel Chasers is a self-contained story.
Making Channel Chasers canon now means you have to reevaluate the meaning of the symbolic ending.
The original ending of Channel Chasers has a symbolic meaning: it shows that Timmy is content with his life because he takes the time to appreciate it. People often forget that the ending takes place in a futuristic future, whose purpose is to visually represent how everything keeps moving forward and becoming more advanced, with flying cars and fancy homes. In contrast, Timmy’s simple and unchanged house shows that, despite being behind everyone else, he is content with his life and feels no need to rush through it, as he is happy because he took his time and grew up well.
It is also utilized to show that when Timmy reflects on his past and negative memories, he doesn’t remember all the details of his upbringing. He holds onto the good memories and takes his time, showing that everything will be okay.
The problem with treating Channel Chasers as canon is that it muddies what was originally an intentionally ambiguous, thematic story. Instead of focusing on the message that growing up is okay through visual storytelling, people start applying strict in-universe logic to how the characters would realistically act. For example, questions like why Timmy and Tootie would ever let Vicky babysit, or how Tammy and Tommy having fairies affects Timmy’s growth, end up undermining his character arc of overcoming emotional neglect from his parents, which is what led to him having fairies in the first place.
Sometimes a story doesn’t need all questions answered to tell a compelling narrative. If you try to answer everything, you can end up ruining the experience and missing the point.
Channel Chasers was a hypothetical ending to the series, representing an era of the show that no longer exists. It focuses on thematic character growth and conveys its ideas in a direct way. Since the series has evolved past that point, Channel Chasers is no longer a suitable ending that makes sense for the buildup across the show’s entire history.
Making the Channel Chasers ending canon now creates consequences that turn it from a previously self-contained special into a fan wish-fulfillment-style conclusion that conflicts with the rest of the series’ logic and history. It no longer aligns as well with established continuity and introduces unsatisfying inconsistencies that did not exist before.
Also, I know someone might bring this up, but just because the ANW writers made Channel Chasers canon in ANW does not automatically mean it was ever intended to be the true canon ending. It only became canon due to pressure, as many fans of the original series became overly insistent that Channel Chasers had to be the “true ending,” due to the show itself never had the chance to provide a proper conclusion and the series creators were not fully satisfied with the direction of the later seasons.
Pretty much every Fairly OddParents post or video in retrospect after 2017 says the same thing: people remember the show as being great for the first five seasons, then becoming completely worse by season 6 with unnecessary additions, and that it should have ended with Channel Chasers.
That was the general opinion of the show for years, with very little nuance, so it’s not surprising that they made Channel Chasers canon. This became especially apparent after the massive backlash over the overweight fake Timmy Turner in the first episode, where many people said it ruined Channel Chasers.
The Channel Chasers ending being canon is pretty much a response to the loudest voices from public consensus, and that’s it.
(The end of my first rambling. I’ll probably make a second part discussing why I don’t think Tootie and Timmy work, not as the ship itself but because of the final execution of how it was handled, and why Chloe was a better choice if Timmy needed a finalized wife)
