There’s a category of cartoons that don’t make a lot of noise. They don’t have viral marketing campaigns. They don’t generate culture-war controversies. They don’t get analyzed in big think pieces. They just quietly air, episode after episode, building something that turns out to be one of the most consistently great shows of their era. Craig of the Creek belongs to that category.
The Cartoon Network series premiered on March 30, 2018, ran for six seasons, ended with a 2023 prequel film and a 2024 finale, and somehow remained one of the most underrated kids’ cartoons of the late 2010s and early 2020s. It deserves to be talked about in the same breath as Adventure Time, Steven Universe, and Over the Garden Wall as one of Cartoon Network’s defining post-2015 originals.
Below, what makes Craig of the Creek special, plus everything to know: the Steven Universe creator pedigree, the stacked voice cast you didn’t realize was there, the show’s quietly groundbreaking LGBTQ+ representation, and why this show endures.
The Basics
Craig of the Creek is an American animated television series created by Matt Burnett and Ben Levin for Cartoon Network. It premiered on March 30, 2018, ran for six seasons through 2024, and follows young Craig Williams and his two best friends Kelsey Pokoly and J.P. Mercer as they explore “The Creek,” the vast wooded area behind their suburban neighborhood that functions as a kid-built civilization complete with its own factions, lore, and quests.
The show is set in the fictional town of Herkleton, Maryland, and treats backyard exploration with the seriousness of a fantasy epic. The Creek is presented as a real place with real stakes, real friendships, and real conflicts, while also being recognizably the kind of suburban wilderness millennials and Gen Z viewers grew up exploring themselves.
🌲 Craig of the Creek at a Glance
- Created by: Matt Burnett and Ben Levin
- Network: Cartoon Network
- Premiered: March 30, 2018
- Seasons: 6 seasons (concluded 2024)
- Episodes: 100+ episodes plus the 2023 prequel film
- Setting: Herkleton, Maryland (fictional suburb)
- Genre: Slice-of-life adventure comedy
- Composer: Jeff Rosenstock
- Main trio: Craig, Kelsey, J.P.
The Steven Universe Connection
The single most important context for Craig of the Creek is that Matt Burnett and Ben Levin were both writers and storyboard artists on Steven Universe (2013-2019). They worked under Rebecca Sugar during Steven Universe’s run and then pitched Craig of the Creek as their own show after building their reputations there.
This pedigree matters. Steven Universe was one of the most acclaimed and culturally influential cartoons of the 2010s, known for sophisticated character writing, serialized storytelling, and progressive themes handled with genuine craft. Burnett and Levin brought that same sensibility to Craig of the Creek, but applied it to a more grounded slice-of-life premise instead of a magical space-opera one.
The result is a show that feels like Steven Universe’s quieter, more naturalistic cousin. Same commitment to character depth. Same willingness to portray diverse identities without making them The Big Issue. Same investment in worldbuilding as a way to ground emotional storytelling. Different aesthetic, different stakes, equally serious craft.
The Stacked Voice Cast Nobody Talks About
The voice cast for Craig of the Creek is genuinely surprising for a Cartoon Network original:
- ✅ Philip Solomon as Craig Williams
- 💡 Noël Wells as Kelsey Pokoly — best known as a Saturday Night Live cast member (2013-2014) and from Master of None and Mr. Mayor
- 🔥 H. Michael Croner as J.P. Mercer
- ✅ Terry Crews as Nicole Williams, Craig’s mom — yes, that Terry Crews. The Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Everybody Hates Chris, NFL-veteran Terry Crews
- 💡 Phil LaMarr as Duane Williams, Craig’s dad — voice acting legend with credits including Samurai Jack (he was the title character), Hermes Conrad on Futurama, Static Shock, Green Lantern on Justice League, and Marvin from Pulp Fiction
- 🔥 Lucia Cunningham as Jessica Williams, Craig’s younger sister
- ✅ Tim Johnson Jr. as Bernard Williams, Craig’s older brother
Terry Crews voicing Craig’s mother in particular is genuinely wild and the kind of inspired casting decision that adds gravitas to a kids’ show without drawing attention to itself. Phil LaMarr is one of the most prolific voice actors of his generation, and having him voice the dad gives the family scenes a vocal weight most cartoons wouldn’t have.
The Trio: Craig, Kelsey, and J.P.
The show’s emotional engine is its central trio. Each character is a distinct archetype but written with enough specificity to feel like a complete person:
Craig Williams: The Leader
Craig is the show’s protagonist, voiced by Philip Solomon. He’s a Black 9-year-old who serves as the trio’s organizer, cartographer, and resident strategist. He carries a homemade map of the Creek that he updates constantly. He’s curious, empathetic, and quietly brave. The show treats his leadership as natural rather than performative.
What’s particularly well-written about Craig is that he isn’t the standard “weak protagonist surrounded by stronger friends” trope. He’s actively good at what he does, and the show respects his intelligence and creativity throughout.
Kelsey Pokoly: The Warrior Poet
Kelsey is voiced by Noël Wells in one of the best voice acting performances in recent Cartoon Network history. Wells brings a distinctive theatrical quality to Kelsey that reflects the character’s self-conception as a Tolkien-style warrior queen leading her band on epic quests.
Kelsey narrates her own life in epic fantasy prose. She carries a sword (a stick painted gray). She has a pet bird named Mortimor who she treats with absolute reverence. She is, importantly, a girl character allowed to be fierce, weird, and emotionally complex without being either tomboy-coded or femme-coded. She’s just Kelsey, and the show treats that as complete.
J.P. Mercer: The Goofball
J.P. (John Paul) is the show’s comic anchor, voiced by H. Michael Croner. He’s the goofy, optimistic, slightly chaotic member of the trio who occasionally drops profoundly wise observations between his more chaotic moments. His backstory (he’s the youngest of multiple older sisters and lives in a particularly hectic household) gives his character context that the show develops gradually.
The trio’s chemistry is the show’s defining strength. They feel like real friends with real history, real inside jokes, and real distinct personalities that complement each other in believable ways.
The Williams Family
One of the show’s most quietly groundbreaking elements is the Williams family. The show depicts a Black middle-class American family with the same level of warmth, normalcy, and complete characterization that white middle-class families typically receive in animation.
Nicole Williams (Terry Crews) is the mom, a working professional with her own interior life beyond just “mom.” Duane Williams (Phil LaMarr) is the dad, a slightly dorky tech enthusiast with his own hobbies. Bernard Williams (Tim Johnson Jr.) is the older brother, a quiet teenager navigating high school. Jessica Williams (Lucia Cunningham) is the younger sister, a chaotic preschooler who’ll grow up to dominate the show by Season 5.
The Williams family scenes are some of the most authentically observed family interactions in modern animation. The dynamics, the patterns, the way conversations flow at the dinner table. It’s all rooted in real observation rather than sitcom convention.
The LGBTQ+ Representation
Craig of the Creek consistently shows up on lists of cartoons with great LGBTQ+ representation because Burnett and Levin treated it as a structural feature of the world rather than as Special Episode material. The Creek’s universe includes:
- ✅ Multiple openly LGBTQ+ supporting characters across all six seasons
- 💡 Married gay teacher characters (Mr. Schulman and Mr. Williams) who are simply part of the school faculty
- 🔥 Trans-coded characters whose identities are treated as facts of life rather than narrative tension
- ✅ Diverse types of family structures that the show portrays without commentary
The show’s approach to inclusion is the gold standard: the diversity is woven into the world’s fabric rather than being the focus of episodes. Characters exist as their full selves, and the show doesn’t make their identities the subject of plot drama. It just shows them living their lives.
The Creek as a Setting
The Creek itself is one of the show’s most fully developed characters. It’s a vast wooded area behind a suburban housing development that the local kids have collectively claimed as their territory. Within it, kids have built:
- ✅ Faction territories with different kid groups controlling different areas
- 💡 An economy based on trading sticks, rocks, and food items
- 🔥 Established hierarchies with respected elders (older kids) and ambitious upstarts
- ✅ Specific landmarks with shared mythology — the Sewer, the Trading Tree, the Stump
- 💡 Rituals and traditions passed down between generations of Creek kids
The Creek treats kid-created culture with absolute seriousness. The show recognizes that when kids build their own civilizations in suburban green spaces, what they build has real rules, real consequences, and real meaning to the kids involved. This isn’t condescending grown-up commentary on childhood play. It’s a respectful portrayal of childhood as its own legitimate space.
The Jeff Rosenstock Soundtrack
The show’s composer is Jeff Rosenstock, the punk rock musician best known as the leader of Bomb the Music Industry! and his acclaimed 2018 solo album POST-. Rosenstock brings genuine musical credibility to the show’s score, with original songs and theme work that elevates the show beyond typical kids’ TV soundscape.
Rosenstock is the kind of indie music figure whose involvement signals to attentive viewers that this show takes its craft seriously. The soundtrack across all six seasons remains one of the show’s underappreciated strengths.
Craig Before the Creek (2023)
In 2023, the show released a prequel film called Craig Before the Creek, which streams on Max. The film tells the story of how Craig first discovered the Creek and how he met Kelsey and J.P. It’s a substantial 80-minute feature that fills in the trio’s origin story with the same care and craft as the series itself.
The film was followed by the final season of the series in 2024, completing the show’s six-season run. Burnett and Levin have indicated that they consider the story complete, though the show’s universe could potentially support future spinoffs.
Why It Endures
Craig of the Creek is one of those cartoons that gets quieter cultural recognition than it deserves. While Adventure Time and Steven Universe got constant cultural attention, Craig of the Creek mostly built its reputation through word of mouth and critical praise rather than viral moments.
What makes it lasting:
- ✅ It respects children. The show treats its child characters as full people with real interior lives, real friendships, and real problems. Most kids’ shows talk down to their audience. Craig of the Creek talks to them.
- 💡 The craft is uniformly excellent. Writing, voice acting, animation, music. Every department is operating at a high level.
- 🔥 It captures something true. The show is fundamentally about what it actually feels like to be a kid building friendships in a suburban environment. Anyone who grew up exploring backyards, vacant lots, or wooded areas recognizes this world.
- ✅ The representation is structural. Diversity is built into the show’s DNA rather than handled as Important Episodes. This is how representation should work.
The next great cartoon will come from animators who learned their craft watching Craig of the Creek and shows like it. The series’s influence on the next generation of animation creators is already visible in shows like Primos and Hailey’s On It! that share its commitment to grounded, character-driven storytelling.
If you missed Craig of the Creek during its 2018-2024 run, the full series is available on Max. Start from the pilot. The show takes a few episodes to find its full form, but once it does, it’s the kind of cartoon you’ll want to watch twice.
