Friday Flashback Episode 7

After School Special

I'm honestly not sure if these two shows ever had other time slots but I will always remember them as after school must-see TV.





When it comes to the best Disney cartoons, there is only one that is on par with Gummi Bears. Duck Tales was a really interesting show. Someone said "Let's make a show about Donald Duck's relatives. We'll take that cheap bastard Scrooge McDuck and make him the guardian of Donald's nephews and niece. They can travel the world and get into adventures. Sound good?" Well, not really, but guess what? It worked! There were a few episodes that were crappy, they usually revolved around Webby and Mrs. Beakley but for the most part the show was really cool. Scrooge had some major enemies like the Beagle Boys and Magica DeSpell but his arch enemy was Flintheart Glomgold. The best stories were always when Scrooge and Glomgold were both going after some treasure, they would make it a five part story and it would last all week. I haven't seen this show in a long time but I would love to get my hands on the DVDs so I can check it out again.




I hate cats, unless they are of the Thunder variety. This is one of the greatest cartoons of all time. Thundercats was one of those shows that I could never miss because it, unlike many cartoons, evolved over time. Things that happened would effect future episodes. Many cartoons avoid this so that people can tune in at any time and feel like they are not missing anything. The Thundercats had to abandon their home planet of Thundera before it was destroyed. During this time they were separated from all of the others who were fleeing. They begin a new life on a new planet, but they are always searching for other Thudercats who may have survived the destruction of Thundera. They share their new world with the evil sorcerer Mumm-ra who is an old, evil mummy who goes into an occasional, magical roid-rage and becomes a more powerful bad-ass mummy. He recruits the other inhabitants of the world, the Mutants, to battle the Thundercats. Many times when a cartoon adds characters, it feels desperate and awkward(I'm talking to you Kazoo and Scrappy) but the other Thundercats who join the show later are a natural addition because it has been established that they are looking for other Cats. I'm sure that most of you have seen this show but if you get a chance, watch it again. I think that you will be surprised at how well it holds up. One of the best stories was presented in a five part mini-series that showed how an unarmed Lion-o had to best all of the other Thundercats to prove that he should be their leader. (Spoiler Alert: he wins.)

Friday Flashback Episode 6

This week I have two of my favorite cartoons of all time. It should be no surprise that they are based on comic books. There have been some really great super hero cartoons in more recent years like the X-men and Bat-man shows from the 90's or the current Justice League cartoon but these were the originals for me. I grew up with these shows and they had a huge influence in my becoming a comic collector.

Spider-Man and his amazing friends took a ridiculous amount of liberties with the source material, but who cares if it's fun. Right? Spider-Man, Firestar, and Ice-man all go to college together and live at Aunt May's house with her prissy dog Ms. Lion. At some point they had a giant computer network installed into Aunt May's house that appears when they move the trophy on the mantle. I guess that they hope Aunt May has some kind of phobia of trophies and will not go near it. Aside from his interactions with his Amazing Friends, Spider-man's(Peter Parker) story is pretty true to the comics. Nerdy student lives with Aunt, fights crime in his spare time. Sounds right. Ice-man(Bobby Drake) was one of the original members of the X-men but I guess he decided that he wasn't getting a good enough education at Xavier's School for Gifted Children and decided to enroll at Empire State. Firestar(Angelica Jones) was created specifically for the cartoon but later found her way into the comics. Her heat power involves the use of microwaves. The last unaired season documented Peter and Bobby's battle with radiation poisoning due to their years of interaction with Angelica. ABC Family still shows re-runs of Amazing Friends so check it out when you have some time.

A bunch of super good guys vs. a bunch of super bad guys. It doesn't get any better than that. Challenge of the Super-Friends is not the first Super Friends show but I think that it was the best. The original Super-Friends consisted of Super-Man, Wonder-Woman, Bat-Man, and Aqua-Man. They were joined by two cornball kids and their dog. Average at best. The new huge group of Super-Friends is joined by two super powered twins and their space monkey. Still unnecessary but better. The true stars of the show were the Legion-of-Doom. Thirteen major villains from the DC universe who decided that if the Heroes can join forces, they should too. One of the cool parts of the show was seeing villains pair off against someone who wasn't their arch-enemy. Watching Sinestro square off with Bat-Man or Bizarro take on Wonder-Woman was always really cool for me as a huge comic book fan. I've recently watched a bunch of these episodes on DVD and they hold up pretty well.

Friday Flashback Episode 5

I love video games.
So obviously I should love video game cartoons right?
Well, kind of.





I did love Captain N the Game Master. I'm not sure if I would still love it but watching the opening brings back some good memories. Were there any greater villains than Mother Brain, Eggplant Wizard, and King Hippo? Well yeah, plenty, but those were the ones they chose so deal with it. Mega-Man, Kid Icarus, and Castlevania were all pretty bad-ass games so I guess they did a good job with the heroes. I always thought that Captain N was pretty lucky because the generic video game princess was way hotter than Peach or Zelda.......so he's got that going for him, which is nice.




If this video doesn't make you cringe, I don't know what will. The Super Mario Brothers' Super Show was an OK cartoon but the live action segments with Captain Lou Albano and Joe Flaherty are pure gold. Why are the super Italian brothers "dancing" to rap music? Is it just because they say brothers in the song? Hey man, that's racist. Anyway, the whole live action concept for this toon is a little sketchy, but that doesn't mean that I didn't still enjoy this show.

Friday Flashback Episode 4

Formula for Success:

Take a successful property + make all of the characters younger = hit show. Right?
Well, it worked for these shows. At least I think it did

Muppet Babies should suck, but it doesn't. The characters transferred from puppets to cartoons and from adults to babies without losing what made them popular in the first place. All of the muppets have very distinct, funny, and likable personalities. Except for Miss Piggy, everyone hates Miss Piggy. The babies either had very good imaginations or the nursery was some kind of temporal hot spot because every door, cabinet. or window opened a worm hole to some other parallel universe (usually in the form of an old movie clip). Anyway, this was a fun little show. I still wonder what Nanny looked like. Was she a super-model? Was she horribly disfigured? All we know for sure is that she had some cool socks.

I love to picture the people in the studio recording that song, it cracks me up. A Pup Named Scooby-Doo is basically just a caricature of the original Scooby-Doo, but I think that it holds its own as a pretty good show. The concept is basically the same; solve a monster mystery that is really just a person in a monster suit. Velma's smart, Freddy's dumb, Daphne's a bimbo. Shaggy and Scoob don't come off looking as much like stoners, but they are still very hungry, so they might be experimenting at this point in their life. When they did the big mask pull-off reveal at the end of every episode, Freddy always thought that it would be the local bully Red Herring (get it?).

Hope everyone had a very happy New Year.

Friday Flashback Episode 3

Here are a couple more of my Saturday Morning Favorites.




Dungeons and Dragons is one of those shows that I could not miss. Like Kidd Video, I needed to know if the gang was finally going to get home. I loved the fact that they all had specific weapons that corresponded to their personality. The guy with the shield always wonders why he didn't get a sword or something cooler but you find out later how important his particular weapon is. There was an Ewoks live-action movie and the kids in it had to pick weapons. The boy ended up with a small rock and he was all pissed, but of course the rock ended up being the most important item. Did I just write about an Ewoks live-action movie? Anyway, it is the idea that the weapon picks the person and not the other way around. Kind of like Locke and his compass. We'll see what happens with that. I am really rambling this week. Dungeons and Dragons kicks ass. This is another show that I picked up on E-bay and it holds up really well. I really enjoyed watching it again. The Dungeon Master still seemed like just as much of a dick as he always did. Just help the poor kids get home you jerk.




Teen Wolf is a great movie! Yes, it is. Don't argue with me.
The Teen Wolf cartoon... not bad. I was a big fan of this when it was on. I was 8. Apparently, after Scott won the big game for the Beavers, more of his werewolf family moved in with him. This includes his little sister who must have been away at camp for a year or something. Oh yeah, everyone must have been so excited about the b-ball championship over the Dragons that they forgot about Scott being a werewolf......except for Boof and Stiles. Ok, we all on the same page now? This was a fun little show. It only had 21 episodes so it wasn't a huge hit but it brings back some good memories for me.

Friday Flashback Episode 2

It's been harder and harder to find time to post with work, school, and all of the holidays but I have been looking forward to this all week.

The hardest part about this is deciding which two clips to post. There are so many good ones.

I pity the fool that don't like gymnastic crime fighters. Yes, apparently Mr. T loves gymnastics. Who knew? This made me laugh out loud when I saw it again. I totally remembered the weird gymnast thing but forgot about his little white Mr. T sidekick and the mohawk-clad dog. That poor alligator had no idea who he was messing with. Hilarious.

Gummi bears is one of my absolute favorite cartoons of all time. This is a smart and well developed show (Well, you know, for a kids cartoon.) It is one of those rare cartoons that has its characters and story evolve over time. I love Scooby Doo and Tom and Jerry but they were strictly episodic. This show left you with questions. What happened to this great Gummi civilization? Will the princess ever discover that the Gummis are real? Will they ever find other Gummis somewhere out there? Did I just see a Dharma logo on that tree?
Anyway, I recently picked some DVDs on Ebay of the entire series and it definitely holds up over time. Oh yeah, that song will be stuck in your head all day...but in a good way.

Tune in next week for another dose of nostalgia, and who knows, I may actually manage to get a post or two in before that.

Friday Flashback Episode 1

I have always been a major cartoon junkie. Whether it was Saturday morning or after school, I have logged countless hours in front of the TV watching cartoons. Some were great, others not so much, but nostalgia can make even the stinkers seem cool in hindsight.

I'll start with a couple of my favorites, but I know that I'm not the only one who watched these shows so let me know if I've stirred up any memories for you.

Kidd Video is about as 80's as anything can get. I Loved this show. Anyone who remembers this show knows that it gets even weirder than the opening suggests. Every episode was followed up by a live action video by the Kidd Video band. Believe it or not, they actually went on tour with the band. By the way, how sweet is cousin Oliver's El Camino?

Wow. Ok, I do not remember Hulk Hogan's Rock n' Wrestling being that corny, but the proof is right there. What the hell is going on? Why are they driving around in cars? Shouldn't they be wrestling, or rock n' ? I'm not ashamed to say that I liked this show but I can't remember why.

Enjoy! I'll have more next week.