Wilkommen to the classic cartoon thread, featuring reviews of classic series, videos of over 50 classic toons and more.
Video intros to all the best classic toons
The Reviews
I got this for around $12, it's the first half of the complete series. It comes on 5 discs, double sided with 33 episodes. Firstly, the picture quality isn't great, this cartoon was made in 1985 so you can't expect a crystal clear picture. The story begins on Mongol where Flash Gordon's wife and son Rick are held prisoner by Ming the Merciless. Mongols resources are running out so he wants to invade the earth. Flash, chased by Ming's ice robots, crashes on earth outside Mandrake's mansion. Mandrake is like a middle aged English magician with an African man servant -Lothar- and a young adopted asian boy.
They both join up with Flash and later recruit the Ghost who Walks: The Phantom, to the team of....... THE DEFENDERS OF THE EARTH!
This is one of those toons so bad it's good and totally 80s kick ass experiences. I have laughed so hard. For a start they are all single dads, the Defenders that is and bring along three sons and one daughter who all live with them and are like junior defenders. The junior defenders are all like in their late teens and wear 80s style tight jeans and bomber jackets.
This is some classic shit. C-L-A-S-S-I-C. It's like the 80s has been distilled into an injection and shot into your arm. It's totally brilliant, totally crap and totally the greatest and worse thing you have ever seen in your life. And that makes it the greatest. There are so many WTF moments that you will be belly laughing half the time and the other half with eyes wide open at the sheer 80s superhero audacity on display.
Let's list some WTF moments. Firstly there is part of one episode where the magician mandrake starts wearing blue goggles for absolutely no reason whatsoevever and in the next scene they magically disappear.
Then there is a scene where huge troll like hands up-end Rick Gordon (Flash's son) and drags him into a tunnel. Inside the tunnel we see that the huge troll hands actually belong to a 30 cm purple fluff toy.
There is the scene where the Phantom's daughter psychically tells her black panther to follow a truck, at which point, said panther jumps off a bridge 80s style and lands on top of the truck. Then in an episode, Mandrake's adopted son throws a rock off a mountain top and somehow manages to crack open the cockpit of a supersonic jet belonging to Ming the Merciless' Ice Robots (yes you read that right). And not only is the jet destroyed, Flash Gordon then flys by and gives the kid the thumbs up. ROFL!
Then the show has awesome moments. For instance the intro for one episode has Flash and the Phantom in space, they engage this bubble shield astronaut suit on themselves, get into a firefight with Mings Ice Robots. So Flash wants to shoot them down but the guns are jammed, the ice robots shoot out their cockpit glass. Phantom suddenly stands up and crouches. Flash says "Phantom, what are you doing?", the Phantom says "Engaging the manual guns." So he jumps out of the jet, onto the wing, breaks a cannon off the wing and shoots down the enemy planes himself. Absolutely AWESOME.
Then later in the same episode Flash engages the Laser Sword. Picture a giant lightsaber coming out of the end of a jet and they use it to ram other jets and then break through Ming's evil dome building, crashing the ceiling down on top of him.
Then there is the episode where the DOE (Defenders of the Earth) computer is infected when they take it to play in a chess tournament LOL! It gets infected by a giant worm and they shrink down Fantastic Voyage style and attack it with little metal rods! BTW did I mention that the DOE computer houses the consciousness of Rick Gordons' dead mother?
Then you find out that the Phantom has a helicopter shaped like a skull! LIKE A SKULL. It's classic! In one scene Flash and Phantom are on foot and suddenly the ice robot jets attack. Flash runs to the copter for weapons. He does a forward somersault into the helicopter and comes out the other side of the copter with a gun and shoots down two planes - in one single movement. Total awesomeness.
Then Phantom can call upon the power of 10 tigers (it's part of jungle law) and he picks up a massive totem and throws it into the sky to trash more jets.
Then there are these inexplicable 80s moments, for instance instead of a dissolve or fade out they have the Phantom's black panther leap towards the screen, the camera entering it's mouth. Or Ming's snake pet looking at the camera and its eye twinkling for NO reason whatsoever.
It throws logic to the wind, they show you these WTF moments at every turn and you can only say "Okay LOL" and go along for the ride. It's hilarious and awesome and brilliant fun at every turn. It makes you feel like a kid again. I'm ordering the rest of the series on dvd now.
This boxset cost me $12 including shipping cost from amazon. If you are a child of the 80s and used to watch this show, just buy it.
The intro from the series can be found at the video intro link.
King Arthur and the Knights of Justice
I got this one disc set for $6 which is less than the price of a sandwich over here. It has the entire first series which is 5 episodes long. Unlike Batman the Animated series, this is no classic. It's definetely not something that holds up today and to be honest it's pretty crap in places. You would buy this for the memories and because you can get it for less than the price of a sandwich. It is though, hugely enjoyable. The story goes that the real knights of camelot are frozen in a cave so merlin goes into the future and abducts an american football team and takes them back in time to replace them. It's one of those shows that is so obviously geared towards young sword wielding wanabes that it's just hilarious in places. So bad it's good. For instance, I just watched this episode where they go to the top of this tower to fight a dragon, the dragon turns out to be an illusion and it was a trap and soldiers are making their way to the top of the tower to kill them.
So, basically the knights have magic armour that has emblems for instance arthur touches the sword on his chest and a sword appears. So they are stuck at the top of this tower and about to be killed so arthur shouts to his buddy "build me a glider!" and so his buddy knight for some reason, instead of having a weapon crest, has a hammer and chisel on his chest and touches it and the tools appear. Arthur then shouts "You have about 30 seconds before we're dead!" so this buddy builds a ramshackle glider out of some rotting wood. Arthur then whips off his cape, attaches it to the frame and 5 heavily armoured knights, with weapons, somehow manage to all fly off the tower on their glider. As they sail away the bad guys now on top of the tower shout "What manner of magic is this?!"
Then to top that off, their horses run beneath them and line up perfectly at the same speed and each knight then drops from about 50 feet in the air onto the horses back and they ride off. But what makes it worse is that later on they are attacked. Now like the weapon crests they have animal crests on their shields. So this one knight brings out his eagle crest and they fly off and escape the attackers. So... this is the same episode and they could have just used the eagle, but instead build a 30 glider. This show is awesome. I just watched an episode where 6 year old kids wearing saucepans for helmets wreck the warlords with sticks and catapults. This show is double awesome.
This is one show that has held up extremely well. The dvd comes in a glossy, lavish packing with a great documentary on the making of this emmy award winning series. 28 episodes over 4 discs for a bargain price. The art is amazing in todays context. It almost seems like TV animation has degraded from this high point. The city itself becomes a character, everything is drawn in an art deco style. The characters taking inspiration from old superman comics. This is almost like the foreshadow for the new Batman films. It has thrilling chases, adult humour, dark moments and that essential batman feel. This comes highly reccomended.
The Adventures of Tintin
Is a 10 disc boxset, celebrating 75 years of Herge. So far I have watched Tintin in America which was pretty lame to be honest. But Tintin and the Cigars of the Pharoahs reminds me of why I used to love this series. An suspenseful feeling, almost like hitchcock at times, with comic flourishes, the stories still hold up well. These cartoons are quite old so the transfer quality isn't amazing but it still looks good if you can overcome that.
THUNDERCATS! Hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
Da da da daaaaaaaaa, da da da, Thundercats are loose. Feel the magic, hear the roar! Thundercats are loose! Thunder, thunder, thunder, Thundercats!
*electric guitar riff*
Thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, Thundercats!
*trumpets*
Yes, the Thundercats have arrived in London. A 12 DVD boxset of the complete series one for around $38.
So GG, I hear you ask. What prompted you to do this classic dvd review now? Well, I respond, I just finished watching an episode that ended with Liono, lord of the Thundercats, arm wrestling a caveman for the time capsule from their destroyed home planet Thundera LOL . Of course Liono won, while the team cheered him on.
So let's get this out of the way first and foremost: Thundercats is not as good as you remember. Maybe it's just because I'm coming off watching the bizaarely brilliant/yet terrible Defenders of the Earth, but after the random insanity and cheese and hilarity and superhero awesomeness, Thundercats almost seems too logical, too sane.
It starts with a great episode that almost feels like an old well made science fiction movie (link below to watch it). Their home planet of Thundera is slowly destroying itself, the Thundercats uppn their mass exodus are attacked by the evil mutants. The mutants wipe out virtually their entire race except the flagship and a band of nobles. The flagship is hobbled and wobbles along to the nearest habitable planet: their new home: 3rd Earth. But some mutants have crashed too and a deadly evil lurks within an ancient temple, the evil Mumra: The Ever Living!
They kill off the best character in the very first episode, the old man, legendary warrior Jaga and from then on there are a couple of logic killers. Liono is a kid who ages to become an adult and yet the two other kids remain unscathed.
There is a problem of repitition in this series. When you were a kid in 1985 watching this, no doubt you anticipated the once weekly event of Liono erecting the sword of Thundera and crying out in might "Thundercats! Hooooooooooooo!" but fast forward 23 years and when you have them on dvd and watch more than one 20 minute episode at a time, seeing the Lord of the Thundercats do the same thing each and every episode; and watching the inevitable reaction of the Thundercats predictably riding to his rescue - if makes you bored.
But there is a bigger problem: the music. Godamn. GOD-DAMN. They re-use the same 4 tracks throughout all of the 16 + episodes I have watched. It's like the themes in star wars only without variation in arrangements. There is the quiet peaceful piano theme, there is Cheetarah's theme whenever she runs fast, there is the thundercats theme when they leap into action and there is the rocking tank theme. It's like they hired a musician for the first episode and then just re-used the same 16 minutes of soundtrack ad-nauseum. It really grates after a while.
Thundercats is also perhaps too logical for its own good. You don't get those random moments of insanity like in Defenders of the Earth that make you belly laugh. That makes it better in some ways but less entertaining in others. A lot of the episodes aren't very satisfying, you never get the sense of the closing of a story, just another chapter in a book that never ends.
That said it has some awesome stuff for kids and like minded adults to dig into. For a start the Thundertank is the most awesome tank in movie and cartoon history. It has giant paws! That can move and break stuff and a mouth which can bite stuff. It can burrow underground and burst out like a dolphin diving and breaking through the sea surface. Panthro can drive that thing up a sheer rock face. It can dive underwater and it has lasers that mount up from the base. It's also near indescrutable.
Cheetarh is sex-ay. She runs as fast as light, has a staff that expands like classic series: Monkey. Tigra has a bolus/whip that emits bursts of fire when it hits stuff, oh and he can make himself invisible at will, no doubt spying on Cheetarah showering.
Liono has a lion gauntlet that acts as a shield, has a grappling hook attached to it and acts as a holster for the sword of thundera. The sword itself not only emits a bat signal, it also can fly and by proxy make Liono fly. It can create a shield of energy, it can fire electric bursts and it refuses to act in the name of evil.
Panthro is perhaps the coolest of the bunch, for a start his voice actor sounds like Lando in Star wars. Then he is the strongest guy like on the planet, he can lift the thundertank with his barehands. He uses nunchuks which can emit a noxious gas. He can fix anything too.
Jaga who dies in the first episode comes back as an ObiWan type character too.
Despite the repitition in this series so far, it has been entertaining and a great blast from the past and has shown signs of improving quite a bit.
INTRO PLUS EPISODE 1 PART 1 HERE:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=JTCVDZpZN1g
Hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! (s)
So the real reason I made this thread is that I continue to watch and collect these classic toons. I got Thundercats the complete series volume 2 at Christmas, 12 discs and the final 60+ episodes of the Thundercats saga. There have been big changes, I think I never watched the second half of the thundercats episodes before so this is all new to me. And....... it's become cheap and really cynical.
On another note, I have been watching the excellent Transformers, Gummi Bears and continue to watch the 80s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, more about that later.
Does anyone remember Silverhawks? They were Thundercats in space.
Or how about the Mr. T cartoon?
Does Supermarianation count as cartoons?
Silverhawks intro here:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=qp2l-jXVpC8
I only vaguely remember this. What was it about? They all turned into metallic hawks that could fight in space? Against who and what?
Sadly they don't sell this as a complete boxset or numbered series. The closest you can get is a 5 DVD boxset of some supervillain episodes. Not only that the X-Men series 1 and 2 boxset that was suppossed to be out in December never came out.
The Real Ghostbusters complete dvd set is now availible at timelife, too expensive for my money though.
I just watched Destination Moon last night, not my favourite. I like Tin Tin in Tibet and the Chinese and Egypt ones.
TRANSFORMERS
No doubt this image is burned into your memory, the eternal struggle between Optimus Prime and Megatron. Autobots fight the evil forces of the Decepticons. There is a war on Cybertron and the Autobots are pursued to Earth where both forces crash. 4 million years later, humans populate the earth and the bots awaken. This show is awesome, as action packed as two episodes of the A-tean shoved into one 25 minute episodes.
Even watching it today, it holds up really well. Huge talking robots kickin the crap out of each other each episode never gets old. It helps that it has some of the best cartoon voice acting you've ever heard, that the bots use cheesy, hilarious lines, taunting and baiting each other.
When the Autobots face off with Megatron for instance they use all manner of colourful nicknames. "Hey Mega-crumb! Hey Mega-turd! Hey Mega-loser! Hey Mega-crap!"
Also Megatron has his classic 80s design and not the lizard robot crap of the new movie.
I got the 14 dvd complete generation one boxset which includes series 1-4 and the movie which chronologically came in between series 2 and 3. But the legendary figure of Optimus Prime suprisingly only lasts for two seasons. Yes, the movie kills him and then Hot Rod takes over until series 4 which is only 3 episodes where Optimus is ressurected but then the whole series ends.
A bit of inside knowledge here, but the Transformers writers, story editors and even the production studio and artists at Marvel Productions went on directly afterwards to making Defenders of the Earth. Transformers doesn't quite reach the character, humour and genuine warmth of that 80s juggernaught, but comes a very close second. It uses a japanese animation house rather than a Korean one that DOE used and it's as good, nay better than Thundercats.
The most awesome and ridiculous moments are the introduction of the Dinobots. They discover some fossils near their base and analyse them. Wheeljack, the resident Mr T of the group suggests making autobots based on the power of the dinosaurs. At which point Optimus strokes his chin and says "Robot dinosaurs sounds like it could be a good idea, you have my blessing!" LOL
Then last night I watched this episode where this Japanese scientist makes a robot and introduces it at a conference "Ladies and gentlemen, behold the worlds first female robot ninja."
I'm neck deep in season 2 now and dreading the moment Prime dies and having to watch seasons 3 and 4 without him and with Galvatron instead of Megatron
I hated when Optimus died. The show suffered, even the animation took a nosedive. It appeared to be a little cruder.
WTF?
My top 5 cartoons are:
1. The 1994 Spiderman series
2. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ( the classic one )
3. X-men
4. Voltron ( the one with the lions)
5. Thundercats