- On Strange Kids Club I wax nostalgic about CBS’ Saturday Supercade. It was a block of cartoons back in 1983 based on popular video game characters like Donkey Kong, Q-bert and Frogger.
- I also talk about all the new DVD releases this week which include a trio of terrible Brad Pitt movies and Barb Wire starring Pam Anderson’s breasts.
Hope everyone had a great week. Check back next week, we have a big 20th movie anniversary on Monday. It’s not a movie you would expect to have a birthday on Valentine’s Day.
They will make cartoons based on anything at this point. Movies, TV shows, video games, dolls, stickers, etc, etc. The list goes on and on. If the suits think they can make money off it, they’ll do it.
There have been countless cartoons based on movies. Usually it’s a dumbed down kid friendly version of the movie with an added talking animal sidekick or something ridiculous like that. But it’s something special when an adult oriented, R rated movie is translated into a kid friendly cartoon. It’s literally amazing that this happens. Now, there have been several R rated movies turned into cartoons that are not actually meant for kids. I’m talking about Kevin Smith’s Clerks the Animated Series and Ice Cube’s Friday the Animated Series (seriously, check You Tube if you don’t believe me) when I say that. They were both created for adult fans of the movie an not meant for children, which is why I’m not including them on this list. Here, you’ll only see Saturday morning, kid-friendly cartoons in this list. And what a list it is.
Let’s get started…
Rambo: The Force of Freedom (1986) – Released the year after First Blood Part II. I can see where you’d want a psychologically damaged one-man killing machine as a role model for children on Saturday mornings. It just fits. It’s what the corporate suits call “synergy”. The cartoon had a nice cast of voice talent though. Neil Ross (Transformers, GI Joe, Galaxy High) was Rambo. James Avery (Capt Sisko from ST: Deep Space Nine) was Turbo. Colonel Trautman was voiced by Allen Oppenheimer from He-Man, Transformers and GI Joe fame and one of the villains, Sgt Havok, was voiced by the great Peter Cullen (Optimus Prime).
Toxic Crusaders (1991) – Based on Troma’s surprise B horror sensation, The Toxic Avenger. The movie featured wall-to-wall language, nudity and extremely graphic scenes of violence and sex. The movie actually showed a dude, while robbing a fast food joint, try to rape a blind girl. Also Toxie kills someone by crushing their head in a weight machine at the gym. And if I remember correctly, he either punches completely through someone’s face or takes their head off with a punch. I totally get why one would watch that movie and think, “Kids’ll love this!”
Robocop (1988) – Based on the Paul Verhoeven classic. I actually see this as a cool cartoon, but damn this movie was violent. Copious amounts of nudity and drug use also earned every ounce of the R it was rated. The cartoon had several nods to the movie including an appearance by Kurtwood Smith’s Clarence Boddicker, despite the fact that character died in the movie.
Welcome to Day 16 of AWESOME-tober-fest. Today is the end of werewolf TV week. Yesterday I discussed one of my favorite cartoons, Fangface. Today, I’ll be discussing another personal favorite, The Cartoon Adventures of Teen Wolf.
The Teen Wolf cartoon was based on the characters in the 1985 Michael J Fox movie, Teen Wolf. Many of the movie characters show up in the cartoon. Obviously we see Scott Howard and his father Harold. Also showing up is Scott’s friend Stiles, Boof, Pamela Anderson and her neanderthal boyfriend Mick. However, only Harold Howard is voiced by the actor who portrayed him in the movie, James Hampton. A few other famous voice actors filled out the cast. Don Most (Ralph Malph) voiced Stiles and the legendary June Foray (The Flintstones’ Betty Rubble, Looney Tunes’ Granny/Witch Hazel, Rocky Squirrel/Natasha from Rocky & Bullwinkle) voiced Grandma Howard. So the cast was solid. Plus it had a kick ass theme song and a ridiculously ’80s opening with Teen Wolf listening to a Walkman.
I love this cartoon and that opening sequence so much that I use a still from it as my avatar/buddy icon on Twitter, Flickr and WordPress.
Obviously, being a big fan of werewolves, and also a big fan of the movie Teen Wolf, I was going to love this show. Not surprisingly, the cartoon changed a few details from the movie. It added Scott’s entire extended werewolf family (see below), gave Scott a younger sister (he’s an only child in the movie) and making the fact that Scott is a werewolf a secret again. I didn’t really have a problem with these changes because it added something to the show. Making the werewolf thing a secret added a bit of drama that would be lost if everyone knew what Scott was. I was able to go with it and still enjoy the cartoon.
The show aired from 1986 to 1987. This encompassed two seasons, 13 episodes in the first, 8 episodes in the second. The reason there are only 8 episodes in season 2 is due to a cartoon voice actor”s strike in late 1986 that halted production during the second season. There was technically a third season aired, but it consisted entirely of re-runs.
Two VHS collections were released in the US. The first was titled Wolf of My Dreams and the second was All-American Werewolf (see below).
In the UK there was a 3 volume set of Teen Wolf episodes with funky artwork showing Scott transforming into the wolf across the three covers.
In Australia, they actually released the entire series on DVD which makes me jealous and pissed off at the same time because the set is in the PAL format. However, I do have a DVD player that is region free and theoretically converts from PAL, but I don’t want to buy this set and then they release American versions very soon afterward. Plus, I haven’t technically tested my DVD player’s ability to convert from PAL to NTSC so I don’t know how well it works. The picture may look like crap. So I’m stuck staring at this DVD box art and seething with unchecked nerd rage and envy at the “Land Down Under”.
So, like I said, I wait. And watch the crappy conversions of Teen Wolf episodes you can find on YouTube. Yay.
Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.
I finish Frankenstein cartoon week with a little known monster gem from the mid ’90s: Monster Force.
This series was created in 1994 and lasted 13 episodes. The story is set around the year 2020 and features a team of teen warriors using high tech weaponry to battle the Universal Monsters as well as other spiritual beings. Frankenstein’s monster, aka The Monster, fights on the Monster Force team as does Luke Talbot, the Wolf Man (descendant of the original Larry Talbot from the Universal movie). Also on the team is a psychic girl named Shelley Frank who is somehow connected to Frankenstein.
The main villain of the cartoon is Dracula (with a weird goatee-type thing that looks totally beatnik) and his faithfully gross servant Renfield. Other monsters like Hotep (The Mummy) and The Creature (from the Black Lagoon) also pop up within the first 7 episodes. Monster Force was released on DVD this year. I got it off Netflix to watch expecting a cool, monster vanquishing adventure series. The verdict? It’s awful. Imagine a retarded kid doing a book report on Japanese stereo instructions. Now imagine that this book report is a tighter, more interesting script than anything you see in this show.
For instance, the psychic girl, Shelley Frank. Her name. Get it? Shelley, as in Mary SHELLEY. And Frank, as in FRANKenstein? And you know that she’s psychic because she and the team mention it probably three or four times EVERY EPISODE. You know, in case you forgot in the five minutes it takes for them to mention it again. Shelley is also the only one with wings on her battle armor so she can fly. Why? Why did they not think the rest of the team would want f’n WINGS on their battle armor? I would. I’m on the team, I want to f’n fly, dammit. That’s the type of character development you see in this show.
Continuing my look at cartoons featuring Frankenstein’s monster. Today I look at Drak Pack.
This show originally aired on CBS between 1980 and 1982 and it was created by the Australian arm of Hanna-Barbera.
The cartoon had a great premise. As descendants of the original monsters (Dracula, Frankenstein’s monster and Wolf Man), the three main teens use their monster abilities, and taking orders from the legendary Dracula, to fight crime and atone for their ancestors’ evil doings. Here is the opening sequence that explains the entire premise of the show (like many Hanna-Barbera cartoons are want to do).
This was a very clever series that merged the superhero genre as well as the monster genre. As you can see, the teens appeared normal until they called on their monster identities to fight evil. The three teens are Drak Jr (or just Drak), Frankie and Howler. They each had different abilities in their monster forms. To change into their monster personalities they high fived and yelled “WHACK-O!” (called the Drak Whack). Surprisingly, they went by the same names whether as regular teens or as the monsters which makes you wonder why they used secret identities. But I guess walking around as a 7 ft green monster would be a bit much. To get around they drove a bad ass hot rod called the Drakster which not only looked cool but had a ton of James Bond-ish gadgetry hiding within it.
I remember really enjoying this show. I only ever saw it a few times because the time that it aired constantly changed. I was always on the lookout for it but never could find it. It was released on DVD in Canada, but you can order it from Amazon (it’s Region 1, so you can watch it on a US DVD player). Unfortunately Netflix has not added it to their library just yet.
Definitely worth a look for monster fans as well as Hanna-Barbera fans. Another really great series staring every0ne’s favorite monsters as heroes.
Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.
