Tagged: cartoon
How Did I Miss The ‘Defenders of the Earth” Cartoon From 1985?!
Wait a second here! How could it be that I’ve never heard of the cartoon ‘Defenders of the Earth’ from 1985?! Up until a few minutes ago I never even knew it existed. This cool 80’s cartoon even aired for 65 episodes and featured legendary comic characters The Phantom, Flash Gordon, Mandrake the Magician, Lothar along with their children kicking villain ass. I know, everyone probably has seen the shit out of this show except me, I grew up in Wisconsin, never had cable tv and perhaps there it just simply didn’t air around where I lived?!
Whatever the case I’m a bit stunned I missed out, as a kid in 1985 I would have loved this show. The animation looks solid too, and even as a kid I could tell when cartoons had shoddy work done on them, my first thought was that it looked like the same animators that worked on G.I. Joe. There was even a Marvel Comic book series of it too..
I guess Marvel legend Stan Lee even wrote the lyrics for the damn theme song! Damn! Is this some sort of proof of the Mandela Effect manifesting in my life? Anyway this is like a King Features version of The Avengers and I think this could make a pretty cool little movie. Anyone else miss this as a kid?!!
Wait now there were also action figures too?! What? Hmm….I am perplexed!!
And some Robot Chicken…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rfc0o1k_HM
The Top 10 Best Animated Music Videos of ALL Time!!
I saw a couple really cool animated music videos this week and it really got me wondering – what are the greatest cartoon / animated music videos of all time?! There’s a few that come to mind immediately and I know there are a ton that likely have fallen under the radar over the years.
The videos I’ve chosen are official ones by the actual artist, mainly more of an old school traditional animated or hand drawn style & I’ve steered away this time of the modern CG style stuff. Maybe some day I’ll investigate that further in the mean time check this out and most definitely let me know if I have left something off of the list – so let’s get crackin’ here as we figure out exactly what the coolest animated videos of all time are!!
Descendents – No Fat Burger (2016)
Here’s a brand spankin’ new video from one of my personal favorite bands of all time. The Descendents have been around since 1978 and packing the pop into punk like no other band can. This cool frantic animated video finally finds it’s cartoon mascot (and lead singer) “Milo” growing older and trying to resist eating everything unhealthy in sight. The band now in their fifties still has the energy but let’s face the facts, they just can’t eat the way they used to as teenagers. This is a call back to their classic song ‘I Like Food’. I always wanted to see the Milo character come to life in animation and the wait is finally over.
A-ha – Take On Me (1985)
Here’s one of the most popular videos of all time and it’s animated! Aside from this song being one of the best pop tunes of the 1980’s it also featured this incredible video filled with adventure & pure heart. The song was released several times but failed to chart, however when they produced this amazing video the whole thing exploded. One of the best things about it is that it tells a short action packed story that really sticks with you long after the video is over. The cool rotoscoping animation also gives it a hyper realistic quality no one had ever seen before in a music video. A true classic.
HarmonQuest: Real Life Animated Dungeons & Dragons Sessions?!
This rad series called HamonQuest is fucking awesome. It takes a real life D&D game and puts it into an animated adventure as it’s happening! What a brilliant idea, I wish I would have thought of this. I always imagine what our games of D&D might look like if we could see them on screen with all of the ridiculous scenarios and decision making that ends up going on.
I always as a DM plan for a serious game but then when you get the actual group together and people begin smoking weed, drinking or being caught not paying attention you often times get a totally different storyline than what you may have originally planned for. Ultimate rpg buffoon-ery to the max. That’s fine by me too, I totally dig the unpredictable nature of a D&D session. Well HarmonQuest puts that grand idea into perspective in an incredibly entertaining way. Check this shit out!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-cuqqHGpRDE&feature=youtu.be
Check out the whole series on youtube and get ready to laugh your ass off!
Oh No!! The Pokemon Go Conspiracy?!!
I barely know a damn thing about this new craze of Pokemon Go! I barely know anything about Pokemon in general but as everyone and their mom are out hitting the streets playing this new game it began to make me wonder if more was a foot here than meets the eye with this new phone addiction. Let’s face it we all spend way too much time looking at our phones, it’s gotten to an embarrassing level here for the human race that we’re all so damn checked out of what’s going on around us and so checked in to our little phone “realities”.
Hey I’m guilty of it too and I’m making an effort lately to put the thing down as much as possible. Well with Pokemon Go now things are getting pretty strange at an incredibly alarming rate. In fact the more info I read about it the more I think it’s far more than an innocent little game. Take a moment to check this out if you too have any reservations about exactly what’s going with this brand new craze that’s sweeping the world!!
STINKOR: The Smelliest Action Figure of All Time!!
Here’s a great old retro commercial from The Masters of the Universe featuring one of my favorite action figures Stinkor!
Yep there was a He-man villain that was a man sized skunk and the action figure did indeed stink! They basically took an older He-man figure, a villain called Mer-man who was a fish man and just repainted it like a damn skunk giving him Mekaneck’s battle armor!
Yeah as awesome as the He-man figures were they often times used the same body parts, swords, armor etc. and just cheaply created new characters.
As kids we didn’t care though we still ate that shit up anyway! So here’s a truly funny commercial that highlights this bizarre bad guy check it out!
Battle of the Insults: Skeletor vs. Donald Trump vs. Cobra Commander!!
When it comes to insulting & ridiculing people no one can do it better than Republican frontrunner Donald Trump and Masters of the Universe’s own ultimate asshole Skeletor!
Both are highly amusing yet incredibly idiotic, pop culture villains who will take any given chance to hurl an insult at their naysayers! So let’s pit these two jackasses against each other in a battle of insults to see just who’s got the most ridiculous cheap shots. Both of these guys have a lot in common in especially in the way they take pride in ridiculing anyone and everyone who gets in their way!
Check this out as first up we have Skeletor!
…..and of course Mr. Big Mouth himself The Donald!!
This is just Part 1 so if you want some more Trump at his finest check out part two!
Oh and I think Cobra Commander could join these two for the fun as well! If only Trump could pick one of these guys as his running mate now that’d be entertainment!!
A Rollins & Danzig Anti-Christmas!
So what happens when Danzig & Rollins celebrate Christmas together? Check out this cool little cartoon from a few years back that shows best these buddies hanging out in their apartment celebrating Anti-Christmas together, because well we all know Glenn worships the devil right?!
Based off the comic book series by Tom Neely this one gives us a glimpse of these punk rock legends lives together around the holiday season!! Oh and let’s not forget their next door neighbors Hall & Oates!
Comic Book Cover of the Week: PLASTIC MAN Vs. Monster Sewer Sludge?!
I had thoughts this morning for some reason about the 1979 Plastic Man cartoon! It made me wanna feature a cool old classic Plastic Man cover. This one from 1966 sees Plastic Man caught down in the sewers battling a creature created from meat by products and sludge?! Yep! Yuck! Plastic Man had some weird ass stories and villains back in the day and this cover is one of the coolest from that era wonderfully drawn by Ramona Fradon.
While we’re on topic lets take a peek back at that Plastic Man Cartoon!
And let’s not forget there was an elastic Plastic Man action figure too:
also here’s Robert Smith from The Cure as Plastic Man for the hell of it:
Also Plastic Man on the Superfriends! Whatta team up!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqeV7h_ijZc
and some live action Plastic Man!
Kick Don Bluth in the Butt and Kickstart The DRAGON’S LAIR Movie!!!
Yes! It’s such a pleasure to do a blog post that I really am totally hyped about these days! This morning I got wind of the brand spankin’ new Kickstarter page for Dragon’s Lair: The Movie and this is something I’ve always wanted to see since the 1980’s.
First let me state that Don Bluth was responsible for my favorite animated movie of all time, The Secret of Nimh, a movie from 1982 that still easily holds up today against the mass produced CG animated movies which have flooded the market. If you’ve never seen it you’re missing out big time. Anyway a year later in 1983 we got quite a surprise in the Arcades, when Dragon’s Lair was released-it was the first hand drawn animated video on the scene and it was a true wonder to behold. Yes the 1980’s were a wonderful era.
I know many people these days don’t even remember what a video game really arcade is, but back in the 80’s it was the place to be. We’d head off to the mall on a saturday afternoon and spend hours there playing video games and then maybe catch a movie afterwords. Ahh, yes, those were the days. I would spend hours watching my brother play Dragon’s Lair and besides it being a very difficult game it was, for me, just fun to watch the incredibly inventive action sequences & adventure unfold before my very eyes. Dragon’s Lair was total eye candy, I was never very good at it myself but I loved it.
So here we are in 2015 and (the now retired from animation) Don Bluth is being challenged by fans to make Dragon’s Lair into an old school style animated feature film via Kickstarter!! The good news is that Don Has officially accepted the invitation. Bluth started out working as an animator with Disney in 1971 having films like Robin Hood & The Rescuers under his belt, he later left and started his own animation company.
So fans we all need to support this venture, get a full on Don Bluth revival going on here, How amazing would it be to see a classic animated Dragon’s Lair feature movie? Who knows maybe if this happens we could get him to do a ‘Space Ace’ movie!!!
I’ve really been missing those classic hand drawn animated feature films, they had so much damn character, I think the world just might be a little better place if we could get this one made, check out the Kickstarter Page right HERE-let’s head into the Dragon’s Lair again!!
Comic Book Cover of the Week: When Cerebus Met Wolverine…I mean Wolveroach!
Back in the 1980’s I loved the indie comic Cerebus, mainly for the artwork, because quite honestly it’s content seemed quite a bit over my head back in those days. Dave Sim is an incredible artist and the creator of Cerebus the Aardvark which ran from 1977 all the way to 2004. In the comic one of the supporting characters was The Roach which Sim used to parody several Marvel & DC characters. I remember back in the 80’s seeing these cool covers as Cerebus was a comic book my older brother collected. I was always intrigued by them and posting these covers is making me wonder if it is indeed time to give Cerebus another shot now that I’m older and supposedly wiser. Check these out as they feature The Wolveroach in all of his glory!
Universal Dork 