Kids cartoons - What happened to all the good stuff?

[ukaskew]

Ben and Holly and Hey Duggee are easily as good as anything from my childhood. I find myself watching Duggee long after my son has left the room!

[timmymagic73]

ukaskew said:

Ben and Holly and Hey Duggee are easily as good as anything from my childhood. I find myself watching Duggee long after my son has left the room!

Ditto. Favourite episode? I loved the Scooby Doo ghost one, the costumes went straight over my daughter's head as she hasn't watched any Scooby yet, but I knew immediately who they were! Very clever. They've won awards for the music too I believe, how to do it properly.

[sgtBerbatov]

The last good kids cartoon they made was Arthur. And it's still being made, Mr.Ratburn got married to a male ardvaark recently and Alabama refused to show it.

[Baby Shark doo doo doo doo]

viggyp said:

Baby Shark doo doo doo doo said:

Loved Mysterious Cities of Gold

They actually released a second series which was made in 2012 and a third will be airing later this year.

Ooooooo thanks

[ajprice]

Transformers, He-Man, Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors, The Trap Door (plasticine counts, right?), Dogtanian and the three Muskehounds, The Real Ghostbusters, Batfink, Danger Mouse, Star Fleet & Terrahawks (puppets, but they count, right?)

[viggyp]

Baby Shark doo doo doo doo said:

viggyp said:

Baby Shark doo doo doo doo said:

Loved Mysterious Cities of Gold

They actually released a second series which was made in 2012 and a third will be airing later this year.

Ooooooo thanks

My pleasure

[viggyp]

ajprice said:

Transformers, He-Man, Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors, The Trap Door (plasticine counts, right?), Dogtanian and the three Muskehounds, The Real Ghostbusters, Batfink, Danger Mouse, Star Fleet & Terrahawks (puppets, but they count, right?)

Loved all of these including Mask who someone stated earlier on. Jamie and the Magic Torch was great also. Anyone remember Visionaries and/or Inhumanoids? GI Joe was good also.

I watched He-Man although I wasn't the biggest fan but I do want to rewatch it as I follow the Grumpy Skeletor account on Twitter which is hilarious at times.

[P5BNij]

Halb said:

Cloudy147 said:

I've just spent a short while zipping back to my childhood (from the 80's) with this collection of cartoon intros that I watched back in the day:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy3RTFFhSYs

Those fast paced, high energy anthems with characters who came to life in rich cartoon worlds were just amazing as a child. And of course you could then ask Santa for the action figures at Christmas and create your own adventures with your mates.

yes. THe quality of cartoons today isn't as good as it used to be. Looking back, the 80s were the water mark. THere were some decent ones in the 90s, and the 00s I think. Most stuff today tries to outdo each other with postmodernism or esoteric animation.
SOme of those anthems are on my running playlist.
British animation died with Cosgrove Hall.

My cousin used to work for Cosgrove Hall as a background and cell artist, she did a lot of the work on 'Jamie & The Magic Torch', she took me for a tour round the studio back in '77 and showed me some of the stuff she'd drawn for it and Kenny Everett's 'Captain Kremen' series (I still have a cell from that stashed away somewhere), even as a kid at the time I could see the quality that went into the production, not least in the sets and puppets for 'Chorlton & The Wheelies'.

[alock]

Larva on Netflix is good

[kowalski655]

C0ffin D0dger said:

Big Bad Barry



and The Gnome



Just brilliant

Nanny Plum us my favourite..so much cynicism

[Iddingtons]

The new Danger Mouse is really very good.

If you want something more akin to Transformers / Visionaries / Thundercats you should check out Voltron on Netflix. It's utterly brilliant.

[ukaskew]

timmymagic73 said:

Ditto. Favourite episode? I loved the Scooby Doo ghost one, the costumes went straight over my daughter's head as she hasn't watched any Scooby yet, but I knew immediately who they were! Very clever. They've won awards for the music too I believe, how to do it properly.

Space and the one where they're stuck on an island, I've watched them hundreds of times! The audio in the space episode is stunning.

I've not seen the Scooby Doo one, my son loves Scooby Doo as well so I'll need to find it.

[AlexRS2782]

I know it's not strictly 100% animation, as it has live action with kids / adults, but Twirlywoos is excellent.

I'm in my 30's and still find it great to watch.

[entropy]

What happened? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RryI7JJ2GHQ

Agreed that action cartoons are missing. WWE, Marvel/DC productions have replaced those.

80s may have been the peak but in the 90s DC/Marvel animation eg. Batman, Spiderman, X-Men were equal/better than the feature films that followed.

80s cartoons seemed to go hand in hand with 80s action films: big muscles, big guns, big explosions.

I remember buying Transformers DVDs and couldn't wait to get rid of them after watching the first few seasons. Some things are best left in the past. The quality of the animation is dire and completely rushed to sell toys.

[AlexC1981]

These are the all time greats from my childhood. All 80s apart from Gargoyles which is 90s.

Mysterious Cities of Gold
Dungeons & Dragons
Dogtanian & the Three Muskehounds
Gargoyles

Honourable mention to:

80 days around the world/Around the world with Willy Fog
Thundercats
Ulysses 31
Tailspin
Defenders of the Earth

[Halb]

timmymagic73 said:

I have tried re-watching some cartoons from my childhood in the late 70s/early 80s, but it's mostly a bit "odd" when viewed again today. Happy memories, but nothing that I'm keen to show my 4 year old. Although she did quite enjoy Trap Door, even though she had no idea what was going on..!

Edited by timmymagic73 on Wednesday 22 May 08:40

Which ones? Still love TRap Door, it was one of the few cartoon things I bought when I was into buying tapes (think it was tapes)
Jamie and the MAgic Torch? Dr Snuggles? Chorlton?

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I think the dangermouse is st and not a patch on the classic. The new Thundercats...undecided on that, probably a better structure than the old one, but not the buzz.

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Mysterious Cities of Gold, has any other cartoon done this? A huge overriding story arc like Game of THrines or something. Loved it as a kid, and watched the sequel a while back, it was not as good...

Gargoyles for me sticks out as the best one from post 1990. It too had a large over-riding arc of sorts, alongside standalone episodes.

also, a bunch of videos of old cartoons started popping up on yt...

[tvrolet]

glazbagun said:

You should watch the new Dangermouse they made. Every bit as good as the David Jason one.

My daughter did some of the backgrounds for that - name in the credits Plus backgrounds and background lead on quite a few other kids cartoons. The animation studio she works for is now owned by Hasbro, which might give a idea as to why some programmes/cartoons have links to lines of toys etc.

[skinny]

Ren and Stimpy was great until the studio got rid of the creator and tried to carry out on without him. The animators wrote the episodes which made it really quite special.

[sausage76]

Got to agree with Hey Duggee, have watched them even when my daughters not there.

I'll leave this here for the converts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K05N2jqFHc8

Ben and Holly is great as well, these some monster something or another on netflix that we watch and that alright as well

[InitialDave]

Halb said:

Gargoyles for me sticks out as the best one from post 1990. It too had a large over-riding arc of sorts, alongside standalone episodes.

Batman The Animated Series was excellent, Reboot was great fun too. Managed to nab the whole lot on DVD last time I was in the states, too.

Going back to the older stuff, Thunderbirds 2086 was one I used to watch on Saturday mornings. Like Mysterious Cities Of Gold, it's probable that this kind of stuff that was repackaged from the Japanese is what nudged me toward watching anime later on.