Watching the OG Fred Wolf Series

[PizzaPower1985]

I'm not a TV guy either. If I can't find a show online, it's not worth my time.

I enjoy cartoons a lot and if I'm gonna watch something I go online. THE WEB is so vast that I use it as my primary entertainment. Articles, videos, looking at art etc. Millions of things to do online!

[ssjup81]

Originally Posted by Leo656

Great to have ya back!

If that was aimed at me, thanks! It was also fun chatting with ya a couple of weeks ago.

Originally Posted by mikey0

True. Some of the 90s, also.

Yeah, it probably was, just didn't notice it as much I suppose since the FCC was getting stricter with the content aimed at kids by the time the 90s rolled around.

Originally Posted by neatoman

There's also the fact that literal TV sucks compared to almost any other way you can get programming.

I feel the same way about television now. I was just talking about this yesterday. I miss when I was excited about watching a certain program or anxiously awaiting the next episode of whatever it was I was watching...both live-action and animated, especially as a kid.

No ad block, no pausing, it literally runs on a schedule, there are very few niches, bonus content is rare and if you to keep personal copies at... ahem, "a very cheap cost", you'll have to painstakingly record it.

Hm, yeah, back then you had to make a genuine effort to watch television shows, especially if two shows aired at the same time that you wanted to watch. You either had to just watch one over the other, switch back and forth between them during commercials (this was Saturday mornings for me, jumping back and forth mainly between CBS and NBC in the 80s it seemed), or luckily have another television with a VCR to record it.

As bothersome as all of that would be by today's standards...there's something a bit nice about it. I think we balanced our time better back then because of instances like this. Like, back in the late 80s, I don't recall the time exactly it aired when syndicated and before it was on CBS in my area and also before the Disney Afternoon was a thing, but TMNT came on in the evenings. I knew that if I had my homework done by a certain time or whatever else I had to do, I would be able to watch it. Same as I got older. If there was a show I watched, I had it planned out so that I'd be able to watch it...as time has gone on, I rarely do this because I can watch stuff at any time because of the net.

I rarely watch television now...?ept for maybe the local news and sometimes reruns of Quantum Leap on one of the stations we get with the antenna...but it's not the same. Even as far back as the early 2000s, my television watching was starting to go down due to the lack of shows that interested me enough to watch.

[Leo656]

Originally Posted by ssjup81

If that was aimed at me, thanks! It was also fun chatting with ya a couple of weeks ago.

Yes it was. And Yes! It was!

[Wesley]

Originally Posted by Leo656

I'd just rather Do Something than Watch Something at this point, unless it's something REALLY good.

I agree, especially during the Summer when the weather is usually great. Most tv shows don?t interest me either.

[Leo656]

"Dark Side of the Ring" is the only Must-See show in all of television, for me. I'll stop everything to watch that show, but that's not even fair because nothing else really comes close to it.

[mikey0]

Originally Posted by ssjup81

Yeah, it probably was, just didn't notice it as much I suppose since the FCC was getting stricter with the content aimed at kids by the time the 90s rolled around.

The 90s had the CBS SATAM episodes of FW TMNT, Pirates of the Dark Water, Bucky O Hare and the Toad Wars, the final episodes of The Real Ghostbusters, Toxic Crusaders, Conan the Adventurer, Biker Mice From Mars, Street Sharks, and Exosquad to give you examples.

[ssjup81]

Originally Posted by mikey0

The 90s had the CBS SATAM episodes of FW TMNT, Pirates of the Dark Water, Bucky O Hare and the Toad Wars, the final episodes of The Real Ghostbusters, Toxic Crusaders, Conan the Adventurer, Biker Mice From Mars, Street Sharks, and Exosquad to give you examples.

CBS TMNT became sillier because it aired on a Saturday morning and was on a network station where the rules are a bit more strict. Ghostbusters went through this too. The syndicated eps running along the ABC eps during the first couple of seasons were different in some ways...like how in the syndicated version they were allowed to reference the Necronomicon by name, but couldn't for the ABC Saturday morning version. They also made it sillier as it went on, toned down the ghost aspect as the concept of humans having died was supposedly not good for kids, and made it Slimer and the Real Ghostbusters, making the Ghostbusters secondary. They even had that cartoon within the show about Slimer and that scientist dude or something. I vaguely remember it and not watching the show as much at that point. First couple of seasons were great though. It wasn't the Slimer show yet and Ghosts being the spirits of humans was still allowed.

The other stuff mentioned weren't on the "big 3" (pretty sure Fox did...I know it was for Pirates of Dark Water). The other channels could be a bit more lax in their programming. Sorry I wasn't more specific about that. I was focusing on the networks.

[Leo656]

No more long vacations, please, you're really good at this.

[IMJ]

Originally Posted by ssjup81

CBS TMNT became sillier because it aired on a Saturday morning and was on a network station where the rules are a bit more strict. Ghostbusters went through this too. The syndicated eps running along the ABC eps during the first couple of seasons were different in some ways...like how in the syndicated version they were allowed to reference the Necronomicon by name, but couldn't for the ABC Saturday morning version. They also made it sillier as it went on, toned down the ghost aspect as the concept of humans having died was supposedly not good for kids, and made it Slimer and the Real Ghostbusters, making the Ghostbusters secondary. They even had that cartoon within the show about Slimer and that scientist dude or something. I vaguely remember it and not watching the show as much at that point. First couple of seasons were great though. It wasn't the Slimer show yet and Ghosts being the spirits of humans was still allowed.

Awesome post. I remember all of this clearly. The first CBS TMNT episode was highly anticipated and I remember watching it as a kid and then calling my buddy down the street and we "analyzed" the episode for anything "new". I had to be in fifth grade at that point, I think.

The Slimer segments of TRG - did not like 'em.... I felt like it was geared towards some other demographic even though I was still a kid at the time.

[sdp]

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

I haven't watched live TV in about a decade, maybe even more. Everything I watched is streamed or on blu-rays. I can't imagine sitting through commercials anymore.

Except on youtube when you're nostalgic of old commercials and now watch them because you want to. I can't stand watching anything on disc anymore, the loading kills the experience for me everytime.

[cammy85]

For whatever reason, they marketed the CBS run as the comic book come to life. My young mind interpreted this as us getting some of the Archie comics adapted to the screen as the comic did with the first seven episodes. D'oh!! I still enjoyed them and I still love The Dimension X Story, Fly and Cufflink Caper.

[ssjup81]

Originally Posted by Leo656

No more long vacations, please, you're really good at this.

I will do my best.

Originally Posted by IMJ

Awesome post. I remember all of this clearly. The first CBS TMNT episode was highly anticipated and I remember watching it as a kid and then calling my buddy down the street and we "analyzed" the episode for anything "new". I had to be in fifth grade at that point, I think.

The Slimer segments of TRG - did not like 'em.... I felt like it was geared towards some other demographic even though I was still a kid at the time.

In all honesty, those Slimer segments, I don't remember liking all that much, which is why I personally wasn't watching. Those later eps of Ghostbusters must wasn't very memorable to me as much as the earlier episodes either because I'd completely forgotten Janine's change. My memory of Janine was always sassy with her Brooklyn accent. I somehow blocked out Kath Soucie. Same with Peter and Slimer acting more friend like (which was boring) and Dave Coulier taking over for Lorenzo. I completely forgot that. I still think of Lorenzo as Peter. Slimer wasn't used as much in the earlier eps either. I mean, he was there, but he wasn't the focus. Oh and I liked Peter wanting to blast Slimer from time to time...but had to make it more kid-friendly, I guess. -_-

I'm not sure how other kids at the time felt about the show...but I know I was one of the ones who didn't watch the entire run out of boredom and was switching to the other stations, unless it happened to be an older episode....before the main four became secondary characters in their own show.

[Leo656]

I mean, you address a good point. I LOVE Kath Soucie in just about everything. And for many years, watching cartoons was like a giant game of "HEY, there she is!" because her body of work was huge. She was like the 80s/90s version of Tara Strong (between the fact that they're both so prolific and even have very similar voices with some of their characters; Strong basically gets the kind of roles Kath used to get when she was younger).

I didn't even know she did Real Ghostbusters until a few years ago. And I absolutely watched the episodes she was in because now that I know it was her, I remember it. But those later episodes just didn't sit well with me AT ALL, they weren't as memorable as the earlier seasons. Once they put such a focus on aiming younger and going all-in on Slimer, that really wrecked the balance of the show all the way around. Even the "regular" parts of the show simply weren't as good.

[ssjup81]

Originally Posted by Leo656

I mean, you address a good point. I LOVE Kath Soucie in just about everything. And for many years, watching cartoons was like a giant game of "HEY, there she is!" because her body of work was huge. She was like the 80s/90s version of Tara Strong (between the fact that they're both so prolific and even have very similar voices with some of their characters; Strong basically gets the kind of roles Kath used to get when she was younger).

She did do a lot of voice over work, didn't she? I think comparing Tara Strong to her is a really good comparison. They do have similar voicing styles with the types of characters they do/did. Now I'm trying to recall who voiced the goth girl on Extreme Ghostbusters...I don't recall if it was Tara or Kath. lol

I didn't even know she did Real Ghostbusters until a few years ago. And I absolutely watched the episodes she was in because now that I know it was her, I remember it. But those later episodes just didn't sit well with me AT ALL, they weren't as memorable as the earlier seasons. Once they put such a focus on aiming younger and going all-in on Slimer, that really wrecked the balance of the show all the way around. Even the "regular" parts of the show simply weren't as good.

Yeah. I think what also hurt it was the fact that I guess the network execs felt that ghosts were too scary for kids. Of course in my mind, as an adult, am thinking, "If your kid is scared of ghosts, then don't watch a show called Ghostbusters! If you know what a ghost generally is and you're scared of that, don't watch the damn show!" Sad how the ghosts got more and more monstrous like because ghosts being the spirits of dead humans was an issue. One of my favorite episodes, was the one with that old woman who had a haunting. The Ghostbusters dealt with it and at the end, Peter decided to stay and talk with the lady because he knew she was lonely and he started to say something about his own mother, but cut himself off. I dunno...just a nice character moment for him and I really enjoyed that. Another ep I liked, was the one with that ghost detective who couldn't pass over until he solved some case he died before he had a chance to solve.

You know, also thinking back on the show, I really favored Janine. She was a fun female character. She didn't take any mess and she was written as an actual character. She was Janine first, woman second, unlike most things now that are trying too hard to force an agenda, imo. I liked how sassy she was and I always liked the accent. I hated her change when remembering about it. She became so boring and motherly. Also, the episode that they did to try and retcon the change made it even worse to me. She was changing to get noticed by Egon when he was already kind of noticing her back in the earlier eps. They'd even had a date. I felt it was a terrible character change.

Using Kath Soucie for weak Janine I guess worked, but I know that Kath was capable of pulling off an accent and stuff. I've heard her do other works. Wish they could redub the entire series and bring her original voice actress back and kick out Kath...too bad you can't do that with Lorenzo, though.

My bias is totally showing here... ^^;

[Leo656]

Oh, man oh man I am so with you on just about all of that. That one episode with Peter staying to chat with the old lady always gets me righthere, man. The early seasons of that show had some absolutely stellar writing.

A lot of the ghosts unnerved me a bit as a 5-year old but that's what I liked about Ghostbusters. Stuff like Sandman, Boogeyman, and Samhain were definitely pushing the limits but that's what made it great! That's what made it memorable!

Like, the episode with Egon and the Boogeyman is such a classic, and it really puts over a great lesson for the kids. Boogeyman is legit horrifying in that show, through a 5-year old's eyes, and they sell that even Egon as a grown-ass man is terrified... but that he overcomes it because he has a job to do. That's what growing up is, realizing that you can't just stick your head in the sand and hide when things are scary or "uncomfortable", you push through it, not run from it. It reminds me of an issue of Superman from around 2008 when he and Supergirl have to fight Brainiac, who Supergirl's never met before, but she's terrified of him because he destroyed the city where she grew up back on Krypton when she was a kid. And she doesn't wanna fight him because she's afraid. And Clark just smiles and says, "It's OKAY to be afraid." And then they go to work. Same thing.

Egon was totally "triggered" but he was able to man up and do the deal. What a great role model! What a well-written show! I stuck around off-and-on for most of it, but those earliest seasons were the best.

I didn't much care for Janine's revamp, either. I thought she was hot already. I didn't think she needed any "help".

[cammy85]

Boogeyman was the second episode I watched after bbeing introduced to Saturday morning cartoons by some friends who had cable and sent a VHS full of the day's block coming from the big three US networks. Mrs. Rogers was my first. I moved away from my current home that summer and showed one of the cartoons; just not RGB for obvious reasons. I could get RGB where I lived, but it came in very poor quality; grainy and changing from colour to black and white.

Intereresting to note that the Gummi Bears episode "Gummi In A Guilded Cage" which introduced the Carpies was also on there, but didn't scare either. That one is pretty intense now.

On topic of TMNT: i don't remember my first episode, but I do remember compiling a VHS for another friend in the same situation later. Enter The Rat King scafed him more than anything shredder did. Go figure.