THE MYSTERIOUS CITIES OF GOLD
October 27, 2011 by adenike
Filed under ARCHIVES, CARTOONS, CHILDREN'S TV, FEATURED CONTENT, FILM & TV
Here are my memories of The Mysterious Cities of Gold:
· It seemed to run for about 629 episodes.
· It had an excellent theme tune.
· There was two boys and a girl who were trying to locate the Mysterious Cities of Gold – they were joined by a Han Solo-eqsue pirate, who was friendly enough but wanted to find the Cities of Gold for his own purposes.
· There was a massive flying machine that looked like a Golden Eagle. Although it was in the opening sequence every week, it didn’t actually appear in the cartoon until about episode 483.
· One of the boys had some sort of special amulet or medallion that could help locate the Cites of Gold.
For me, The Mysterious Cities of Gold, along with The MuskerHounds and Willy Fog, makes up the Holy Trinity of cartoon shows from my youth. It’s interesting to note that all three had long, ambitious story lines told over many episodes, and all had a kicking theme tune. If I close my eyes I can just make out a broom cupboard bound-Philip Schofield’s (pre-This Morning) face (and white George Clooney hair), encouraging viewers to write in to get a printed copy of the theme song lyrics. Or was it Andy Crane? Ed the Duck was definitely there. I have a clear memory of watching every week and wondering ‘But when are they going to find that massive Golden Eagle flying machine?!?’ And feeling very relieved when they did. Continue reading “THE MYSTERIOUS CITIES OF GOLD” »
DANGERMOUSE
These days there’s something quite laughable about a small white mouse fighting crime, with an eye patch and a hamster side kick in a creased suit. But back in the early 80s, this secret agent duo kicked Batman and Robin’s ass, and were top of the class in coolness and ratings.
I was born in 1984; making me the grand old age of 26. However, Danger Mouse hit our screens three years before, meaning I was a tad 2000 and late in missing the start of this cartoon caper. But all I had to do was play catch up and ask my folks to pop in the video cassettes of their hay days; back when shoulder pads were actually meant to be in dresses, and way before Boy George painted his neck black. Continue reading “DANGERMOUSE” »
INSPECTOR GADGET
What I could never work out as a kid was – was Inspector Gadget a robot? Or some sort of cyborg? Or was he just a human with a load of, well, gadgets? Some of them – like the propeller in the hat – could feasibly just be wacky James Bond-esque contraptions, but ‘Go Go Gadget Legs’?!? There’s no way they were detachable.
OK I am now going to look on Google to find the answer. Hang on a minute… Continue reading “INSPECTOR GADGET” »
THE RACOONS
June 4, 2011 by adenike
Filed under ARCHIVES, CARTOONS, CHILDREN'S TV, FILM & TV
“This is the Evergreen Forest: quiet, peaceful, serene. That is, until Bert Raccoon wakes up….” It was these lines which brought me a giddy thrill over countless Saturday mornings during the 1990s.
Having rushed downstairs to fix a bowl of healthy cereal which I then preceded to bury under an Everest of sugar, I would watch a Saturday morning children’s television schedule which was so varied in characters, plots, and eye-grabbing animation that I would feel spoiled come lunchtime.
However, it is the Raccoons which I always look back on with some of the fondest memories of my childhood television viewing. Continue reading “THE RACOONS” »
SCOOBY-DOO
May 30, 2011 by adenike
Filed under ARCHIVES, CARTOONS, FEATURED CONTENT
Everyone remembers Scooby-Doo, right? And do you recall the three most classic series in the franchise: Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, The Scooby-Doo Show and Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo?
Based on a comedy ghost-hunting dog and his pals, Shaggy, Fred, Velma and Daphne (aka Mystery Inc.), this Hanna-Barbera-produced cartoon made its original debut way back in 1969. However, many of us 70s and 80s babies remember watching these memorable shows in the 80s, when they were on heavy rotation (syndication) on British Tv screens. Continue reading “SCOOBY-DOO” »
BUTTON MOON
May 30, 2011 by adenike
Filed under ARCHIVES, CARTOONS, FEATURED CONTENT, FILM & TV
In research for this article I managed to find a whole episode of button moon on Youtube and, I have to say it’s a lot different watching it back now. The catchy yet brief theme tune goes, ‘We’re off to button moon, we follow Mr Spoon, button moon.’ THAT’S IT! This is then repeated twice. Somehow, I remembered it to be a lot more… well, a lot better than that. But oh no, it’s just 11 words long, and a bit rubbish really ! Continue reading “BUTTON MOON” »
MY LITTLE PONY
My Little Pony, the cartoon, was American ‘trippi-ness’ at its best. Set in ‘Dream Valley’ (I’m not even kidding you), it was a TV series about flying ponies who always got themselves into trouble with fairytale like creatures such as goblins, gremlins, (yes they are different I’ll have you know) and witches. The series, which ran from 1986-7 originally, always ended in a happy frame of mind (obviously! We’re in dream valley here!), it truly is a whirlwind of euphoric, genuinely trippy but happy happenings. Continue reading “MY LITTLE PONY” »
MR MEN AND LITTLE MISS
With today being the 76th birthday of the late children’s author Roger Hargreaves, what better way to celebrate than with an ode to the original Mr Men and Little Miss books, of which he was the creator and writer.
Continue reading “MR MEN AND LITTLE MISS” »
‘GOOD LUCK’ TROLLS
Bright hair, fancy dress and a happy go lucky attitude; no we’re not talking about Katy Perry’s latest video, but the wild and wonderful world of ‘Good luck’ Trolls.
With their constant smiling faces and bright eyes filled with wisdom, they pretty much dragged Barbie down in the dirt and kicked Ken’s ass in terms of coolness; or perhaps that was just in my eyes.
Even though these adorable dolls originate back in 1959 (the handiwork of a Danish fisherman, too poor to buy his daughter a gift, instead carving for her a little troll from wood), and became a phenomenon in the 60s, they enjoyed a huge resurgence in popularity in the 90s, and most of today’s fans first discovered them in this era. Continue reading “‘GOOD LUCK’ TROLLS” »
HE-MAN AND THE MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE
April 9, 2011 by adenike
Filed under ARCHIVES, CARTOONS, FEATURED CONTENT
He-Man – the self-anointed “most powerful man in the universe” is an icon of popular culture. The rousing theme tune is ingrained into the minds of a generation of children who enjoyed one of the wittiest playground chants in history – who didn’t sing: ‘I have the power/To pick up a flower/And throw it two metres away’ along to the music? (Ed: At my school it ended: ‘… in half of an hour it hurts’. LOL!)
He-Man was the perfect man – big muscles, tall and healthy with lovely long blond hair. That’s what every 80s schoolboy looked for in their heroes right? Oh, no sorry, that was Hitler.
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