Kid Cartoon Reviews

Recently the kids have been home with the H1N1, or some derivative of it, so we've spent a lot of time laying around watching kid stuff on TV. What follows is a review of some of our current favorites:

Scooby Doo-First off, the plot is the exact same every time. A monster pops out and cackles. Then the gang is driving around aimlessly, apparently looking for mysteries. They find a mystery to solve. They split up to look for clues. Shaggy and Scooby get scared and also eat things. Fred and Daphne go in the corner and hump. Velma's glasses fall off. They accidentally catch the monster and reveal that he is Mr Carruthers, the janitor. They unravel the flimsy evil plan for the benefit of the police. There is usually dry ice involved. Scooby and Shaggy eat more things. The end.

In newer episodes, however, the ghosts have become real, instead of Mr Carruthers, the janitor, which sort of ruins the "everything can be explained by a greedy jerk" thesis the old show had going for it. Heck, I even saw a 20 foot tall glowing red Chupacabra, when in actuality they are supposed to look like a hairless coyote. Then we watched "A pup named Scooby Doo" where the plot was totally implausable, even for a cartoon, which is saying a lot. An example: Burglars were chasing the gang, who are all kids now for some reason, so they jerry-rigged a Home Alone type device to foil the burglars. So a burglar ran in and a tennis racket hit him in the face. Normally, you'd go "Ow" and maybe have a bloody nose. In this case however, the burglar flew backwards, out the door, over the trees, and into a whole other country where he landed on the beach and made a giant hole, which he then climbed out of, stole a rowboat, rowed back to the correct country, and ran back to the house, all in a span of 5 seconds or so. Even the kids were skeptical of this scenario.

The Jetsons- Possibly the most sexist cartoon ever. I guess it was made in the 60's, so that was acceptable then, but I found myself almost being offended, and I'm me. Women drivers are feared, Jane spends all day shopping (How do you spend all day shopping, every day?). Mr Spacely is a jerky midget, George's job consists of pushing one button and then sleeping, and this bank robber named Knuckles Nuclear seems to appear in every episode. Also, your food is all in pill form, which sucks.

MVP-Most Valuable Primate- Almost as implausable as the plots from "A pup named Scooby Doo". A monkey, who lives at a college with an old man and a retarded dude and is really smart, runs away when the old man dies because the jerkface dean is going to sell him to a research lab. The retarded guy puts him on a train and tells him to get off at "Simian Village" or something like that. Here's where it really gets tough to believe. He's leaving from LA. The stops on the train are San Francisco, Simian Village, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, and Bumblefuck, BC. Let's see, 4 giant metropolises, a monkey village, and a frozen noplace. Right. The monkey, of course, winds up in Bumblefuck, BC, where he is befriended by a deaf girl and becomes the star of the hockey team. What strikes me is that somebody actually had to look at this plot and say, "Yes, I think this will serve our viewers well. Go with the 'Runaway Monkey Hockey Star' movie". Funniest part of the movie bar none: The deaf girl is talking like deaf people talk. Bella says to me, "This girl talks worse than Miles." She is 5. He is 3. I am dying laughing.

Higglytown Heroes- Obviously thought up by someone on meth. Everyone in the show are Russian Nesting Dolls, and when the smaller ones get frightened, they hop inside the bigger ones, regardless if the bigger ones like it or not. This could, theoretically, lead to a situation, like the Apocalypse, where the biggest person in the world could be hopped into by the rest of the 6.791 billion people, which would surely cause some gastrointestinal discomfort. Also, the squirrel is voiced by the secretary from Ferris Bueller's Day Off with a weird Fargo accent. Just makes the show more bizarre.

Handy Manny- Wilmer Valderrama's attempt to become the most sensible kids show since Mr Rogers, which it is, but even with the anthropomorphic tools, it's really boring. The antithesis to the "A Pup Named Scooby Doo" plots, these center around Handy Manny being hard working and resourceful, while his tools bicker about stuff. Remember when your mom used to put Mr Rogers on to make you settle down, because it took him 10 minutes to change shoes and put on a gay sweater? This is Handy Manny.

Mickey Mouse Clubhouse- Finally, a show that would make Walt Disney mad enough to break out of the cryogenic chamber he's stored in along with Ted Williams' head, John Henry Williams' testicles, and Austin Powers' mojo. Mickey and friends are all CG now (take that Steamboat Willie) and are focusing on problem solving, instead of general hijinks. Pete, from the Beagle Boys, has been reduced to an oppotunistic antagonist, and Donald Duck thinks things out, instead of having the giant spazzes he's known for.

Guess it shows me that I'm getting old, because I'm finding fault in cartoons, but screw you, ours were better...