The Pemmy, Krissi & James Kinda-Sorta-Hopefully Funny Cartoon Podcast

Hey folks, here's the story 'bout Betty the Booper, she was a real sweet boop-a-doop-a-dooper. From being an unnamed poodle singer in a supper club to starring in the Fleischer's first color cartoon, animation's fabulous flapper dazzled audiences with her charm and the adorable voices of Mae Questel, Margie Hines and others. As her earliest version entered the public domain a short while ago, we take a look at a quartet of her short subjects.

Even if the yule log has stopped burning and the eggnog is all drank up, the holiday cheer doesn't have to end on the 25th, right?? ... work with us here, this is what happens when a regular podcast schedule meets the realities of awkward holiday timing. Bakertoons returns to the podcast to help us check out the final member of the Festive Four, Frosty the Snowman, and the special that took a dysfunctional family to the big time in Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire. You'd think there's not a lot of daylight between the two, but since both...

The current era of Disney animated musicals arguably peaked right here, folks. Encanto was a brilliant, heart tugging movie about family bonds and overcoming trauma, filled to the brim with memorable characters and songs. It's been analyzed up and down, left and right, front to back, what could our podcast crew possibly add?? Well, to do it, they went and recruited Northern Belle Rogue, themselves an Encanto superfan, and hopefully you all enjoy the results.

She walked so He-Man, My Little Pony, the Transformers and more could run. Strawberry Shortcake, from the pens of Barbi Sargent and Muriel Fahrion for American Greetings, was picked up by Kenner and aimed to be a multimedia smash via televised specials to help promote the character's world and toys on secondary, independent TV channels. Through this six-year journey, surprising connections to Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Ed McMahon and Frank Zappa all wind up caught in the precocious six-year old's garden. Artist Mary Bellamy joins us for a berry good time!

He's fearless! Scarless! ... a little too careless. He's Dynomutt, and in 1976 he joined up with Scooby-Doo on the latter's new home on ABC. While Scooby's formula was still mostly working, things were getting a little sillier with the great dane at the same time. Half the show were the Scooby mysteries you knew, and the other half was a very goofy take-off on the formula established by Adam West's Batman series. And it was a decent hit, too, apparently, so let's see how this package show held up!

Dracula! Frankenstein's Monster! The Wolf Man! And this time not in the form of young crime fighters but from Universal, their most famous shepherds, and developed by comics legend Marv Wolfman!! What should have been a surefire thing turned out to be one of the most horrifying horror-themed failures in animation history, especially since Marv wasn't actually writing any of these episodes. We think you'll agree they could have really, REALLY used him!

THIS EPISODE IS NOT FOR KIDS!!! I CANNOT SAY IT ANY MORE PLAINLY THAN THAT!!!

I mean, yeah, most of you reading this know that, and that Hazbin Hotel is a uniquely conceived adult-oriented cartoon. The fandom for this series is massive and includes our own Krissi Harding, who picked this show for her birthday selection and introduced it to James and Pemmy. So come join us for a happy day in Hell, and hear your hosts say things they never once imagined would come out of their mouths!

Trigger warning: discussions of depictions of...

We turn once more to Fox Kids, the legendary Saturday morning programming block that gave us Bobby's World, X-Men, Eek the Cat, the Tick, and... this show. Piggsburg Pigs, created by Fred Silverman's daughter Melissa and produced by Ruby-Spears, feels like the last gasps of the 70s and 80s style of Saturday morning fare before the revolutionary creator-driven works that would define the decade took over the zeitgeist. These pigs only made it one year before hitting the butcher's block, and we're going to look at why it might have been a mercy killing!

Heavens to thunderous theatricality! Hanna Barbera's scenery chewing mountain lion finally takes center stage after popping up here and there, and everywhere even! Whether matching wits with Major Minor or just trying to achieve his dreams of stage notoriety, few characters in the company's repertoire were quite as verbose. So don't exit stage left, or any direction, before checking out this episode!

Alternate Title: The Ballad of a Brooklyn Broom Bandit

What started as a spat over DuckTales turned into Fox making their own kids entertainment, with an ambitious take on J M Barrie's tale of the boy who never grew up. It's a story of the intricacies of the public domain, schedule slip-ups, ensemble darkhorses and the brilliance of the one and only Tim Curry. We hope we did right by this almost forgotten gem.

Looks up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a bird in something akin to a plane!! Super Chicken was a project Jay Ward had tried to get to air for over seven years by the time it reached ABC in 1967, when it finally did as part of George of the Jungle. One sip of the super sauce and Henry Cabot Henhouse III fights like a comet! I mean, comets can only fight by crashing into things, so I'm not wrong, am I?

After 100 episodes of pratfalls, birdcalls, stock gags, flea bags, wild takes and corn flakes, we finally get REALLY TWISTED! It's the wild story of Felix the Cat's 1990s revival series that was as turbulent behind the scenes as it was surreal on the screen. Marc and Jordan from the That's Not Quite All Folks podcast join us as we break down and build up a true cult classic first season that took a drastic turn in the second.

FUN!!

Righty-O! It's Felix, the Professor, Poindexter, Rock Bottom, and the rest of one of the most enduring 1950s television animated series of all time. It's also DEEPLY strange with oddball gags and the episodes being split in two roughly three and a half minute parts. So does it hold up at all? Would you believe "maybe"? Come see what we pull out of the bag of tricks this time!

Unbeknownst to a much younger James, Western sword and sorcery tropes, motifs were a big deal in gaming in 1980s Japan, and from that wellspring would arise one of the most enduring fantasy franchises in that nation. Record of Lodoss War has it all: goblins, dragons, wizards, thieves, and leggy Elvish women that a young Pemmy fell in love with. So come join our return to the world of tabletop gaming tropes in animation.

And remember... it's Falis with an F, not a PH.

It's the X-Men as most kids hadn't seen them before at the dawn of the 21st Century, as teenagers! With the Fox cartoon so fresh in people's minds, this was a way to get a new angle on these now pretty well-known characters, and a match made in heaven for the youth market-oriented WB Network. But as one of the "middle child" adaptations of this franchise, it's not very prominent today. Does it still hold up? Justin Toner joins us to find out!

The Hooded Claw is ransoming this podcast description to lure Penelope Pitstop into yet another one of his traps, so I'll keep this one brief: it's the writing of Michael Maltese, the voices of Janet Waldo and Paul Lynde, and one of the most memorable women of animation in the 1960s, all coming together for a true cult classic. Please join us, and maybe help us untie this rope while you're at it?

And as a raven shouts defiance, the call goes out for the mightiest heroes of all! ... so how did these five guys wind up being the ones to answer it?? A break-out success for Ralph Bakshi in the 1960s, the Mighty Heroes were a bunch of cartoon cut-ups who wouldn't make the cut for the Great Lakes Avengers! It's up and away with this formative superhero parody that has some issues but still somehow holds up.

To follow up DuckTales, did Disney think bigger? Nope, they thought smaller. Rodent size, in fact, by returning Chip and Dale to prominence with a 65 episode run of high adventure in tiny spaces. It's pompous feline crime bosses, nefarious cults centered around soda, and one lady mouse that some people are still strangely fond of, all in this episode with special guest star Cary Woodham!

Detective work in the cartoon world is a dog-eat-dog racket. Ace Hart, Private Eye, he'd know. This animated German Shepherd deals with every case thrown at him by his animator Eliot Shag, and even has the nerve to talk back if it's not going so great. Yup, it's a fusion of animation and puppetry courtesy of Nelvana and the Jim Henson Company with some of the cleverest film noir parody ever on Saturday mornings. With special guest, artist Will Carroll!

After post-apocalyptic beasts, a cosmic trilogy and a successful feature film, the Transformers return to animation like never before! Quite literally as Transformers Animated has as much in common with shows like Ben 10 and Teen Titans as it does past iterations of the franchise. And yet it worked so very well, becoming one of the more loved iterations of the robots in disguise to this day!

It's the only animated appearance by Judy Garland! It's the movie that got Chuck Jones fired from Warner Bros! It's... a box office flop. Gay Purr-ee is a fascinating movie both by its circumstances and the fantastic artwork that went into it, and Krissi helps James on a journey to 1890s Paris through the eyes of a starstruck Mewsette. Best enjoyed with a champagne or at least a soda with lots of Bubbles! Bubbles!

The filthiest language ever on Saturday mornings! Q*Bert hopped out of the arcades and into a pastiche of Happy Days courtesy of Ruby Spears, for a cartoon that was... just kind of mostly there. Atari Archives creator and frequent Retronauts host Kevin Bunch joins Pemmy, Krissi and James to talk about the game, the show, and the circumstances surrounding the video game industry around this time. Hop on in and join us!

Is this trip really necessary? Or rather, is this podcast a little too of the moment?? Well, half of it, anyway. The animation industry became pitchmen for rationing, selling war bonds and other ways to help our men and women overseas during World War 2, while also taking every pot shot the Hayes Code would allow them to at the fascist powers we were opposed to. Can we bring that energy back? Please? Anyhow, we've got Donald Duck, Popeye, Woody Woodpecker and a batch of oddly familiar gremlins.

Would you believe that in 1973, Evel Knievel wasn't done in by a motorcycle accident but a bunch of bumbling roller skaters? Bailey's Comets, another DePatie-Freleng production conceived by Joe Ruby and Ken Spears, attempted to out-do Wacky Races in every regard. More characters! More teams for these characters! More outlandish situations! More memorable protag... no, we can't say that with a straight face. Dastardly and Muttly these bozos AIN'T!!

Rally Ho and away we go! As Hanna Barbera entered their first, brief action/adventure phase, their old comedic roots would still be showing with this particular series at the same time. Thus you had the boisterous Ted Cassidy-voiced Frankenstein Jr bellowing his way through madcap monster battles while the Impossibles took on various eccentric criminals between jamming out. Hard to believe today this show was considered too violent for TV, when it was kind of mild even back then!

In-between Garfield's own segments was US Acres, a short subject series based on Jim Davis' other, less widespread comic series. The tales of Orson, Roy, Wade, Bo, Lanolin, Booker and Sheldon got pretty popular as part of the show, outlasting the comic they were based on by a good few years, and giving the show's team vehicles for more gags that wouldn't work with Garfield himself. So come down to the farm, y'all!

Arguably the magnum opus of both Jim Davis and Mark Evanier, Garfield and Friends entertained audiences and pushed cartoon writing into some genuinely funny places it hadn't really gone since the heyday of Jay Ward. It's held up remarkably well, and our hosts look at four of their favorite short segments that star the fat cat himself. Tune in for US Acres coverage in two weeks, too!

Tis the season for hot chocolate, presents under the tree, goodwill to all men and women, and... colorful ghost monsters?? It's the timelessness of A Charlie Brown Christmas, contrasted with the VERY "of its time" Christmas Comes to Pac-Land. One of these aired for years upon years on network TV until just very recently. One of these was reran at 3 in the morning on Cartoon Network. I don't think I need to tell you which is which. Merry Christmas, and enjoy the podcast!

This is the podcast that quacks in the night! This is the iOS update that makes your phone too hot to handle! This is the Darkwing Duck episode! A breakaway hit for the Disney Afternoon that is still much loved to this day, we're joined by Cary Woodham to talk about two of our favorite episodes, Comic Book Capers and Life, the Negaverse and Everything. Step right up and come on in, here's where the danger begins!

Sometimes a good idea on paper turns sour in the execution. The Biskitts, a show with a strong resemblance to the Smurfs at first glance, could have easily been its own thing if it played more into the Robin Hood-esque outlaw aspects of the characters hiding treasure from a greedy despot and helping others. Instead we get repetitive slapstick, stilted dialogue and one really, really bizarre court jester. Enjoy?

Like, Scooby and the gang get a whole lot more talkative and a lot sillier in this one, man! Swinging the pendulum in the direction of comedy after the darker Mysteries Incorporated, Be Cool was advertised as a more back to basics approach, but only in terms of storytelling. Between one daffy take on Daphne Blake and the major increase in gags per minute, this one had fans kind of divided, but not our hosts! So pack a box of Scooby Snacks or twenty and come listen!

It's showtime! Just in time for Halloween and in the wake of his massively successful comeback movie, Beetlejuice fever is running wild once more, so what better time to revisit the characters' kid friendly incarnation in animation? Nelvana, with Tim Burton himself helping develop the show, brought the Ghost with the Most to ABC Saurday mornings and to Fox Kids on weekday afternoons with wild antics and the most blatant puns of the era. Don't come apart at the seams, come join us!

9 seasons, 101 little blue fellows, and one nearly inescapable cultural force. The Smurfs, straight out of Belgium and the pen of creator Peyo, sang and played while evading Gargamel to the delight of 80s kids and no doubt the annoyance of their parents. Behind the Hanna-Barbera created cartoon is a long history of comics and other animations extending both before and after it, but for American kids like your hosts, it's the natural starting point. So Smurf along with us and enjoy!

He's courageous! He's amazing! He's... a mouse in a London pillar box. Danger Mouse protects the world from the criminal activities of Baron Silas Greenback and various other would-be world beaters alongside the hapless helper Penfold, all with the stiff upper lip we associate with our friends from across the pond. Running for over a decade in its native country and doing good business in the States for Nickelodeon, the secret agent gave many 80s kids in America their first real taste of British comedy.

A semi-major FIFA mascot who came from a comic book isn't the craziest choice for a cartoon subject, but Sport Billy did not deserve to be saddled with the bizarrely bad acting of Lane Scheimer. A mid-season replacement on NBC in 1982, the show would be the last Filmation product that network would pick up for their Saturday morning schedule. No amount of penalty kicks can make up for this! Pemmy, Krissi and James have been wanting to get this out of the- I mean, examine this now rarely seen cartoon for a while, so come join them!

No dammit necessary, he's Gumby! The little clay fellow who could go anywhere, do anything, and wound up in all sorts of messes because of those very attributes. With friends Pokey, Prickle and Goo, Gumby's adventures enchanted generations, inspired numerous stop motion artists to come, and could quickly go from adorable to WILD in a heartbeat! Join us as we watch how a molded figurine broke the mold!

Heavens to athlete's foot! With 20 years under their belt, Hanna Barbera plunged into their character archive to assemble three teams to compete in a pastiche of Battle of the Network Stars in Laff-a-Lympics. Just getting there, though, was a long, winding race to rival any carrying of the Olympic torch! Pemmy, Krissi and James line up on the track to talk about the mother of all cartoon crossovers!

Oo De Lally, this movie had a wild and winding history to its making! Robin Hood is arguably the cult sensation of the various Disney feature films, not nearly as big as the Silver Age and Rennaissance Age hits that sandwich its release, but still much adored by those who grew up with it. Linwood Knight joins James and Krissi to break down why the movie turned out as it did, especially with all that notorious recycled and traced over animation, and discuss what worked and what could have worked better.

They're tiny, they're tooney, they took the fight right to Disney for syndicated dominance! Tiny Toon Adventures brought Warner Bros' animation division back to top form, with the help of Steven Spielberg and a host of talented writers, artists and voice actors. Krissi and James are joined by friend of the podcast Meiou to discuss the wild comedic lunacy of a trio of short subjects from the first season, and a pair of music videos. If you know the show, you probably don't need us to tell you which music videos they are.

Duck season! Rabbit season! Elmer season! Podcast season!! Arguably three of the most memorable Looney Tunes shorts ever created, Rabbit Fire, Rabbit Seasoning and Duck! Rabbit, Duck! have made generation after generation laugh hysterically. Pemmy and Krissi are happy to be along for the ride as James tries to find something, ANYTHING new to say about these brilliant cartoons. All this, and Rabbit Rampage, too!

Hogans Heroes comes to Saturday morning?! Well, in an indirect way, as these three bears are trying to work around a very authoritarian zoo administrator and his bumbling zookeeper assistant. The Hair Bear Bunch became a cult hit in reruns on USA and Cartoon Network long after it didn't do so hot in its first network TV run. So get out all your best hair care products and join us at the Wonderland Zoo for this diamond in the rough of a cartoon!

Pemmy, James, Kyle and Justin return to see what a difference 10 years really could make in the world of Saturday morning. Scooby Doo had jumped from CBS to ABC, the Smurfs were dominant, Alvin and the Chipmunks, the Littles and Dungeons and Dragons were ascendant, and Richie Rich kept having to prop up other properties. So come along and join us!

With plans having gone up in smoke more than once, we're breaking the glass on an emergency episode, which turned out so long we had to split it into two parts! So here's part 1 where Pemmy and James were joined by Justin Toner and Kylepedia to talk about the entire Saturday morning schedule of 1973!

Three goofy ghosts running a moribund motel for the dearly departed? That's a GREAT idea for a cartoon! Then how the heck did Hanna Barbera make this so... so... below average!?! It's a sad thing when even the likes of Paul Winchell, Joe E Ross AND Alan Oppenheimer cannot salvage this mediocre effort. If they couldn't, what hope do us ameteurs have?

Hide your cats, the old Alfer is back, and NOT in pog form! With the smash success of his sitcom, Gordon Shumway quickly joined NBC's Saturday morning roster in 1987 courtesy of DiC. And you can tell they were given a budget for this show since it's downright lavish compared to a lot of that company's output. In fact, this is a better than average cartoon and we were pleasantly surprised to have enjoyed it, so get your earbuds ready for the next best podcast episode this side of Melmac.

N'cha! Too few American fans of Akira Toriyama have seen the anime that first made him a household name in Japan, and that includes James and Krissi. So Pemmy and special guest Kylepedia help them fix that with this examination of the first two episodes of this absolutely goofy series. So come join us in Penguin Village where pigs announce the morning, the sun brushes its teeth and adorable Arale-Chan tries to figure out the world around her, which in turn can't quite figure her out.

Faster than a speeding plot device! More powerful than hammy voice acting! It's the most famous season of the show that defined the DC Comics heroes and villains for an entire generation of kids! The Justice League versus the Legion of Doom across 16 episodes of some of the most over the top camp ever seen on Saturday morning, cramming a massive cast into the 22-minute run time. So join Pemmy, Krissi and James as they answer the Trouble Alert!

In part 2 of our coverage of the Super Mario Super Show, we hustle to Hyrule and check out the Friday feature of the series, The Legend of Zelda. In this Moonlighting-inspired take on the then-fledgling franchise, Link and Zelda butt heads and fend off the warlock Ganon together in a cartoon that's turned campier with age. And yet it's... surprisingly adult??? Tune in for our explanation why.

Is there any more consistently enduring 80s icon than Mario, the mascot of Nintendo's platforming games? Well, whether you agree with that or not, Mario Bros Mania was indeed everywhere by the end of that decade and this cartoon was the ultimate proof of that. A wild mix of live action segments and goofball cartoons putting the plumbers and company into every story the writers could think of, this was arguably the high-water mark for adaptations of video game properties for a long while. Faint praise, but seriously, this is far from the worst thing on TV in 1989!

With Pemmy away visiting his kid for their birthday, Krissi leads James on a cyberpunk-style take on the Holmes Cannon courtesy of DiC and Scottish Televison. With writers absolutely game to make the most of their 20-minute time allotments, this series comes so close to perfection you can almost taste it! 

This podcast isn't much like a hurricane, but it come at you fast! DuckTales was Disney's biggest step into television animation to that point, and it was the single biggest harbinger of the 90s Animation Renaissance, paving the way for much of what would follow. Justin Toner joins the podcast crew as we dive into the Money Bin to check out two classic episodes of the seminal afternoon series.

We've dipped our toes in Disney content in the latter half of last year, but now it's time for one of their most famous stars to get the spotlight. Donald Duck is by far the most prolific Disney character between animation and comics across the globe, making him a natural first choice for our dives into the material that built the foundation of the Disney company. Pemmy, Krissi and James are joined by Marc and Jordan of That's Not Quite All Folks to check out his very first animated appearance and three all time classics from the 40s.

Two tales of holiday redemption, together in one podcast to close out the year. Pemmy and James look at the very first TV special inspired by the works of Dr. Seuss as Chuck Jones builds upon a 9 minute read and makes a masterpiece, while Disney tackles Charles Dickens' literary classic while squashing it down to about 25 minutes. Have a Merry Christmas and a happy holiday season, and we'll see you all in 2024!

You've seen the meme "Every so often a blue dog comes to guide the generations," right? Most folks today can speak to Bluey and Blue's Clues, but what of animation's OG cyan canine, Huckleberry Hound? This gentle, optimistic fellow broke Hanna Barbera's TV animation company to the big time, setting the stage for Yogi Bear, the Flintstones, Top Cat, Scooby Doo and everything else that followed. He's near and dear to James' heart, so join him, Pemmy and Krissi as they give the dog his due.

Surprise! We have an episode as unexpected as the success of the show in question! On October 13th GLITCH unleashed onto YouTube this demented little treat of a cartoon aimed at a slightly older crowd than much of the fare we've covered on this podcast. Pemmy loved it, and he talked James into making this quick bonus episode of the podcast to cover it while it was still new and relevant. But be warned, there are SPOILERS ahead, so if you want to watch the Amazing Digital Circus first, you should really go do so.

Al Capp, the cartoonist behind Lil' Abner and (thereby) the original portrayals of the Shmoo, passed away just two months after this show made it onto the air. We can't even begin to imagine what the outspoken Capp must have thought of his parable for the Earth's bounty being turned into a mystery solving shapeshifter. It was one of the last of the teen mystery/adventure cartoons not to involve Scooby Doo himself that HB would bring to Saturday morning, and watching this, you can kind of tell why the subgenre was in its last days.

Puppy Power Goes Wrong! Or rather, it first goes right then goes wrong? Or goes right in all the wrong ways? The legacy of Scrappy-Doo, one of the most maligned characters Hanna-Barbera ever created, isn't as simple as some make it out to be, and Pemmy, James and Krissi sit down to hash out what happened, when and why, while looking at three cartoons featuring the pup. It's a tale of network executives meddling, writers reaching and Fred Flintstone's catchphrase being turned into yet another dog. Enjoy!

In comedy, the law is that diametric opposites are inevitably pulled together just because the universe wants to see personalities clash. Hence, in this modern Disney Channel favorite, the ever optimistic Molly drags curmudgeonly Scratch into misadventure after misadventure. Pemmy and James dip their toes into the house that the mouse built for the first time, just in time for Halloween.

Because nothing is scarier than Disney lawyers.

In the wake of Arleen Sorkin passing away last August, Pemmy, James and Krissi Harding set out to pay tribute to the character she was instrumental in unleashing on the world. That a snarky little gun moll named Harleen Quinzel could somehow upstage the Joker himself and become one of the most recognizable characters in DC Comics to this day is a testament to the series and her creators Paul Dini, Bruce Timm and especially Arleen herself. Enjoy, puddins!

Few criminals in animation history are as notorious or beloved as Lupin the Third, the simultaneously suave and goofy gentleman thief. In his second anime run, which Pemmy and James look at in this episode, the character became TMS' flagship property, running over 150 episodes. Many of his US fans first encountered him via Adult Swim's broadcasts of an English language dub, but there was a prior project that saw a small amount of this series dubbed for the home video market, and we check out a little of both!

Video game mania erupted in the early 1980s with the arrival of Namco's revolutionary maze-chase game, so leave it to Hanna-Barbera to turn the property into a dollar store diet cola version of both the Smurfs and the Flintstones. That's just the kind of rut HB was in during the 1980s, sadly, but it's not a complete loss thanks to the efforts of a stellar voice cast. Friend of the podcast and all-around Pac-Man expert Cary Woodham joins Pemmy and James to find the cure for Pac-Man Fever.

Before Smash Brothers, before any of the Capcom crossover fighting games, before just about any significant gaming crossover, there was a humble little cartoon on NBC called Captain N. DiC let kids live vicariously through Kevin Keene as he's sucked into the worlds of Mega Man, Metroid, Castlevania and more... except a LOT was changed in the translation from cartridge to cartoon. Krissi Harding returns once more as we try and make as comprehensive a look at this show as a trio of silly animation enthusiasts can. Press Start to Play, Select for Options.

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50 Episodes?? YABBA-DABBA-DOO!!! As massive Hanna Barbera nuts, Pemmy and James couldn't think of a better show to watch for this little milestone than their most successful foray into prime time television. The Flintstones ran a solid six seasons with the brilliant voice acting of Alan Reed, Jean Vander Pyl, Bea Benaderet and Mel Blanc at the helm, cementing Hanna Barbera as a force in entertainment for decades to come. What else but a caveman with mood swings could sell children candy-flavored vitamins, after all?

Thank you, one and all, for sticking with us, and here's to the...

Pemmy and James wonder if the makers of the original Highlander movie expected anything like this to be spun off from it: a cartoon set 700 years after the apocalypse, where the Immortals give up killing each other except for one malcontent named Kortan. Still, there's prophecy, Macleods, swordplay and some remarkably done backgrounds in this animated series that in many ways feels like a product of the previous decade. And sadly no soundtrack from Queen, either.

Great Scott! The very first original cartoon series from Universal's then newly minted animation firm was a direct follow up to the Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale-helmed movie trilogy. Except... not precisely. The series isn't considered canonical to the films, and looking at these episodes there's any number of potentially valid reasons why. So head back in time with us to the radical 90s as we see if this cartoon has the juice to get us to 1.21 gigawats!

Underwater adventures! A teenage rock band! Exotic monsters! And best of all, a talking shark! How could Jabberjaw possibly be bad?! Well, there was the fact that the writers at Hanna Barbera have been going to the same "teenage mystery/adventure" well for seven years now and it was starting to dry up. Despite this, Jabberjaw remains one of the company's more memorable characters, and this week we explore the ocean depths of his unintentionally humble start. Nyuk-nyuk-nyuk-nyuk...

Arguably one of the most popular series of shorts DePatie-Freling put together that's not directly tied to the Pink Panther film franchise, a debonair ant is perpetually pursued by a back-talking aardvark. What separated this from other chase cartoons? SASS. So much SASS. That and a really catchy soundtrack from Doug Goodwin! 

Daffy was most frequently at his Daffiest under the directorial vision of Bob Clampett. The rubbery animation and wild, exaggerated takes he employed made the screwy duck probably his most effective character to express his individual sense of what was funny. Pemmy and James explore one of Bob's earlier Daffy cartoons co-starring with Porky Pig in Porky's Last Stand, before diving into a trio of Bob's masterpieces from the tail end of his tenure at Warner Brothers: Draftee Daffy, Book revue and The Great Piggy Bank Robbery. Should you miss this podcast? Well now I wouldn't say that!

Hey kids! It's a fresh syndicated start that'll warm anyone's heart! Well, at least it'll make it laugh. Yogi's Treasure Hunt was a key part of the Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera block of shows, bringing the first generation of funny animal characters back to form and returning Dastardly and Muttley to the company after a rights dispute. It started modestly, but ended with some of the most unusual parody work the company would ever do. X marks the funtastic spot in this episode, so come on and join us!

We've had a lot to say about Hanna-Barbera's meddling kids style shows of the 1970s, but what of the properties that made them a household name in the first place? The best place to start is by packing this pic-a-nic podcast for a trip down to scenic Jellystone Park for a look at one of their most popular characters, Yogi Bear! With 2 shorts from his time as part of the Huckleberry Hound Show and 2 shorts from his own headlining program, we hope you'll find this to be smarter than the average cartoon podcast!

With Wrestlemania just coming around the corner, Pemmy and James are joined by the Uncharted Territory's podcast's own Chad Olson to turn back the clock to the era of the very first Wrestlemania and the WWF's quest to broaden their audience. Partnering with DiC, we got cartoonish exaggerations of personalities who were themselves already larger than life and sometimes very un-PC, and some of the worst animation errors we've seen to date on the podcast. Whatcha gonna do?! Listen, we hope!

Check out Chad's work on the Legends of Wrestling card and dice game at www.filsingergames...

Break out the varied polyhedral dice, it's time to revisit the first major piece of D&D related media ahead of the big movie coming out at the end of the month! Six kids get stranded in a non-specific realm loaded with D&D beasties via an amusement park ride, and regularly match wits with the ruthless (and not very wise, just look at his stat sheet) Venger. It racked up a solid three seasons, but how does it hold up now? Krissi Harding returns to the couch to help us put the show in its context and judge...

Podcast listeners, Transform and ROLL OUT!

No other boys toy line to get a cartoon in the 1980s seems to have had nearly the longevity that the Transformers have had. The mix of science fantasy, boisterous characters and imaginative designs just clicked into place like a well built Leader Class toy, in spite of all the wild animation errors and goofy scripts. So what was the secret? Pemmy and James look at the episodes "SOS Dinobots" and "Webworld" to try and pin down the foundation of what makes this franchise keep on truckin'.

JAWBREAKERS!!

They were the odd ducks of Cartoon Network's first real burst of original programming. The brainchildren of Danny Antonucci, Ed, Edd & Eddy's misadventures in their cul-de-sac usually ended in pain and humiliation in equal measure. The unique animation and bizarre slant on the kids' slice of life format made it a sleeper hit that ran for 10 years with new episodes on and off for that duration. So come on and grab your favorite plank as we check out two classic schemes from their run. (Insert Ed-like non-sequetor here)

Room-a-zoom-zoom! The Josie variation of the Scooby Doo mold is put into action on the race track as Speed Buggy adds elements of Speed Racer and the Love Bug into the mix. Is Tinker the most unlikely mechanical genius out there? Is Debbie the most underrated female character in Hanna Barbera's library? Can James withstand the sheer number of times relationships of space and volume are plain old ignored?! Join us and find out!

From her roots as Dan DeCarlo's creation named after his wife, Josie McCoy's eight year journey from comic books to cartoons took some interesting turns before she and the Pussycats even hit the airwaves. Once they did, their show was somehow more than the sum of its parts, and sits alongside the likes of Top Cat and Wacky Races as one of Hanna Barbera's best single season efforts. So come on and watch the good guys win!

The holiday season is wrapping up, and as Krissi Harding helps Pemmy and James warm up from their misadventure, they enjoy a look back at two more vintage Christmas specials. A Garfield Christmas and A Claymation Christmas Celebration both debuted on CBS on December 21st of 1987, making them natural fits to review together, and possibly set the stage for some of the subjects we're planning on tackling in 2023.

Happy Holidays, one and all! (I'd say Merry Christmas, but, you know, it'd be 5 days late)

The weather outside is frightful, but the podcast is so delightful, and... ummm... yeah, I can't finish the lyric. Seriously, folks, a lot of what we've been looking at this fall has pointed us to this very Christmas special, one of the four most well known of its ilk. It's a tale of the consequences of bullying, of misfit toys and oddball prospectors, and a truly memorable performance by Burl Ives. And hey! If you liked this, tune in two weeks from now for more Christmas fun!

Due to scheduling conflicts, the Ed Edd & Eddy episode is delayed and to maintain our schedule we're breaking the glass on this emergency fill-in episode. If you've listened to this for any length of time, you probably noticed we tend to refer to this big old list of shows, shorts and eventually movies we want to look at. So here's a behind the scenes look at Pemmy and James going over what cartoons they want to talk about in the coming years. Enjoy! Trust me, this won't be an annual thing, that would get redundant quickly.

Spider-Man, Spider-Man, in a cartoon made as cheap as they can. Pemmy and James are joined by Kylepedia to look at the very first cartoon starring Marvel Comics' most iconic hero of them all. It's a debut that gave us Dr. Octopus' ever-changing haircut, a propeller boat made entirely of webs, and that theme song that hasn't left the public consciousness since the show debuted. 'Nuff Said.

We're putting on the nonsense, and realizing that perhaps it's too much for even us! Pemmy and James look at this Rankin Bass production animated by British group Halas and Batchelor Studios which adapted the works of Edward Lear, Lewis Carroll, Ogden Nash and many more. It's limericks, riddles, puns and poems with a Laugh-In format, a goofy cast of jokesters and not a lot of structure, making it a fascinating experiment in the era of Scooby-Doo and the Archies.

When Fred Silverman wanted more Scooby, he sure got it! These hour length episodes cemented the great dane and the Mystery Inc crew in the pop culture firmament by pairing them with the likes of Batman, the Three Stooges, Sonny and Cher and many more. Since Halloween is coming up, though, Pemmy and James thought it most appropriate to revisit their episode with the Addams Family, which coincidentally is the only episode not available on current home media. All this, and James' most shameful secret! ... not really.

What scares a notorious chicken-heart like James Irish more than the classic horror tropes? Absolutely wretched cartoons like Quacula, which was introduced to him by Pembroke W. Korgi. James swore revenge soon after. Seriously, the B-Feature in the ABA format for the Heckle and Jeckle revival on CBS is proof that even Frank Welker can only elevate bottom of the barrel material by so much.

Also this show features a writing credit from Paul Dini. I don't think he puts this on his CV.

Scheimer and Prescott get their hands on the Terrytoons characters and turn out one of the most random, fast paced productions of the 1970s. Is it any good? Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhh... not really, but it is still strangely enjoyable, at least to Pemmy. We break down this bonkers show in our easily imitated fashion!

Identical characters distinguished only by their voices, Heckle and Jeckle joined the ranks of cartoon trickster royalty courtesy of Paul Terry's production unit, distributed by 20th Century Fox. They were some of the most critically lauded shorts that studio ever made, but have they aged as well as, say, the Looney Tunes or MGM's Tex Avery shorts? Pemmy and James look at two of the best of the bunch to find out!

Rankin Bass, purveyors of stop motion holiday specials and mid 80s action shows, dipped their toes in the Saturday morning scene for a spell in the late 60s and early 70s, with this particular show hitting right in the middle of that period. Featuring character designs by Paul Coker inspired by the books by Kenneth Grahame, the adventures of Tobias the Dragon and Mr. Toad would have fit in perfectly with Rocky & Bullwinkle. If only this show didn't debut 10 years past the point that style was in vogue...

A tale of two brothers... brothers who love horrible movies, engage in bizarre misadventures, and sound like Salem the Cat and Zim. The Angry Beavers debuted in 1997, with the Nicktoons era in full swing, and proceeded to absolutely annoy the president of Nickelodeon, and then be overshadowed by that pineapple-dwelling fellow two years later. Now, over 20 years later, James introduces Pemmy to this cult classic series. He may never forgive him. (We're kidding, he has fun!)

Arguably the last of the successful Scooby-Doo clone shows, Captain Caveman debuted as part of the Scooby's All Stars block and went on for three years worth of adventures with Dee Dee, Brenda and Taffy. Pemmy and James reminisce about this series, it's legacy and how squeezing a cartoon mystery into 11 minutes isn't always the best idea!

After 19 years on television, Lassie's classic series came to a close, and the beloved collie would appear immediately following that in what is objectively the WORST cartoon we've seen for the purposes of this podcast! Filmation turned out a show with boring action, horrendous voice acting, a complete lack of visual continuity in some points, and other decisions that left one of our hosts ready to start sobbing. Strap in, folks, this one ain't pretty!

Sorry this one's running a little late, too. Things have been a smidge disorganized.

Over about three years, King Features Syndicate TV brought brand new Popeye cartoons to the television market to compete with the syndication of the Paramount theatrical shorts. Two hundred and twenty of these were made in that span of time, featuring work from creators like Jack Kinney, Gene Deitch and Lou Scheimer. There's truly no other Popeye media quite like these, folks; these wild, freewheeling and often bizarre creations are an experience worth talking about! So we did!

This month it's all about EC Segar's famous sailor man, who's strong to the finish 'cause he eats his spinach! Popeye, Olive, Wimpy and Bluto feature in some of the finest work Fleischer Studios put out, using physical models for backgrounds, wonderful facial animation, brilliant ad lib dialogue from Jack Mercer and company, and only a very few bits that haven't aged that well. Listen Sesame! ... that doesn't work, does it?

With almost 100 years of theatrical shorts, feature length films, TV series and more to draw upon, the Looney Tunes themed podcast That's Not Quite All Folks has a lot to draw from, which makes it a good thing Marc and Jordan are almost never at a loss for words. Pemmy and James invite them to talk underutilized characters, Seven Arts, their favorite episodes of their podcast, and more!

Chuck Jones all but reinvented Daffy Duck when turning him into a deuteragonist opposite Bugs Bunny, and continued this evolution when Daffy took on a wide variety of genres, typically alongside Porky Pig. Westerns? Check. Science Fiction? Check. Swashbuckling Epics? Check. Fourth wall breaking madness?? Check and double check! It's our 20th episode, and there's no better little black duck to spend it with.

Long story short, we're taking some time off while one of us sorts out medical issues. We will return!

Sufferin' Succotash! We finally return to the world of theatrical short subjects with a look at Warner's clownish cat of many, many, MANY lives! Sylvester may be best known for being paired with Tweety Bird or Speedy Gonzalez, but past those roles he's been all over the place being pummeled by dogs and kangaroos, singing on fences and fearing for his life opposite some of Termite Terrace's spookiest backdrops. We hope you think this episode is the cat's pajamas!

Scooby Mania meant networks wanted more teens solving mysteries, and Hanna-Barbera were happy to oblige with many, many shows over the course of the 1970s that tried to recapture the success of the Meddling Kids formula. Clue Club was one right in the middle of the road of this trend in terms of storytelling quality, and our hosts wind up mildly split on it while simultaneously dreading the worse mystery shows yet to come.

Zoinks! It's the single most popular TV cartoon franchise to ever come from Saturday Morning! It's a Great Dane and four teenagers in pursuit of people in ridiculous costumes! Scooby Doo and the Mystery Inc gang have teamed up with celebrities, matched wits with every monster you can think of, and endured the indignity of working with a kid named Flim-Flam, and it all began with this 1969 production meant to capitalize on the success of the Archies. Join us as we explore two iconic episodes from its first season.

What could be more appropriate for Halloween than a cartoon starring a vampire, a werewolf, and a Frankenstein's monster? Except the Drak Pack isn't especially spooky, more in line with the comedy-adventure shows Hanna-Barbera had been making for over a decade by this point. It's goofy, more than a little hokey, and made mostly watchable by some genuinely fun voice acting. So whack "play" on this podcast, why don't ya??

Capcom's imaginative, visually striking fighting game series comes to syndication courtesy of Graz Entertainment. It's not good. At all. In fact this is by far the worst cartoon we've reviewed on this podcast so far, and that's AFTER James removes his bias against what they did to one of his all time favorite video game characters here. Hopefully the end result of this podcast is worth the pain we endured creating this.

Take a snickering shaggy dog blended with a mild mannered TV detective, add some cartoon villains who are over the top even by Saturday morning standards, and let them do battle for about seven minutes a week, and you get this Hanna-Barbera semi-classic! Before Mumbly joined the ambitious crossover Laff-a-Lympics, he made a name for himself amidst reruns of Tom & Jerry and Grape Ape cartoons. Pemmy and James are on the case of how well it holds up today!