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Saturday
Morning Memories of Unca Cheeks' Misspent Youth
(PART TWO)
Unca Cheeks wants to tell you all about the massive, nationwide test undertaken by the drear and humorless trolls of the Action For Children's Television group (ACT), back in the early '70s.
They rounded themselves up this great, noisy, wriggling herd o' kids, see; reg'lar seven- and eight- and nine- and ten-year-olds, of all races and both genders.
Sat 'em down in front of a whole lotta television sets, in twosies and threesies. Muttered and frowned and scribbled down jillions and jillions of notes, whilst peering owlishly at said goggle-eyed moppets; the latter whom were allowed to watch multiple episodes of BUGS BUNNY, SCOOBY DOO, and JONNY QUEST (the "bad" cartoons of the experiment, you see); or MISTER ROGERS' NEIGHBORHOOD, IN THE NEWS and CAPTAIN KANGAROO (the "good" shows of same).
The tabulated and dissected results of this adventurous, foreseeing foray into pure, theoretical research...?
"The test subjects," the report blandly reads, "when allowed to choose for themselves, always gravitated towards the colorful, frantic animated programming."
"It would appear obvious," said treatise concludes (and Unca Cheeks is adding the emphasis requisite to such an earth-shattering revelation as that which awaits you), "that children are incapable of making the crucial distinction, themselves, between worthwhile entertainment and that which is bad for them."
In other words: any kid who prefers animation and adventure to relentless chirpiness and mealy-mouthed, hold-still-kid-this-is-good-for- you moralizing is -- de facto -- inherently wrong.
Wrong and bad.
Well.
Your Actual Working Parent, Unca Cheeks -- once a gen-you-whine, for-real li'l kid his own aged and arthritic self -- would like to weigh in on this here partic'lar topic, so long as we're all just... y'know... talkin'.
Action For Children's Television is fulla day-old
horse muffins, quite frankly. 
There's nothing any more more inherently misguided and/or meretricious in any self-respecting kid opting for a little fast-paced, well-crafted fantasy over some pallid, thinly disguised, committee- designed-and-approved "Be A Good Citizen" claptrap than there is any adult's electing to spend a restful, low-wattage evening in the company of (say) the cast of THE DREW CARREY SHOW, over whatever's showing a couple of channels over, on PBS.
... and, heck: any kid sharp and/or perceptive enough to prefer Race
Bannon over Mr. Greenjeans is a-okay in my book.
You damned betcha.
God forgive me for being able to recite this theme song from memory; even after all these years:
"Hercules! Hero of song and story!
Hercules! Winner of ancient glory!
Fighting for the right; fighting with his might!
With the strength of ten ordinary men!"
That was the first stanza.
That one was okay.
It was the second stanza which was just plain ol' sick and wrong.
"Hercules! People are safe when near him!
Hercules! Only the evil fear him!
Softness in his eyes! Iron in his thighs!
Virtue in his heart! Fire in every part
Of the mighty HERCULES!"
"Softness in his eyes"...? "Iron in his THIGHS" -- ?!?
Oh, yeah. You GO, girl.
In all seriousness, however: THE MIGHTY HERCULES was -- for all of its (unintentional, surely) homoerotic subtext -- some kinda cool, cartoon -wise.
The Hercules in question was the actual, for real sonuvaZeus of Greco
-Roman mythological notoriety; except for the fact that -- rather than being inborn -- his amazing physical strength and nigh-invulnerability stemmed from the possession and utilization of a snappy matching magic-ring-and-belt ensemble; the regular, once-per-episode activation of same which was always accompanied by this mind-bogglingly awesome (they're my memories, dammit; I say "awesome") shot of lightning bolts whipsawing their way down from the heavens and "energizing" the big, lantern-jawed lummox.
Hercules was nearly always accompanied on his travels and adventures by this quasi-retarded li'l centaur kid, name of Newton; who was forever stigmatized, in turn, by means of the single most relentlessly annoying speech impediment in all the annals of recorded cartoon history.
He said everything twice.
Like this:
"That's right, Herc! That's right, Herc! I'm touching myself! I'm touching myself! Get the Kleenex! Get the Kleenex!"
Made you wanna grease the hairy, hooved little so-and-so. Twice.
Made you wanna grease the hairy, hooved little so-and-so. Twice.
THE MIGHTY MIGHTOR was one of those endearingly dopey and whacked-out late '60s Saturday morning notions which -- even when viewed through the willfully occluded lens of fond nostalgia -- is wholly and indisputably indefensible, on virtually any conceptual or intellectual level.
Still totally waycool and nifty keen-o, though.
The Mighty Mightor
was this, like, cave-type guy, see; and -- whenever he hefted this funky
"mystic battle club" of his appropriately skyward, and bellowed out a reverb-y
"MIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIghtorrrrrrrrrrrrr!" -- he'd gain the powers of brontosaurian
strength; pterodactylian flight; and the ability to channel destructive beams
of nigh-incomprehensible potency through said cudgel. In order to... I
dunno... whack the holy living crap out of The Forces of Crime and Evil.
Which (apparently) were quite the pesky little neighborhood prob, back
in the Stone Age day. Apparently. I s'pose. Hell: I
just work here, all right...?
It wasn't the sort of half-hour adventure cartoon, God alone knows, which relied overmuch upon complex, multi-level plotting and/or probing and insightful characterization(s)...
... but: we were third-, fourth- and fifth-graders, f'cryin' out loud.
It's not exactly as if any of us were clamoring, lustily and insistently,
for great, heaping gobs of Dostoevsky in our Saturday mornings... y'know?
A far more adventurous (both in the literal and conceptual senses of the word) and excellent cartoon offering of the period was the clever and sorely missed SHAZZAN!: with characters designed by legendary Gold and Silver Age comics great, Alex Toth. [See still reproduction, below]
The way it all worked, was: brother/sister duo Chuck and Nancy -- while cavern-combing, recreationally,, somewhere up Maine way -- find two halves of this mystic ring, see? And, upon donning said fragmented tokens; touching them together; and jointly shouting the inscribed word "SHAZZAN!": the perplexed pre-adolescent pair find themselves stranded in this Arabian Knights-By-Way-of-H.P. Lovecraft corner of the ol' time/space continuum, without even so much as a quasi-magickal bus token by means of which to get back home...
... along with (via agency of the aforementioned fractured gimcrack) a towering, jovial and incalculably powerful djinn, by the name of Shazzan.
The congenial genie boomingly informs Chuck and Nancy that -- due to a curse inconveniently accompanying their newfound mystic talisman -- they must (somehow) locate "the real, true owner of the ring, and return it" before he can alakazam 'em back to terra a little more reassuringly firma. Gifting them with a good natured (albeit dim-witted) flying camel named Kaboobie -- genies just plain ol' suck at naming things, don't they? -- Shazzan pledges always to come a-runnin', whenever they do their panicky Ring Thing in the face of various slimy sultans, fiendish fakirs, repulsive rajahsand suchlike, in the interim.
The SHAZZAN! cartoons were fast-paced and clever ones; and actor Ted Cassidy ("Lurch," from THE ADDAMS FAMILY) was clearly having himself one king-sized ball, as the voice of the unflaggingly cheerful and eager-to-please genie.
Catch any and all re-runs of this'un, the next time they appear in some suitably foresighted, CARTOON NETWORK-type venue, rangers and rangerettes.
SHAZZAN! just plain ol' rules, is all.
THE HERCULOIDS, however, were an even faster, funner kidvid pony ride. [See still reproduction, below]
Detailing the mindlessly violent (read: blissfully cathartic) exploits of a hardy, familial band of interstellar castaways, stranded upon the isolated and verdant jungle planet of Amzot (father Zandor; mother Tara; and son Dorno) and their fiercely loyal trained menagerie of one-of-a-
kind space creatures (laser-eyed dragon Zok; massive stone ape Igoo; magma-discharging rhinoceros-type thingie Tundro; and intelligent, shape-shifting plasma beings Gloop and Gleep), the Alex Toth-designed HERCULOIDS -- along with SPACE GHOST and JONNY QUEST -- best exemplified the wonder and the glory that was the whole shamelessly over-the-top Hanna-Barbera approach to kids' adventure cartoons, throughout the 1960s.
[UNCA CHEEKS' ASIDE: some of you will doubtless recall Unca's earlier recounting of his brief auctorial flirtation with the certifiable whack job who claimed to be the rightful early '80s holder of the Charlton Comics copyright (see: ONE FROM THE VAULTS, page 2).
[Said prevaricator deluxe, at one point along the fork-tongued way, also conned a foolishly trusting Unca Cheeks into believing that he'd received The Big Okey-Dokey from Hanna-Barbera to publish a licensed HERCULOIDS comic book; for which wholly bogus and non-existent "series," Unca was "hired" to script the initial four issues.
[Mandated (purportedly) to work up convincing meta-fictive rationales for such burning cartoon issues as: "Why Were Zandor and Family the Only Human Beings On All of Amzot?" and "How Did They Ever Manage To Band Together With All Those Waycool Alien Monsters In the First Place?"... Unca Cheeks sweated and grunted like a freakin' galley slave over those issues, boy; in loving tribute to those marvelous cartoons of his long-distant childhood; each one told from the POV of one of the HERCULOID creatures, themselves.
["... Between
a Rock and a Hard Place" (issue #1; the Igoo story); "Peripheral
Visions" (issue #2; the Zok story); "... Because I'm the
Daddy! That's Why!" (issue #3; the Tundro
story); and "Am I Going Too Fast For You...?" (issue #4;
the Gloop and Gleep story).
.
..
[Remind Unca Cheeks to tell you all about those,
someday.]
BIRDMAN AND THE GALAXY TRIO was yet another entry in the Alex Toth-designed series of Hanna-Barbera cartoons; and a personal favorite of Unca Cheeks', to boot. [See still reproduction, below]
Birdman was
a former cop who -- after having gotten his fool self shot eighteen or twenty
times whilst safeguarding some big deal museum's Egyptology exhibit from being
burgled, or somesuch -- finds himself being magicked back to life and then
some, immediately thereafter, by a grateful Ra (or Thoth-Amon; or "Blind Lemon"
Tut; or some omnipotent- type hotshot from said sandy pantheon, at any
rate); sporting both wings and devastating solar energy powers; and summarily
released on his own masked recognizance in order to Do Dat Dere Super-Hero Thang,
by golly, by jingo.
At some point along the spandexed way, Our Hero picked up a bluish-
purple falcon sidekick by the name of Avenger; who -- apparently; assuming
the two both existed in a world where "proportion" is more than just a word
situated comfortably between proponent and proposition -- either
stood a good three, four feet at the shoulder, easy; or else didn't much
mind being seen be-bopping about in public with a burly, muscular eighteen-inch-tall
man. In tights.
[See still reproduction, below]
...................,
Birdman shared his appointed half-hour with one of the two sharpest, snazziest "secondary features" in the history of kidvid adventure cartoons, entire: the futuristic super-hero exploits of the star-spanning Galaxy Trio. [See still reproduction, below]
Cool, dispassionate team leader Vapor Man (the one with the bluish-
green tint to his alien features; could morph himself into any form of gas or mist); violence-prone team pilot Meteor Man (super-strong, and able to expand to three sizes: Big, Bigger and Omigawd-It's-A-Total-Eclipse-Of-
The-Freakin'-Sun); and Gravity Girl (resident Terran of the outfit; wielding total mastery over the forces of gravity) were kinda sorta like this animated, three-person Legion of Super-Heroes, basically: roaming the spaceways and smacking the holy living hooey out of anyone or anything even faintly resembling a costumed super-villain.
For a series of stand-alone cartoons never extending past the seven or eight minute mark, tops: the Galaxy Trio feature possessed a remarkably textured back story, and an admirably cohesive "continuity." References would be made in passing, via dialogue, to episodes and events from previous shows; and significant details concerning various alien cultures and personalities stayed consistent, throughout.
It was -- in its own (admittedly) low-key way; given the times and its targeted audience -- one of several "thinking kids" cartoons of the day.
... which was considerably more (alas) than could be fairly stated for one of the truly notorious super-stinkers of Saturday morning fame: the irredeemably lame and awful SUPER PRESIDENT. [See still reproduction, below]
Super President -- who could transmogrify his substance into that of any known element from the Periodic Table -- was a masked adventurer who also just happened to be James Norcross: the President of the United States.
Jesus whack me with a big, gnarled stick if I lie.
Now, even as a wee, trusting and perfectly complacent (not to mention kinda stupid) grade schooler... Unca Cheeks was often given to silent, contemplative musings on two particular points of storytelling order, re: the title protagonist of the SUPER PRESIDENT cartoons:
A.) Is there any real, demonstrable working necessity to wearing an (ostensibly) identity concealing mask, when one is already given to flouncing merrily, merrily about the countryside under the confessional nom de guerre of "Super PRESIDENT"...?; and --
B.) ... can you just imagine what this guy's re-election commercials must be like, every four years...?
("My worthy opponent in this debate has pledged that -- if elected -- he will
completely eradicate the national debt, while simultaneously granting
every man, woman and child in this country a ten thousand dollar tax rebate.
On the other hand: I just saved the entire planet from the
alien warlord Throgg and his rapacious, insectile hordes. Plus: I'd like to see the man big enough and tough enough to make me
leave office, if'n I don't wanna. I'll be crushing the Speaker
of the House's head like a grape, later this evening. Thank you...
and: God bless.")
As painfully idiotic as SUPER PRESIDENT was, however: the show
had the gloriously inspired and surrealistic Spy Shadow as its designated
"back-up" feature. So: that was all right, then.
[See still reproduction, below]
The Spy Shadow cartoons hinged upon one of the cleverest conceits in all of recorded Saturday morning kidvid history.
To wit: a U.S. Secret Service agent's own shadow -- inexplicably -- achieves full and independent sentience; and promptly sets about the business of aiding his flesh-and-blood fellow (agent Richard Vance, to be precise) in safeguarding American shores from the ever-present threat of malefic foreign yadda yadda yadda.
Sometimes.
Just so long as said shadowy simulacrum believes that his corporeal counterpart
is in the right, in any given instance.
Spy Shadow was -- by any reasonable yardstick -- one of the weirdest, most original concepts going, network cartoon-wise.
None too shabby an accomplishment, really; given a genre including such one-of-a-kind notions as (say) masked super-hero cave men, and shape-shifting American presidents.
I'm just sayin', here, is all.
Of course: no discussion, re: the greatest kidvid action/adventure shows ever could be counted complete, sans mention of that incomparable Saturday morning standard bearer: Doug Wildey's JONNY QUEST.
Oh, God.
Oh, God... where even to decently start, with this one...?
Jonny Quest was the stout-hearted (and relentlessly inquisitive) pre-
adolescent son of internationally renowned ubergenius, Dr. Benton Quest; the latter whom -- along with resourceful and two-fisted live-in bodyguard Race Bannon; Jonny's mystically inclined bestest buddy, Hadji; and scrappy pet pup, Bandit -- experienced adventures and intrigues so intelligent and deftly plotted, they all but set the gold standard for kids' adventure 'toons.
A standard (one hastens to add) which has -- in the thirty-plus years since said cartoon's initial inception; as a prime time network offering, no less -- yet to be even adequately equaled; much less surpassed.
Other "key" recurring QUEST characters of note included Race Bannon's sweetly amoral, wrong-side-of-the-tracks thief/smuggler girlfriend, Jezebel Jade; and the chillingly megalomaniacal would-be world conqueror, Dr. Tzin...
... but.
BUT --
... more than practically any other aspect of the show: it's the monsters which loyal QUEST aficionados (invariably) remember best; and over which said show's countless legions of die-hard devotees (inevitably) wax the most unabashedly rhapsodic, in nostalgic reverie.
The Invisible One-Eyed Energy Creature. The Shrieking Giant Pterodactyl. The Gargantuan and Remorseless Mechanical Spider. The Shambling and Inexorable Egyptian Mummy. The Inhumanly Fat Jungle Guy With the Pet Man-Stalking Komodo Dragons. That Loathsome, Verminous Little Homunculus of a Dog, From the Taco Bell Ads. The Soulless Monster Who Came Up With the Pilot For DAWSON'S CREEK.
Wherever evil reared its horned and horrible head...
... there stood the Quest Clan: unwavering and resolute.
Unca Cheeks has heard two entirely separate (and -- to his mind -- equally valid) rationales offered, over the years, as to the precise nature of the JONNY QUEST cartoon's unquestioned and enduring appeal to generation upon generation of wide-eyed and appreciative viewers.
A.) JONNY QUEST was the ultimate kids' fantasy: you're an only child, indulged and doted upon by The World's Smartest Dad (Dr. Benton Quest); taken on one thrilling adventure after another, under the tres formidable protection of The World's Coolest Grown-Up (Race Bannon); and accompanied by Your Very Bestest Buddy In the Whole Wide World, who can do magic (Hadji).
B.) The widowed Benton Quest and bachelor Race Bannon
were the most attractive and estimable gay couple in all of Saturday morning
kidvid history.
Finally: there was Sid and Marty Krofft's LAND OF THE LOST.
(Yeah, yeah... I know, already. LAND OF THE LOST wasn't until
the early '70s. And: it wasn't no cartoon,
neither. I imagine there must be some online small claims court
you could take the matter up with, somewhere. Get. Off.
My. Back.)
"Marshall, Will and Holly,
On a routine expedition,
Met the greatest earthquake ever known!
High on the rapids,
It struck their tiny raft,
And plunged them down, a thousand feet below!
To the Laaaaannnnnnnd of the LOSSSSSSSSSST!"
Oh, hell; you think the bloody thing reads lame? Try imagining
it to the actual musical accompaniment of multiple banjos, f'chrissakes.
Forest ranger Rick Marshall -- along with impetuous teen son, Will; and resourceful pre-adolescent daughter, Holly -- are trapped in this weird, fluke-y rathole in the time-space continuum, see? And the place is simply... like... crawling with way blood-thirsty dinosaurs; and shaggy primate quasi-people calling themselves Pakunis; and these impressively single-minded and vicious reptile creatures, the Sleestaks; and crumbling, long-abandoned cities an' high-tech artifacts an' stuff; and... and...
... and, oh, good golly, people! Everything! Just
EVERYTHING, is all!
For Unca's money: it was the pie-eyed and implacable Sleestak which were the real, true stars of the show. [See still reproduction, above]
The Sleestak tended to habituate within the bowels of one of those aforementioned mouldering and abandoned cities, nearby Our Trio's base "camp"; and although it was virtually impossible to figure out just what, exactly, the bloody things wanted -- they were, all of them, incapable of (or else resoundingly uninterested in) replicating human speech; and virulently anti-social cusses, to boot -- it was strongly hinted, more than once, that they were the sole, degenerate survivors of some unimaginable prior calamity which had occurred within said environs.
One of those Pakuni-type creatures mentioned earlier -- the diminutive and hyper-active Chaka -- became a sort of unofficial "fourth member" of the Marshall family; managing to assimilate a dozen or so words of the English language, over the course of several television seasons; and freely contributing his native understanding of the local perils and pitfalls, whenever possible. [See still reproduction, below]
It's worth noting, at this juncture, that this uniformly well-written and fascinating series boasted an impressive auctorial pedigree, all told. Hugo Award winning science fiction author David Gerrold (THE MAN WHO FOLDED HIMSELF; A MATTER FOR MEN; WHEN HARLIE WAS ONE) was the Story Editor of record; and fellow SF masters such as Norman Spinrad (BUG JACK BARRON), Theodore Sturgeon (SOME OF YOUR BLOOD) and Larry Niven (RINGWORLD), among others, contributed thoughtful and innovative episodes, as well.
The series managed to establish a complex and satisfying cosmology for itself, overall; with such science fiction staples as time paradoxes; alien "first contact"; and alternate realities working their respective ways into the storytelling mix, as time went by.
There are (as of this writing) several nicely inexpensive LAND OF THE LOST videotapes commercially available; each one containing multiple episodes of this groundbreaking and pivotal kidvid classic.
Unca Cheeks Sez: check 'em out, for God's sake.
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