Duck Tales

I like Disney cartoons made for TV -- it's obvious that Disney has a lot of play in the writing department so the cartoons are usually well-written. Such is the case with Duck Tales, the Scrooge McDuck cartoon that had a 3-yr run in the late 80's. This is one of those cartoons that completely absorbed my attention when I wasn't napping or attempting to cram for a final exam in 2 hrs (yep, I was quite the slacker -- sigh, I miss those days...). Watching it again with DJ has been interesting -- he's about as obsessed with it as I was. The advent of personal recordable media has greatly enhanced this shared family trait. We got about 4 discs from the library and they have been on continual rotation for the last week or so (they're actually really late and our account is blocked). This is about on the same level of child obsession as Scooby-Doo was less than a year ago. Tale Spin is another Disney cartoon that started after Duck Tales -- it was not as successful but I thought it was a good show and featured characters from Disney's Jungle Book.

Star Blazers, Voltron, and Gatchaman fallout

I made my 5-yr old son a really cool Gatchaman t-shirt and he refuses to wear it because, as he says, "you won't let me watch Gatchaman, so why should I wear a Gatchaman t-shirt?" He is wise beyond his years. I was hoping it would be a consolation prize -- he can't watch the ADV dubbed-version of Gatchaman because of bad language, but here's a really cool shirt with a reproduction of a Gatchaman poster... No dice. I've been pondering the idea of whether or not to get some episodes of Battle of the Planets -- they won't have the questionable language, but they'll also be confusing as all get-out with the changed names, and that stupid robot.

So, I'm trying to work on mending my son's broken heart with some other great anime from the same era, Star Blazers and Voltron. Voltron I never watched as a kid but it is fondly remembered by many of my age peerage. I never saw the English-language version of Star Blazers; I remember watching 16-mm silent footage of Space Battleship Yamato at the Polish-American Center in the East Village back in the early 80's.

We've had fun watching both of these so I've packed the Netflix cue chock-full. I've now got the Star Blazers theme going through my head almost constantly and occasionally will bust out with a couple of stanzas while DJ and I drive around on errands. I return once again to Blackcatter's World of TV Theme Song Lyrics to share the words with you: "We're off in outer space/protecting Mother Earth/To save the human race/Our Star Blazers!" I often think of Battleship Potemkin when I think of the theme song, I'm not sure why.

It'll be a fun summer.

Star Blazers photo taken from Lambiek.net
Voltron pic from 80stees.com