Where Are Our Saturday Morning Cartoon Movies?

Really enjoyed this article.
And yes, I´d be right next in the line paying happily to able to “go back”.

Found some old Thundarr the Barbarian cartoons online.  While I have the fondest memories of the show, it doesn’t hold up.  I couldn’t finish one episode.  Come to think of it, pretty much any cartoon I’ve hunted down from my childhood turned out to blow pretty hard.  G.I. Joe was the biggest let down.

Personally, If any of these show can be done right they could be big success.

Reese Witherspoon as Penelope Pitstop!!

Whatever, the “new ideas” complaint is akin to trolling these days since there are PLENTY of new ideas out there, most people just need something to whine about. Speaking of most people, the majority of human society couldn’t tell you what Herculoids or Thundarr even are so there’s plenty to mine there and I’d love to see both adapted for the big screen.

A well done remake of The Herculoids could be excellent. Imagine the faher/leader of the team as someone who recognised the obsession with tech on his own planet and he leaves the rat race behind to settle on a new planet with his family. His resourcefullness and innate intelligence allows him to live off and in harmony with the environment. Over a course of a mini series we can see him discoering these one of a kind animals with extrodinary abilities and along with his wife and child gain their trust and becomes champions of a world that needs them. Or something like that.

Why should Hollywood be allowed to screw up Saturday Morning shows the way they have everything else? (See Underdog and Land of the Lost.)

High-concept cartoons from Hanna-Barbera and Ruby Spears Productions? Good thing you have never watched Space Runaway Ideon. Your head would explode.

that actually sounds like a great concept…sadly we can only pray someone gives it a similar concept and doesnt fall prey to studio demands for some silly kid friendly movie to sell toys and cups..
a Herculoid movie should be made! Thundarr definitely should be made! Visionairies for the third idea!

have to admit been wishing holly wood would start tapping into things like Thundar and the hercouloids but given how old these things are hollywood proably figures they would not be able to get an audience to warrent the cost. plus both thundar and the Herculoids think are owned by Warner’s since they own HB

Ookla can only be played by Peter Mayhew, or if he passes, we can always put Lou Ferigno in the the Costume, actually he might be quite good in the role.  (though yeah, they will probably do a cheap CGI and everyone wills ay he looks like Sully from Monsters Inc.)

But actually, one reason people aren’t clamoring for this likely has to do with the weakness of the Master’s of the Universe Film (which I still say was pretty cool, and a great billy barty part, which is essential in my book) and then a series of Jay Ward knock offs (george of the Jungle and Dudley Doo Right) featuring Brendon Frasier that has studios a little soft of SMC films.

In truth, I was really waiting for Brendon to take on Tom Slikc or Super Chicken (hey actually there was a middling Underdog film as well now that I think of it) but I think the weakness of the others pretty much killed the dream.

Now that said, the problem for those films as it was with Battleship and previous Hero Movies, was counting too much on Fandom to make a hit and not worrying about writing, acting, dirceting and special effects.

Thundar is actually a good test case for it, since it was a dramatic series with strong ties to existing popular properties (Star Wars Meets Conan, as interpreted by Jack Kirby) So if someone had a hundred millions dollars laying around and wanted to cast Armie Hammer as Thundar and maybe Brenda Song as Ariel, the get Vince Gilligan to write it and heck we’ll get some unknown indie kid to direct it (gotta save money somewhere) and you just might get enough late 30′s early 40′s guys who have a vauge memory of a half remembered T.V. show to come out a couple times to make your money back.

But your real problem here is that most of these kids shows just didn’t run long enough to build a strong enough cult audience.  I mean I would love a Jenny McCarthy Penolope Pit Stop with an all little person anthill mob, and Seth MacFarlin as the hooded Claw, but who but you and me remember this cartoon and remember it fondly enough to have done our dream casting on it.  (o.k. under pressure from Mr. Mac Farlin , who is likey to executive produce we will switch out Jenny MacCarthy for for Laurie Perpron on Mila Kunis’ reccomendation, but we insit on Peter Dinklage for Clyde or there simply is no movie!)

Oh, hello the Pirates of Dark Water ring a bell to anyone?

Thank God most people don’t know what crap Thundarr or Herculoids were. This and other projects like He Man were the Nadir of American animation.They were what held back the development of American animation for decades.Strickly fodder for the basement dwelling mouthbreathers.

Reese Witherspoon as Penelope Pitstop? I could see it work, though, as I watched the cartoon, it struck me how people who are into bondage would be into this. And, seeing Reese Witherspoon in bondage situation would definitely be something to look forward to…

“…we may have to put up with the casting of Will Ferrell as Thundar.”

Will was born to play Ookla the Mok!

Smurfs, GI Joe and Transformers all have sequels in the next year or two. The money is there.

Where Saturday morning cartoons REALLY fail is the fact that they are extremely difficult to balance between kids and adults.

GI Joe wasn’t very kid-oriented to begin with, and the Transformers movies are more violent and adult oriented (especially the drug references in #2) than the kids cartoon ever was.

Hanna Barbara cartoons just can’t work any more because the sense of wonder they offer has been lost to a more crass, self-aware audience taste. Yogi can’t compete with Cartman, and the self awareness of George Of The Jungle can’t really compete against Family Guy.

I think the main reason there haven’t been a lot of movies based on these cartoons is because the cartoons were horrible.

Feel free to drop dead you ignorant, over-opinionated numbnut.

If they do a Lidsville movie my life will be complete.  Can’t wait for Hong Kong Phooey, it was such a fun show.  RIP Scatman Crothers.

 The problem lies when people try to explain just how great their childhood was.  They remember it being so much more intense and serious and brilliantly written, forgetting that the series was created and marketed to for 8-12 year olds, and in that they did their job.  And if you go back and watch those series WITH that mindset?  You’re good.  But go back expecting the same brilliance and you get this guy.

I want a new Centurions cartoon.  And a video game that’s worth playing would probably be one of the most addicting third-person shooter/action games ever made.

I’d be down with a tv revival of Thundarr if we can’t get a movie deal. With better animation and better writing I think it would be a hit. Rather than yet another version of Ben 10.

If it’s Hasbro, then as they are currently recycling their toy line into new rerun material on the Hub, there is a chance the Visionaries could make a come back, there, and if they can build up new interst there, it’s not that hard to make the leap to film….so there you go.

Hey Warner Brothers/Legendary Pictures Zack Snyder/Peter Jackson/Guillermo Del Toro please give us Thundarr The Barbarian and Masters of the Universe movies! 

M.A.S.K would be amazing