What Other Shows Were We Watching in 1993?

Saturday mornings weren't the only time to watch animation on the networks back in the early '90s.  Remember racing home from school to catch your favorite shows on weekday afternoons?  This Parent's Guide to Children's Entertainment Issue article lists some well-loved classics like "Batman the Animated Series", "Reading Rainbow", and even "Mystery Science Theater 3,000".  Honestly, there aren't too many duds in this list, just shows that I remember being very popular at the time that have since been forgotten. 

Let's get that "Avonlea" nostalgia train rollin', girls!






-----

Art of the Day



The perils of posting art week-by-week is that art I made for MerMay and JuneFae is finally appearing here in the middle of... AngeLy?  Ah well.  That's a pretty rad cliff I painted, IMO.

What Were we Watching on Saturday Mornings in 1993?

Saturday Morning Cartoons were still a thing back in 1993, which is worth noting in itself.  According to TV Guide's Summer 1993 Parent's Guide to Children's Entertainment Issue, the shows available ranged from tried and true classics (Looney Tunes compilations), updates of classics ("Tiny Tunes", of course, but also the... less fondly remembered "Tom and Jerry Kids"), attempts at recreating the success of the Ninja Turtles (the insane "C.O.W. Boys of Moo Mesa"; honestly, I'll never get used to minotaurs riding horses), and mostly forgotten oddities like the "Super Dave" cartoon.  And a cartoon with Scooby Doo in it because there has always been a cartoon with Scooby Doo in it.







-----

Draw of the Day



On an ill-advised nostalgia kick, I watched a few episodes of the all-but-forgotten 1986 Hanna-Barbera series "Wildfire" and it is... something else.  Starring magnificent monstrosities meant to be magical talking horses, droopy-winged fairies, Maleficent-with-the-copyright-cropped-off, and a really boring protagonist.

The 25 Weird Days of Christmas Day 16: "Santa and the Fairy Snow Queen"

I think I may have to go back and update my old list of Weird "Nutcracker" Adaptations...



Oh wow...

* - It's Mr. B-Sharp!?
* - Most of these costumes are pretty cool.  The Lion and Raggedy Anne, on the other hand, are tragedies.
* - Santa begs for the Fairy to change the characters back into toys because they might get broken or fall in love.  "You weren't made for living!"  Have some existential horror for Christmas!
* -  So.  Turns out the idea of having a magical toy spy on your kids for Santa to make sure they're being good around Christmas isn't a new thing.  (This does not make it okay.)

-----

Art of the Day!

An oldie, but a goodie. Consider it a "stay tuned"...

The 25 Weird Days of Christmas Day 1: "The Adventures Of Candy Claus"

Happy Holidays, everyone!  This year, encouraged by my Inktober success at actually posting something, however brief, every day, I'm going to try and do an Advent Calendar of weird and/or forgotten Christmas specials.  Will I find 25 specials weird enough to make the cut?  Will I give myself the "you don't have to post on weekends" clause?  Will this Christmas marathon break for "Star Wars"?  (In order: I hope so, probably, and possibly.)

Most of the specials I have lined up are entirely new to me, but I could swear I've already seen our first entry at least once as a child.  It's "The Adventures of Candy Claus", it's directed by noted weird animator Yoram Gross, and it looks like this:



Candy Claus appeared in an ad for a 900 number, in which she's identified as "the Christmas Seal Child".  None of that matters as far as the special goes.  Instead, Candy is one of two dolls made by a family who just realized it isn't really fair that Santa never gets a present on Christmas.  (The special at least operates in a world where nobody questions whether Santa exists, which is honestly refreshing.)  Candy comes to life thanks to the power of love and she becomes Santa and Mrs. Claus' daughter because sure, why not.  Later, this young new character for the young persons to relate to gets her own sleigh pulled by baby reindeer, a robot buddy, and access to a time machine.  Really.

The other doll, meanwhile, is stolen and raised by Oh No, a wicked... nasty old man that's also a wind ghost...  This doll comes to life but only *partially*.  He is barely able to move and talk because Oh No doesn't love him.  Oh No gives the poor thing the name Hey You, treats him like crap, and makes him compare his wretched life to Candy's and reflect on the existential horror of his existence and hate himself.  If you're at all paying attention, you may have noticed that this is one hell of a subplot to a children's Christmas special.

With that in mind, as terrible as the songs are (and of course these hideous earworms are why I remember this special), they're nothing compared to that ending.  Merry Christmas, kids!😥

-----

Art of the Day!

Hey, if it's winter, Boston Yeti should be reappearing soon!

Let's Watch "Dinosaurs: Fun, Fact, and Fantasy"!

You know, I was all set to review "Dinotasia".  But right after I watched that, I watched an older dinosaur show that had been lying around on my YouTube "Watch Later" queue, and I found it much more interesting and worthy of discussion.

Tangent time for the curious: "Dinotasia" is a very strange edit of the animated sequences in "Dinosaur Revolution".  So if you've seen that already, it's not even worth your time.  Unless you love the melodious sound of Werner Herzog's voice, in which case you should watch "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" instead and become humbled as f*** as an artist.  The only thing different for me was I really noticed how frequently questionable the animation was this time.  Someday, dinosaur documentary animators will learn that CGI dinosaurs on a real live background for an entire film never look entirely right, and also that they are going about integument all wrong.  Until then... ouch.

Anyway, I called this show interesting, but really the more accurate descriptor is, freakin' fascinating.  It's from 1982, so it's from right at the last gasp of the pre-Dinosaur Renaissance way of thinking, so there are more than a few unintentional mind-screws seen thirty-one years after the fact ("Plodding Dinosaurs"?)  So here for your enjoyment is Picture Palace Productions made-for-video documentary for children entitled "Dinosaurs: Fun, Fact, and Fantasy".

Either that, or it is a collective fever dream we're all having involving singing crocodiles, a "Pokerap" but with dinosaurs (from before the "Pokerap" was even a thing, no less), magic dragons, and other, weirder things.  I don't even...?



(Note, I initially watched this because I had it confused with a Ray Harryhausen documentary with a similar title, but isn't that our old friend Dougal Dixon in the credits?)

-----

Sketch of the Day!  Inspired by an odd mechanic in a "Jurassic Park" game.

Links Of Interest - What Am I Even Doing Anymore Edition!

Right. 

* - First off, the Savannah College of Art and Design has a stunning collection of Don Bluth animation art, including art from never-made films, some of which they have recently posted online.

* - Jim Hill wrote this touching article about Boston.

* - Tom Bancroft wrote an evenhanded reaction to the Disney animation studio layoffs.

* - Filmspotting SVU watched Don Hertzfeldt's "It's Such a Beautiful Day" and discussed it and other unusual animated features.

* - "Futurama" has been re-cancelled.  I'm surprisingly not too upset about this.  They had a good run.

* - Everything is Terrible just wrapped up Puppet Week and it is incredible.

* - Tim Brayton of Antagony and Ecstasy wrote a guest post for The Film Experience reflecting on "Jurassic Park".

* - Mark Witton basically wondered if the word "reptile" even means anything anymore.

* - Mark also wrote the blog post I've always wanted to.

* - If any one movie begged for a muckraking, nobody involved in the making of the damned thing is spared, everyone is called-out on their WTFery, "How the hell did this even happen" Final Cut/Devil's Candy/Monster-style "Behind the Scenes" book, it's..... Well, it's "Radio Flyer" (1992). If we're talking about any ONE movie, I mean.  But until that happens, here's a long article that helps explain why the "Super Mario Bros" movie is the way it is.

* - We're getting a movie based on the Bone Wars!

* - Start using these obsolete words!  The owls demand it!

The_Disney_Channel_in_the_1990s.mpeg

I'm going to just post this thing that was lurking in my YouTube Queue without further comment.

Actually, I will give you fair warning that the sound quality is blargh.  I will also warn you that, no matter what your age, your brain is not prepared for this.  It can't be.  There's no way it could be.  Your brain might actually just sh*t itself at some point during this movie; like, your spinal column will be full of brain-poop by the end of this movie.

Okay, without further ado: The Disney Channel Circa 1990 Presents Shelly Duvall Presents the Most Random Collection of Celebrities Ever Assembled Starring in, "Mother Goose Rock-N-Rhyme"...



Yeah... this probably could have stayed in the nostalgia box...

-----

Sketch of the Day! Have a unicorn.

"It's Mime Time." - "Christmas at Walt Disney World" (1978)

I had to save something special for Christmas Eve, and oh, I think I found us a doozie.  Last Christmas, I shared Progress City's upload of "Kraft Salutes the 10'th Anniversary of Walt Disney World", and dubbed it the "Star Wars Holiday Special" of Disney.

I may have spoke too soon. Take a look at this barrel of madness:



Young people, this is why us kids who were born in the end of the '70's are the way we are.  Couple of things that stood out to me:

* - So, who would win in a fight? The Clinkers or Chewbacca's family?

* - That vulture is totally thinking, "I ought to be soaring majestically over the Balkans and here I am serving as window dressing for a bunch of soft-rock weenies."

* - Adult.  Babies. 😱
 
* - The Gepetto scene is actually kind of touching. Then it gets weird. And finally they cut to, yep, more mimes.

* - You know, to be fair, at least this special actually takes place inside the Magic Kingdom for the most part.

* - Villains singing "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen". Uh-huh.

* - The sing-along finale is nice but this is another one of those situations where I wonder what the real animals were thinking. (Aside from the obvious "Get me the eff out of here!")

* - OMG Shields can TALK!?!

-----

Festive Older Art of the Day! I can't speak for the people who made the special we just watched, but I promise I was high on nothing but Christmas spirit when I made this:



Merry Christmas to all! See you sometime in January when I'll post something about dinosaurs again maybe.

Trees are Terrific! "The Berenstain Bear's Christmas Tree"

There have been a number of animated adaptations of the Berenstain Bears, but "The Berenstain Bear's Christmas Tree" is still my favorite. It's the earliest animated adaptation of the long-running children's book series, if I'm not mistaken, and comes from a far funkier period in the Bears' history.

That's not to say it isn't heartwarming as heck. But I also love how they immediately cut through the treacle at the end by pointing out a rather troubling hypocrisy.



-----

Festive Older Art of the Day!

My youngest cousin when she was one year old, fixing Santa with a disapproving stare.

The Insanity of the 1996 Walt Disney World Christmas Parade!

There's a part of me that thinks I ought to be doing a trip report or something more substantial like that, but I've been busy with decorating and other Christmassy things. So here's a weird Christmas and Disney related video instead:



I discovered this barrel of insanity some time before we left for our spur-of-the-moment Christmastime in Disney World Round Two trip. It has been argued that the current age of the Disney theme parks is the strangest ever but looking back at 1996, I don't know. Among the stuff I noticed:

* - Is it me or is this actually a document of Jerry Van Dyke gradually losing his mind?

* - I forgot how obnoxious the hype for the live-action remake of "101 Dalmatians" was back then.

* - How would you like to be on the same stage as that terrifying Broadway Lumiere costume?  How would you like to have to WEAR that terrifying Broadway Lumiere costume?

* - J.D. Roth's entire career seems to be floating from random hosting gig to random hosting gig.

* - "Remember the Magic!!!"

There are two major Weird Disney Things that are worth singling out here:

* - Okay, there was one interesting and different thing we did during this latest WDW trip, and that was staying in Saratoga Springs. It is a very very large and sprawling resort with many buildings spread out over a large area. I don't think we would have liked it nearly as much if we were in one of the more remote buildings (we were in Congress Park in a building overlooking the remains of Pleasure Island across the river and within about a twenty-minute walk to the main building.) But our room was huge as far as DVC studios go, the facilities in the resort were all very nice, and it was fun spotting the buildings like the old theater that betrayed the fact that this used to be the Disney Institute.

Generally speaking, if you are walking around in Walt Disney World and you see something very strange that has been there since the mid-80's through mid-90's, you can explain it with two words: Michael Eisner. The story with the Disney Institute is that supposedly Eisner went to a resort in upstate New York once that catered to older adults and during your whole stay there you took classes in various subjects. "I LOVED it," he said upon his return, "I LOVED spending the whole week in classrooms learning how to cook or arrange flowers or whatever! You know what, I WANT that! I WANT that in my park!"

And so the Disney Institute, a resort where you'd stay in and take classes all through your entire stay in Walt Disney World, was built. As you can see in the segment about it in the video, the concept didn't go over as well as Michael Eisner thought it would.

* - Castle. Cake.


-----

If you enjoyed this weird Christmas special from days gone by, I'm planning something big -and probably ill-advised- for next week. Until then, here's the Sketch of the Day with Santas galore!

Random 90's Animation - "Gumby the Movie" (1995)

Something fortuitous that happened during this Strange Animated Films from the 1990's Made By Random Studios Marathon: Three significant and -to say the least- diverse animated features from the 1990's turned out to be available for instant viewing on Netflix.  They are not on my list (if anyone was following along), and I wound up watching two of them out of order, but I felt it'd be silly to ignore them if they're that easily accessible.  Today, we'll be watching the first such film and man, leave it to the only G-rated one in the trio to be the most brain-melting.

Art Clokey's original and very optimistic title for "Gumby the Movie" was "Gumby 1".  Weirdly, this title remains in the opening credits for the film.  It's just the cherry on top of the big weird sundae that is "Gumby the Movie".

But just so we're clear, I should emphasize the fact that nothing in the only feature-length "Gumby" film (if you don't count "The Puppetoon Movie", since he's just hosting it) suggests that it was made on drugs.  Look, I grew up with the old "Gumby" shorts from the 50's and 60's and with the more recent (and arguably stranger) "Gumby" television series.  "The Gumby Show", an anthology of Art Clokey's earliest Gumby cartoons, is available on Netflix Instant and is a handy reminder of the weird dream logic -or, perhaps more accurately, weird story told by a very young child logic- that Gumby runs on.  Here, random events plots, bizarre characters, trippy electronic music, shapes casually changing, and storylines wandering off and ending up very far away from where they started is Tuesday.  So again, to clarify: so far in this project the "Gumby" movie feels less like a likely candidate for an animated film made under the influence of powerful hallucinogenics than the "An American Tail" sequel.

But wait, this is a 90's movie marathon, right?  What's Gumby doing here?  Well, seems Art Clokey was determined to make a feature-length "Gumby" movie and that it apparently took him many, many years to do this.  Clokey had good Sticktoitivity, to borrow a phrase, and finally saw his dream project finished.  Just in time to premier in the immediate wake of another strange animated film in an unusual medium that had a long road to theaters... and thereafter turned out to be utterly game-changing: "Toy Story".

In comparison to "Toy Story", "Gumby the Movie" was, to say the least, quaint.  You win no points for guessing which of these two films ate the other alive at the box office.

But with that unfortunate timing far in the past, and with "Gumby the Movie" having since become a cult favorite on home video, how does it play today?  Well, it's still... quaint.  But it's quaint in a good way.  The impetus for the story is a Farm Aid style benefit concert for crying out loud!  The low-tech analogue animation is kind of refreshing to see, and I wish more modern stop-motion films were willing to let the "seams" show just a little bit.  That said, the animation is quite lovely for what it is; many of the animators also worked on "The Nightmare Before Christmas" after all and their attention to detail shows here.  I should note, however, that while the "Gumby" characters look cute and appealing as always, the more "normal" characters don't, and are often weird and scary.  Looking back, though, that's an old problem with the "Gumby" series.

If you're familiar with Gumby, than this is basically everything you might imagine a giant-sized "Gumby" episode would be.  It starts out with a typical TV show plot, and then gets progressively stranger and stranger.  There are a lot of references to classic science fiction films for some reason, but basically if Art Clokey was interested in something at all, it found it's way in here somehow.  (If you aren't familiar with Gumby, I can't really say that this would be a good introduction to the characters.)  It's on Netflix instant, and it's worth a look if you're ready for something very odd.

Next up: Yes, Virginia, Mike Judge did have a theatrical hit feature film.

-----

Sketch of the day!

More wildlife park sketches!

My Summer of Sequels: "Cinderella 3: A Twist in Time" (2007)

In case you were wondering, there's a reason why I am doing My Summer of Sequels. It took me a while to realize it but here it is.

You can't fairly call the time period of Disney that roughly covers the 2000's the Dork Age without covering the DTV sequels.  Because when you get right down to it, they are an integral part of the reason why this was the Dork Age for Disney.  Make a seemingly endless string of direct-to-video sequels (nearly all of which could be subtitled, to borrow a phrase, "The Search For More Money") to your classic films and your classic films start to lose their special-ness. I've mentioned this before in an earlier post, and no, I will not be covering the sequel that prompted it ("The Fox and the Hound 2"; "Dumbo 2" never happened, thank the gods old and new).  Even though I briefly considered doing so.  Even though it was right there in the queue ready to go.  Chronologically, it's review would have gone right about here.  But I caved.  You win, Disney DTV Sequels.  You broke me.

And anyway, if I covered the sequel (actually a midquel so that, once again, the characters can be shown in their more marketable forms) where Patrick Swayze voices the leader of an evidently very popular country band consisting of one human playing guitar and five dogs barking and howling and yapping along (by the way, writer who came up with that plot point, what the f**k?), I'd obviously have to cover "Tarzan 2", the midquel where George Carlin voices a crazy old hermit gorilla.  And the midquel where Belle rescues a baby bird and Beast goes out of his mind over that.  And the sequel where Quasimodo falls in love with a chick and shows her a bell that is very literally beautiful on the inside (Get it?  Get it?)  And the sequel where Princess Kida reveals her people to the outside world for... reasons.  And the sequel where Stitch basically becomes the Pikachu equivalent to 625 other Stitch-like creatures.  And the one where... why am I even bringing these up?

I hope covering the sequel where Cinderella's wicked stepmother gains magic powers and alters history makes up for all this.

On to the terrible horrible no-good very bad task at hand.  If anything positive is to be said about "Cinderella 3: A Twist in Time," it's that it is at least one of the more conceptually complicated sequels in the pack.  Cinderella and Prince Doormat are celebrating their anniversary and the Fairy Godmother is there to do... absolutely nothing important except accidentally set the plot in motion.  See the action here very wisely shifts right to Lady Tremaine and the stepsisters.

Side-note: during my last trip to Walt Disney World, I realized that if I am ever a Face Character (Characters who show their real faces, can speak to the guests, and can never break character ever), I want to be a stepsister.  They have the best job out of all of the female Faces.  Every other Face has to be polite and nice and happy to see all the children.  The stepsisters, on the other hand, *have* to be rude and nasty and bratty.  That is awesome!

Another side-note: I cannot even imagine all the important plot points I must have missed out on by skipping "Cinderella 2: Dreams Come True".  I can't.  Seriously, you guys.

So anyway, Anastasia and Drizella are whining and moaning all day and Lady Tremaine is seething over the fact that she could be the absolute worst and scariest of all the Disney Villains since she is just so needlessly cruel to every living thing within line-of-sight - but she doesn't have powers.  Shortly thereafter, Anastasia stumbles upon the anniversary party and poor dingbatty Fairy Godmother drops her wand right in her hiding spot.  Tremaine in turn nicks it from Anastasia, and now we are all well and truly f**ked.

Here's where things get... ehhhh... mildly interesting in a badly-written fanfiction way: Lady Tremaine uses the wand to travel back in time to when the whole Search For the Girl Who Fits the Shoe business happens (the most genuinely brilliant aspect of this movie is its acknowledgement that, again to borrow a phrase, strange magical women distributing transparent footwear to depressed girls is no basis for a system of government).  She makes the shoe fit Anastasia, deletes Cinderella from the Prince's memories, and we suddenly find ourselves in a genuine "What If...?" Disney movie.

At a certain point, I realized that this movie was just turning into Megamorphs: Back to Before (stay with me).  Somehow, Cinderella remembers what happens, so she has to spend the tedious bulk of the movie convincing the Prince that something is terribly wrong.  Couple problems here: The DisneyToon studio just was not equipped to handle Silver Age style character designs.  Cinderella and the Prince are onscreen an awful lot and the TV studio budget does not do them any favors.  It's a little like watching Barbie and Ken court each other (and not in the fun "Toy Story 3" way).  Furthermore, while Cindy at least gets a little bit of character development, the Prince appears to have all the awareness of a houseplant.  Actually, given what I've seen of my houseplants, less awareness.  It takes him way too long to finally figure out what's up.

And some time after he finally does figure things out, he jumps right out the window.



Like you do.

I have to give credit to this scene, as it actually woke me up.  Like, did I really just see that?



Yup.  Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, I am very proud to present you with DisneyDirectToVideoSequels.gif (Note: Not actually labeled as such and you can blame the Photobucket Apocalypse.)



Just trust me when I say that yes, this actually happens, and no, context will not help you in the least.  It's also way funnier in the film because as you see, it is animated on ones, even though it happens so fast you could blink and miss it.  So whoever was in charge of this little scene of WTF really put their heart into it.

After this scene, the only interesting aspects of "Cinderella 3: Electric Boogalee" are some honestly poignant character development in Anastasia, and a Dark Pumpkin Coach which is way more metal than it sounds.

Next up, our very last sequel ever!  Seriously, I am not even acknowledging that Disney DTV Sequels are even a thing after this.

-----

Sketch of the Day!

Really Old Heraldry Studies, fit for a much more interesting Princess:

My Summer of Sequels - "Pooh's Grand Adventure" (1997)

And so we launch into My Summer of Sequels and my gosh I hope I do not end up regretting this.  But, man, if today's movie sets the tone for the project than this is going to be a very long ride. 

A bit of background before we begin.  Disney started making direct-to-video (henceforth DTV) sequels to it's beloved animated films in 1994 with "The Return of Jafar".  Now something that may surprise people today is that most fans actually did not have much of a problem with this first sequel, as it was essentially setup for the well-liked "Aladdin" animated series.  "Return of Jafar" was soon followed by "Aladdin and the King of Thieves", which many still consider to be the best DTV Disney sequel of them all.  (Sadly, neither of these films are readily available through Netflix.)

"Pooh's Grand Adventure" was the third-ever Disney DTV sequel, and still few people had a problem with it (in principle, but we will get to that when we get to that).  It was "Beauty and the Beast: the Enchanted Christmas" that started to sour everyone on the concept.  At the time, many people considered "Beauty and the Beast" to be the overall finest animated feature Disney had ever created, and to make an obvious cash-grab Christmas movie that takes place *during* the original, happily retconning a great deal of it to hell and back, cheapened both the film and, in many ways, the very Disney name itself.  (I will not be covering "BATBEC" as that's not something I want to suffer through again.)

And then "Cinderella 2" came along in 2002 and Disney fans were basically done with DTV sequels for good.

This brings us back to the lecture at hand: "Pooh's Grand Adventure: The Search for Christopher Robin".  I think fewer people had a problem with this movie for many of the same reasons last year's "Winnie the Pooh" had a disappointing box office: over the years, Disney has done a spectacular job of Pooh oversaturation.  For as long as the character Winnie the Pooh has been around, Disney has been producing animation, toys, books, and whatever for well over HALF that time.  And so this particular DTV sequel felt, at the time, less like a cheapening of the character and everything we love about him, and more like another drop in the bucket.

That said, "Pooh's Grand Adventure" might just be the most deeply upsetting and inappropriate thing Disney has ever done with Winnie the Pooh and the residents of the Hundred Acre Wood since "Too Smart For Strangers".  (By an astoundingly wide margin, to be sure, but still.)

"Grand Adventure" isn't entirely sure whether it wishes to be a direct sequel to "The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh" or a finale of sorts to "The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh".  It's much much closer in tone and overall look to the Saturday morning series, "New Adventures", which had its share of surprisingly dark episodes.  Those dark episodes were pretty short, though, while "Grand Adventure" is so very long.  Yeah, the running time is listed at only an hour and a few minutes, but the pace is excruciatingly slow.  The bewildering songs that seem to be included only as an obligation rather then to keep the plot going do not help.

The plot seems like a test run for last year's "Winnie the Pooh" theatrical film (Pooh et al misinterpret a note left by Christopher Robin and set out to find him) and, oddly, "Toy Story 3".  Like "TS3", you've got a gang of toys struggling to reunite with their master in a story with sometimes surprising darkness and depth.  The thing is, the "Toy Story" series is generally pitched towards older kids, and it earned that darker deeper tone over the course of three feature-length films.  Winnie the Pooh is, when all is said and done, a character created for very young children.  The tone is kept exceedingly light and "safe"; cheerful songs assure us if the characters appear to be in danger and any monsters are exaggerated and silly.  (Case in point: the DVD of "Pooh's Grand Adventure" contains the short "Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day" among the extras and... man, that's not even fair!)

By contrast, "Grand Adventure" takes the perils and sadness of its story very seriously, and it is damned jarring.  (Take a drink whenever the particularly discordant term "Skullosaurus" is uttered.  Just, what?)   These are all going to sound like I am making them up, but I promise you I am not.  Before the gang finally meets up with Christopher Robin again...

* Piglet is carried high into the sky by cute little butterflies and nearly falls to his doom.

* Tigger is trapped on a flimsy bridge and the whole gang falls down an impossibly deep chasm trying to rescue him.

* Pooh wanders off alone in the middle of the night and sings a song about how lost he is without Christopher Robin and it's utterly heartbreaking.

* Everyone gets lost in a huge perilous cave and they each suffer their own tedious ordeals before finally running into each other again.

* During that time, Pooh is trapped in a very small room all alone for what feels like forever(!) and is damn near ready to spend the rest of his life stuck down there(!?) with only the memory of Christopher Robin to keep him company(!?!)

* And this happens:



Gaze upon it in despair.

Take as long as you like because it's really everything you need to know about this movie.  Just, the longer you stare at it, the more it'll start freaking you out.

During an overlong and utterly mystifying sequence that is far stranger than I could possibly describe, Pooh stays... like that... for what feels like several minutes.

At least it was long enough for me to realize that somebody had to storyboard this sequence and that some poor animators had to draw him like that for a while because at no moment did anyone point out, in so many words, WTF.

Might as well mention (I want to wrap this up because my gosh, these are an awful lot of words about a direct-to-video Winnie the Pooh movie) that the DVD format does not do this film any favors and I figure the same will be true for most of the upcoming DTV sequels as well.  The animation mistakes are far more obvious now, and there are some moments that are downright sloppy; jumpy foreground shrubs and whatnot.  Given that the next sequel coming up had to satisfy a theatrical audience, one can only hope it'll at least look better.

-----

Sketch of the Day!

Thinking of Pooh inevitably makes me think of college, since my dorm basically adopted him as our spirit guide power animal. Here's an old sketch of campus:

Things I Must Post About!

This is partially for my benefit, partially for you readers to laugh at. I just finished an archive binge on my own blog and here are all the subjects I said I would write more about "someday":

* - WACOM Tablets and why they own so hard.

* - Jeff Smith's Bone. Actually, let's just get this one done: It's very good. Great art, terrific story. Just be aware that this is the kind of graphic novel that starts out like "Pogo" and ends like Dragonlance, and we all know what those are like, right?

* - Executive Meddling. Though I think between Don Bluth Month and the "Alien 3" review, I think that's been adequately covered. If you just can't get enough sad stories about an artist's vision being screwed by the higher-ups, you may read the namesake Trope, or listen to the whole spectacular debacle that the director of the film "Fanboys" suffered in this episode of the /Filmcast.

* - Speaking of: Podcasts! I got another shout-out by the very nice guys at "Science... Sort Of" in a recent episode. I think it's time to return the favor.

* - Obscure and or strange cartoons and shows like the previously and very briefly mentioned 1990's "Land of the Lost" reboot, "Kidd Video," and"Glow Friends".

* - The 1980's "Dinosaur" documentary with Phil Tippet animation and the PBS "Dinosaur" documentary with cel animation.

* - Reviews of illustrated books that somehow influenced me. William Stout's Dinosaurs, Rien Poortvliet's Gnomes, and Wayne D. Barlowe's Expedition.

* - Hazel Hedgehog and the Smurfette Principal. Maybe. Once again, the namesake trope pretty much covers it. Hazel herself is mentioned in the "Comics" section.

* - Classic Ranger Rick, though this is seeming less and less likely, and that makes me sad.

* - "Inception" and how much it melted my face off. Actually, yeah, there's my review. "Inception" = Awesomesauce.

"Trish, this is a movie that is essentially a victory lap for one of your favorite directors, stars an actor you've been a fan of since forever, the rest of the cast is incredible, it has amazing music, a brilliant fight scene unlike anything ever attempted before, and many shout-outs to M.C. Escher and Jungian symbolism and other stuff that you find awesome. And all you have to say about it is, 'It's Awesomesauce'? You know you wrote an entire blog post about a Tinkerbell book..."

Yeah. Yeah I know. It's just that I'm very late to the party and better writers have beaten me to everything interesting I could say about "Inception". I'm pretty sure I don't need to sell the movie to anyone at this point either. And I consider the Tinkerbell review an Old Shame.

By the way, Christopher Nolan was totally robbed. Bad Academy! Bad!

* - Other good 2010 movies I haven't got a chance to review yet and deserve long write-ups because they are underrated/obscure/whatever.

* - MOER OLD PALEOART!!! Especially the tale of Syntarsus (got that ready for Thursday!) and the Simon and Schuster Encyclopedia.

* - "Fraggle Rock" for cryin' out loud! Jim Henson's stuff in general.

* - "Invader Zim" and "Super Mario Brothers"

* - Movies That Are Good But Have a Ton to Answer For.

* - Expensive bird seed failure.

* - Dinosauroids and maybe other weird pop culture paleo-stuff.

* - And maybe this will be the year I write about the classic Christmas specials, yah?

OK, I'm promising nothing, but there's a good long list of subjects. Hopefully "someday" will be "over the next few weeks".

----

Art of the Day!

I have updated my DeviantArt ID finally! I don't know, I think Spewey is a good mascot don't you?


DA ID 2011 by ~babbletrish on deviantART

Forgotten Christmas Specials 2010!!! Part Two

Once again, YouTube is proof that God loves 80's children and wants us to be happy:



Here it is: Ralph Bakshi's Christmas special for Nickelodeon, "Christmas Comes to Tattertown". Let me repeat that, because the full implications didn't hit me until a while later either: Ralph BAKSHI (long pause) CHRISTMAS special (another long pause) for NICKELODEON.

It turns out that it is way weirder than I remembered. It's a little obvious at times that this is a one-off special cribbed from a rejected series, but it's still a lot of fun. Look for all the references to 1930's cartoons (was that Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and Flip the Frog?)

Compared to that, "The Glow Friends Save Christmas" is going to seem a little... conventional. I don't have much to add to this except that Bashful Bug is even more useless here than she is in the Glow Friends cartoon, that whoever animated this has never even seen a deer, and that I only saw this once and kept confusing it with the more (in)famous "Christmas Comes to Pac-Land" in my foggy 80's kid memory.



Hey, speaking of "Christmas Comes to Pac-Land"! Here it is, with thanks to The Retroist blog. This can't be the first time you've ever seen this can it?



Here's another "I Saw It Once and Keep Confusing it in My Memory with a Different Thing I Saw Once" Christmas Special. This is "The Christmas Raccoons". I love how every Christmas special from Canada I see tries to be more crazy than the last one I saw. I still have no idea what the hell Cyril Sneer is, and I kept confusing this with "The Raccoons and the Lost Star".



----

Festive Thing of the Day!

Yeah, technically both of the two most recent posts should count, but if this isn't enough crazy Christmas specials for you, Comics Alliance has reviews of three "Most Awesomely Bizarre" holiday specials and Platypus Comix has the Island of Misfit Christmas Specials. That we live in a world where they made a Pac-Man Christmas Special makes me happy every day.

And if that STILL isn't enough, the great Everything is Terrible has a lovely collection of weird direct-to-video holiday joy for all ages.

And if that somehow STILL isn't enough, Topless Robot has a list of Unconventional Christmas Movies. For those of you who like their strange Christmas stories in print form, here is a list of Unconventional Christmas Comic Books, care of Comics Alliance. Finally, I have the Last-Minute Gift Guide up at the Realm of Mad-Ness.

----

Sketch of the Day! My cousin and his family held this year's family Christmas party. It was also the first time their dogs had seen more than ten people in the house...

Never Mind "Terra Nova", Let's Watch Dinosaur Children's Shows!

So there is a show called "Terra Nova" coming to Fox sometime next year. You love dinosaurs, I love dinosaurs, we all love dinosaurs, so you might have heard of it. We know exactly this much about it:

1) It involves Steven Spielberg.
2) There's at least one dinosaur in it.
2.5) But don't call it "'Lost' with dinosaurs".
3) The plot has something to do with some humans from the future traveling through time to live in the Mesozoic era. Apparently the Earth is dying in the future and so people go back to the past to set right what once went wrong.

Now, call me cynical but it occurs to me that the plan to send humans back to pre-human times in a bid to fix the ecological catastrophes humans have caused in the future is... flawed. What if it just gives us another seventy-million years to eff things up?

(Light-bulb goes *ping!*)

Oh my God -- here's my bet on how this series will end. The humans settle in about a thousand years or so from the end of the Cretaceous, and it turns out that (wait for it) Natalie Portman was a swan the whole time! Also, that time-traveling humans contributed to the K-T extinction.

Also, I will wager you that whatever the plot actually is, the dinosaurs will still look like they did in the "Jurassic Park" movies. I am ready to say I will wear a frilly tutu or something equally silly all day long, with all the inconveniences that implies, if we see just one feather.

Sketch of The Day, right in the middle of the post!



Yeah. But never mind "Terra Nova" for now. Are there any shows on TV involving dinosaurs we could watch right now? Well, yes there are.

The first series is the one I have the least to say about, for ill and for good. It's called "Dino Dan" and it airs on Nick Jr. It is - and this is the intriguing part - made with the cooperation of the venerable Royal Tyrell Museum. You can bet your hindquarters the dinosaurs on the show are going to be as accurate as possible given the production date.

And the limitations of the animation budget. The dinosaurs are CGI creations (we will be seeing a lot of this) and the animation can get a little wonky. It's nice that the Compsognathus has feathers, but it also looks like he stuck his toe in an electrical socket. .

The premise behind the show is that Dan Henderson (awesome) is a kid who loves animals and knows an awful lot about them. And he sees dinosaurs where others don't. Aside from teaching the audience about Ornithodirans of all kinds, the show informs it's young audience that everyone loves small children who are insufferable know-it-alls total nerds. Interesting.

"Dino Dan" is at least far better than our second dinosaur-involving children's show. Then again, most things are. Currently airing in an early-morning death slot on The Hub, "DinoSapien" is a British/Canadian co-production. And it is *weird*. And I don't mean the fun kind of weird.

The plot: A girl goes to a dinosaur-themed summer camp in the woods and meets the titular creature, named Eno. Eno looks like what would have happened if E.T. had an illicit affair with Dougal Dixon's Dinosauroid (seen at the 2:00 mark). He is, all told, an odd-looking protagonist for a kid's show. On the one hand, I like that they aren't afraid to let Eno enter the uncanny valley (I can't help but think we'd have a horrific instinctual reaction to an actual flesh-and-blood anthropomorphic animal-person; I base this theory on the comments under those Orangina ads), but a part of me wishes he'd been allowed to be a little cuter.

He's supposed to be a kind of Dromeosaur, and he sports a few feathers but is otherwise naked. And he has really strange hands. He at least is a little more believable than the Diggers, which are another kind of dinosaur lurking around the campground. I have no idea what's going on with them.

The show itself is very reminiscent -for ill and for good- of the live-action sci-fi series from Nickelodeon in the early '90s. You're going to see a lot of bad animation and annoying children. I was beginning to feel very distraught over this project...

But then...

Oh, but then...

Let us now watch "Dinosaur Train". Indeed, let us watch "Dinosaur Train: every day. Because it might be the greatest and best kids' animated series with dinosaurs in it and should maybe even have a spot on my DVR in-between "My Little Pony" and "The Walking Dead" (someday, my prince will come ). But I am getting ahead of myself.

Initially, when this series was announced, people were skeptical. It was hard not to be when all we had was a title. Muses Ryan Roe of the great Muppet fan site "Tough Pigs", "they (must have) arrived at the idea of Dinosaur Train after rejecting Space Bulldozers, Kittens Eating at McDonald’s, Cupcakes Playing Drums, and Dead Bugs with Moustaches." And then... the show premiered.

I am not going to get to wordy here. People, there is an episode with Therizinosaurs doing Tai-chi. There are Therizinosaurs and they are in a cartoon for kids AND THEY ARE DOING MARTIAL ARTS AND THIS IS AWESOME!!! Also, they have feathers. Matter of fact, minor theropod characters are more likely to have them then to prance around naked. Nerd glee!

Addendum: More, and far more detailed, reasons you need to let your kids watch "Dinosaur Train" over at DinoGoss

----

Feederwatch Friday!

Sharp-shinned Hawk 1
Rock Pigeon 4
Downy Woodpecker 1
Black-capped Chickadee 2
Tufted Titmouse 1
White-breasted Nuthatch 1
Northern Cardinal 1
House Sparrow 25

----

Festive Things of the Day!

Speaking of Muppets, those of you in the New York City area (specifically, Brooklyn) can attend the Muppet Vault Christmas event this coming Sunday! Nobody made Christmas specials like the Muppets, and the Tough Pigs gang will be showing some of their favorite lost classics. Perhaps they will include this crazy thing?

And if you are in North Conway, New Hampshire, you can do what my cousin and I did this July and visit the Christmas Loft. Granted, visiting this place during Christmas isn't going to have the same impact, but even so it... it is something to see, I can promise you that.

AND there is, finally, a new Homestar Runner Decemberween episode!