Worst Cartoons Ever

I was thinking back to my childhood. Specifically, I was thinking about all the cartoons I watched. Even more specifically, I was thinking about all the time I wasted watching really, really crappy cartoons.

Some of these shows were so poorly written, drawn and produced that I couldn't help but feel ripped off. As a kid, I never really had any path of recourse. But now, in our Internet age, it's easy to track people down and find those accountable for wasting my precious childhood years. Also, with a blog, I can at least feel like my voice is being heard by somebody.

For every GI Joe there was a Popples. For every Voltron, a Lazer Tag Academy. For every Jem, a Lady Lovely Locks and so on. So now, after 30 years of feeling screwed over by animation, I'd like to call out the following shows and their makers.

1. Kissyfur
Are you kdding me? How did this show get ok'd by anyone. This touchy feely show was about a little boy bear and his dad. If I remember correctly, Kissyfur and his old man escaped from the circus and decided to run a tour boat company.

Seriously.

Mostly, I just remember a lot of sappy positive messages and A LOT of hugging. The whole thing was stomach-churning and not at all how I wanted to start my Saturdays. Not surprisingly, this was produced by the always 3rd-rate DIC company which also laid such eggs as Captain Planet, The Littles and the legendary Hammerman.

Of course they also produced #2 on my list:

2. The Get Along Gang
Another super-sappy crapfest with plenty of hugging and huge helpings of heavy-handed politically correct messages conceived to brainwash children into being mindless robots...at least, that what sticks with me from the one time I watched it when I was 8. First off, I think the Get Along Gang was created by an inferior greeting card company that was trying to keep up with the "cartoons based on greeting cards" trend that was started by Hallmark's "Shirt Tales" and never really took off.

The Get Along Gang was led by a moose in a sweater...I believe the sweater had an "M" on it which I can only assume was for "Moose" but it could just as accurately have been for "Moron."

The gist of the show was that all these animals in clothes liked to hang out together. They liked to do things as a group and if one member dissented the rest of the gang would force the offender into submission. Like if Mr. Moose wanted to go rollerskating, the rest of the posse would say "Yay, let's go rollerskating." Then one of the other animals, perhaps the turtle with the headband, would say "I'd rather go to the mall" and then the rest of the gang would say that the turtle was bad person (turtle) for disagreeing with the group. In the end, he'd give in and they'd all go rollerskating as a happy, mindless group. Thanks for encouraging my individualism, DIC!

3. Rude Dog & the Dweebs
If the Get Along Gang taught us anything it's that cartoons should not be based on greeting cards. Perhaps just as bad of an idea is basing a cartoon on a clothing line...especially and inferior clothing line like Rude Dog.

For those who don't know, Rude Dog was a surf/skate t-shirt company that featured a little Spud's Mackenzie type rip-off dog. This was a time when every clothes company had to make surf clothes. And even though clothes are a dumb thing on which to base a tv show, there were plenty of better options.

The most obvious example is T&C Surf. Their shirts had all kinds of cool characters like a surfing gorilla and a guy in a witch doctor mask. That's the kind of thing that would make a good show! Nintendo saw the potential of T&C and made a video game based on them, but the tv folks, even the losers at DIC, let this ship sail on by them.

I seem to remember Gotcha having some half-man half-fish that probably would've made an ok cartoon. Or maybe Maui & Sons could've done something along the lines of Muppet Babies or Captain Caveman & Son. Hell, I'd even rather just watch the car from Jimmy'Z t-shirts drivin' around for half an hour. Or maybe the O and the P from OP could just walk around having alphabet adventures. Hobie, PCH, Catchit, RipCurl - all better than Rude Dog.

Anyhow, I can't remember anything about the show except that all the dogs (the "Dweebs" being Rude Dog's buddies) had bad accents and I think they worked as auto mechanics. I could probably go on wikipedia and refresh my memory, but it's just not worth it.

4. Snorks
Quite possibly the most-obvious knock-off ever, the Snorks were basically the Smurfs with snorkels built into their heads so they could live underwater. They looked like the Smurfs, they talked like the Smurfs, they had the same personalities as the Smurfs. The girl was probably named Snork-ette and they probably ate Snorkberries while being chased by Snorkamel. Screw the Snorks!

5. Turbo Teen
This one is just ridiculous. The "hero" of this show was a teenager who could turn into a car. I mean, it's not like Superman changing into his cape or Bruce Banner getting mad and getting big and green. Heck, it's not even like a Transformer turning from a robot into a car. This is a real and actual human turning into an automobile...but only when he gets hot.

I have no idea how this works. I don't remember anything about the backstory. I just know that dude would turn into a car when he got hot.

He used this ability to fight crime, but it was a ludicrous premise that even little 6 year-old me couldn't get into.

The show worked as any normal show only at some point "Turbo Teen" would have to chase a really fast bad guy. Other than hauling groceries and bathing at the car wash, this is where turning into a car would really come in handy. Of course, the problem is that in order to chase the bad guy as a car, he would have to get hot. This generally resulted in him having an exchange like this:

Stranger: He stole my purse! Please catch him!
Turbo Teen: No sweat...errr lots of sweat.

Then he'd start running until he turned into car.

Lame.

6. Give me some time. I'm sure I'll think of more.