cartoons of yesteryear

I apologize for the long layoff but with the semester winding down a bit and the weather turning for the better it's becoming difficult to justify sitting in front of a computer if I'm not doing actual work. I'll do my best to improve the frequency. I also apologize because this post will probably seem a little bit like a rant but I promise it will be entertaining. My friends and I have been on an old school movie kick as of late and because of this we've been watching and discussing films that we grew up on and how they are much more traumatic then we remembered. In this day of political correctness where "everyone wins, everyone gets a blue ribbon" it's rare to see kids movies offering anything other than a happy ending and terrible songs. Back in the day this couldn't be further from the truth. Everything from death and disease to drinking and terrifying villains was fair game and no I'm not just talking about Mufasa dying. Let's all take a trip down memory lane.

This has been the most recent movie discussed so I figured I should stare here... The Brave Little Toaster. The movie, as a whole, has very dark tones but this scene might just take the cake. Upon doing some research you'll discover that this scene is literally the Air Conditioner committing suicide... (remember- kids movie) Brave Little Toaster

Tell me as a kid you were ready to deal with that kind of issue... I can't even talk about it now. Yet this remains one of my favorite movies from our childhood and I wouldn't think twice about playing it for my kids some day.

Next up let's take a look at The Land Before Time (THE ORIGINAL ONE....not the 19 sequels that followed) This scene is where Little Foot's mother is about to die. This is where, as basically a toddler, Little Foot finds out he'd be in charge of escaping a giant T-rex, leading a bunch of other dino kids, and attempting to save the future of his family. Pretty tall task for the long neck. Land Before Time.

If you can get through that scene without getting choke up it's not that you're a bad person, just that you have no heart.

Now we move on to Fievel: An American Tale, remembered by most as, "That movie with Somewhere Out There" in it. The story is about a Russian, Jewish mouse family (so far, so good) who make the trip to America to start a better life. Early on Fievel gets lost and is forced to survive on his own. Now the story of basically another toddler trying to survive would be hard enough, (I'm seeing a theme) but the whole movie is just dark and terrifying. This is a short scene featuring The Giant Mouse of Minsk and despite it being a helpful tool for Fievel, it still scares the crap out of me. I can't stress this enough, please remember that this is a KID'S movie. Fievel: An American Tale

The next movie I want to talk about is The Last Unicorn. If you take the time to watch this film pretty much everything is scary in it from the ridiculous harpie to the insane red bull who kills off all the unicorns. The one character, however, that sticks in my mind is the skeleton in the grandfather clock. I remember him acting incredibly odd and laughing at everything when I was a kid and I never understood why until now... He was drunk. Absolutely smashed. If you watch the movie he's crushing a bottle of wine the whole time. Seriously, they put a wino skeleton who offers advice in this movie. How are any of us normal? The Last Unicorn.

Again, this is just a small sampling of the movies that we watched growing up. When you couple this with basically every Disney movie before Aladdin and Henson classics The Labrynth and the Dark Crystal it's amazing to consider what will never be shown to kids again. All of this isn't even mentioning shows like Are you afraid of the Dark which still haunts my dreams.

I hope you enjoyed this little trip down the creepy memory lane that we all experienced. If you have any movies or shows you used to watch along these lines please feel free to post a comment or a clip.

Enjoy the beautiful weather and have a happy Easter.

Na zdravie!