Blackstar- an interesting fantasy show in the vein of Flash Gordon that seemed to be a forerunner to He Man by about two years. John Blackstar had the star sword and his nemesis had the power sword. Interesting how at least on episode of He Man seemed to use some animated sequences originally done for Blackstar as well.
Not to stray off topic, But Friday Night circa 73,74 were awesome too!
The Six Million Dollar Man, The Planet of the Apes then Kolchack the Night Stalker!!All on Friday Night! I used to go to bed Spooked by the Night Stalker, then wake up with Bugs Bunny..It didn't get any better than that!
I really miss those days.
What kids today don't understand is that back in the 70s - 80s there was an average of about 12 channels.
And only 3 of those channels had a sharp picture.
I remebmber if I woke up around 5:30 or 6, some really strange shows would be on (Arthur and company), and as 7-8 o'clock rolled around, more cartoons would flood the channels...then around 10 hue live action kids shows would start- Jason of star command, Isis, shazam, etc.
Hen around noon, after all the cartoon and kidshows were done, it was time for Tarzan theater.
How about cartoons that never got a chance: road rovers, and freakazoid. Animaniacs suffered when it went to saturdays. Battletech was doing good in ratings until fox axed it, so was the original Dragonball and one other anime i forgot that had a catgirl in it. That got axed after a few episodes. Fox had a ton of good saturday morning cartoons in 2000 but most got axed when they phased the stuff out. Digimon was still thriving, there was one about a giant mecha and a little robot boy who thought the mecha was alive like him.
Damn dude, you had it good.
We had ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS and like one UHF station. In the 80's there was a 2nd UHF station that set up shop but was hard to pull in. 12 channels would have been amazing!
This thread is fun and very poignant.
I fear so much that we, as products of a pre-OnDemand age, are facing a terrifying time. Our children assume that the show will be OnDemand, so if they want to do something else and miss the first broadcast, well, no big deal.
I submit that that attitude is the biggest deal of the last 25 years: Believing that you can have everything. How different is that outlook than, well, I know I don't have the money for a new car, but I'll buy it on installments so I can have it now. Our parents, many of them had to save up cash for a car first. Or shared one. Or didn't have one at all. And still, here we are.
Saturday Morning Cartoons were our groundings in responsibility, timeliness, togetherness, imagination in the name of not missing the fun. That informed our little minds that rewards and good things required patience and committment. I ache for that again. I know that in the universe of DVR's, the Internet, iPhones and fast food everywhere, I have lost some of myself.
I don't mean to pull the thread down, but I know that I was not ready for the on-demand world. In many ways it got the better of me, and I see that now. Not to say I am not impulsive a little now and then, but its different. Less frequent.
Let's all try to remember to appreciate things again, in the spirit of the Saturday Morning Cartoon ritual.
Now, if you will excuse me, I have to go DVR 800 channels of "quality programs" so I can not watch them later......![]()