by Daniel V. Garcia
Daily Lobo
As a child of the '80s, after-school animation was always hit or miss.
This was before the ubiquity of cable and channels such as Cartoon Network, so kids across the nation had very few options. "Tom and Jerry" reruns and similar fare had aired regularly for so many years that I managed to memorize lots of dialogue. Even today, I can still sing the theme song of "Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids," a talent I recently put on display for an inebriated audience at a student ghetto party.
One animated show in particular revolutionized my young life with its top-notch cell animation, a rockin' theme song and lots of kung fu. It was the Thunder, Thunder, Thundercats, Hooo!
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This was the only show to have mutants and mummies battling anthropomorphic alien cats on a mysterious planet. The good guys were the cats, and each of the big cat species was represented by a character whose name was a derivative of its respective species; thus Lion-O, Tygra, Panthro, Cheetara, etc. These handsome and well-built beings beat up the stupid and ugly mutants that were part lizard, monkey, etc. It was as if George Lucas, Akira Kurosawa and Sergio Leone dosed some acid one bacchanalian night and drew up the storyboards together.
"Thundercats" illustrators were whiz-kid Japanese animators, and for all practical purposes, they made this series the first anime to gain widespread viewership in America. It came complete with a mythology and a backstory, and the story arcs became more and more complicated as the seasons progressed. The show even had a resident psychologist who would peruse the scripts and extract a practical lesson from them so that all the kids would grow up to become respectable citizens.
Even my vocabulary was expanded by this show. Not that I recommend using TV as an educational tool, but I specifically remember learning the word "paranormal" from watching "Thundercats."
The show, like most 'toons of the time, featured some sort of conflict between the good guys and the bad guys that was always resolved at the end of each episode. They seem simplistic and slow to me now, but I challenge parents to report a bored child after their kids have been turned on to these feline fighters. A friend of mine tells me that her kids love it so much, they've been looking for the toys. It's too bad the toys have been off the market for so long, because now one has to pay collector's prices for them.
For some reason, fate saw to it that I never caught the final linchpin episode at the end of each season. Try as I might, something would always come up, and I would miss it. It has been the bane of my existence. Thankfully, my lifelong obsession has come to an end now that the complete series has been released on DVD.
Finally, I'll discover what happened to Lion-O after his fateful battle with Mumm-Ra.
Courtesy of Cartoon Network
