So I hear that Garfield hates Mondays. I'm not a huge fan of them myself but for totally different reasons. My work week starts on Sunday but I'm usually pretty excited about that. I guess I'm just an optimist like that. Often I am so exhausted tired by the end of the night that I really don't want to get up on Monday and I'm just not quite there all day. Some less holy folk might call this an anointing hangover but I'd never go there. I have to go in on Monday though because I have to clean my office and plan my week on Monday or the rest of the week is shot. It's just not pretty when I have meetings on Monday morning like I've had for the past few weeks. My office is a very scary place right now. Anyways, Mondays will come with a new feature. I had been keeping that day random but I got a great idea from a post over at SCL today. On the off chance that you read my blog but not Jon's go check it out. From now on Mondays will be about the best things in life that I learned from 80s cartoons. Sure the 80s gave us terrible hair (be honest did you have a mullet?), downright scary clothing, and the 3rd worst musical fad of all time (80s hair bands *shudder*), but we did get a few awesome things from the 80s. We got Cyndi Lauper, The Princess Bride, Goonies, and most importantly the best cartoons ever. Sure the 90s had a few good cartoons but it also spelled the death of the before and after school cartoons. No the 80s had the real GI Joe, Transformers, Thundercats, He-Man … and also some stuff that girls liked but I didn't watch them because I didn't have a sister to share the TV with. Come on a journey through my childhood and learn things that explain why therapists charge so much money. My first lesson is this. Yep, it's true. The hero of the story can die. I was 7 when The Transformers Movie came out. Not the new live action version I'm talking about the old cartoon movie. It is the first movie I remember watching in theaters. I'm sure I watched others but this one stands out. I was addicted to Transformers like nothing else. My parents bought me several of the toys and they learned the difference between Transformers and Go Bots because that was very important to me. Transformers were cool and Go Bots were the cheap knockoffs that the pariah of the 2nd grade played with. I was so hip in 2nd grade because I had some seriously awesome toys. I had an Optimus Prime die cast transformer. I weep a little when I see how much those sell for now but mine didn't survive because of the movie. If you aren't familiar with the movie Optimus dies in the opening sequence. Honestly that is all that I really remembered from it until I bought the movie for my son (that is what I told my wife at least) last year. I had it in my head that he dies at the end of the movie because it is the last thing I remember. Apparently like so many other things I have blocked that from my childhood. I had a good childhood but anything unpleasant gets filtered so … He can't die though. He is the hero that always saves the day. Don't they know the hero never dies? Well, if I had read The Princess Bride I could have understood the lesson without the shock that lead me to destroy my Optimus Prime action figure. It is explained in the beginning of the book that sometimes the hero dies, and so it happens in the book. I think we do prime our kids to think that the hero always wins and get the girl and all that stuff, but I learned that this isn't always true. I don't know that modern cartoons would do something to dramatically risky. That is hard for me to imagine in today's society but it is something we need to understand. We try so hard to keep our kids from heart break that when it does happen it is that much harder for them. The good news is that even though the hero died, an unlikely character stepped up to the plate and saved the day. Also Optimus made a comeback in the cartoons and I regretted the whole "destroyed my toy because of that stupid movie" incident, but hey I was 7 not like I could predict the future. PS, I also learned that when your hero dies it is ok to cry but that is a post for another day.Sometimes Heroes Die
Friday, February 20, 2009
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5 comments:
Yes, the Princess Bride...And don't forget Magnum PI. I'm sure statistics would show an increase in 'the stache' movement.
And I beg to differ about the hair...I wore a mean 'big bangs' and perm.
Princess Bride (sigh)....
I still watch that movie. When I was painting a mural in my daughter's room, instead of listening to music, I replayed that movie over and over again. Which was cool because I was painting a princess mural.
Annie K,
Almost every female had big bangs and a perm in the 80s. I stand by my *shudder*. My mom has naturally curly hair and made the mistake of getting a perm since everyone was doing it. We have a few pictures of her fro that she hasn't destroyed.
katdish,
It is one of my all time favorite movies. The book is pretty impressive as well if you don't mind the inside joke that the book is a "good parts edition" written by someone else and that there is a lawsuit going on over the rights.
I was made in the 80's, so I think it makes that decade pretty awesome.
I didn't get to experience much of it, but I caught all the really good parts.
You have to talk about Thunder Cats! They were totally awesome; one of my favorite all time cartoons.
Did I miss anything by not reading the Princess Bride??? I watched the movie and the hero doesn't die? Did I get confused? Were you saying it was just a really cool thing from the 80's and not that the hero died in it?
max02,
I came a decade earlier but just barely. This made me more able to experience the joys of 80s cartoons. The movie is very much like the book. There are a few differences, for example Fezzik from Turkey in the book not France and Humperdink is not completely useless in the book. Also Wesley does die in the book, it turns out there are levels of dead and he goes through them but Miracle Max and the power of love over come. I really enjoy the humor in the book but there is a lot you have to wade through because of the running gag that the book was written by Morgensten. There are editors notes and everything much like the move where it keeps cutting back to Fred Savage and his grandpa only much more involved.
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