Cartoon Network Nostalgia Thread

[Kiddington]

I'm a huge nostalgia buff; I'll freely admit that. I have an expansive DVD and video game collection (among other childhood items, too many of which to list here), consisting of many of my favorites from "the good ol' days" that I cannot and/or simply refuse to part with.

That said, don't take that as me being a, ahem, "nostalgiafag" (I absolutely hate that term, but it does appropriately apply to a certain crowd). Although I'm not really a "fan" of present-day Cartoon Network (they do a lot of stupid things wrong that they never did 10-years ago) there is still plenty on the channel that I enjoy today. Regular Show has already become one of my all-time CN favorites, and I'm also starting to warm up to Gumball as well... although not completely sold on it, I'm getting there. On the action end, Young Justice and Batman: Brave and the Bold are both fantastic shows, and fit perfectly within that group of new/modern-day favorites.

Although I love the 90's, and cherish so much of what that decade has to offer, I'm not against new things; not at all. One's individual taste changes all the time, and there is, unfortunately, plenty of stuff I grew up with that doesn't do it for me at all nowadays, aside from the nostalgia factor. As I watch new stuff on TV, though, I discover new favorites all the time. I love nostalgia, and relishing in the past is always fun trip down memory lane, but I'm always open to new things. It's good to have a balance between the old and the new, and it'd be nice if everyone lived by this philosophy (as opposed to the hardline, one way or another stance of hating all things old, or all things new that so many people live by).

[Spark Of Spirit]

I don't think anyone would argue with the 90s being a great decade. It's probably one of the best in modern media because of the wonderful balance it had in everything going on, movies, animation, music, video games, and TV shows were all hitting their own types of peaks here all around the same time. Collectively, it's a great decade.

But I think the 70s were better for movies, the 60s for music, and the 80s for... lol, I can't even finish that one, the 80s blew. It had great arcade games and music, but nothing it really excelled at.

The 00s was a solid decade with a lot of great stuff, but it wasn't really overwhelmingly superior in anything from any decade previously. Where it wins, in my mind, is for specific examples separate from the whole. Sitcoms were getting stale, cop shows were losing the sense of fun, mainstream music was bought by the record companies, animation was becoming committee driven, action movies were getting their balls cut off, dramas were beginning to go up their own ass, and video games were getting streamlined. But there were still examples of material that hangs with the best of the best in all categories.

And that's my take on frivolous crap no one cares about!

[Dr. Insomniac]

I'd argue that the 00s was when sitcoms were becoming more inventive and getting out of the standard multi-camera status quo with Scrubs and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, cop shows were gaining some true grit with The Shield and The Wire, indie music and animation were finding more ways to be seen by the general public via YouTube, Newgrounds, etc., and dramas were becoming more serialized and layered like Mad Men or Breaking Bad.

But yeah, action movies and video games haven't really hit a major upswing as far as last decade was concerned. Unless you count the rise of PC gaming.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Well, it mostly comes down to taste as I've mostly grown tired of the multi-camera sitcom and I find most gritty cop shows overly boring, but that's just me. I'd much rather watch something like Titus or Monk which were shows in the decade that still used the older formats exceedingly well.

Either way, I do think that even though it was a crazy decade for entertainment, there's still a lot of excellent stuff in it.

As an aside, I fucking hate Scrubs. 

[Kiddington]

As an aside, I fucking hate Scrubs. 

This.

Whenever one of my friends tries to "sell me" on Scrubs, I often think to myself "wow; these are the people I hang out with?" God damn, I hate that show.

I'm sure if I tried to sell them on MLP, they'd say the same about me... but for my sake, I don't even bother. 

[Commode]

I used to love the shit out of Scrubs.  I haven't watched it in forever though...

[Avaitor]

Scrubs has got to be the most hit-or-miss show ever made. Even Evangelion doesn't have such a topsy-turvy relationship with people across the board.

It's also easily the most influential comedy in the past decade, which I guess shows what you think of today's sitcoms depending on if you like it or not.

[Kiddington]

I like plenty of today's sitcoms; The Office, How I Met Your Mother, Parks and Recreation, Curb Your Enthusiasm, etc. I know a lot of those are similar in style, but I dunno; I don't really see a correlation between liking Scrubs and liking other newer sitcoms.

The problem with Scrubs, for me, is that it just isn't funny. When I watch it, nothing clicks at all. The writing sucks, the characters, for the most part, also suck (sans Dr. Cox, who I thought was OK when I seen it last) suck, and I find the over-emphasis on relationships very grating (I know a lot of sitcoms always do this, but I never cared for the way they handled it). It just doesn't work for me.

I could give it another chance... hell, it's been quite a while since I've seen it last. I really don't want to, though.

[Geezer]

Huh? Scrubs was absolutely hilarious.  I wish it was MORE influential, because then we'd have less flaming shitturds like 2 Broke Girls and Last Man Standing and more actually well-written, witty shows.  Dr. Cox and Dr. Kelso are two of the most unique, awesome characters on TV in recent memory.

That being said, the med-school intern season was horrendous and should be wiped off the face of the Earth immediately, and deleted from the memories of anyone who watched so much as one frame of it.

[Avaitor]

I honestly stopped watching after the first ABC season. That was intended to be JD's last season, and as far as I was concerned, that was the last.

[Dr. Insomniac]

I honestly stopped watching after the first ABC season. That was intended to be JD's last season, and as far as I was concerned, that was the last.

Yeah, pretty much.

[Sketch]

I swear every time I get on YouTube I end up looking at old Cartoon Network promos and packing. Why just today I stumbled upon a Static Shock Miguzi promo in the related videos bar and ended up watching quite a few Miguzi promos. That and I can't tell you how many times lately I've rewatched Toonami videos on YouTube. The old Cartoon Network sure knew how to promote their shows. Not that they're bad at promoting shows now but they were much better and more creative about it "back in the day".

[Rosalinas Spare Wand]

A lot of marketting was just way better in the past. Companies were more about being edgy or tongue in cheek about their products from the 90's and even a little into the 00s. Nowadays, the clever campaigns come by less frequently (and when they do, they wear out their welcome so fast ie Old Spice) or they're reserved for a 1 time only Superbowl slot.

As an aside, I love how Saban Brands is promoting Power Rangers everywhere, but I hate Nickelodeon's own branch handling the previews and commercials for it. Most of them feel incredibly generic and could probably be swapped around with any other show they air. That's how awful they are.

Hey you remember that one campaign CN ran when they first began to air Pokemon and Yugioh on the channel? I knew they were reruns, but they certainly knew how to promote the hell out of reruns.

[Commode]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GOg3kLNjTs&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-HrXL2yOYY&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lr_oYqrYwG8&feature=related

How many of these do you remember?  Some of them surprised me, like the Summer Fridays one,  I forgot all about that one, yet I remembered it so vividly.  I love the one at the beginning of the third video too, where they are flying through the CN office building, but I'm kind of curious, when did they use that one?  I remember seeing it when it originally aired, but it had to have been in 2004 or later(long after I stopped watching the channel regularly; also around the time that most of the HB characters featured in the video disappeared from the channel[when was the last time you saw fucking Squiddly Diddly on CN?]), as I noticed things like the new CN logo, as well as characters like Puffy AmiYumi, Teen Titans, and the Megas XLR guy making appearances.  I just find that strange, as I thought that intro was a little older than that.

[Kiddington]

Yeah, I remember those. I often cite that last one (among other things) as proof that CN wasn't totally dead after the infamous "revamp" of 2004. It was definitely on the downswing, yes, but at that point, they still knew how to advertise.

That's one of many things I've always hated about the Snyder era; these guys don't know how to advertise for shit. CN's ad campaigns now are as boring and uncharismatic as it gets. I don't know why people loved the "nood" era so much; I thought that was one of their worst efforts yet. Guess it comes down to personal flavor, but I haven't been impressed with any of CN's advertising in years.