1980's Saturday Morning Historical Preservation Society

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Saturday mornings in 1982, over on NBC at 8:30 in the morning you could find the adventures of The SHIRT TALES, although if you're younger than me you *probably* remember this show from somewhere else and are getting ready to hit "Leave Comment" to let me know that I've made a terrible mistake.

HOLD THAT BUTTON, and read on...

Much like other perennial 80's favorites Strawberry Shortcake and The Care Bears, The Shirt Tales were created for the Hallmark Greeting Card Company (by Janet Elizabeth Manco) with no real story or reason other than to look cute on greeting cards. The Hanna-Barbera came along and gave them a storyline! Tyg Tiger (in orange), Pammy Panda (in pink), Digger Mole (in light blue), Rick Raccoon (in red), and Bogey Orangutan (in green) lived in a big hollow tree in Oak Tree Park (as Tigers, Pandas, Raccoons, Moles and Orangutans often do in the wild) and wore shirts which flashed various brightly lit messages reflecting their thoughts. They spent their time teasing the park ranger (Mr. Dinkle) and FIGHTING CRIME AS SOME SORT OF SUPER-SECRET AGENTS (as Tigers, Pandas, Raccoons, Moles and Orangutans often do in the wild). They zipped around the world in a vehicle known as the STSST (Shirt Tales Super-Sonic Transport) which was a car, jet, boat, submarine, and pretty much anything else they wanted/needed it to be.

The show ran for two seasons on NBC Saturday Mornings, 10 episodes in the first season and 13 in the second season. In the second season things changed *slightly* with the addition of "Kip" (a young Kangaroo) and an apparent power-struggle between Rick and Tyg. Rick was rarely seen in that second season, which i weird since he had been the apparent leader of the group in season 1. Weird.

Anywho, you *MAY* remember seeing this cartoon on CBS rather than NBC, and with good reason; in the Fall of 1984, NBC dropped Shirt Tales from their schedule and it was immediately snapped-up by CBS, who were looking for a last-minute filler to replace the low-rated "The Biskitts" cartoon at the last minute. CBS showed a mix of re-runs from both seasons of Shirt Tales.

(Sorry for the poor sound quality, it was the only ORIGINAL 1981 OPENING with the voice-over that I could find)

Saturday morning at 8:30 in 1981, NBC and Hanna-Barbera made history with the debut of The Smurfs. What can I tell you that isn't already common knowledge (to people like us) about this show? Fred Silverman (President of NBC at the time) had bought a Smurf doll while on vacation in Colorado (the toys started hitting US shelves as early as 1976) and Fred thought "Hey, I'll bet that would make a good cartoon".

Anybody else know any good stories about The Smurfs?

The Tarzan/Lone Ranger/Zorro Adventure Hour from Filmation has been mentioned here before, but for continuity sake let's bring it up again.

Filmation had a ton of 15-minute adventure cartoons featuring Tarzan that they kept running and re-running with various new cartoons all through the 1970's and well into the early 1980's. This show was officially called an "Adventure Hour", although it rarely went hast 30 minutes per scheduled episode. For 1980 and 1981, the Tarzan cartoons were packaged with brand new Lone Ranger and Zorro cartoons as part of a bait-n-switch scam that I've never ever forgiven them for; I'd tune in hoping to see a new Lone Ranger cartoon and ALWAYS get an episode of either Tarzan and Zorro, or just a double-dose of Tarzan re-runs :(

They are why I have trust issues.

(Cross Posted from Tumblr)

DYNOMUTT, DOG WONDER - Tuning in to your local NBC affiliate at 8:30 on a Saturday morning would bring you to the second half-hour of the Godzilla / Dynomutt Hour. Much like the Godzilla cartoons that they were paired with, the Dynomutt cartoons used in this show were just reruns of the two seasons that had run from 1976 to 1978 with no new content other than the opening title sequence. The show was about a Batman-esque super hero (Blue Falcon) and his assistant, bumbling yet generally effective robot dog Dynomutt, who could produce a seemingly infinite number of mechanical devices from his body. As with many other animated super-heroes of the era, no origins for the characters were ever provided so you should go ahead and start writing your FanFic *NOW* :)