Making animated Camp cool, over 20 years before Brave and the Bold

Spider Man is an interesting figure in comics. He is a comic icon, a character whose popularity rivals such figures as Superman and Batman. The character has spawned several different comics, over four television shows and three major motion pictures. Ironically, much like the character himself, the Spider Man franchise is defined more by its failures then it successes.

Ask a comic fan for his thoughts on Spider Man, and you will likely hear a diatribe about either the infamous “One More Day” story, or the “Clone Saga”, or the resurrection of some ancillary character. Mention the film franchise and be prepared for lots of complaints about the use of Venom, or the emo dancing. While these complaints might seem bitchy, the truth is they have a point. Spider Man is an institution with amazing highs and some very awful lows.

The character’s forays into animation are also riddled with success and failure. However, we here at Worst Cartoons Ever, are really only concerned with the failures. The failure we are most interested in debuted in 1999. It was the year that Spider Man the Animated Series had been cancelled. SAS had been the #1 show on Fox. It had managed to adapt the most popular comic stories for younger audiences, while at the same time revamping various characters that had long since become unpopular to comic fans. It did all of this with a low budget and constant conflict with Fox executives. Fox, not wanting to lose their viewers, however, decided to make a new series. This show would become the infamous Spider Man Unlimited.

Spider Man Unlimited arguably should have been popular. It came out the same year SAS ended, limiting the risk of losing an established fan base. It had flashier animation and the ever popular 90s strategy: a darker and edgier plot. However, it only took about 3 episodes for viewers to see what this show really was: a crappy retooling of an already popular franchise.

Spider Man Unlimited basically did everything it could to separate itself from SAS and the Spiderman franchise as a whole. The premise was basically: Spiderman accidentally boards a spaceship to a strange new world called Counter-Earth. There he fights a poor man’s magneto without the magnetism powers, called the High Evolutionary. He is supported by a cast of characters that can only be called rejects from the Island of Doctor Monroe.

What was the main problem with this show, you might ask? Well, it took the character of Spiderman and stripped him of all his supporting cast and his classic setting. Counter Earth is a poor man’s replacement for Manhattan. The new setting is basically a generic sci-fi local with random sections that try to emulate Spidy’s old stomping ground.

The new characters are also poor imitations of the classics. Gone is JJ, Mary Jane, the Osborns, Kingpin, Aunt May, and all the other characters that helped make the Spider Man franchise so great. In their place are two hulked out versions of Venom and Carnage…who for some reason are working together now, despite every other medium presenting them be enemies? The green goblin is now a heroic Hispanic guy who looks like a reject from some bad Disney show. In fact, the show often made use of Bizaro…I mean “Counter-Earth” versions of classic villains. What was their twist? They were heroes on this planet. How ingenious. I mean who doesn’t want to see all their favorite characters changed into completely different characters with blander personalities and limited to only one or two guest spots.

It’s needless to say that these changes were not popular. Every change the creators made seemed only to annoy fans. Even Spiderman’s costume was a flashier, but less interesting version of his classic suit. All these alterations and the lack of interesting new characters quickly drove fans away from the show, proving once again that a gimmick is not enough to keep an audience.

Spiderman Unlimited got cancelled before it even finished its season. Several episodes went unaired. And until recently the show was all but forgotten. Disney’s Jetix block has recently been airing the complete 13 episodes. So if you are curious about how bad this show truly was, you can find out for yourself.

Verdict: Spider-Man Unlimited might not have been so bad if it hadn’t been about Spiderman. If it had been some generic Sci-fi show about humans versus animal men, it might even have become popular. Instead it was seen as an insult to the fans of SAS and Spidy in general. The mere existence of this program is evidence that some networks think the only thing that makes a franchise is the title character. Spider-Man Unlimited is defiantly one of the great failures of the Spider-Man franchise, but thankfully the character is able to keep bouncing back.

The true heir to SAS, only took 9 years...yay

What can you say about a show like Street Sharks? It’s a cartoon built on lame puns, bad animation and bankrupt creativity. Perfect fodder for us here at Worst Cartoons Ever.

Premiering in 1994, Street Sharks was a show built on one simple message: Buy our Toys! A cartoon serving as a shill for a toy company, shocking isn’t it? While this was hardly a unique development, Street Sharks lacked all the charm of some of the most famous cartoons/toy commercials.

While shows like TMNT, GI Joe and Transformers all were corporate whores; they had a certain endearing quality that made them classics. What separates them from pale imitators like Street Sharks is that somehow the classics were able to make us care about their characters. If I had a dollar for every time someone fondly talked about classic age Optimus Prime, or heard a friend sing the infamous TMNT theme I wouldn’t need to work at this website. These shows endured and had lasting legacies beyond their toy lines. Street Sharks, for various reasons, lacks any distinctive qualities. This is probably due to the fact that it is a brazen rip off of more classic shows.

So, without further ado, let’s dive into the banality that is Street Sharks. (Sorry for the pun…there will be a lot of them)

Street Sharks is about, and stop me if you’ve heard this plot before, 4 brothers mutated into anthropomorphic animals. When they’re not spewing out catchphrases and shoveling junk food down their oversized mouths, they’re fighting crime. More specifically, they fight a mad scientist and his two incompetent henchmen. Just to add to the drama of this story, our brave heroes must do all this while hiding themselves from the judgmental public. If this premise sounds familiar, then you’ve, oh, I don’t know, seen anything broadcast? for kids ever.

Let’s just admit it. Street Sharks is a rip off of the Turtles. To make it worse it’s not even subtle about it. Look at the cast. They’re all less interesting versions of the TMNT crew but in shark form…yay! You have the 4 brothers: Ripster (the leader), Big Slammu (the tech guy), Streex (the cool but rude one) and Jab (the dumb party guy). The only thing that separates them from the turtles is their lame pun names and the XTREME spelling. After all what makes a character cooler then adding an X in the name right folks?

Seriously, just look at these abominations yourselves.

[Apparently they are only sharks from the waist up. Can you still be furry bait if you have no fur?]

I mean, dear god, it’s like the Turtles borrowed some pills from Barry Bonds.

The villains are no better. The main villain is known as Doctor Paradigm. Why is his name Paradigm? No real answer, just go with it. Paradigm is such a cliché that he even comes with a vague Eastern European accent. Again I must ask why? Did the show feel like it still needed to fight the Cold War in 1994? Or did creators watch some cartoons from the 80s and think all villains needed an accent? Ugh, let’s move on.

Paradigm, around the second episode, is infused with Piranha DNA. This seems to give him no real powers other then to make his face Hulk-out every time he gets pissed. This bizarre power gives him the oh so funny nickname: Piranoid. (God I feel like I’m drowning in pun names.) Oh, and let’s not forget the capper for this cliché storm of a villain. His voice, when changed, goes from European to such a shrill voice even Starscream would find it effeminate.

Paradigm is aided by his hapless, bio-engineered henchmen the SEAviates. (I swear these puns are going to kill me.) The original two, ugh…seaviates, were named Beebop and Rocksteady. Wait…I’m sorry I was thinking of a better show. No, these two are named Slobster and Slash, get it? It’s funny right? RIGHT?

These villains spent their time doing the standard Villain thing. They mostly just tried to mutate the citizens of their city. Other then a small running plot about the Sharks trying to cure themselves while looking for their missing father, there was no real running story. The plot involving their missing father started and really ended with the first episode. Throughout the rest of the show the sharks rarely mentioned their father, and took no real active steps to find him. Instead,the show used their shark’s father to solve any problem they had written themselves into. Basically, the writers just used the guy as a walking Deus ex Machina. By the time the show ended, the father wasn’t even mentioned. So the one chance this show had to make itself interesting…was basically abandoned.

Over the course of the show’s run, there would be numerous other characters introduced. With even worse pun names like Moby Lick, and Rox. These characters never really stayed on the show for more then a few episodes, and seemed only to exist to sell new action figures. However, by the time they were even introduced, the show was already floundering. (Oh god now I’m making puns).

Verdict: This show just sucks. Everything about it is either a cliché or a rip off of more successful shows. The jokes are mostly puns that just make you wince. What makes this show even worse is how it reflects the XTREME culture of the 90s. While TMNT reflected surfer culture and popularized phrases like “Radical” and the infamous “Cowabunga,” Street Sharks tried to be hipper and mimic skater culture. The sharks, when not munching through pavement, enjoy snowboarding, rollerblading, and spouting catchphrases like “Jawsome” and “Kick some Fin”. Sharks just seemed to have tried to update the TMNT franchise for the mid 90s and failed miserably.

Street Sharks was dumb, violent, and a forgettable piece of American pop culture. Without a doubt, this show ranks among the worst ever broadcast. One would be better off just watching old reruns of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles instead of this trash. It’s totally non Jawsome.

It’s a new year and Worst Cartoons Ever is going through a wide variety of changes. Chris won’t be updating here as often, but, as the new writer for the site, I hope to maintain the quality of insight and snark he provided. This website will continue to be one of the best places to find commentary on all kinds of cartoons.

Cartoons–few things are loved more by children. I can remember every weekend waking up obscenely early to catch hours and hours of cartoons on various networks. Who didn’t rush home after school when they were young just to see another rerun of their favorite show? Cartoons have given the world such timeless classics as Rocky and Bullwinkle, Doug, Pirates of Dark Water, and many others. However, for every classic cartoon we watched as children, there was a slew of crap that streamed into our homes.

We here at Worst Cartoons Ever make it our job to remember…and mock these terrible programs. We believe that bad shows deserve to be mocked not forgotten. Every week we’ll bring you a cartoon to be ridiculed relentlessly. We hope to provide more articles as time goes on including comparisons of our classic cartoons to other forms of animation including CGI films and anime.

I hope that you continue to enjoy all that we provide here, and share our love of bad cartoons.

Hey, it’s Friday! And that just means I gotta dance it out. Maybe I’ll just sashay about, do Disco Teddy Bear. You know how we do. Or maybe I’ll just celebrate with a non-cartoon thing I made in celebration of a great review from the Guardian UK website. Neat!

“There are postings on the difficulty of animating teeth and a video of a talking breast that will send you into a ‘depressing shame spiral’.” -Guardian UK

That’s it! That’s my site exactly! I had you pegged all wrong, foreigners. And now, a non-cartoon featuring Rue McClanahan and an illegal number of cats in a living room. Happy Friday. Or should I say….CATurday! Damn…should have posted this tomorrow for that to work.

Sorry for the late post, but here are your Freak-Out Friday Winners! Each of you should email me your addy or look me up on Facebook (under the moniker “Chris Ward”) to receive your WORST PRIZES EVER Gift Box! You won’t be disappointed. The first winner is none other than Friginator. How could I not give this guy a box of free crap? His entry was ridiculously long, for starters, but very entertaining. I once wrote a 600 word panegyric to Willie Aames from Charles in Charge, so I’m not one to point fingers at verbose web comment entries. Here’s the cartoon that scared him most as a child. He is apparently a giant pussy.

Also, I want to send a box of free crap to Rock Ripsnort. A.) for having the coolest Ninja Turtle villain name that never was and, B.) for making me want to find some episodes of Chuck Jones’ Curiosity Shop, which isn’t on DVD. I couldn’t track  down the cartoon that scared him, but this is pretty much all I need to see.