AnimatedFan01
Active Member
There are many cartoons that aired during my childhood which I appreciate today but regretfully didn't pay much attention to as a kid when they were airing or at least early in reruns. Either I never saw them, only vaguely remember them, didn't care to watch them and just changed the channel or wandered out of the room to do something else, or ignored them and just used them as background noise since I wasn't interested. Here's my rundown of such cartoons, separated by network:
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network was pretty much a staple in my early-to-mid childhood (ages 4-7) household. It was mainly used as filler or background noise when my family couldn't find something else good on TV. However, the only originals I went out of my way to watch were Foster's, Billy and Mandy, Ben 10 (which I think I mainly just liked for the visuals and the toys; I don't remember watching much of the Season 1 DVD I had gotten for my 6th birthday), and Chowder. As for non-originals, I remember becoming hooked on Skunk Fu! for some reason around the time it premiered and eventually The Mr. Men Show (I lost interest in SF! by the time it disappeared from the schedule and in TMMS about several months before it too disappeared). I think Tickle-U is what got me into CN in the first place, since I would regularly watch Peppa Pig, Little Robots, and Gordon the Garden Gnome before preschool. Oh, and I was allowed to watch Adult Swim from an early age, pretty much every night, as long as I didn't repeat anything I saw (which I never did), with Family Guy being my earliest memory from the block.
Anyway, with the four originals I regularly watched being addressed, here are the ones I wish I paid attention to more:
-Ed, Edd 'n Eddy: At most I found the show okay and used it as filler for Foster's or B&M. One thing I didn't like even as a kid was Ed's antics. I found his behavior annoying at times and thought there was something mentally wrong with him (as I grew older I began to tolerate him a lot more and saw the funny in him, though I still stand by some of my original opinions on him). The only episodes I remember seeing during my childhood which I can cite are One Plus One Equals Ed and Knock Knock, Who's Ed?.
-Camp Lazlo: I was really ambivalent to it as a kid. The first time I remember seeing the show was when I was getting ready for school one morning and the Halloween episode was on. I liked that it reminded me of SpongeBob and used some of the same background music as it, but at the same time there was something grating about the characters and pacing that turned me off. Anyway, it wasn't even one I would sit down to watch, mainly it would just play in the background as I preoccupied myself with something else. Now that I look back, I realize there's a lot from the show that I should have appreciated more as a kid but didn't, especially since it was basically SpongeBob at summer camp but with non-aquatic animals.
-My Gym Partner's a Monkey: The only episodes I remember "seeing" during its run were "Shiny Thing" and the one with Adam on the football team. I'm surprised I didn't recognize Jake Spidermonkey as having the same VA as SpongeBob. If I'd recognized it back then, I'm sure I would have been more drawn to the show. Otherwise, the theme song was the only thing that really stuck out for me when I was young. There was something that turned me off slightly about the show and it wasn't Jake's obsession with his butt (oh please, I found butt humor hilarious as a kid; when Shin-Chan danced with his butt showing I'd burst out laughing). As with Lazlo, MGPaM is one of those shows I appreciated more as I got older, and realized I overlooked a lot of positives during its run.
-Squirrel Boy: Now I'm not sure I even watched this one at all during its run or brief rerun time, as I literally have zero memories of seeing even a glimpse of it on TV. I was definitely aware of the show's existence though externally, to some extent, as I remember seeing a Spot the Block commercial around 2007 which started with Billy and Mandy on the couch with Billy eating chips, then it transitioned into a song with various CN characters across the screen, one of whom was Rodney. Additionally, when McDonald's was having the CN tie-in around the same year, I remember seeing the commercials which showed the Rodney and Leon toys, and also saw the show's title in the toy display stand inside McDonald's which showed said toys, though I vaguely recognized it if at all (I don't remember getting any of the toys beside the Bloo and Wilt ones, and the Gym Partner Bull Shark one time). Anyway, I became hooked on the series after searching it online several years later and appreciated it as an underrated gem; I've watched all the episodes and memorize all the lines to a good amount of them.
-Class of 3000: I'm not sure if I even remember when it was airing at all, but since it was rather short-lived and never reran after its final episode due to legal issues, I sure wish I'd cared enough to have seen it while it was still airing rather than finding out about it long after. Okay, truth be told, I still haven't watched a single episode of it today (though I've seen several brief clips from CN promos and commercial breaks), but having gotten the chance to see it back then would have added to the quality due to the nostalgia.
-Flapjack: I very vaguely remember seeing it at the premiere of its run. All I remember was a Nood bumper taking place at the grocery store with Captain K'nuckles on a conveyor belt with a bunch of bottles of maple syrup. That, and a bumper parodying the Tootsie Pop commercial. It wasn't until a year after its premiere that I finally saw a full episode. The first time I saw it, my impression was low, as I was turned off by the dark and washed out artwork, and the over-reliance on gross-out and disturbing close-ups. As I got older, while I do stand by my main gripes with the show as a kid, I think it complemented the pirate-y feel, and I overall view Flapjack as a great combination of Chowder with SpongeBob with Courage with Ren and Stimpy.
Nickelodeon
Truth be told, I was probably more of a Nickelodeon and Disney kid than a CN one, which is probably why I didn't care enough for a majority of CN's originals. SpongeBob was the first show I remember seeing and it has been a longtime favorite of mine since toddlerhood. And of course the Nick Jr. block also catered to my viewing of the channel with Blue's Clues, Oswald, Oobi, Franklin, and Little Bear. Aside from SpongeBob and Nick Jr., my main interests in the channel also came from The Fairly OddParents, Jimmy Neutron, and later, for a brief period, ChalkZone. But here are the ones I missed out on:
-Rugrats: Despite hearing so much about it and it still playing in reruns by the time I was in preschool, I barely remember seeing it outside of the movies for it which my mom rented for me from Hollywood Video, and the morning it played on the Super Stuffed Nicktoons Weekend in 2007. Apparently nobody in my family liked the show and outright disliked it. Not sure why.
-Danny Phantom: It was still airing when I started school. I barely remember watching it, but I remember comparing it to Ben 10. I guess I was never home when it was showing.
Disney Channel
Actually, I've seen pretty much every 2000s DC original cartoon, only some I cared to watch more than others. The only one I barely remember seeing was The Buzz on Maggie, which I only remembered the title and main character design from. As I later saw it post-cancelation, first I liked it, now, not so much.
Other (preschool shows)
-PB&J Otter: I'm not sure if it was even playing reruns by the time I was in preschool, but my two older siblings remember the show more than I do, and after having watched it on YouTube, I'd wish I had seen it during the period of my childhood which I remember.
I'm sure there are a few others but I wanted to get the ones from the top of my head. It's even more frustrating to me when I can't tell if I even saw a show during its run but still get the same nostalgia from it as other shows that were airing which I do remember. If it's a show I still don't care for to this day but was airing during my childhood, then I don't feel the slightest nostalgia for it. But if it's a show I actually enjoy but have no memories of seeing during its run, I do feel the nostalgia, which gives me the impression that I *may* have seen the show at least partially but the memories are locked far away in my head (if what I've heard from research is correct, once an old long-forgotten memory pops into your head, there's a specific receptor in your brain which can differentiate whether it was real or made-up).
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network was pretty much a staple in my early-to-mid childhood (ages 4-7) household. It was mainly used as filler or background noise when my family couldn't find something else good on TV. However, the only originals I went out of my way to watch were Foster's, Billy and Mandy, Ben 10 (which I think I mainly just liked for the visuals and the toys; I don't remember watching much of the Season 1 DVD I had gotten for my 6th birthday), and Chowder. As for non-originals, I remember becoming hooked on Skunk Fu! for some reason around the time it premiered and eventually The Mr. Men Show (I lost interest in SF! by the time it disappeared from the schedule and in TMMS about several months before it too disappeared). I think Tickle-U is what got me into CN in the first place, since I would regularly watch Peppa Pig, Little Robots, and Gordon the Garden Gnome before preschool. Oh, and I was allowed to watch Adult Swim from an early age, pretty much every night, as long as I didn't repeat anything I saw (which I never did), with Family Guy being my earliest memory from the block.
Anyway, with the four originals I regularly watched being addressed, here are the ones I wish I paid attention to more:
-Ed, Edd 'n Eddy: At most I found the show okay and used it as filler for Foster's or B&M. One thing I didn't like even as a kid was Ed's antics. I found his behavior annoying at times and thought there was something mentally wrong with him (as I grew older I began to tolerate him a lot more and saw the funny in him, though I still stand by some of my original opinions on him). The only episodes I remember seeing during my childhood which I can cite are One Plus One Equals Ed and Knock Knock, Who's Ed?.
-Camp Lazlo: I was really ambivalent to it as a kid. The first time I remember seeing the show was when I was getting ready for school one morning and the Halloween episode was on. I liked that it reminded me of SpongeBob and used some of the same background music as it, but at the same time there was something grating about the characters and pacing that turned me off. Anyway, it wasn't even one I would sit down to watch, mainly it would just play in the background as I preoccupied myself with something else. Now that I look back, I realize there's a lot from the show that I should have appreciated more as a kid but didn't, especially since it was basically SpongeBob at summer camp but with non-aquatic animals.
-My Gym Partner's a Monkey: The only episodes I remember "seeing" during its run were "Shiny Thing" and the one with Adam on the football team. I'm surprised I didn't recognize Jake Spidermonkey as having the same VA as SpongeBob. If I'd recognized it back then, I'm sure I would have been more drawn to the show. Otherwise, the theme song was the only thing that really stuck out for me when I was young. There was something that turned me off slightly about the show and it wasn't Jake's obsession with his butt (oh please, I found butt humor hilarious as a kid; when Shin-Chan danced with his butt showing I'd burst out laughing). As with Lazlo, MGPaM is one of those shows I appreciated more as I got older, and realized I overlooked a lot of positives during its run.
-Squirrel Boy: Now I'm not sure I even watched this one at all during its run or brief rerun time, as I literally have zero memories of seeing even a glimpse of it on TV. I was definitely aware of the show's existence though externally, to some extent, as I remember seeing a Spot the Block commercial around 2007 which started with Billy and Mandy on the couch with Billy eating chips, then it transitioned into a song with various CN characters across the screen, one of whom was Rodney. Additionally, when McDonald's was having the CN tie-in around the same year, I remember seeing the commercials which showed the Rodney and Leon toys, and also saw the show's title in the toy display stand inside McDonald's which showed said toys, though I vaguely recognized it if at all (I don't remember getting any of the toys beside the Bloo and Wilt ones, and the Gym Partner Bull Shark one time). Anyway, I became hooked on the series after searching it online several years later and appreciated it as an underrated gem; I've watched all the episodes and memorize all the lines to a good amount of them.
-Class of 3000: I'm not sure if I even remember when it was airing at all, but since it was rather short-lived and never reran after its final episode due to legal issues, I sure wish I'd cared enough to have seen it while it was still airing rather than finding out about it long after. Okay, truth be told, I still haven't watched a single episode of it today (though I've seen several brief clips from CN promos and commercial breaks), but having gotten the chance to see it back then would have added to the quality due to the nostalgia.
-Flapjack: I very vaguely remember seeing it at the premiere of its run. All I remember was a Nood bumper taking place at the grocery store with Captain K'nuckles on a conveyor belt with a bunch of bottles of maple syrup. That, and a bumper parodying the Tootsie Pop commercial. It wasn't until a year after its premiere that I finally saw a full episode. The first time I saw it, my impression was low, as I was turned off by the dark and washed out artwork, and the over-reliance on gross-out and disturbing close-ups. As I got older, while I do stand by my main gripes with the show as a kid, I think it complemented the pirate-y feel, and I overall view Flapjack as a great combination of Chowder with SpongeBob with Courage with Ren and Stimpy.
Nickelodeon
Truth be told, I was probably more of a Nickelodeon and Disney kid than a CN one, which is probably why I didn't care enough for a majority of CN's originals. SpongeBob was the first show I remember seeing and it has been a longtime favorite of mine since toddlerhood. And of course the Nick Jr. block also catered to my viewing of the channel with Blue's Clues, Oswald, Oobi, Franklin, and Little Bear. Aside from SpongeBob and Nick Jr., my main interests in the channel also came from The Fairly OddParents, Jimmy Neutron, and later, for a brief period, ChalkZone. But here are the ones I missed out on:
-Rugrats: Despite hearing so much about it and it still playing in reruns by the time I was in preschool, I barely remember seeing it outside of the movies for it which my mom rented for me from Hollywood Video, and the morning it played on the Super Stuffed Nicktoons Weekend in 2007. Apparently nobody in my family liked the show and outright disliked it. Not sure why.
-Danny Phantom: It was still airing when I started school. I barely remember watching it, but I remember comparing it to Ben 10. I guess I was never home when it was showing.
Disney Channel
Actually, I've seen pretty much every 2000s DC original cartoon, only some I cared to watch more than others. The only one I barely remember seeing was The Buzz on Maggie, which I only remembered the title and main character design from. As I later saw it post-cancelation, first I liked it, now, not so much.
Other (preschool shows)
-PB&J Otter: I'm not sure if it was even playing reruns by the time I was in preschool, but my two older siblings remember the show more than I do, and after having watched it on YouTube, I'd wish I had seen it during the period of my childhood which I remember.
I'm sure there are a few others but I wanted to get the ones from the top of my head. It's even more frustrating to me when I can't tell if I even saw a show during its run but still get the same nostalgia from it as other shows that were airing which I do remember. If it's a show I still don't care for to this day but was airing during my childhood, then I don't feel the slightest nostalgia for it. But if it's a show I actually enjoy but have no memories of seeing during its run, I do feel the nostalgia, which gives me the impression that I *may* have seen the show at least partially but the memories are locked far away in my head (if what I've heard from research is correct, once an old long-forgotten memory pops into your head, there's a specific receptor in your brain which can differentiate whether it was real or made-up).
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