Far from Perfect, Far from Terrible

Crappy film

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

This will always be my most favourite out of all the classic Saturday morning 'cartoon' shows of the 1980s, as it was the only one that I ever made that special childhood connection with and took to heart. It must have been right at the tail-end of the 80s when I saw the few episodes on TV that I did, the rest were on dusty old VHS tapes that I picked up over the years. It was definitely enough for it to greatly capture my imagination though, and I was very thrilled and entertained by the rich and unique world of the show and all of it's varied and colourful heroes and villains and I still love and have a special place for it today, it's one of those animated shows that can 'take me back'. When I eventually got the whole series on DVD I was surprised by how well it held up for me and how much fun I had watching the many episodes that I never got to see as a kid. I find the style of the show to still be pretty cool and impressive, especially the iconic intro song, that always got me all amped-up to watch it! I like how it was set on a planet that could be an alternate version of Earth that's eons into the future, based on how it was named "Third-Earth" as well as how most of the native races are recognisable as humanoid versions of Terran animals. That fantastically strange world had something for just about anybody, it had futuristic technology and robotic races like the bizarre Berbils, who while most fans always seemed to unanimously hate them, I always thought they were cute as weird buttons! They had those things side by side with medieval-ish villages and magical fairy folk and axe-wielding savages and cyborg pirates and gigantic monsters and ancient demons. It may have been very episodic in nature but not to the downright painful degree that other popular animated shows of the time were, they did try out some story arcs like Lion-O's Anointment and Mumm-Ra Lives, and I enjoyed the vast majority of the episodes, even when the show started to get a little crazy when the Lunataks showed up and the exploded home planet of Thundera began putting itself back together! Some of my favourite episodes are "The Tower of Traps" because it's such an atmospheric little tale and it has a poignant ending, "The Garden of Delights" for the hilarious blatant drug addiction metaphor, "Mongor" because a demonic purple goatman who feeds on the power of dear is nifty, "The Book of Omens" as it's the only time Mumm-Ra asks Lion-O to save him, and "Shadowmaster" for it's the only time that Mumm-Ra secretly helps the Thundercats out, if only for his own benefit! The Wildstorm comic books beautifully carried on the story after the series ended, I'd highly recommend them if you're a fan of the Thundercats. It had its moralistic themes but they weren't mercilessly preachy and rubbed in your face all the time. I loved how the Thundercats could fight if they had to, which they frequently did, but were peaceful beings, their idealism and innocent outlook and diplomatic attitude was something good and positive for little kids to be watching. I think the animation is fine enough, to me it also holds up, and much better than certain other famous series of the time I might mention.. In some sequences it looks to be inspired by Japanese anime. And now on to my favourite animated villain of all time. Poor Mumm-Ra during the intro, screaming in mad frustration at being eternally thwarted and foiled in his evil schemes! I love that crazy old demon mummy, he was so much fun to watch, and he was pretty scary too with his corpse-like blue skin, red eyes and sharp teeth. The way he looked and sounded, coupled with the macabre visuals of his black pyramid lair was almost chilling. He was so evil yet absurdly lovable too that I sometimes wanted him to win! No matter what the Thundercats did to banish him he always came back, even if he and his whole pyramid were completely destroyed the Ancient Spirits of Evil could just bring it all back out of nothing, and thanks to his sarcophagus time was certainly on his side... And what an amazing trademark insane laugh he had, Earl Hammond did a phenomenal voicing job as the bandaged ranting fiend, how the man didn't erode his voice-box while cranking out those booming commands and hoarse roaring cackles at such incredible pitches us beyond me! It was truly one of the all time great voice performances, let nobody ever dare to forget the magnificence of mighty Mumm-Ra! He was possibly the most memorable thing about the show, hell one could even say that he arguably made the show. I never even got tired of seeing his transformation sequence in practically every single episode where he was freakishly beefed-up and had his power level greatly increased and had a much cooler design yet was strangely never all that more effective in his evil ways, it was so epic! This to me is a timelessly wonderful series that I still love to revisit every once in a while for old time's sake. I mean yeah it was a product of its time but Thundercats was still a very great and special show that stood out from the rest, it was one of a kind and still is. I don't think they'll ever be its like again. My thanks to everyone involved who pulled such a terrific and legendary animated series together. Too awesome to be forgotten. I can still feel that Thunder!!! x

This show followed the exploits of the Thundercats, a race of human cat people whose planet was destroyed so they were forced to relocate to another planet. Their future leader, Liono is but a child when they leave their planet, but thanks to a pod malfunction he ages to an adult while the others in the group essentially stay the same age. He is given the sword of omens and a cat claw and they start a new life on a planet filled with many perils including mutant men, pirates, and the evil creature Mummra. The cartoon was a pretty action packed, the dialog at times was corny and as the show progressed it got weaker, but that is really a lot of cartoon shows at the time. I have to admit, of all the cartoons there were this was probably the easiest one to collect all the toys for as they really did not add to many characters to the show as it went along. You basically had Liono, Panthro, Cheetara, the tiger dude (can't remember his name), Snarf and the two kid ones. The villains consisted of about three mutants, Mummra and a group of pirates that really did not have all that many episodes. There were another set of super berserker warriors and two or three more Thundercats introduced in later episodes, but I do not ever recall seeing them as toys. So all in all a good show, with the one story arc of Liono having to past these tests facing the other Thundercats as one of the highlight multiple part stories.

ThunderCats is the absolute best cartoon ever created. In a time when Anime was not yet that popular in the U.S., the creators of ThunderCats had the sensibility to try something new, to make ThunderCats stand apart by using Japanese cartoonists.With the most talented voices of any cartoon, ThunderCats reached the top of the charts, an instant hit. It had sensational, original music which had a different theme for each character and the theme song was catchy and simple enough for kids to pick up and sing along.It was truly original. In a time when heroes were macho beyond macho, Lion-O had the vulnerability of having the mind of a child trapped in the body of an adult, the result of his body aging while spending 10 Galacto years in a suspension capsule. As Tygra said in the second episode, he missed those important growing up years where a person matures into adulthood. He was truly relatable to kids.Kids also related well to Wilykit and Wilykat, two kids on the team who had to deal with adults telling them what to do.All the ThunderCats were superb characters, though I must say Tygra is my favorite. The cartoon blended three very important elements which helped it become a success: action/adventure storytelling, humor, and moral & ethical values. And that most kids love cats didn't hurt either.Cartoons today stink, the 80's rocked for the best cartoons and ThunderCats were the best ever. This was my favorite cartoon as a kid and I find now watching them on DVD, I love them more than ever. It's a cartoon which both kids and adults can love.ThunderCats Ho!

What more can be said about this classic animated series, Thundercats. It had everything that 80's cartoon shows had that most cartoons of now don't have: Originality. That classic good vs. Evil, morality story that was full of adventure. Like Transformers, Voltron, Defenders of the Earth, the original He-Man: And the Masters of the Universe, and G.I. Joe, Thundercats stood out as the classic show where you didn't have to rely on 3D animation or state of the art technology. Thundercats stood out on its own and Now with the DVD release, new generations can be introduced to it. And continue to be passed on. Thunder! Thunder! Thunder! Thundercats, HO!!!