Kids Cartoons I Miss

Before I begin my list, I'd just like to repeat again that these are my picks and my opinions.  I highly doubt that many of you out there will completely agree with my rankings and with so many great cartoons to choose from its entirely understandable.  In fact, there are so many great cartoons from my childhood (90s) that I decided to double the list this week and make a top 10 today.  Unfortunately, because even 10 choices doesn't seem enough, I had to omit many popular choices such as:

Rugrats (seriously would've been my number 11)
Rocko's Modern Life (weirdly awesome show about a wallaby)
Aaahh!!! Real Monsters (monsters in school and their misadventures)
Dexter's Laboratory (Dee-Dee get out of my labor-a-tory!)
Gargoyles (I honestly never watched this show but it oozes with style)
Duck Tales (A-Whoo hoo?)

and many many more.  With dozens of great picks to choose from, I had to go with my own opinion and my experiences. 

NUMBER 10

REN & STIMPY

1991

Now I know a lot of people are already gonna be upset that Ren & Stimpy isn't ranked higher then number 10 on my list, but please before you get upset, hear me out.  I used to love this show when I was younger.  I watched it as often as I could on Nickelodeon, bought the comic books, and even played most of their videogames.  If you asked me 10 years ago whats my all-time favorite cartoon, I'd have to say it would've been Ren & Stimpy.  I was really excited when the DVDs came out and immediately bought them.  Question for you now is, have you recently watched an episode of Ren & Stimpy?  I'm amazed at what they got away with showing kids in the 90s.  This show didn't seem as entertaining today as it did when I was younger and the overly adult reboot in 2003 showed how twisted the creators of Ren & Stimpy were.  Bottom line is, I loved it as a kid, not so much as an adult.  Entertaining, but sort of lost it's appeal as I got older.

One of the most famous episodes of Ren & Stimpy is right here.  Guaranteed to make you happy and filled with joy!

NUMBER 9

RECESS

1997

I have to confess, that I didn't really start watching Disney's Recess until it was shown on UPN but I loved all the adventures the kids would get into.  Recess was about T.J. and his friends in elementary school.  What made the show appealing to kids was it's great blend of relatability mixed with it's over the top atmosphere.  I'm sure all of us could relate to the episode of Recess where the kids are stuck indoors on rainy days and forced to find entertainment inside.  Or what about the episode where the kids all buy monster cards and it becomes a schoolwide obsession?  This show had entertaining characters, funny stories, and can still give a lot of us feelings of nostalgia. 

NUMBER 8

MUPPET BABIES

1984 

Muppet babies they make our dreams come true!  Come on, you know that you remember the theme song.   Although this show released in 1984, there were 8 seasons running until 1991!  I remember watching episodes of this as a young kid and enjoying every one of them.  I honestly didn't know anything about the muppets before muppet babies and thought that the muppets were actually a spinoff of their baby versions cartoons.  While today it really seems kinda embarassing to say I enjoyed a cartoon about baby versions of famous sock puppets, I don't care.  I loved this cartoon and I ain't ashamed!

NUMBER 7

POWERPUFF GIRLS

1998

Now if my last entry seemed really babyish, this one might have a lot of you questioning what was going on with me.  This show came out in '98 meaning I was already 11 years old.  While I wouldn't freely admit I watched this show back then, I have no problem saying I did now.  The show about 3 cute and super powered girls fighting off crime was one of the main reasons I wished I had cartoon network in my area as a kid.  I used to watch this show at my friends house and there was something just oddly cool about it.  The bad guys were fun and funny (Mojo Jojo and the Gang Green Gang), the supporting cast was enjoyable (the Mayor stands out), and the action wasn't half bad.  The main characters were great (Bubbles was my favorite) and for some strange reason, I couldn't get this song out of my head years later!  Yeah I liked this girls cartoon and I'm sure I wasn't the only little boy who watched it.  Hopefully..

*fun fact ~ Bubbles voice actress (Tara Strong) does voiceover work for cartoons like Pokemon, Drawn Together, and Family Guy as well as video games like Metal Gear Solid, No More Heroes, and Rikku from Final Fantasy X.

NUMBER 6

DOUG / HEY ARNOLD!

1991 / 1996

Alrite while I know this is technically cheating and I could've easily made a top 11 list instead of clumping these two together, its my list so I can do what I want!  Honestly though, these two kind of entertained me in the same ways and were also similar in others.  Odd kid dealing with school life?  Check.  Strange family members? (Judy for Doug, Grampa for Hey Arnold!) Check.  Colored best friend? Check (yes Skeeter is blue, but we all know what color the creators were going for). 

Doug and Arnold were both characters who really weren't that special.  Doug dreamt really big and had great fantasies, but he pretty much was just a normal kid.  He had crushes on girls, had problems with bullies, and overcame his minor problems.  The same can be said about Arnold.  He also dealt with bullies, overcame minor problems, and had crushes on girls.  Neither one of these two shows were really all that funny, yet they were entertaining to me, and still are.  I enjoyed them then and look forward to someday finding them on DVD or any other media so I can share them with my future kids someday. 

NUMBER 5

X-MEN

1992

Arguably one of the best cartoons on Fox Kids, X-Men pulled us in from the second we saw the awesome opening and heard the great theme.  Seriously, check this out and tell me that this wasn't great. X-Men Opening.  How pumped would you have been back when you were a kid to see that?  Mutants with super powers fighting other mutants, cool characters that have still stayed relevant for close to 50 years (spawning countless cartoons, comics, movies) and a story that was really entertaining!  This show introduced many of us to the Marvel universe (the other main one was Spider-Man) and we loved every minute of it.  Although the story kind of got a little too complicated for some kids (story arcs spanning 3-4 episodes or even entire seasons) we still enjoyed it and unfortunately the show stopped production in 1997.  The X-Men are still popular enough to spawn new shows like X-Men Evolution, and Wolverine and the X-Men, but none will probably ever live up to the 1992 version I grew up with.

NUMBER 4

BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES

1992

Batman is iconic.  He's been in countless amounts of movies, spawned shows in nearly every decade since his introduction, and is almost universally known.  Batman was introduced to mainstream media in a campy live action 60s show starring Adam West and Burt Ward.  Not until '89 did the darker Batman show up in Tim Burton's classic Batman film.  Thankfully, Batman the animated series showed more of the Dark Knights moody atmosphere, and less of the '60s Bat-Dances.  I could spend all day discussing Batman's history, but you could actually check it out right here.  The animated series was praised for its great story telling and ability to capture the way that many feel the Dark Knight should be like.  You have all the main villians like the Joker, Two-Face, Mr. Freeze, and the Penguin but one famous villian actually came to be through the cartoon.  I'm talking about Harley Quinn of course, the Joker's sidekick/lover.  Great characters, fun fight scenes, good visuals, and quite possibly the best Batman and Joker voices ever (Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill) made Batman one of the best cartoons of it's time.  Scratch that, I still would watch this show so mark this as one of my all time favorite cartoons ever. 

NUMBER 3

TINY TOON ADVENTURES

1990

The miniature versions of Looney Toons famous characters were a delight to watch as a kid.  Buster and Babs bunny had just as much personality as their adult counterparts and the show even had some cameos of Bugs and other famous characters like Sylvester and Daffy.  The shows greatly written and produced theme just helped to fuel the love for this show.  If you didn't watch this show as a kid, I'm sorry to hear that but happy to let you know that you can still pick this series up on DVD.  This show spawned video games along with thousands of other merchandise and even had two spin-offs (The Plucky Duck Show and Pinky, Elmyra, and the Brain).  If you're a fan of '90s cartoons but haven't seen this show, you're doing yourself an injustice.  This show (like Muppet Babies) proved that pint-sized versions of famous characters truly can work. 

NUMBER 2

TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES

1987

Now I know for a fact that you know who the turtles are.  In fact, you're probably singing the theme song in your head right now aren't you?  What can be said about the turtles that hasn't already?  The show ran for close to 10 years, had 3 live action films, had one of the most successful toy lines ever, and had some of the best video games at the time (TMNT the arcade game, Turtles in Time).  Named after famous artists (obviously) four mutant turtles were taught to be ninjas from their rat master Splinter.  Vigilantes who loved Pizza, they used their skills to thwart the evil Shredder.  Meh, to sum it up just watch the theme song.  I loved this show as a kid, owning most of their toys and probably having all of their old episodes recorded on VHS somewhere.  I loved this show so much, that I wanted to be a ninja turtle when I grew up! Well, that or a wrestler (can you blame me?  It was the '90s!).  The Turtles are still classic and even today have movies, cartoons, and comics coming out. 

*Speaking about their video games, DO NOT BUY THE TMNT REMAKE ON XBLA.  It is terrible.  That is all.

Now what on earth could possibly be better then the turtles?

Well, for starters, take a look at the title of this list.

This is the top cartoons I miss.

I love each and every one of these toons but there are some that I miss more then others.

Also, just because I enjoyed some of these as kids, that doesn't mean that I'd watch them today

(as indicated by Ren & Stimpy)

Which brings me to...

NUMBER 1

ANIMANIACS

1993

The Animaniacs was a half hour of insanity.  You had the Warner brothers and their sister Dot, Slappy the Squirrel and her nephew Skippy, Buttons and Mindy, and Pinky and the Brain who were so popular, they two spinoffs!  Acting as a sort of cartoon comedy block, each character had their own little plots.  The Warners loved to wreck havoc along the Warner Bros studio, always avoiding Ralph the security guard.  Pinky and the Brain tried to..of course..Rule the world!  The writing was great and a lot of it had to do with the hidden adult content.  Now I'm not saying that it was as bad as Ren & Stimpy, but there were definitely some moments not suitable for children.  But that was some of the appeal of the show.  It was aimed at children, but also tried to entertain adults too.  The great writing also got a great boost from the amazing musical scores that Richard Stoner's team (did music for tiny toons and freakazoid to name a few) wrote, with one of the most famous songs being Yakko's Nations of the World.  Wow..I dare you to try to remember the song, let alone sing along.  How could a song be so catchy, yet simultaneously teach us geography?  The animaniacs is my number 1 pick and definitely deserves to be on your list for top cartoons. 

Didn't Quite Make The Cut:

Bobby's World

Freakazoid

Ghostbusters

Swat Kats

Darkwing Duck

Pinky and the Brain

The Tick

Let me know what you think! Agree?  Disagree?  Like it?  Hated it?  Let me know please.  Thanks for reading and hope you enjoyed this new list.