Cartoon

I watched a lot of Saturday morning cartoons.  My sister and I would wake up early and if we were very quiet we could watch as much Saturday morning shows as we could stand until noon.  This was the only time of the week when our TV watching was not limited or censored by our ever vigilant mother.  I guess my mother felt that no matter what loathsomeness was present in other genres of TV,  cartoons were exempt by their very nature.  After all, cartoons were made for children and therefore would never have any adult themes or concept that would destroy our moral character.  She apparently did not consider cartoon violence a morality issue, nor did she seem to understand that Bugs Bunny and Popeye had some definitely adult themes.  Mind you there was nothing blatant in those cartoons, but having viewed them as an adult myself, there were plenty of suggestive situations and double meanings portrayed.

So we reveled in this TV feast all the more since it was the only time each week we could sit in front of the TV for more than an hour at a time.  It didn't hurt that many of the cartoons were the best thing ever created.  Our favorites consisted of the following:

The Bugs Bunny Show

This was the holy grail of Saturday morning cartoons featuring Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Foghorn Leghorn, Elmer Fudd, such as in Acrobatty Bunny / What's Up, Doc?, as well as many others and in later years, The Road Runner and Sylvester and Tweety.  This was well animated, brilliantly scripted and hilariously voiced animated cartooning at its best.  Even as kids we knew there was nothing better than what we were watching.  We anticipated the start of this show and when this hour was up, the rest of what Saturday morning had to offer was pale in comparison. 

The Flintstones

Ah yes, the tale of a stone age family.  Fred, the father dealing with his boss and Wilma his wife using all sorts of prehistoric appliances.  Their neighbors Barney and Betty were always in on most of the exploits.  I always felt that Barney and Betty were in many ways a cartoon version of Fred and Ethel from the I Love Lucy show.  I especially loved this show because I had saved up some box tops and sent off for a cardboard version of the actual Flintstone house.  When it finally arrived it turned out to be more fun as a concept because I didn't have any Flintstone characters to put in it.  The Flintstones

The Jetsons

This was like the Flintstones, but set in the future with George, the father character having all sorts of issues with his boss.  Jane, the wife was always using some sort of  futuristic appliance and the kids did futuristic kid things.  I think or favorite part of this show was watching George Jetson become trapped on the dogs treadmill.  All in all it painted the future as somewhat vapid and dismal.  My favorite character was the robot maid, I think for her general downtrodden attitude. Rosie the Robot

Jonny Quest

Oh, my God, but we loved this show, especially the opening credits where there was this eye like thing chasing them.  Jonny was a young boy and he had all sorts of adventures with his same aged friend Hadji and the bulldog Bandit as they accompanied his father Dr. Quest.  There was this other guy Race Bannon and it was unclear exactly what his job was and how he related to the rest of the family.  It may have been an early version of 'don't ask, don't tell'.  The Mystery of the Lizard Man

Underdog

I always loved the cartoons that had a catchy them song.  This one was a great one with: "There's no need to fear!  Underdog is here!"  It was also nice to have a character who struggled with his inabilities but still made good. The fact that he always talked in rhymes was a negative, but it wasn't like we watched these things for the dialog.  The Ultimate Underdog Collection Volume 1

George of the Jungle

Another great theme song which my favorite part was: "George, George, George of the jungle.  Watch out for that tree!" and then he would smash into a tree.  Well, that was mostly what we watched this for so it was pretty far down on the list, but still worth it. GEORGE OF THE JUNGLE (1967)

Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids

 Any program narrated by my favorite of favorites Bill Cosby was a good cartoon.  It combined this with some nice animation and interesting stories.  There was less of a ha, ha about this program and more about teaching us some sort of morality message, but we did our best to avoid learning on Saturday mornings, so we just let the educational messages slide off and enjoyed it as a cartoon. Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids

Mighty Mouse

We liked this superman in mouse form because he did all sorts of heroic and totally superpower things, but there was the issue with him spontaneously bursting into opera. All in all this was only a good choice if nothing else noteworthy was available. Mighty Mouse

Sunday

Considering the absolute feast of cartoons on Saturday morning we were definitely experiencing withdrawls symptoms on Sunday morning.  Luckily, Sunday had a small cartoon fare itself.   It was pretty slim pickings as far as quantity but luckily there was a really great cartoon available.

The Rocky and Bullwinkle show

Now this was a compilation shown done right with opening and closing sequences and cliffhanger endings.  Not only did this have Rocky the flying squirrel and Bullwinkle the moose in their fights against the villains Boris and Natasha, but it also was a collection of other cartoons we liked such as Fractured Fairy tales - a very dry witted  version of classic fairy tales with modern twists;  Peabody's Improbable History - with the Professor Peabody, the genius dog and his boy Sherman- we really liked their interactions since the Professor's attitude was quite antagonistic.  I especially loved it when Professor Peabody ordered Sherman with, "Quiet Boy!";  and Dudley Do-Right which had the main character Dudley of the huge square chin always rescuing Penelope from the schemes of Snidely Whiplash.  This usually involved a train track. Rocky & Bullwinkle & Friends: Complete Season 1

Davy and Goliath

That we actually watched this show proved how desperate we were for cartoons on Sunday.  If this program had been offered on Saturday we would have shunned it.  This was a show with an overwhelming moralistic attitude, definitely Christian and definitely intending that we learn something wholesome from it.  We resented it almost as much as we needed to watch it.  Davey & Goliath
After all, once this show was over then it was just the wasteland of Sunday afternoon movies and then the Wonderful World of Disney in the evenings, which could be absolutely excellent, but also meant the weekend was over.