No mid-life crisis here...just these shows turning
Remember that one day when you could wake up without an alarm? When you would get your favorite bowl of cereal and sit between the hours of 8 and 12? This is a blog dedicated to the greatest time of our childhood: Saturday mornings. The television programs you watched, the memories attached to them, and maybe introducing you to something you didn't realize existed. Updated every weekend.
July 20, 2024
July 13, 2024
July 11, 2024
BENJI GREGORY DEAD AT 46
You can read the full story here.
Best known for his role in ALF, he played Andy in an episode of Pound Puppies (1987) and Biff Tannen Jr. and additional voices for Back to the Future: The Animated Series.
July 06, 2024
25TH ANNIVERSARIES
We're gonna party like it's 1999! That's because that's when these shows aired, currently turning...
June 29, 2024
MARTIN MULL DEAD AT 80
You can read the full story here.
He voiced Paul Prickly in two episodes of Recess and Governor Kevin in Teamo Supremo.
20TH ANNIVERSARIES
The networks began what would be their final decade of Saturday mornings with most of these shows turning...
15TH ANNIVERSARIES
As the first decade of the 21st Century came to a close, these shows graced your TV screens. This year, they're turning...
June 22, 2024
5TH ANNIVERSARIES
Hey! It's our 10th anniversary! And what better way to celebrate our anniversary than by also celebrating the anniversary of the very reasons we exist in the first place? So, without further ado, here are the shows celebrating...
June 20, 2024
WILLIE MAYS DEAD AT 93
You can read the full story here.
He voiced himself in the “Willie Mays and the Say-Hey Kid”
episode of The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie.
June 01, 2024
HAPPY PRIDE MONTH!
Celebrating Pride Month with a highlight of the LGBTQ+ characters featured in various Saturday morning programs--either overtly or confirmed years later by their respective creators.
May 29, 2024
METV TOONS NETWORK LAUNCHING!
May 18, 2024
TRANSFORMERS: ROBOTS IN DISGUISE (2015)
Will Friedle – Bumblebee, Ultra Bee, Butch, Righty, various
Constance Zimmer – Strongarm, Filch, Wingcode, Matronly Docent, various
Darren Criss – Sideswipe, various
Khary Payton – Grimlock, Bisk, Divebomb, various
Mitchell Whitfield – Fixit, Toolbox, Cinch, Major Mayhem
Stuart Allan – Russell Clay, various
Ted McGinley – Denny Clay, various
Peter Cullen – Optimus Prime
Eric Bauza – Drift, Back, Forth, Headlock, Pseudo, Silverhound, Ziegler, Major Mayhem
Roger Craig Smith – Jetstorm, Slipstream, Airazor, Blastwave, Major Mayhem, various
One of their primary goals for Transformers media outside of the recent live-action films was to create a unified continuity between projects going forward; offering a kind of consistency in the brand. Within the previous decade, Transformers had undergone a number of reinventions between multiple animated series from both sides of the globe, the film series, and the comic books from Dreamwave and IDW Publishing. The groundwork for this idea, dubbed the Aligned Continuity, was laid out in the massive document called the “Binder of Revelation” written by Alvarez, Vice President of Intellectual Property Development Aaron Archer, and various other Transformers experts and fans. It took elements from every Transformers incarnation to date to outline the definitive franchise bible that would affect everything outside of the films. However, creative teams were still given the leeway to craft their own stories and art styles, and were not strictly beholden to established facts found in the Binder. It was essentially meant to be an outline for the broad strokes of the overall story that must be touched on. Archer would call this the “squint test”—as in if you squinted just right, it all lined up.
The first entry under this new continuity was the video game War for Cybertron, released in mid-2010 by Activision, and supplemented by the novel Exodus, written by Alex Irvine and published by Del Rey Books. These would introduce a corrupted version of the Transformers’ power source, Energon, called Dark Energon. The first television show in this new continuity, and one of the earliest entries on The Hub, was Transformers: Prime; a co-production with Darby Pop Productions. The name was meant to symbolize the establishment of a new “prime” continuity for the franchise. Prime was developed by Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, the screenwriters for the live-action Transformers film and its sequel, Revenge of the Fallen. The series was their chance to delve into the mythology and character arcs of the Transformers that the limitations of the films—such as how long the expensive CGI characters could appear on screen—didn’t allow them to properly explore.
Team Prime consisted initially of Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen), Arcee (Sumalee Montano), Bumblebee (Will Friedle), Ratchet (Jeffrey Combs) and briefly Cliffjumper (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson & Billy Brown) as they operated out of a former military missile silo near the fictional town of Jasper, Nevada. They operated in secret from the humans (besides their traditional human allies) as they continued their battle against the Decepticons. Megatron (Frank Welker), Starscream (Steve Blum), Soundwave (Welker) and his minion, Laserbeak, were the only notable Decepticons amongst an army of identical drones, but others would join as the story progressed. The discovery that Earth’s core was really the planet-sized Transformer Unicron established that the planet was truly Cybertron’s twin. This led to a race between the factions for Cybertronian artifacts strewn across the planet and the Omega Keys to restore Cybertron; destroyed by Megatron with Dark Energon, which was more abundant on Earth. The Dark Energon in Prime was depicted differently from War for Cybertron as it was more of a legendary substance with supernatural abilities (like raising the dead) while in the game, it was merely a powerfully dangerous substance.
Although War for Cybertron was more influenced by Generation 1 and Prime took greater inspiration from the films, events from the game and novel were referenced in flashbacks on the show, and the sequel game, Fall of Cybertron, featured references to Prime. The only hangup in the grand plan was with IDW. HasLab had tried to convince them to reboot their comics to become more in line with the Aligned Continuity, but as they were already so deep into their own stories, they refused to abandon that investment of time and effort. They would, however, publish separate books related to Prime.
Despite Prime’s overall success, it was decided to end the show after three seasons. Reasons for this included Prime’s out of control budget and The Hub receiving lower-than-expected viewership numbers, which would see Hasbro give a majority stake back to Discovery and the channel renamed Discovery Family the following year. Additionally, plans for Prime’s third season had to be abruptly scrapped and reworked when the franchise received a new head toy designer and introduced the Predacons–a race of ancient Cybertronian dragons–to the Prime line. They now had to be worked into Prime’s third season, subtitled Beast Hunters. Takara Tomy, Hasbro’s Japanese partners in the Transformers franchise, opted to not even air the Beast Hunters season in Japan. Instead, they created their own continuation of the Prime story called Triple Combination: Transformers GO! featuring original Japanese-themed characters battling the Predacons for the time-twisting Legendiscs.
The ultimate goal of the Aligned Continuity was to eventually lead up to a grand shared universe that would incorporate all of Hasbro’s properties; in particular G.I. Joe, M.A.S.K., Action Man, Stretch Armstrong, the Micronauts, Jem and the Holograms, Primordia (a relaunch of 1986 toyline Inhumanoids), and even board games Candy Land and Battleship. This was highlighted in the comic Unit:E, given out at New York Comic Con 2011 (and, incidentally, was also the name of a federal agency in Prime). Unfortunately, this grand vision never came to pass.
While High Moon Studios, the makers of the Cybertron games, was fully on board with the idea, the creators of the animated shows wanted freedom from the Binder to do their own thing. That’s why Rescue Bots, based on the then-upcoming pre-school toys in the franchise, was said to be in continuity with Prime against HasLab’s plans. It was argued that a second series on the same network with the same production companies should be connected. Rescue Bots was kept largely insular from the larger Prime story, but Optimus and Bumblebee would make guest appearances.
Additionally, Hasbro’s ambitions at being an entertainment company was falling far short of expectations. They had put a lot of money into the film adaptation of Battleship, which ended up sunk at the box office. High Moon Studios owner Activision laid off a large number of their staff, and assets from the two games they produced were cobbled together to create the lackluster midquel Rise of the Dark Spark; meaning now Hasbro lost their video game partner in their plans. A direct video game for Prime, Transformers Universe, was also scrapped after years of developmental difficulties. Finally, Hasbro started making budget cuts and shut down HasLab, laying off most of its staff (the HasLab name would later resurface as Hasbro’s crowdfunding arm for one-shot collectors’ items that wouldn’t see mass release to stores).
Even though the Aligned Continuity imploded, projects for it were still coming out. The next entry was a sequel to Prime called Robots in Disguise (not to be confused with the 2001 anime of the same name, and initially working under the title TF2). Developed by producers Adam Beechen and Jeff Kline and Duane Capizzi, the series was set three years after the defeat of Megatron. Bumblebee (Friedle, reprising from Prime) had become a seasoned police officer on the restored and prosperous Cybertron. A vision of a presumed-dead Optimus (Cullen) appeared to him and led him back to Earth to deal with the threat of recapturing the escaped Decepticons from a crashed maximum-security ship. This would be the first Transformers program where Bumblebee was the central focus; playing off of his growing popularity thanks to being prominently featured in the film franchise.
Initially joining Bumblebee was his partner, cadet Strongarm (Constance Zimmer), who could transform into a police SUV and whose by-the-book mentality often clashed with Bumblebee’s loose style, and Sideswipe (Darren Criss), a rebellious “bad boy bot” that Strongarm apprehended causing some vandalism in his futuristic sports car alt form and forced to come with her to Earth. The Bee Team’s ranks would be bolstered by the addition of Mini-Con Fixit (Mithcell Whitfield), who worked aboard the prison ship and ended up damaged in the crash, causing him to frequently glitch; Dinobot Grimlock (Khary Payton), a former prisoner whose headstrong destructive tendencies as both bot and T-Rex was put to use for the good guys; bounty hunter Drift (Eric Bauza), a former Decepticon thief named Deadlock that operated with a code of honor and transformed into a futuristic car; Drift’s Mini-Con students Jetstorm, who was impulsive and often acted inappropriately, and Slipstream (both Roger Craig Smith), who was more obedient to Drift; and Windblade (Kristy Wu & Erica Lindbeck), an ancient warrior with a clairvoyant instinct for finding Decepticons that could transform into a VTOL jet. Additionally, they had two human allies: child-like junk collector Denny Clay (Ted McGinley) and his son, Russell (Stuart Allan), who came to live with his father while his mother was in Copenhagen. It was in their scrapyard, the Vintage Salvage Depot for the Discriminating Nostalgist, just outside of Crown City, where the Autobots set up their base.
Occasionally the Bee Team would be joined by cool and collected Jazz (Arif S. Kinchen), who was tasked with cultural observance and analysis and became a sports car; medical officer Ratchet (Combs, reprising from Prime), tasked with tracking down rogue Decepticons with Mini-Con Undertone, and could become an ambulance; Blurr (Max Mittelman, reprising from Rescue Bots), a hotshot Rescue Bot who loved speed and never hesitated to show it in his race car form; and the powerful-yet-gentle Bulkhead (Kevin Michael Richardson, reprising from Prime), who transformed into a SUV.
Optimus Prime had sacrificed himself to save Cybertron during Prime. But instead of dying, he was taken to the Realm of the Primes: an ethereal plane outside of time and space inhabited by the original Thirteen Transformers. There he was trained by Micronus Prime (Adrian Pasdar) to combat a coming threat. That threat would come sooner than anticipated and Optimus was sent to Earth infused with the power of the Primes. Once the threat was defeated, however, they took their power back, leaving Optimus weakened. He would join Bumblebee’s team and work under his old friend to aid in their missions.
A special weapon utilized by the Bee Team were the Decepticon Hunters, found on the prison ship. They were multi-purpose tools that could read its wielder’s mind and become whatever weapon or device they needed. However, there was a trick to them: the user needed to have an absolutely clear image in their head of what they wanted, or else it would change into random objects. Additionally, if a Decepticon Hunter wasn’t working perfectly, it could severely damage both itself and its user.
The primary antagonist was the wolf-like Steeljaw (Troy Baker), a brilliant schemer and revolutionary with goals to take over Earth as a new home for Decepticons under his rule, and who could become an off-road vehicle. He would form his own Pack that included Underbite (Liam O’Brien), a Chompazoid whose strength was determined by how much metal he consumed and could become a four-wheeled tank; Thunderhoof (Frank Stallone), a former crime boss with moose-like antlers and hooves that could become a tractor; bounty hunter Fracture (Kevin Pollak), who had no loyalties or scruples so long as he got paid, and could become a chopper; his Mini-Cons Airazor (Smith), a dimwit that took pleasure in doing bad things to others, and Divebomb (Payton), the smarter of the pair with razor-sharp claws he WASN’T hesitant to use; and Clampdown (Jim Cummings), powerful yet cowardly and always willing to do anything to save himself, who could become a hatchback.
Other villains included sword-wielding pirate Saberhorn (Fred Tatasciore), who could become a winged rhinoceros beetle and could combine with Decepticon Bisk (Payton), a powerful fighter who treated life like a video game and could become a sports car, to form Saberclaw; Scorponok (Victor Brandt), a gruff scorpion-like bot whose stinger-tail was lethal; cold and aloof Glowstrike (Grey Griffin), who enslaved her Mini-Con captors to rebuild the prison ship to get her off of Earth, and could transform into a ladybug; Soundwave (Welker) and his bird-like minion, Laserbeak, Megatron’s chief lieutenant and master tactician who wound up trapped in the Shadowzone—an alternate dimension that was essentially like a prison—but was eventually freed; Starscream (Blum), who had managed to survive the Predacons and found and attempted to utilize the Weaponizer Mini-Cons bred by the Decepticons for revenge on Megatron; the Stunticons, who plot to conquer the planet’s roads by finding Cybertronian weapons or by combining into more powerful forms, comprised of leader Motormaster (Travis Willingham), brutish Heatseeker (Mikey Kelley), timid Wildbreak (Dave Wittenberg), opportunistic Drag Strip (Maurice LaMarche), and the snobbishly snarky Slashmark (Kaye); the Scavengers, a group of Decepticons that made a living stealing Autobot relics from the Great War comprised of crab-like Clawtrap (André Sogliuzzo), Paralon (Jason Spisak) who could become a scorpion, lobster-like Thermidor (Cummings) who could become a sports car, and porcupine-like Scatterspike (Robin Weigert) who could become an offroad truck; Cyclonus (Harry Lennix), a mighty Cybertronian starfighter with a chilling voice and boasts of the destruction he’d bring, but which hid the fact that he had a strong cowardly streak; and Megatronus (Gil Gerard), a powerful fallen Prime that blamed both planets for his eventual defeat and imprisonment; among others.
Transformers: Robots in Disguise was meant to return to the Transformers’ former home of Cartoon Network, but made several international detours along the way. The first 13 episodes of the series were dubbed in Chinese and premiered in China on December 31, 2014 on the website 1905.com; where they could be purchased for roughly $3-4 each until January 15th. Purchasing them also entered viewers into a contest to win an assortment of Hasbro toys and a roughly $5 digital coupon. It then premiered on Canal J in France, Biggs in Portugal, and Cartoon Network in Hungary, Australia and New Zealand before finally hitting the United States on March 14, 2015. This would continue for the duration of the show, with episodes premiering in Singapore, Australian iTunes, Cartoon Network UK (which aired 2 episodes a week), Teletoon (now Cartoon Network) in Canada, and Gulli in France days or sometimes even months ahead of the US broadcasts.