JQ gets props for scaring the hey out of me when I was a kid when that invisible monster started rampaging. Yeah, once the boys got it covered in paint it instantly became totally non-scary, but even my inner 9 year old would vote for Scooby each and every time for the booby prize here-unimaginably dull, same plot over and over and over each and every time (the “monster” is ALWAYS some con-artist, always), unfunny comic relief, rest of the cast dull as dishwater. And only in a later TV movie did any of the monsters turn out to be real.
What kind of bizarre parallel universe have I fallen into, where Jonny Quest is considered bad? No way, man. That was the coolest cartoon ever! There was a time when I paid my cable company an extral five dollars every month, solely so that I could get the channel that was carrying Jonny Quest one day a week. And it was totally worth it!
Filmation has got to stand out when we talk about bad cartoons. Although they did have a few winners (Fat Albert* and Star Trek: The Animated Series, most notably), their extremely limited animation (even more so that Hanna-Barbera) always made them look exceedingly low-rent.
Of all their more forgettable products, I would identify the worst as Fraidy Cat, a show about a cat who has lived through 8 of his 9 lives, and is haunted by the ghosts of his former incarnations. Just insipid.
*Fat Albert, I suppose, is tainted in retrospect by its strong association with Bill Cosby, but as a cartoon series it was excellent.
If childhood memory serves (and I’m not claiming it does), all Popeye cartoons had the exact same plot:
Popeye and Bluto/Brutus fight over Olive Oyl
Bluto beats up Popeye
Popeye eats spinach
Popeye beats up Bluto
Popeye sings his little gloating song
Any of the super el cheapo cartoons that pretty much took over kid TV on Saturday mornings. The animation sucked. For example, they would have standard backgrounds that would scroll to give the impression that their cheap, crappy cartoon characters were moving. Horrible quality. Plus, the content was bad in and of itself.
I see a lot of old cartoon shorts every year during the sci-fi movie marathon I go to. Most of those old ones from the 30s and 40s are bad (they make Brothers Flub and all of those Filmation joints look like Pixar) but I agree that **Popeye **cartoons are the most cringe-worthy.
I can’t vote for the worst, because I’ve seen so many bad ones. And if I looked at them as an adult, I bet they are even worse. I loved Inch High, Private Eye, for example, but I bet it was actually terrible.
But Jonny Quest rocks! It doesn’t even belong in this thread! He’s living every boy’s adventure life we all dreamed of. Sure he could have been killed in every episode. And any kid that rides his bike by himself could be killed. Does that make his parents “bad parents”?
And the invisible energy creature is still a classic. Not to mention the spider probe.
The King Features ***Popeye ***cartoons they showed on kids’ TV in the '60s were awful. The Paramount ones from the '50s and late '40s were not that bad. But the ones from Fleischer Studios in the '30s and early '40s were hilarious works of art.
Of all the politically incorrect films shown at science fiction conventions, nothing beats Coal Black an’ de Sebben Dwarfs. When it came on at Minnecon in 1979, even the guilty white knee-jerk SJW liberals in the room went “Ooooooooooooh!” Such delectable forbidden fruits are best enjoyed in a dark hall filled with dozens of other anonymous people.
The King Features version was certainly that. The earlier Max Fleischer black and white ones are far better, better animation (natch), and more variety of stories.
Terrytoons made a bunch of terrible cartoons in the 30s. Mighty Mouse had nothing but a theme song, and things like Hector Heathcote are a waste of celluloid. The earlier Farmer Alfalfa – from the silent days – only exists to show that you could animate drawings.
Felix the Cat also was pretty bad. The comic strip is well regarded, but the cartoons are far too formulaic, with Felix getting in trouble and using is deus ex machina case . . . I mean, bag of tricks, to get out of it.
No question that Jonny Quest was the greatest cartoon ever. Fucking Yetis, werewolves, Race flying around with a jet pack with a bazooka in hand while chasing down a surviving pteronodon. Normal boys fantasies.
I vote for all The Marvel Superhero ('60’s) episodes. I’d forgotten how bad the Original Spider-Man cartoons were until I tried to rewatch them.
The Three Stooges, The Three Robonic Stooges and Go Go Gophers have to be the most boring cartoons ever made. Granted the anime adaptations of Swiss Family Robinson and Little Women are boring, but I blame the dubs.
Jonny Quest was awesome, that giant spider was both scary and awesome. Though I did always wonder why Jonny resembled Race much more than Dr. Quest. Mrs. Quest, you little slut!
Worst was Scooby and Scrappy Doo, followed by anything that Hanna-Barbera did.
Cow and Chicken, Cat Dog, followed closely by Kids Next Door, and Ed, Edd, and Eddy. All of which came out at roughly the same time. I’m glad I wasn’t subjected to that trash as a kid.
