Beloved Childhood Movies, TV and Books

[Benji]

(Yes, it's a quiet day for me)

When you're a kid you get obsessed with stuff easilly. You find something you like and you basically want to absorb it into your very being. Currently my nieces are doing that with Frozen, and Brench inadvertently mentioned Asterix in the RAW thread, which reminded me of when I was young and obsessively read and re-read Asterix comic books.

So it got me to wondering - what obsessions did EWB have when we were younger?

Sonic The Hedgehog
To this day I love Sonic, mostly the early games, but I also obsessively watched two Sonic cartoons - Sonic Underground and the STH with Scratch & Grounder. My biggest obsession though was the British Sonic The Comic by Fleetway. I loved this comic, it took Sonic's game mythos and created fun, detailed and interesting stories for them, from the first arrival of my favourite Knuckles, to the Brotherhood of Metallix (this universes version of Metal Sonic) to Issue 100 where Robotnik was finally removed from power (but not totally beaten, of course). My mum chucked out my old comics at some point in time, but I'd love to be able to read them all again, including the extra story adventures of Shinobi and various others. PS: Megadroid rules.

Animorphs
Looooved the Animorphs, it was my 'young adult' series of choice. Ax's goofy misunderstandings, Rachel's sheer badassness, Cassie and Jake's relationship, Marco's struggling family issues, Tobias' everything. Absolutely loved the books and the universe it created, and it taught me some fun facts about animals along the way too.

Asterix
This became a running joke for the other primary school kids at my expense, as I'd always check Asterix out of the library, but I loved it. Probably the earliest comic I regularly read, I absolutely loved Obelix, and to this day insist that vertical stripes are slimming in his honour.

[I Don't Mind]

TV

Power Rangers

Dragon Ball Z

Spider-Man The Animated Series

Movies

Teenage Mutan Ninja Turtles 2: Secret of the Ooze

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes

[Skummy]

Sonic The Comic! <3

That was one of my absolute loves. It did such an incredible job of fleshing out a very silly game world into something really quite fascinating and in-depth. It also had a ludicrously trippy Ecco The Dolphin mini-comic, an utterly bonkers Decap Attack strip which seemed to go on forever just to amuse whoever was writing it, and it once featured a Streets Of Rage comic I've wanted to track down for years for a single page of the characters trapped on top of their van surrounded by bad guys. That image stuck with me.

Asterix, as well, I adore. I was, and am, a comic book nerd - not necessarily in the sense of knowing the backstories of every superhero imaginable, but in the sense of always wanting to find out more about the history of comics themselves, and I'd say a lot of that stems from boyhood love of Asterix. I read every single one, countless times, and once upon a time could have told you the names of almost every character, even when half the time I probably didn't get any of the jokes.

Comic obsession grew to the Beano, too. I used to get that every week - my grandparents would buy it for me, and I'd get it from them when I went to visit on Sundays. My Gran knitted me a Dennis The Menace jumper, and my Mum gave me all of my older brothers' old Beano, Dandy, Topper and Whizzer & Chips annuals one week when I was off school sick, so I had this collection of comic annuals dating back to the early '80s which I just adored.

Sticking with comics, soon after that came Marvel Comics and 2000AD; I swear by 2000AD as a formative influence in my tastes in general, but Marvel was probably a bigger obsession at the time because they had cartoons. I adored the Spider-Man and X-Men animated series, and I only last year re-watched all of X-Men and, while it wasn't as intelligent as I'd remembered it, it was still a ludicrous amount of fun. As much as I've grown disenchanted with a lot of things superhero, I'll always have a soft spot for '90s X-Men.

TV shows....Animals Of Farthing Wood. The greatest kids' TV show ever made. I used to watch a hell of a lot of TV, though, and wasn't all that picky.

I struggle with movies...I can't really remember having any favourite childhood movies that I'd watch over and over again, because I was never really allowed control of the TV enough to get that privilege! And, to me, to still be a beloved childhood movie it would have to be something I could watch now and not look at it with much of a critical eye, and there's not a lot I can say that about...probably Jumanji is the only thing jumping out at me that fits the bill.

Books would be an easier one...there's book I still own, The Encylopedia Of Myths & Legends Of All Nations, which I took out of my primary school library so often, having been the first person to do so since the late '70s, that when I left the school they gave it to me. It's a very odd 1950s thing, with some nations glossed over in a couple of pages - I think "Myths & Legends Of The Japanese" made it to two and a half - while others are detailed obsessively, with Ancient Greece in particular taking up the bulk of the book, and detailing each myth in obsessive detail, but without a single bit of insight or descriptive flair, just a lot of "Heracles did this and then this and then this", which - reading it back a couple of months ago - felt very strange indeed. But as a young kid I was utterly obsessed with mythology, particularly ancient Greek and Hindu myth, so this book was like a source of all knowledge to me. I think I can trace my love of all things ancient and esoteric largely to this book.

The Discworld series is my next one. A very good friend of mine, who adores fantasy novels, recently said to me that she can't stand Terry Pratchett, and I found it very difficult not to get angry...because as much as I doubt I could ever read anything of his now, I doubt there's been a more important literary figure in my life. I read Discworld shortly after reading The Hobbit, and I know which one I preferred. It was a world I absolutely adored, and a writing style that opened my eyes to countless other possibilities...it was the first series of books that I felt wasn't talking down to me like most kids' books were, and wasn't a little out of my grasp like the adult books I was reading at the time, it felt like it was for me. And I had friends who read them, who I could talk to obsessively about them. I had a signed copy of the Discworld Companion, in which Pratchett wrote "In your heart you know it's real", which remains one of my prized possessions, no matter how battered and dog-eared it got.

My first usage of the internet was at my Dad's work - Hull College - during which I looked up cheats for Theme Hospital, and subscribed to the Discworld newsletter, which was a raw text file every month that my Dad would print out for me at work to read later, and was probably 20 something pages. Through Pratchett's writing I discovered Douglas Adams, I discovered Neil Gaiman, and so on and so on. He's where it all started, for me.

[Benji]

Oh shit, I forgot that Decap Attack strip, that was amazing.

Animals of Farthing Wood remains the greatest trauma of my childhood. The hedgehogs Moley and Badger were one of my favourite childhood duos too.

Also, speaking of encyclopaedia type things - I had some Wheat-a-bix books of facts that I obsessively re-read cover to cover.

[EddieG]

Pokemon, Paddington Bear and Thomas the Tank Engine.

Why, yes, I'm extremely excited about the movie.

[Skummy]

Yes! I had the Weetabix Book Of Facts, and the Weetabix World Atlas! My brother - who is now an archivist/historian - used to be so obsessed with that sort of thing, and you couldn't go wrong with facts and raw data. He always needed to know every flag of every country, what the biggest lake was, how tall the tallest man was, and so on, so we always got the new Guinness Book Of Records every year, and got those Weetabix books in there too.

I'd probably find Animals Of Farthing Wood sadder to watch now than I did then - I never used to cry at stuff as a kid, nowadays I'm liable to cry at least once watching Animal Planet. I'm an emotional sod. Back then, it was sad, sure, but I lived in a farming community and that was how things went, I didn't really think too hard on animals getting killed in shows like that, because it was something I was reasonably used to.

[EddieG]

Oh, adding to my list, for books I loved this series called Snelle Jelle which nobody but Lars and maybe Jasonmufc will get as the title would suggest, it's Dutch.

[Asuka's Gonna Kill You]

TV

Goosebumps

Kenan & Kel

Dastardly & Muttley

Movie

Stop Or My Mom Will Shoot

Just Ask For Diamond

Scooby Doo Meets The Boo Brothers

[Skummy]

Oh, Goosebumps has reminded me, Choose Your Own Adventure books, especially the Jackson/Livingstone Fighting Fantasy series. Those were my childhood.

[9 to 5]

Oh, Goosebumps has reminded me, Choose Your Own Adventure books, especially the Jackson/Livingstone Fighting Fantasy series. Those were my childhood.

House of Hell was my favourite. You knew you were fucked when you ended up in the kitchen.

[Benjamin]

Too many. There's definitely too many. Off the top of my head there's Pokemon, Power Rangers, Goosebumps, everything Disney, Archie Comics, Enid Blyton, Noddy, Transformers, all the Spider-Man and X-Men cartoons, Digimon, Thundercats, Duck Tales. Okay ill stop there.

[lanky316]

Animals of Farthing Wood was my first case of nerd rage. I remember my disgust at realising Weasel (amongst others) had a sex change but that didn't last long, I soon got over it and learnt to enjoy it for what it was. A lesson I think a lot of people could still do with learning. Easily the best thing to ever come out of Eurovision (EBU, anyway)! Had the audiobook on tape too which was on a near 24 hour loop for a while and my old comics/magazine collection is still on the book shelf at my parents.

I loved all the "that really looks fun!" game shows we used to have loads of. Knightmare, Crystal Maze, Finders Keepers and Fun House for example. Watching the latter two now though I realise we were basically just watching other kids have fun but that was enough. The other two though are still great, keep meaning to book that Crystal Maze style thing in London (Liverpool Street? Can't remember - found it, just round the corner from Euston by the looks of it) and can't believe they never tried out Knightmare with modern technology, or even throwing in the sci-fi version they were apparently working on.

Edited November 11, 2014 by lanky316

[9 to 5]

The thing about Fun House that even as a kid I thought was shitty, was how often the go-karts broke down.

[Gazz]

Oh, Goosebumps has reminded me, Choose Your Own Adventure books, especially the Jackson/Livingstone Fighting Fantasy series. Those were my childhood.

I swear sometimes you're my long lost twin.

They've actually started releasing digital versions of the books as Android apps. I've got about 20 of the original books somewhere too, I really should get around to collecting the whole set at some point.

[Monkey D. Lars]

Beloved Childhood series:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Bv8PqYUjPg

Especially this one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf1cDtNBV_A

Also!

I also enjoyed: Spiderman - The animated series, Batman - The animated series, Batman Beyond, X-Men, Ducktales, Rescue Rangers, Eek! the Cat!, the Tick, Darkwing Duck, Power Rangers, Beetleborgs, Pokémon, Johnny Bravo, I Am Weasel, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Dennis the Menace, Bobby's World and Dragonball Z!

This also just made me realise that TV for kids nowadays really sucks!

Having just rewatched Spiderman the Animated Series. I might start with TMNT next.

[lanky316]

A few of the Fighting Fantasy books are on the iPhone/Pad as well, got a few of them as part of a good offer but ended up deleting them due to space. Nice and easy, good art work with the dice rolling automated. Going to redownload them I think...

There were loads of clones as well, vaguely remember having a Sonic the Hedgehog one and a couple of football career ones. Ended one career after three pages. Given a choice of trials with Arsenal or showing support for my school team chose to represent my school rather than play for THEM. A broken leg from a tough tackle and game over Still, better than playing for Arsenal...

[TheWho87]

I could be here all day listing the shows I loves to watch but I still own two of the three VHS tapes I would pretty much over play, the two I still own are M.A.S.K. and Dino-Riders which had a couple episodes of each and I remember watching them on a near constant loop, the other one that I cannt find anymore I remember had Denver the Last Dinosaur as well as a couple of other episodes of other shows of which I can only remember something about making pancakes in a library. I do also remember renting Popeye and Son and Deputy Dawg alot from the local video store.

Another show I havent seen represented here is Maid Marian and Her Merry Men, I loved that show and looking back on it today it is still great, a kids version of Blackadder based on Robin Hood.

Dino-Riders might have gone under the radar but the first episode is just awesome even with that A-ha inspired intro

[EddieG]

Beloved Childhood series:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Bv8PqYUjPg

Especially this one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf1cDtNBV_A

Also!

I also enjoyed: Spiderman - The animated series, Batman - The animated series, Batman Beyond, X-Men, Ducktales, Rescue Rangers, Eek! the Cat!, the Tick, Darkwing Duck, Power Rangers, Beetleborgs, Pokémon, Johnny Bravo, I Am Weasel, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Dennis the Menace, Bobby's World and Dragonball Z!

This also just made me realise that TV for kids nowadays really sucks!

Having just rewatched Spiderman the Animated Series. I might start with TMNT next.

I was too old to get really obsessed, but I did watch Shin Chan when I lived in Spain.

Oh, another one that probably only you and Jason will get, Samson & Gert!

[Maxx]

Everything I've blogged about, podcaster about or shown on TGIF nights, minus nekkid gramma

[SpanishMen]

TV

Dragon Ball Z

Doraemon

Ranma 1/2

Beakman's World

Yu Yu Hakusho

Lucky Luke

Ninja Hattori

Fly (Dragon Quest)

Dr. Slump

Detective Conan

Detective Gadget

The Smurfs

Captain Harlock

Slam Dunk

The Addams Family

Kinnikuman (Muscleman)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Captain Tsubasa

The Adventures of Tintin

Garfield and friends

Pingu

Movies

Back to the Future Trilogy

Toy Story

The Brave Little Toaster

Jurassic Park