Disney Sequels Gone Bad

From the beginning, Walt Disney Studios has made amazing animated feature films from its first full length feature film, Snow White to The Lion King and more recently The Princess and the Frog. The films that have come out in theaters do well, but what about the ones that have gone straight to home video?

From what I've seen, every time Disney makes a sequel, it is never as good as the original film.

The only well known sequel films that were actually launched in theaters were The Rescuers Down Under and Fantasia 2000.

In 1994, the first Disney sequel on direct home video was Return of Jafar from the classic film, Aladdin. The film mostly focuses on the parrot, Iago, having a change of heart. It would have been better if the writers had come up with a better storyline.

Disney came out with a third chapter of Aladdin called Aladdin and the King of Thieves, which was loosely based on Alibaba and the Forty Thieves. This was followed by Pooh's Grand Adventure: The Search for Christopher Robin which has a plot very similar to The Hobbit.

Afterwards a bunch of Disney sequels came out that were huge disappointments.

Source of image from: ibtesama.com

Two sequels that should have been released right to VHS but instead opened in theaters were: Peter Pan: Return to Never Land and The Jungle Book 2. Both films were not well received by fans and did terribly in the box office.

Source of image from: Don't Push Me!!!

The only sequels that weren't total flunkers were The Lion King II: Simba's Pride and Cinderella 3: A Twist in Time.

What film will be next to bring forth shame? A sequel to Dumbo? Alice in Wonderland? Pinocchio?

Thanks to John Lasseter, the DisneyToon Studio has canceled doing any more sequels and will instead focus on making spin-offs of some original films. Hopefully, Disney fans will not have to suffer watching more poorly written animated movies.


All other Disney poster images are from : movieberry.com

All films belong to Walt Disney Studio.

Pokemon vs Digimon

The Biggest trends in the late 90's was all about monster pets. Pokemon was the most ingenious marketing device that made kids obsess over the idea of catching and taming monsters in small prisons (Pokeballs). Because of this great hit, other series tried to replicate this concept with different characters such as those in Monster Ranchers and Beyblade.

One series that was on an equal plain with Pokemon was Digimon. Besides the names having the "mon" at the end, what is the difference between these two franchises?

Pokemon focuses on one boy named Ash, who travels with an electric mouse named Pikachu. Together, they catch and train Pokemon in order to collect gym badges.

Digimon revolves around seven kids, partnered with their own digital monster.

Most of the Pokemon have one or two stages of evolving; for example Squirtle can evolve into Wartortle which can turn into Blastoise.

Digimon, on the other hand were not limited when "Digivolving". They could evolve into any level in order of rank; for example they could go from In-Training to Rookie to Champion to Ultimate and finally the highest rank, Mega.

Both series had different kinds of antagonists. The villains in Pokemon, Team Rocket, were thieves who constantly stalked Ash in order to steal Pikachu.

The bad guys in Digimon were actually more threatening and challenging to fight. Myotismon, a vampire Digimon, actually wanted to rule both the digital and human realms.

You might be wondering why Pokemon is a more recognized name than Digimon?

When the first season of each series came to and end, Pokemon and Digimon had different ideas about adding new seasons.



Digimon continued for only three more seasons. In each of the three, there is a new set of kids with new monsters. The "goggle-headed" leader is always replaced by a new one, meaning the seasons are not chronological and independent in their own right. Digimon's idea to replace the original characters from seasons kept the series from having the popularity that it could have had.

Pokemon kept its main characters. Every time Ash's journey came to an end he would always lose in the finals that took place in a stadium arena. Then he would give his captured Pokemon away, keeping only Pikachu. Ash would then start a new adventure in yet another country. Pokemon's continuously ended each season in the same way causing the series to become dull and eventually lose its popularity.

All Pokemon images belong to Bulbapedia and all Digimon images are from Digimon Wiki.

Pokemon belongs to Nintendo and Digimon belongs to Bandi.

Only Toonami

Source of image from: Tom

Remember when you were young and came home from school and wanted something to watch on TV to past the time? I remember there was one television block on Cartoon Network that broadcast the coolest action cartoons on the planet. The channel block was Toonami.

Source of image from: Gamespot

Toonami first premiered in 1997. Its original host was Moltar, a villain from the Space Ghost cartoon.

Source of image from: New Nostalgia

From the beginning, retro action shows like Voltron, The Superfriends and ThunderCats aired during this television block.

Source of image from: Game Bomb

It was not until later that Toonami started airing Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z which increased Toonami's popularity.

Source of image from: Gamespot

In the new year of 2000, TOM, a little robot, took over for Moltar as a permanent host.

Source of image from: Toonami Fan

TOM hosted Toonami from a futuristic spaceship along with a female computer named SARA.

Source of image from: starpulse.com

Dragon Ball Z became its number one hit anime.

Source of image from: Yu Yu Hakusho Legendado

Because of this , Toonami started airing more anime features such as Gundam Wing, YuYu Hakusho, and Rurouni Kenshin.


Source of image from: Maniacal Laughter

The only non-anime cartoons that aired on Toonami were the shows: ReBoot, Superman: TAS, Samurai Jack and Batman Beyond.


Source of image from: Gamespot

TOM has had three different make overs in his time as Toonami's host. In one episode, TOM "died" during an adventure while hosting, and SARA managed to save TOM by rebuilding him and giving him a dark and slicker robot shell.

Source of image from: Photobucket

By 2004, Toonami moved to broadcasting on Saturday nights. TOM received another upgrade making him slightly taller and buffer.

Source of image from: Photobucket

As for SARA, her makeover made her look more feminine and anime-ish.

Source of image from: The Nerd Rage Report

New listings of action packed shows such as Teen Titans, Megas XLR and Justice League began to air.

Toonami was doing well in 2005, but it started to have a hard time finding good anime shows that were suitable for younger viewers.

Source of image from: Photobucket

Things got worse when TOM received another redesign. TOM's new look was too childish and his face looked like something out of Thomas the Tank Engine!

SARA was then replaced with two scene-hogging robots that are hardly worth mentioning.

Source of image from: Naruto Spoilers

At this point, Naruto was the only show that kept Toonami on the air.

Source of image from: Photobucket

By 2008, Toonami came to an end. Despite the fact that it was erased from television broadcasting, it will still be fondly remembered as the 2 to 4 hour block that entertained us with some awesome action packed shows.

Here are links to videos of Toonami from YouTube:

First Toonami Intro

Introduction of TOM

TOM 2 Intro

Toonami Finale

Toonami belongs to Cartoon Network. Other shows that aired on Toonami belong to their rightful owners.

The Universe's Chew Toy

Growing up in Massachusetts, my favorite childhood CGI cartoon was Beast Wars: Transformers. One of my favorite robots from the whole series is Waspinator.

As you can tell from the name, he's capable of transforming from a giant wasp into an android.

He is a Predacon soldier who works for the main villain, Megatron.

Originally, Waspinator was supposed to be killed off when they were making season two, but thanks to the support of his fans, the writers convinced Hasbro to keep him, knocking off two other characters instead.

What makes Waspinator so charming, yet pathetic is how he can be practically destroyed in battle but somehow manages to stay alive.



Source of image from: fastcharacters.com

In hindsight, he's a lot like Kenny from South Park.



He also has an interesting speech pattern like Gollum (Lord of the Rings) and Stitch (Lilo & Stitch).

When the series came to an end, Waspinator was sick of being swatted countless times and quit serving Megatron. After the war ended, Waspinator was left behind on prehistoric earth, becoming a deity to the primitive human race.

One would think by then he'd found eternal happiness, but this was not the case.

The humans grew annoyed with Waspinator and forced him to leave their planet, sending him back to Cybertron.

After arriving on his home planet, he was abducted by Megatron and turned into the brooding Vehicon general, Thrust. As Thrust, instead of transforming into a bug, he turned into a futuristic motorcycle. However, Thrust was more loyal to his former leader than Waspinator had been and he was more cool-headed and not afraid to speak out.

In the final conclusion of the series, Waspinator had returned, only this time reformatted as a puny little insect with the head of Thrust.

Waspinator: "Why universe hate, Waspinator?"


Here are links that show a collection of the times Waspinator got scrapped in each season.

Season 1

Season 2

Season 3

Source of Waspinator/Thrust images from: Transformers Wiki

Waspinator belongs to both Hasbro and Mainframe Entertainment.

Kenny McCormick belongs to Tery Parker and Matt Stone.

Out with the Old, In with the New

Batman: The Animated Series in my opinion, is the greatest out of any other Batman Cartoon spin off. I've noted though that as the series continued on as The New Batman Adventures, the designs of the characters were altered.

Poison Ivy used to look slightly like Jessica Rabbit. Now she looks more like an elf with pale green skin.

The Penguin's body used to be deformed, giving him bird-like qualities. His new design makes him look more human and less hunched.

The Mad Hatter's age changed from middle-aged to elderly. His facial features and height were altered giving him a more rat-like look.

The Riddler had red-hair and wore a green suit with a purple mask over his eyes. In his new look (which I think is worse) he has a slender body and wears a jumpsuit, which adds a dash of boldness.

The Ventriloquist lost his hair and got new glasses and eyes. His boss, Scarface, became more square-like.

Both Two-Face and Bruce Wayne's design weren't changed too much, but for some reason it hurst my eyes seeing them in a different art style.

From what I've seen, the only two characters in the series that had their designs edited more than twice are the Scarecrow and the Joker.

The Scarecrow didn't look really scary at all when he first appeared. Even when they edited his mask with hair and added pupils, he still didn't look terrifying enough. Now in The New Batman Adventures, Scarecrow went from looking like the one in The Wizard of Oz to now the Chainsaw Massacre.

As for the Joker, he originally looked more similar to the comic book version, but then was given a pointier chin and edges. The only slight problem with his makeover was that his eyes looked too beady-like and he's missing his zany lipstick. This change was corrected in Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker where his features from both designs were rolled together into one package. The result was perfect.

Source of all images above from: The World's Finest.

Batman belongs to Warner Bros./DC Comics.