Thundarr the Barbarian Comc Book

 It's still pretty early in the year but I think I can safely say Thundarr the Barbarian from Dynamite is my most anticipated comic of the year!

 

As far as Saturday morning cartoons go, Thundarr is at the top of my list and was likely a factor in my picking up the D&D Basic rule set at that age. If, for some reason, Thundarr isn't known to you, check out the show's intro. A post-apocalyptic world combining sci-fi and fanatasy? Doesn't get much better than that! 

 

 

 Like many comics these days, Thundarr has multiple cover variants. The above one is my favorite since Jack Kirby himself worked on the show's production design including most of the villains, which are all memorable in their own way. Not only is in done in a very Kirdy-esque style but there's a not so subtle Kirby tribute on the cover.

 

 The comic hooked me from the first few pages. Obviously, I'm an easy mark but even in the opening scene, they bring back a few of the bad guys Thundarr crossed paths with in the show. Being an 80s Saturday morning show, Thundarr was pretty episodic and usually dealt with a new threat each week. To see some of them pop up from the get go, told me these folks are really paying attention to the source.

 

 If you watched the intro, you might recognize the guy on the left that appears for maybe 2 seconds. 

 

The comic tells two stories simultaneously: The main story takes place in the present of 3994 and has Thundarr going under cover to break up a human trafficking/slavery ring. The other story is told through flashback and follows Thundarr's life as a gladiator slave leading up to him meeting Ookla and Ariel.

 

 Despite how much I was looking forward to this, the first issue snuck by me and I only found the second issue just released a few weeks ago. This issue spends a little more time in the flashback, you get to see how Ariel ties into things, and Thundarr faces his toughest arena fight yet: Ookla the Mok!

 

Meanwhile, in the present day, the gang confront the Council of Wizards who are involved in the human slave trade. In classic comic tradition, these wizards have all been bested by Thundarr over the show's run and are now gathered together to bring him down! One of them activates a time portal and sends our heroes back to 1994 just moments before the runaway planet passes between the Earth and the moon, kick starting the global apocalypse from the intro!

 

 

Another thing I love about the series so far is they perfectly capture the characters, including Ariel's commentary on Thundarr's recklessness.

 If you're a fan of sci-fi/fantasy that's just being introduced to Thundarr from this post, you'd probably enjoy the comic. But if you're someone that's been craving more Thundarr adventures since the 80s, I think you'll absolutely love this and find it a worthy successor to the show.

 

Halloween Videos

  

Sometimes you just need a filler post as it gets near the end of the month.

 

 

The Ill Advised Records Retro Halloween Video Special clocks in at almost 4.5 hours. It's quite the compilation of animation, local and national commercials, and television clips. I haven't watched the whole thing but what I have skimmed through, it's a blast!

 

Ultra Halloween VHS is more compilation gold featuring Halloween themed episodes of Simpsons Treehouse of Horror, Raggedy Ann & Andy, Bobby's World, and more. It also includes the live action The Halloween That Almost Wasn't starring Judd Hirsch as Dracula. Between each show are vintage Halloween commercials.

 

 

 

 And just in case you've made it to this point in your life without seeing the Paul Lynde Halloween Special, here you go! If you weren't around in the 70s, I can't overstate who prevalent the variety show/special was on TV.

 

 

Lastly, here's the Bugs Bunny Howl-o-ween Special from 1978. If you grew up with Loony Tunes, this will no doubt bring back some good memories.

 

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The Addams Family Board Game (1974)

Ten years after the last Addams Family games came out, Milton Bradley returned to Cemetery Lane for more fun with the frightful family. But this release was based on the short-lived 1973 animated series, which is available on the Internet Archive!

 

Disclaimer: None of the photos in this post are mine. They were sourced from around the internet including BoardgameGeek.com and the And Everything Else Too blog.

  

From the instruction panel:

This weird family does everything different than most folks and this game follow that concept. The object of this game is to lose, not win, for if you win you lose and it's fun either way.

  

The game is a straightforward spin and move with the exception that you don't want to be the first to the end. If you are, you lose!

 

There are a few spaces on the board with instructions that can help or hinder you. If you're "lucky" you might slip on some rocks back to Start, fall down a waterfall, or have Thing lend a hand (sorry, not sorry) to a shortcut back to the beginning. If you land on another player, you get to move them ahead three spaces. 

 

The player movers that come with the game are the average colored pawns like you'd find in Sorry. It was probably cost prohibitive but it'd be fun to have cardboard standees of the family members.  

 

 The 1964 Ideal game had art based on the TV versions of the family. Since the animated series drew (again, not sorry) inspiration from the original Addams comics, that's what we get here along with their animal companions Ali the alligator, Ocho the octopus and Mr. V the vulture. 

 

Fun fact: a 10 year old Jodie Foster supplied the voice for Pugsley in this series!

 

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Comic Review - Space Ghost/Jonny Quest: Space Quest #1 (2025)

Worlds, and galaxies, collide in this crossover event featuring two of the biggest (at least in my book) Hanna-Barbera names in action.

 

 Just about a year ago, I posted about Dynamite bringing Space Ghost back and earlier this year, they also kicked off a Jonny Quest series. This crossover event takes places after JQ #5 which has Team Quest venturing briefly into the future from their 1965 home time.

 

This isn't the first time they've crossed paths in comics but it is the first time in this Dynamite continuity. Back in 2016, DC had the ambitious 12 issue Future Quest that also included the Herculoids, Birdman, Mightor and other heroes.

 

In this story, an alien craft has crash landed and the military turns to Dr. Quest for assistance. Of course, they've stripped it for parts but there's one piece of tech they can't figure out on their own. Dr. Quest just happens to have something that will charge it up but is hesitant to help before fully understanding it. Plus, the General running the place is kind of a jerk. My money's on him being an alien in disguise.

 

 Boys being boys, Jonny, Hadji, and Bandit can't help but get into trouble and juice the alien tech while everyone is asleep. Only they're shocked to find themselves teleported and face to face with Space Ghost! In their place, the equally bewildered trio of Jan, Jace, and Blip arrive.

 

 The art in the book is great. It may not look like the cartoon, but it definitely captures the feel of 60s science-action. You don't need to have read the Jonny Quest series to understand what's going on. There's enough exposition to get you caught up. With this being the first issue, it feels like they're just lighting the fuse on something that's sure to blow-up into something bigger as it goes.

Hasbro Dungeons & Dragons - Venger & DungeonMaster

 Finally getting around to wrapping up wave 1 of Hasbro's Dungeons & Dragons animated figures and we've got the biggest for last: Venger and DungeonMaster.

Two figures for double the cost, how can you go wrong? If you're lucky, you might be able to find them at 50% at Target. I learned my lesson with pre-ordering all these figures. I could have easily gotten the entire wave at clearance price so no pre-ordering wave 2.

DM is a solid figure and I mean that quite literally! He has no legs and his torso just kind of goes all the way down to his feet, which are also melded into the body. No issues with the shoulder or wrist joints which are the only articulation. He's a cool little figure that I'd keep on my desk at work if that was an acceptable thing to do. Now I feel like I need to get a Black Series Yoda so they can hang out together.

 

Hasbro Dungeons & Dragons - Hank

 I was going to hold off on the next D&D figure installment but since the second wave just went up for pre-order (affiliate link) I figured it would be a good time to post.

Hank the Ranger is my second favorite kid in the series. Not so much because he's the leader but because he's got the coolest weapon, a bow that shoots endless energy arrows!

 

For those of you that haven't yet experienced the new windowless boxes, here's how the figures and accessories are packed.

 

Hasbro Dungeons & Dragons Figure - Bobby & Uni

 Come, traveler, let us return to the realm of Dungeons & Dragons to meet a boy and his dog...uh, unicorn.

Today we're joined by Bobby the Barbarian and his unicorn friend/pet Uni. Good job with the naming there, kid.

Again, loving the external package design even if the contents are wrapped in thin paper with nothing really to keep them from getting tossed around inside. Remember last time when I said how much I liked the way they were making a larger image with the box sides? Well, someone fell asleep on that.

Where is the top of Hank's bow or Diana's right foot?? I swear this line just gets more disappointing the further down the rabbit hole I go. I can't overstate how much I want to truly love this line but keep feel like I'm getting kicked in the teeth. Oh well, let's see what's in the box.

Hasbro Dungeons & Dragons Figure - Diana

 Well, it took almost 40 years but we are finally getting action figures based on the 80s Dungeons & Dragons cartoon! As soon as it was announced, I knew I was going to go all in on the line...even if I have no idea where I'm going to display them.

We're starting it off with the group's most agile member, Diana the Acrobat. By the way, if you're not familiar with this cartoon, you may at least want to watch the intro to get an idea about the series and characters.

Now, Acrobat itself wasn't really a class in D&D and I always thought it was an odd thing to be when you have Fighters, Thieves, Magic-Users, etc. Earlier the same year the show debuted, the class Thief-Acrobat was introduced in Dragon magazine. I'm guessing having a character be even part Thief was frowned on for a kids cartoon so they went with Acrobat.

This is my first purchase with the plastic-free packaging and I have to say, I like the look of it! The box art is fantastic. I understand some people's gripes with it and I think it's definitely going to lead to an increase of scumbags buying them, tossing some other figure in, and returning it. One thing I'm not a fan of is the figure and accessories are just wrapped in a thin paper and not held down inside the box. It feels really cheap.

Headless Horseman Cartoon (1934)

 Washington Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow has been around for over 200 years and while almost everyone is somewhat familiar with the story, they also probably imagine the incarnation from Disney's 1949 The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad with his flaming pumpkin head. 

 

 

But this was not the first animated appearance of the infamous ghost. In 1934, Ub Iwerks created an animated short film called The Headless Horseman. Iwerks also worked on the Disney shorts The Skeleton Dance and The Haunted House. If you're a fan of classic animation, you'll definitely get a kick out of this.

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Archie's Weird Mysteries - Halloween of Horror

Archie's Weird Mysteries was an animated series that ran for 40 episodes between 1999-2000. It was distributed in the US by DIC Entertainment and first aired on the PAX network. Remember the PAX network? Yeah, I don't blame you.

The series focused on the Riverdale teens encountering all sorts of strange stuff like zombies, ghosts, and even UFOs after a lab accident goes wrong and turns the town into a weirdness magnet! It also spawned a tie-in comic series in 2000 that ran for 34 issues, although it eventually dropped the "Weird" and switched to mundane mysteries.

 

 

Among the 40 episodes were a few multi-part story arcs including a 3-parter called Vampire Night where the climax takes place at a Halloween Party!

Thundarr the Barbarian Funko Pops

 Shortly after Funko started cranking out Pop figures, I had my heart set on ones based on my favorite Saturday morning cartoon, Thundarr the Barbarian. While I kept it in mind that they may never happen, over the years I figured they'd start running out of things people were nostalgic for and eventually they would come and they finally have...sort of.

 

 Back in February, Funko announced all the exclusives for their Spring 2021 VirtualCon and among them were these three I had been waiting on for years. Yes, my most wanted Pops were coming but they were going to be an online exclusive. In the span of a few seconds I went from elation to presuming I'd never actually see these at a decent price.

A couple weeks later, I saw something about being able to register ahead of time to order the figures. The only catch was you had to have been signed up two weeks before I found this info. Like Thundarr, I was going to fight on ignoring any obstacles in my way!

Monthly Movie Recap - December 2019

Happy second day of the New Year!

I decided to give everyone a recovery day before posting the December recap.

Streaming

The Mandalorian (Disney+) - What a season finale! I cannot wait to see where the next season will take us. Fans will be going broke soon as the all the merch is starting to go up for pre-order.

The Witcher (Netflix) - Only about half way in but I am loving it so far. It's been quite awhile since I've played a Witcher game but this feels just right.

The Big Screen

Frozen 2 (2019)
I enjoyed the first one quite a bit so I was definitely up for a sequel. What I didn't expect was that a few minutes into the new movie, I was actually happy and excited to be back with these characters again. I really like how they used local folklore and mythology for the fantasy elements. I don't think it had as great of a soundtrack as the first movie but the one song Kristoff does solo that looks like it came out of an 80s power ballad video is pure gold. And I think he may have become my favorite character in this series.

Rating: 8/10

Batman vs TMNT (2019)

It sounds like a no-brainer, right? After reading the rad Batman/TMNT crossover comic series I thought this would be worth a watch. I had high hopes going in as it seemed to start out with a Batman:TAS vibe and then some horribly drawn turtles showed up and the plot degenerated into something silly that I'd expect from the original TMNT cartoon. When you make my boy Donatello look like a dude in a green morph suit, you lose me.

Rating: 6/10

Holiday Hell (2019, Amazon Prime)

You take the good, you take the bad, you take em both and there you have your average horror anthology. Jeffrey Combs chews up the scenery like the genre pro he is as the owner of an oddities shop where every item has a story. If you can get past the horrible dialog and acting of the first tale, the rest can be entertaining. "The Hand That Rocks the Dreidel" is a bite sized Puppet Master story so it wins the movie for me.

Rating: 5/10

Star Wars The Rise of Skywalker (2019)
With every new trilogy movie, I need to see it at least twice to formulate a decent opinion and this one is no exception. There's a lot I liked and there's some things that came off as dumb, like(event A happens because we need B next or things happen that end up having no real impact. It's Star Wars, it's a space fantasy and I shouldn't care about "logic" but like the slo-mo chase in The Last Jedi, there are some things I have a problem wrapping my brain around. These feelings generally subside on multiple viewings, listening to podcast reviews, and reading a visual dictionary. We'll see where I'm at after another viewing.

Rating: 6/10

Klaus (2019, Netflix)

I have Mrs Dex to thank for this one, I probably would not have picked it otherwise. It turned out to be a great re-imaging of how Santa came to be from the man that brought you Despicable Me. The animation is fantastic and the story is cute.

Rating: 7/10

 

Doom: Annihilation (2019, Netflix)
Talk about going out with a whimper. This sequel no one asked for is probably the least entertaining movie I watched all year. Sure, it has things from the game like a chainsaw and BFG but it's also got demons that are clearly people in rubber suits and a cast with less charisma than a box of rocks.

Rating: 2/10

Month

New: 6  Rewatch: 0

Year to Date

New: 75  Rewatch: 3

Here are all the movies I watched in 2019. I stole the idea from Bob Johns at It Came from the Man Cave, go check out his Best of 2019 post! You can get a better look at the movies on my Letterboxd page.

Scooby-Doo - Shaggy & Headless Horseman Figures

Quick programming note: Yes, I know it's Wednesday. No, this is not an Addams Family post. It's pretty much the Wild West from here on out!

A couple or three years ago, Character Ltd released two series of Scooby-Doo figure two packs. Each pack had one of the Scooby gang and one of their villains. At the time, I passed on the Scooby/Headless Horseman pack and have been kicking myself ever since because now it's "hard to find" aka pricey.

Thankfully, Walmart recently released figure repacks for Scooby's 50th Birthday.

For around $6 you get two figures. Obviously they're not amazing quality but for the price, I think they're pretty great. They've got more articulation than I'd expect for "cheap" figures.

My biggest "problem" with Shaggy is that he's got a mouth but they didn't color it in. So he looks a little weird from a distance. I mean if you're going to put the beard lines on his face, would it kill you to color in the mouth?

Note to self: next time get matte finish backdrops not glossy

Ol' Headless has the same points of articulation as Shaggy but his cape (I guess it's a cape?) gets in the way of his full range of movement. At first glance, it looks removable but has a large peg fixing it to his back.

His hands are oddly positioned so that if his arms are anywhere except by his sides he looks like he's doing the robot. His head may not come off but at least he knows how to party!

These should still be available in your local Walmart and for the price they'd make a great Halloween gift for Scooby fans of any age. The girls have been hard to find in my area but Velma has Frankenstein's Monster and Daphne comes with Wolfman, for you classic monster fans.

If you check out the other Countdown to Halloween bloggers by clicking below, a ghost may follow you home!

Book Report - The Scooby-Doo Encyclopedia

Need something to pass the time on your next road trip to a spooky castle?

The Scooby-Doo Encyclopedia was released just last year and thanks to Reis O'Brien on Instagram, I know it exists! I also pretty much inst-ordered it after seeing his post. This book is packed with all kinds of Scooby-riffic stuff!

Let me start by saying I wouldn't call this an Encyclopedia. If you were to flip through it in the store, you'd see it's really more of a character guide. I know Scooby-Doo Character Guide doesn't quite roll off the tongue. Maybe Scooby-Doo Case Files? Do kids even know what an encyclopedia is?

It's broken down into several sections. Each of the gang and the Mystery Machine get their own entries. Then there's a few pages on family (including a Doo family tree!) and some notable friends/guest stars.

Then it gets into the really good stuff: the villains! The cover claims to contain every bad guy from the classic series. I'm no Scooby-phile so I can't verify that, but considering each of the 93 pages has multiple entries, I'm going to take their word for it.

Every once in awhile, one of the gang will pop up in a bubble to provide a tidbit related to the entry. Shaggy tells jokes, Velma provides case breaking clues, Daphne give facts, Fred talks about the location, and Scooby naturally talks about snacks.

For better or worse, the book also includes The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo. On one hand, you have Scarppy-Doo but on the other you have Vincent Van Ghoul who was voiced by Vincent Price. I can tolerate a lot of Scrappy-Doo if Vincent Price is involved!

If I had to nitpick the book, my one quibble (how often do you get to use that word?) with it would be that it doesn't give any reference to the episode in which the baddie appears. Yes, I know we live in the internet age and there's probably a Scooby-Doo Wiki that can get me the info but it would have been nice to have that info in the book.

That very minor thing aside, this is a really fun book for Scooby fans of all ages. While flipping through it I found plenty of classic favorite villains as well as quite a few that I didn't recognize, which is why I'd like it to have episode information. The last page even has a recipe for Scooby snacks!

You can pick up the Scooby-Doo Encyclopedia on Amazon for just $7!
Like, zoinks, that's totally worth it!

Quarter Bin - Battle of the Planets

Battle of the Planets will always be one of my favorite cartoons. It was my first real intro to Japanese animation and was one of the shows in rotation that my friends and I would use for inspiration when playing out our own adventures. I remember making our own wristbands and sonic boomerangs out of cardboard.

The arrival of Battle of the Planets in the US was due to the popularity of Star Wars at the time. It's right there in the name! Star Wars. Battle of the Planets. The original show, Science Ninja Team Gatchaman, was edited (read: sanitized) for American audiences and incorporated new footage featuring an R2-D2 inspired robot called 7-Zark-7. Until the internet age, I had no idea BotP was anything other than what I saw on afternoon TV. The original Gatchaman is a bit more violent and has some adult themes, including transgenderism.

Here's the show's intro



Just hearing that music and voice-over makes me feel like a kid again! The basic premise of the show followed this group of super teens battling the evil Zoltar and the forces of Spectra. Like any good hero, each one has a signature weapon and vehicle. Being Japanimation, the vehicles combine but not in a Voltron like way. This is a quick clip showing how all the vehicles combine into the command ship, The Phoenix.

I don't know how popular the show was when it aired but I feel like they missed out by not marketing it in the US with a toy line. I know I kid me would have been all over it!

The show ran in syndication from September 1978 - May 1980 while the comic produced 10 issues from June 1979 - February 1981. The first few issues featured the Gold Key logo and then switched to Whitman. Oddly, issue 4 can be found with either company logo on it.

The art in the comic is about on par with what you'd expect for a comic adaptation of a 70s cartoon. It's not going to knock your socks off but it gets the job done. Like the series, the comics for the most part are self contained stories. I didn't fully look into it but I think they're all original stories.

In 2002, Image/Top Cow Comics brought the super teen team back into print with a 12 issue mini-series featuring alternate covers by Alex Ross. They went on over the next couple years with a manga adaptation, one shots featuring Mark and Jason, and a 6 issue Princess mini-series. There were also a pair of crossovers.

I know next to nothing about Witchblade so that book wasn't nearly as exciting to me as the Thundercats crossover. Definitely a fun read for fans of either!

Collecting the Gold Key issues will put a small dent in your wallet. Ebay shows issues ranging from $10-$40 each and going upwards of $100 for pro graded copies. The more recent Top Cow books are generally under $5 each.

If you've never seen the show, it's worth checking out. There are plenty of episodes to be found on YouTube. While the original Gatchaman might appeal more to us now as adults, Battle of the Planets is still good if you need a dose of Saturday morning cartoons.

And just the next day, Toy Galaxy posted this awesome video.

Meet Wreck-It Ralph!

I thought with the recent announcement of Wreck-It Ralph 2, this would be a good time to share these photos from three years ago. Timely, right?

Starting around November 2012 you could meet Wreck-It Ralph and Vanellope Von Schweetz in person at DisneyWorld's Hollywood Studios park. I was lucky enough to visit during this time frame. They were in the Art of Animation building, which has since been converted to the Star Wars Launch Bay. In 2014, they left (presumably to start working on the sequel?) to make way for Baymax and Hiro. Will they return to the parks with the new movie? We'll have to wait and see.

The sign above greets you as you enter the queue area, which is indeed themed to make it feel like you're in Game Central Station. Along the queue are a few video screens made to look like you're inside different games looking out.

The queue isn't a very big area compared to the ones you'd be in for big time characters like the Princesses or Mice but it is a fun area to hang out in. My favorite thing there was a status board that showed if games were on time or delayed.

What really surprised me is the people that put this together did their homework. Well, I guess it shouldn't be that surprising because it is Disney after all. Aside from some of the big names in video games there were also some in there that I'm guessing most people haven't heard of like Zookeeper.

Of course, there are a few mentions of Tron. Disney, all I'm asking for in the next movie is some kind of Tron cameo: lightcycle, recognizer, heck I'll take an identity disc in the background somewhere!

Eventually, the wait is over!

I enjoy meeting the characters and I don't usually geek out too much about it but I was pretty excited to meet Ralph and Vanellope. I thought it was a nice touch after going through the game themed waiting area that the meeting area looks like you stepped into Vanellope's game, Sugar Rush.

Here's a brief video I found to show you what the area is like.