Saturday Morning Cartoons

Welcome to a new feature of CatholicSkywalker: Saturday morning cartoons.

Perhaps I am dating myself, but I was just discussing with a friend about how cartoons we an event, especially the ones on Saturday morning. After a hard week of hitting the workbooks and dodging gym balls, you were rewarded with a Visual feast. Going back to the whole concept behind this blog, I believe that e movies, books and television we watch, especially as children, shape our society, but more importantly our own moral compass. Cartoons are silly. But they're also important because of how formative they are on the young mind. So today I thought we would start with one of the best Saturday morning cartoons of all time.

MUPPET BABIES

Based on a musical sequence from the feature film Muppets Take Manhattan, the Muppet Babbies ran for 8 seasons on CBS. The show featured baby versions of Muppet characters who live in a playroom and are looked after by the matronly Nanny. The fun of the show was in the use of imagination. The Muppet Babbies spent most of their time in the playroom trying to keep themselves entertained and occupied. They would take ordinary things like boxes and couches, and the animation would take us into the characters' imaginations and follow them on the most fantastic adventures. This, I think was the show's greatest strength and it's greatest asset to kids who would watch it today. In a world where kids are trained always want the newest technology, the Muppet Babbies encouraged kids to look with wonder and possibilities at the world around them.

And the show had strong themes about friendship and individuality. But above all of that. The show was funny. Rewatching a number of episodes recently, most of the wit still holds up. Muppet babies also loved using clips from contemporary movies and tv shows. At the time it made the show feel relatable to my life. I mean, who hasn't gone down into their basement at one point and imagined it was the Tempe of Doom? Today, the clips elicit more nostalgia than anything. It is also the reason why you will not see me released on DVD any time soon, with media copyright laws being what they are. Fortunately, you can almost every single episode on YouTube right now. ( google mbfan07)

The Muppet Babbies taught me that my imagination could not only be a refuge fore when your world got kind of weird. But it also taught me that this same imagination could create whole new worlds to share with others.