"Listen up. I'm an animation fan; I've seen all sorts of animation in my lifetime. I've watched countless cartoons from every decade, good and bad. The statement I'm about to make....might sound hyperbolic but it's true:
"Believe me when I say Kidd Video
is bar none, the absolute craziest, strangest, chaotic cartoon I have ever seen. You know
that Raggedy Ann movie?
This is weirder!"
This cult favorite originally ran from 1984-85 on
NBC and produced by
DiC Entertainment and
Saban Entertainment. It involved a
Garage Band who were brought to a
very strange magical land called the Flip Side by the evil
controller of cats,
Master Blaster. Master Blaster wishes to kidnap all the musicians from our world (it's never really explained
why; perhaps he had hit upon the idea of using
The Power of Rock for evil). The band escapes with the help of the
good Fairy, Glitter, and the rest of the series involves them getting into
adventures in every city and battling Master Blaster and his Copy Cats.
As with the
Dungeons And Dragons series, they're also
ostensibly looking for a way to get back to the real world... but not really. The fact that
everyone in the Flip Side loves their music relieves the sting of
Failure Is the Only Option.
Much, much more importantly, this series is remembered for being a truly
glorious perfect storm of
Rule Of Cool,
Deranged Animation, and
The Eighties.
Mass quantities of
The Eighties.
The show was canceled for being too costly for NBC to produce.
Compare
Jem. An extensive website, with episode guides, is maintained by
Toolbot
, who has also been kind enough to upload
several episodes to
YouTube. Which is good, because trying to describe the show is nothing compared to actually watching it.
Tropes Used:
- Adventure Towns - A different week, a different town.
- Art Evolution - Season 1 -> Season 2, as demonstrated here. Also counts as an Art Shift.
- Big Bad - Master Blaster, although he's rather incompetent.
- Big Eater - Fat Cat. Duh.
- Band Toon - While not based on a real band, it otherwise fits the description to a "t".
- Captain Obvious
Master Blaster: They're getting away!
Copycat: Thanks for the news flash, Your Obviousness.
- Cats Are Mean - Actually, the Copy Cats are just Punch Clock Villains. Master Blaster is the real meanie.
- Cloud Cuckooland - The Flipside.
- Cool Car - The bizarre tour bus that must have been designed as a tribute to Yellow Submarine. Somehow created out of a Subaru Brat.
- Creator Backlash - Robbie Rist wasn't too fond of Where Did Our Love Go?
Robbie Rist: And I guess that “Kidd Video” was also responsible for what I believe is the worst cover of Where Did Our Love Go? that has ever been committed to media. It’s just…oh, God, it’s awful.
- Cute Bruiser - Glitter gains super-strength (enough to toss buildings around) any time she sneezes.
- Deranged Animation - See page quote. Any questions?
- Disney Acid Sequence - The whole series, really.
- Do-Anything Robot - Toolbot
- Down the Rabbit Hole
- The Eighties - Oh God yes. Did we mention Glitter wears legwarmers?
- '80s Hair - Carla
- Expository Theme Tune - Complete with live action footage of the origin story.
- Failure Is the Only Option - Both ways. The gang can't get home, nor can the Master Blaster capture them, or we have no more show.
- Fairy Companion - Glitter
- Fake Band - Inverted. The four main actors who played the heroes also sang and played the band's songs.
- Fat and Skinny - Fat Cat and Kool Kitty.
- Five-Man Band - Literally a Four Person Band, but they have a sidekick.
- Five Man Band Concert - Another "the whole show" trope.
- Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal - The Copycats, however She-Lion wears shoes.
- Hey, It's That Guy!/Hey, It's That Voice!: Splinter's the bad guy. Meanwhile Cousin Oliver and Milton were two of the band members.
- Keep Circulating the Tapes - Given that the show was basically made of 80s pop songs, trying to straighten out the rights issues means this has no chance of being released on DVD.
- Ho Yay: Sometimes Ash and Wiz. But then this was The Eighties.
- Meaningful Name - Kidd Video, Whiz, Master Blaster, She-Lion, Kool Kitty. And those are just the recurring characters.
- Non-Human Sidekick - Inverted. The pirate captain is a parrot who carries a miniature human on his shoulder.
- Ominous Floating Castle - The Master Blaster's lair is a cross between this and Air Borne Aircraft Carrier.
- The Power of Rock - The Flipside is basically an entire universe that runs on rock music.
- The Psycho Rangers - The Copy Cats. The enemy band to the Good Guys' band. Part Goldfish Poop Gang.
- Punch Clock Villains - The Copy Cats
- That Reminds Me of a Song - Using popular radio hits of the day, sometimes including the music videos.
- Rule Of Cool - The only excuse for the show's premise.
- Trapped in Another World - The Flipside. They're trapped in it.
- Terrible Trio - The Copy Cats.
- Walking the Earth - Okay, they ride a bus-car-submarine-thing.
- What Do You Mean, It Wasn't Made on Drugs? - Even the people who worked on it even commented on it.
Robbie Rist: I don’t know what they put in the water cooler in the animation department, but it became this crazy thing that... it was like
Lidsville. It was this acid-influenced, crazy animation. It became something like
Alice in Wonderland, and I was in my twenties and watching these second-season episodes, going, “Is this for kids?” It was just a little bit too weird.
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