#80s children's tv

[atomic-chronoscaph]

The Batty Bat - Count Von Count and Ftatateeta and the Bats (1985)

[vintage-tigre]

[popping-your-culture]

Kelly Bundy, every late-80s, early-90s kid’s crush.

[squidsploitation]

a compilation.

[kumatajdg]

An anoymous commission of Douglas shunting trucks at Wellsworth, shortly before his incident in the episode "Brake Van"!

[awolfswill]

Strawberry Shortcake fan stickers I made

[arconinternet]

Dinosaucers (Videos, 1987)

You can watch the entire extremely 80's animated series here.

[thecringefailintherye]

thoroughly british post incoming

ENOUGH of this fucking roland rat vs basil brush nonsense. theyre two bad bitches with equal slay, stop pitting them against eachother and let them kiss.

[minisinmedia]

Christina Applegate as Kelly Bundy wearing pink mini skirt and crop top on Married...with Children

[peridyke]

crazy dat one of the first games I remember ever playing was capn crunch crunching adventure which was a free shitty computer game that came with an aol subscription and constantly reminded you to eat capn crunch cereal. thanks ronald reagan

[rulethemwithkindness]

Paul Reubens ( aka Pee-Wee Herman ) and late John Paragon ( Also known as Jambi The Genie ) on the set of Pee-wee’s Playhouse.

[episodicnostalgia]

Star Trek: The Next Generation, 116 (Feb. 13, 1988) - “When the Bough Breaks”

Written by: Hannah Louise Shearer Directed by: Kim Manners

The Breakdown

The Enterprise is checking out a sector of space where an ancient mythological race known as the Aldeans supposedly live.  They are said to be so technologically advanced that they’ve hidden all evidence of their existence (including their planet) using cloaks and shields, allowing them to focus on space-poetry instead of space-enemies. Conveniently, just as Riker is explaining all of this the entire Aldean planet de-cloaks, and announces that they are totally peaceful; apparently, they would like to make an offer that would be 100% mutually beneficial.  The Aldeans explain that they can no longer procreate, and their planetary computer can’t figure out why (none of them are actual scientists anymore, their computer just does everything for them).  Their solution/offer is to take a handful of the Enterprise’s children and raise them as their own, but Riker answers with a flat “no” on behalf of the parents, presumably because he’s never had to babysit before.  Not ones to take no for an answer, the Aldeans simply beam the kids they want directly off the Enterprise, which for some unfathomable reason includes Wesley Crusher (a rare alien race that doesn’t want to kill him for a change). 

Picard is adamant that the children be returned, but the Aldeans are equally resolute, and since their super-computer vastly out powers any offensive that Starfleet could throw at them, the captain is short on solutions.  However, the since the Aldeans aren’t overtly evil, they offer (as payment) an exchange of information about the known galaxy, which would take the federation centuries to discover on their own; if Picard refuses, they’ll push the Enterprise to the other side of the Galaxy.  See?  They’re not so unreasonable after all

Under the pretense of “taking time to negotiate an agreement”, Picard stalls long enough for Beverly Crusher figure out the reason the Aldean people are sterile is due to radiation poisoning, since the planetary shield generator is destroying their ozone.  Seeing as all of them are lazy good-for-nothing artists (they don’t care about learning mathematics or sciences of any kind) they’ve been wholly unable to figure this out for themselves. But worst of all, the radiation would subject their newfound child-captives to the same fate.  Fortunately, they are able to see reason and return the children to their families; unfortunately they also return Wesley.  The Aldeans resolve to re-learn how to taking care of themselves (instead of just having fun all the time, as selfish artists are known to do), and the children learn that going to school and learning Calculus is indisputably vital for everyone (although one guest-star parent concedes that art is fine too, as long as you learn math).

The Verdict.

There is virtually nothing about this episode that I enjoyed.  I could go on about how little I care for Wesley, but even without him ‘When the Bough Breaks’ is just insufferably boring, and dumb.  Clearly the writers were trying to make some kind point against indulging in ‘too much of a good thing’. There’s also a comparison to the Aldeans ozone crisis mirroring “20th century earth”, but any relevant allegory is mired in the conceit that freedom from suffering inherently results in laziness and intellectual negligence. 

By this episode’s logic, 24th century earth should then be filled with tons of lazy-good-for-nothings, selfishly living off the benefits of a post-scarcity world.  But according to Trek-Lore, humanity didn’t travel into space out of economic necessity, they did it to explore and seek knowledge for the pure sake of it.  Why would the Aldeans be any different? Historically, many of our most educated people have had the privilege of not constantly fighting for survival (at least for a portion of their lives), allowing the freedom of exploration and experimentation.  Obviously, that hasn’t always been the case, and a I’m not going to suggest that humanity never benefits from having challenges and struggles to overcome, but I refute the idea that people only seek knowledge and advancement out of necessity.  Additionally, art and science have seldom flourished independently of the other, and often go hand in hand.

Also, what exactly were the Aldean’s plans once the Enterprise left?  They state their intention for the children to procreate one day (before they find out the cause of their sterility), but did they seriously mean for a dozen kids to repopulate an entire planet?  I’m no expert, but it occurs to me there might be some problems with inbreeding.  And what if the kids don’t want to pair up and mate when they get older? Why not offer to take in children who have no families and need a home?  Surely they’re going to need thousands of kids to make a difference, and it’s been established that even the Federation has orphans.  There are just too many places where the story falls apart for me to accept the premise.

The ONLY good thing about this episode is the reveal of the Aldean super-computer (they call it the Custodian), which actually looks pretty cool.  That alone earns ½ a star, giving this episode a sum total rating of…

½ a star (out of five)

Additional Observations

There’s a very compartmentalized bias being expressed here that seemingly argues heavily in favour of a standardized public (aka western) education.  I’m all for teaching children the math's and sciences (indeed, I’m generally in favour of accessible education for all), but surely a utopian society could find a way to offer them, that doesn’t require calculus to be taught in a boring classroom setting.

For a super luxurious civilization, the Aldeans have a pretty dull looking world.  Just lots of walls with very few windows, which is a shame since that purple sky would presumably be very pretty to look at.

At one point Beverly Crusher visits Wesley to see how he’s holding up with his new adoptive captors.  While there, she hands him a medical tricorder to ‘discreetly’ scan the Aldeans for clues to their condition, but Wesley is so obvious that it almost plays like a looney tunes gag.  “Hey I’m just gonna walk behind you and not do anything suspicious.  Keep looking over there!”

Did any of the writers actually believe the audience was invested in Wesley?  For that matter, WERE any of the audience invested in him?  I genuinely don’t blame Wil Wheaton, but GOD the writing for his character is uncomfortably bad.

[popping-your-culture]

[nellarw95]

Happy Birthday Ed 🥳🎂🎈🎁🎉

April 12,1946

Buon Compleanno 🥳🎂🎈🎁🎉

12 Aprile 1946

[awolfswill]

[arconinternet]

3-2-1 Contact (Videos, 1980-1989)

The science series from the Children’s Television Workshop, later the Sesame Workshop. You can watch various episodes of the show here and here.