She-Ra / Raccoons / Voltron reboots

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Denyer
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She-Ra / Raccoons / Voltron reboots

Post by Denyer »

Is there something in the water? Looks more appealing than the Thundercats one at the moment, and Noelle Stevenson has done some well-regarded comics.

http://www.darkhorizons.com/first-photo ... ra-reboot/

Touch wood it does the source material justice even if it seems to be following a <Franchise> Kids approach like various DC/Marvel series, and it'd be nice for another generation to find the original POP stuff through it.
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Post by Tetsuro »

I do find it a tad hypocritical when somebody resurrects a heavily nostalgia-driven franchise - which you really only do because they're a safe bet, the interest is already there - and then say "oh, it's not for you" when people don't like it.

You're dismissing the very same people whose interest you were gauging on when choosing to reboot it. Who the f*** is it for then?
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Post by Denyer »

Kids?

The point is generally to present stuff to a new audience because the original concept and/or characters had merit.

The original Thundercats cartoon was a memorable intro sequence, some solid concepts and a lot of predictable/terrible/repetitive hack writing. The reboot that got cut short was great, but it wasn't close to the original -- it did something different (better, IMO) with it.

POP was a decent show and more people will find it because of a reboot, which is nice. And there'll be a new show that may or may not have legs.

Did I mention the Raccoons reboot?

https://bigjumpent.com/projects/the-raccoons/

Faces are a little off and Sneer's been toned down, but cautiously optimistic.
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Post by Clay »

Denyer wrote:Kids?
Kids.

I thought the new Thundercats promo looked adorable. And She-Ra looks fine too. But apparently a handful of vocal folk are frothing at the mouth that the new series are different. And that makes me sad.
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Post by Auntie Slag »

I always kinda fancied Melissa Raccoon.
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Post by Skyquake87 »

"The evergreen forest. Quiet. Peaceful. Serene. That is until Bert Raccoon wakes up..."

I remember they used to show this alternated with The Flintstones on BBC1 in the days before Neighbours. I'm not sure about a modern take on The Raccoons. The original had a huge emotional heart to it, I'm not sure today's era of zappy, sarcastic 10 minute 'toons could do it justice.

Christ, 10 minute cartoons. Is this the influence of YouTube on a generation...?
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Post by Tantrum »

New She-Ra looks like Hank Venture.
Skyquake87 wrote:Christ, 10 minute cartoons. Is this the influence of YouTube on a generation...?
Not unless that influence extends back to the late '90s. Cartoons like the Powerpuff Girls used to do 2 unrelated stories in a half hour. Take out time for commercials, and that's about 11 minutes per segment.
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Post by Skyquake87 »

Ah, I forgot about that. Its been a very long time since I watched the Powerpuff Girls! I used to love that, and thought the film was pretty good too. Although oddly bleak. That was brought back recently, wasn't it?
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Post by Cyberstrike nTo »

I would say that while I found season 7 of Voltron: Legendary Defender overstuffed with way to many storylines and some of the characters get lost in it, and it introduces a whole bunch of new characters that seem to scream "That they're going to be potentially the new Paladins of Voltron!" taken as a whole series IMHO it is a LOT better than Voltron: Defender of the Universe ever was.
Yes, I know it was just an American anime mash-up of two different anime shows made by Toei. I know a lot of people don't like Vehicle Voltron but even in the Americanization of the series, it does have some decent characters and a sightly more morally grey and complex (for the time at least) themes than the Lion Voltron ever did.

Voltron: Legendary Defender has action/fight scenes that rival, (if not just flat out better) than some live action big budget movies.
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Post by Tetsuro »

Cyberstrike nTo wrote: Yes, I know it was just an American anime mash-up of two different anime shows made by Toei. I know a lot of people don't like Vehicle Voltron but even in the Americanization of the series, it does have some decent characters and a sightly more morally grey and complex (for the time at least) themes than the Lion Voltron ever did.
I think Vehicle Voltron's (or rather, Dairugger XV's, since that's what I actually watched) biggest shortcoming is that it has way too many characters. The titular robot is made up of fifteen units, each with their own pilot. Even though they're divided into three sub-teams, I think out of all fifteen pilots, only two got any sort of a focus episode to build them as characters, and everyone else was pretty much just "who?" - and that's just the team that actually pilots the vehicles! There's a whole bunch of other supporting characters running the actual ship that operates as their base! The villains are really the only ones to get consistent characterization.

GoLion in the other hand is basically just copping elements from Combattler and Voltes V, especially the five man team and their character designs. Probably the only thing that makes it noteworthy is that it's one of the few super robot shows I've seen that isn't completely earth-centric.
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Post by Cyberstrike nTo »

Tetsuro wrote: Thu Aug 30, 2018 2:30 am
Cyberstrike nTo wrote: Yes, I know it was just an American anime mash-up of two different anime shows made by Toei. I know a lot of people don't like Vehicle Voltron but even in the Americanization of the series, it does have some decent characters and a sightly more morally grey and complex (for the time at least) themes than the Lion Voltron ever did.
I think Vehicle Voltron's (or rather, Dairugger XV's, since that's what I actually watched) biggest shortcoming is that it has way too many characters. The titular robot is made up of fifteen units, each with their own pilot. Even though they're divided into three sub-teams, I think out of all fifteen pilots, only two got any sort of a focus episode to build them as characters, and everyone else was pretty much just "who?" - and that's just the team that actually pilots the vehicles! There's a whole bunch of other supporting characters running the actual ship that operates as their base! The villains are really the only ones to get consistent characterization.

GoLion in the other hand is basically just copping elements from Combattler and Voltes V, especially the five man team and their character designs. Probably the only thing that makes it noteworthy is that it's one of the few super robot shows I've seen that isn't completely earth-centric.
Vehicle Voltron did have way too many characters but at the same time it did have some better episodes and storylines like this one time where they find a planet that is partially terraformed by the Droole and since the Droole had destroyed their last colony attempt some of the team think "Why don't we steal this planet from them and use their own terraforming tech to help out our people?" With others saying: "It would make us just as bad as the Droole" and the Droole are being led by a group of warmongers that don't care if their people become extinct even if a rouge sun will destroy their homeworld and one of them does care and doesn't want to fight and even surrenders a planet to the Vehicle Voltron and they name the planet after him. Having 15 pilots for the team was too many only like 5-7 have any thing resembling a character arcs but I do think it's a more complex show with better villains and anti-heroes and there are some really great stories that are better that Lion Voltron which was just a monster of week type show.
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Re: She-Ra [and The Raccoons, etc] reboot(s)?

Post by Denyer »

Anyone been watching the She-Ra series? Generally amiable enough fluff, although I listened to season three in French whilst doing something else and didn't feel I was missing much.

Most of the shortcomings are due to the <Franchise> Kids approach -- there isn't really any sense of peril, and when there occasionally is you wonder why all of the adults have ****ed off and left the kids to deal with things. The Horde is very thin on troops... basically Catra, Scorpia, a few original character kids and a bunch of robots, for the most part.

Contrast that with the original, which had Etheria generally believably occupied by a hostile army, large cast, etc. and which was better written than MOTU and a lot of other kids TV at the time, and a lot of it boils down to a completely different show borrowing the names of characters and places.
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Re: She-Ra [and The Raccoons] reboot(s)?

Post by Denyer »

Also, apropos of having searched for a couple of Raccoons-related things, Lisa Lougheed's debut album got a random vinyl reissue last year:

https://returntoanalogrecords.com/produ ... een-nights

Which means that somebody is sitting on a remaster that would probably let them release a good FLAC copy but isn't, judging by this listing having preview clips...

https://www.juno.co.uk/products/lisa-lo ... 726996-01/

I have ordered a copy though.
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Re: She-Ra / Raccoons / Voltron reboots

Post by Skyquake87 »

Is the new She-Ra Netflix or something? I think I'd be disappointed by it. I loved the original (thought it was much better than He-Man) and the premise, with the Horde having over-run Etheria.
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Re: She-Ra / Raccoons / Voltron reboots

Post by Denyer »

Yeah, Netflix. Seems to review okay with its target audience but am guessing the rest of the production crew might be coming at the same as Noelle Stevenson, a generation removed from the show it's loosely based on, and focusing on lighter fare for young ones -- the slavery aspect of the original show is shied away from, for example. The Horde seems to be more a lightly-equipped expeditionary force with Horde Prime lurking in the background ready to be brought in.
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Re: She-Ra / Raccoons / Voltron reboots

Post by Skyquake87 »

Well, if it's skewing younger then that's fine and dandy. Honestly, I think it's great to have these shows still around in one form or another, even if it does whiff of no-one having any great new ideas. They might not appeal to me, and that's right and proper. And the original's still out there if I want to track it down. "For the honour of Grayskull!"
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Re: She-Ra / Raccoons / Voltron reboots

Post by Denyer »

I think I'd have found it more off-putting as a kid than as an adult, TBH. The "bad" guys are portrayed as regular types to an extent and with a lack of subtlety that's easier to appreciate with an education in narrative theory and being interested in process as much as content. The best media as kids was the stuff that didn't patronise or talk down, and primary school me would've picked it apart as much or more than MOTU, Thundercats/Ghostbusters comics or the TF cartoon after a while and gone back to reading Dragonlance.
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Re: She-Ra / Raccoons / Voltron reboots

Post by Cyberstrike nTo »

I never watched the original He-Man and She-Ra so I don't have much knowlegde of this show going in and I LOVE the Netflix She-Ra and it's last season was pretty dark and changed the character dramatic with Glimmer becoming Queen and going down a bit of darker path by using a unstable ancient superweapon and the reveal of Light Hope was and She-Ra origins were and how She-Ra stopped the ancient superweapon but at a great cost and the true threat Horde really is. Plus Geena Davis is doing the voice of Huntera and that is great for me.

IMHO it's great show.
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