Daniel85

Holy shit, people.

I’ve been searching for this ad for years, and never managed to track it down. Someone’s finally uploaded it to YouTube.

The Wobbies World commercial is a pillar of Victorian childhood. A flagstone! A bulkhead!

No-one I know ever actually went to Wobbies World, but we all saw that commercial about 5 times a day every day of our lives. Did any of you guys ever actually get to go to Wobbies World? Please fill me in if you did.

In hindsight, Wobbies World looks incredibly lame. But how awesome did it seem as a kid?! I would’ve given my Game Boy to go on that frickin’ bubble helicopter.

I don’t understand how Wobbies World assumed the exalted position of desire it did amongst early 90s Aussie kids. Surely we were smart enough to see that the place was a complete shithole? Nevertheless, I can remember harboring an intense need to go to Wobbies World. Maybe it was cos Disneyland seemed impossible, Warner Bros Movie World perhaps a little less so, but still mostly unattainable… but Wobbies World was a definite maybe. Nunawading’s in the Melways, dad could drive there!

Or maybe it was just that incredibly hypnotic music. I love how it finishes at the end of the commercial. Tik-tik-whoo.

Some more points, because I’m not done dissecting this relic of 90s Victorian kidhood: 

What’s the deal with that stupid mannequin dressed as a fireman? They couldn’t even afford real animatronics, so they just pinched a dummy from the bins behind K-Mart. Oh, and that early shot where it zooms in on the dummy’s face is frickin’ terrifying.

“Bring your friends, and mum too!” (But dad can fuckin’ stay home.)

And I’m sorry, but a slide isn’t a ride. It’s playground equipment. Just had to call bullshit on that one.

P.S. I tried to find the clip from The Late Show where they parodied this commercial (with a funpark named Piss Weak World), but it’s not on YouTube. Instead, please accept this equally hilarious Late Show spoof of Channel 9’s old “We’re Still #1″ campaign:

Just kidding!

I like how the kids have Indy and Toht refer to that one figure as “Cairo Swordsman” as if that’s his actual name.

And the shot with the mother setting a picnic table in the background is a nice touch. Very thoughtful for a standard 30-second “these kids are playing with our toys, you should too” 80s toy commercial.

Edit: For some reason the video doesn’t want to embed, so just go to http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=7sIbx6hrF7 if you want to watch it.

This is one of my all-time favourite animated shorts. It’s one of Chuck Jones’s latter-day efforts at WB. Granted, it’s no Duck Amuck or One Froggy Evening, but the concept is solid and the 50s modern style is a look I really dig.

I first saw this short on the late-lamented What’s Up Doc, Channel 9’s weekday afternoon Warner Bros program. We kids of the 90s were really spoiled when it came to animation. We were exposed to all the classics through syndication and cable, and then we got all the fresh new stuff coming out of the Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon stables. You really have to feel sorry for today’s kids, with all the shit they’re getting.

Anyway, enjoy the short.

I’m sure you’ve all seen this by now, but if not: 

Fantastic. It’s gonna be great to actually see a decent movie poster in theatres for a change, as opposed to the dodgy photomanipulation crap that spackles the lobbies these days. Drew Struzan straight up rocks.

This is undoubtedly old news to everyone by now, but…

Yep, the best fucking show in the history of television is being revived. I don’t like how the new logo looks like some kind of energy drink logo, or a sequel to Halo or something, but it’s hard to care too much when we have the sheer awesomeness of Gladiators returning to our screens.

The original series intro will prove incontrovertibly my claim to the show’s unassailable awesomeness:

Everything about that is awesome. (I know I’m overusing the word ‘awesome’, but I wholeheartedly believe that the word was actually coined by a Druid seer many thousands of years ago to describe Gladiators, which he had seen in a vision of the future.)

The intro looks like it’s straight out of Kevin Sorbo’s Hercules or Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers: The Movie (two other examples of sheer 90s awesomeness)… and the theme song is incredibly reminiscent of Joe Esposito’s “You’re The Best” (from The Karate Kid).

The shot of Taipan shredding on his guitar on the peaks of Olympus is further testmament to the unrivalled coolness of Gladiators.

I first got wind of this when I was in the States and saw that they were reviving American Gladiators. I hoped and prayed that Australia would follow suit, and then a couple of weeks ago I started seeing promotional posters all around Melbourne. Happy boy, happy boy.

I always loved in the original series how there would be these roided-up gym freaks who’d come on, convinced they could mix it with the Gladiators, and then they got totally thrashed on the Roman Rings or the pyramid. That’s what we call hubris, motherfuckers. And then there’d always be some little 5′6″ baldheaded tough-nut high school maths teacher who’d absolutely carve it up. (GHS alumni: Do you think Mr. Truscott would’ve been the greatest Gladiators contestant ever?)

The best thing about the original series was when they did the International Gladiators comp. There was one British Gladiator (Wolf?) who was a totally batshit crazy geezer, and he had a rivalry going with Vulcan. It was epic. I thought those two were gonna kill each other.

Best show ever.

(Edit: My brother just told me that this is old, old, old news and everyone’s known about it for months. Oh well. I’m still excited.)

This has always been one of my favourite 80s songs. I never realised the band was from Melbourne, though.

For some reason the song makes me think of the Target in Bay City Plaza. (Fuck you, Westfield… it’s called ‘Bay City Plaza’.)

The video is pretty awesome… great New Wave aesthetic.

Why didn’t I think of this?!

John! Paul! George! Ringo! Zombies!

Okay, now I wanna see someone run with this and do a Zombeatles cartoon or comic, a la “Marvel Zombies”.

And just ’cause I’m a huge nerd…

While My Dismembered Leg Gently Seeps
A Taste Of Brains.
Fixing A Hole (In My Chest)
Everybody’s Trying To Eat My Baby
All You Need Is Napalm
Mmmmm…. Mr. Mustard

And of course…

Help!

Come on then, out with ‘em…