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You probably haven’t watched Saturday morning cartoons in, um, well, forever, right?  But, let this cook your noodle: there’s a Teenage Muant Ninja Turtles 25th anniversary crossover/event/cartoon movie Turtles Forever, airing tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. EST on 4Kids.tv (check local listings and all that but most likely the CW).

Holy shit! Eastman and Laird’s black-and-white original comics turtles are joining the ’80s cartoon Turtles and the ’00s cartoon Turtles in some sort of geek-tastic cartoon bacchnalia. 

Yes, I will be glued to the television tomorrow morning to see how the original TMNT incarnation will be portrayed, since they were stoic badasses.

Cartoonist Jim Benton imagines what sort of children’s book Ted Geisel might write if he were alive today. [via]

Holy fucking shit my head just exploded.  Got nine minutes? Squeeze this in between doing real work because you absolutely need to watch the shit out of this.  This is everything I would want out of a cartoon as a kid and nothing more.  Seriously, how was this not a cartoon from the 80’s? Regardless, I’m just happy this exists now.

From the official summary:

It is the 23rd Century…

Earth has long since been abandoned after the inevitable zombie apocalypse, and is now not much more than a backwater post apocalyptic wasteland. However, Dead Earth is still inhabited by the unfortunate masses of peoples trying to survive after the wealthy and powerful were evacuated during the Zombie Uprising. Day by day, they attempt to make a normal life amidst the crumbled remains of what were once great cities and nations – whilst fighting off the thriving undead that roam it’s surface.

Humanity has spread across the stars, and the cross cultural frontiers & explorations have begun anew, as more and more interstellar civilizations are encountered. History does indeed have a way of repeating itself, does it not? Because of this, the Interstellar Embassy was created. It’s existence enables a more or less amenable co-existence between the various races and species – keeping enough order to discourage an eruption into complete chaos and war.

Enter the Intergalactic Kung Fu Zombies.

They have no memory of who they once were in their mortal lives.
They are not like other zombies, such as those from Dead Earth.
…
They awoke aboard their BattleCruiser – the Coffin – 1, with but a brief greeting by the G.H.O.S.T – a mysterious Artificial Intelligence whose only purpose seems to be the vigilance of the cosmos, though it’s location is completely unknown. It keeps their old identities a secret, and they are not even sure if the digital persona even really knows what their days amongst the living entailed. Regardless of the situation, the G.H.O.S.T. always pays them handsomely for their efforts, which enables them to upkeep the Coffin-1 BattleCruiser and expand their arsenal. A question remains however, since their zombification is likely sourced by the same mutagen or virus that spawned the Zombie Uprising back on Dead Earth long ago…

They are… THE INTERGALACTIC KUNG FU ZOMBIES

AmIright? AmIright? [via]

It’s a site dedicated to sexy cartoons of power lifting women.

It’s funny because it’s sad.  And sorta true.  But mostly because Africa isn’t even on the map.

[via YBNBY]

Chip Zdarsky created this set of illustrations of every hipster douche’s favorite political figure: Look out, it’s Li’l Che! (Shouldn’t it be chequito?)  I smell a cartoon coming in 2010.  Maybe now that Li’l Bush isn’t doing anything the two of them can be a li’l superpolitical teamup.  [via Warren Ellis]

Marvel Entertainment has a new cartoon coming out that’s aimed at 6-12 year olds, but I swear it’s aimed at 25-30. I’m sold and when Dave Grohl and the Fightin’ Foos kick in at the end, well dang I’m like that five-year-old version of myself hopped up on pop rocks and Lik-m-aid’s Fun Dip. The animation looks weirdly stiff and they lose major points, but this at least seems kinda cool.

Though, we’re not as jazzed about this as anything from the DC animation library – including the upcoming Justice League: The New Frontier.

Ask director Michael Bay just how passionate Transformers fans are and he will surely tell you about the negative early feedback he got during production of this year’s biggest movie hit.  Seems there was much ado about flames on Autobot leader Optimus Prime’s torso.

Flames?  Well, several months later it’s probably something he can laugh about now, but back then he actually had to justify adding flames to Optimus Prime.  Such is the passion of Transformers fans.

And like that mini-controversy every time a new animated version hits networks, fans grumble until the cows come home.  Nothing will ever quite live up to “G1,” not Beast Wars, not Transformers: Armada not any of the different incarnations.

Marty Isenberg is hoping this time around that’s not the case.  The story editor for Cartoon Networks Transformers: Animated, which debuts on Dec. 26 at 8 p.m. eastern just hopes fans give his series a chance, changes be damned.

And changes there are.  Lots of them.  This might be the most radical departure from Transformers canon to date.

Produced by Sam Register, the former CN exec who helped create shows such as Teen Titans and Hi Hi Puffy Ami Yumi and, most recently, Ben 10: Race Against Time, the show bears many of Register’s trademarks. The animation mixes anime and domestic animation techniques quite familiar to Teen Titans fans.

“Well, Sam is our executive producer and handpicked me, Matt (Youngberg, Supervising Director) and Derrick (Wyatt, Art Director) to run the show, so on some level it’s going to reflect his taste,” Isenberg responded. “The character design is pretty much Derrick’s department and I think it’s fantastic! Derrick’s designs are what sold me on doing the show. The faces are expressive, you can tell who’s who, merely by the silhouettes, and most importantly, they’re fun!”

Then there’s the story. In T:A, Optimus Prime (voiced by David Kaye) isn’t the ultimate Autobot we first met back in 1984. He’s actually a lot younger, greener and leading a repair team that includes Bumblebee (Bumper Robinson), Prowl (Jeff Glen Bennett), Ratchet (Cory Burton) and Bulkhead (Bill Fagerbakke). The leaders of the Autobots are named Ultra Magnus (Bennett) and Sentinel Prime (Townsend Coleman) and he’s busy ruling on a Decepticon-free Cyberton.

Of course, that doesn’t mean the Decepticon’s are anything but gone. This time they were just defeated in the “Great War.” MORE »