How to Watch Cartoons Like It's ACTUALLY 1985 (My Experiment)
118Remember the magic of Saturday mornings? Waking up, pouring a bowl of sugary cereal, and gluing yourself to the TV for hours of cartoons. But was that "golden age" just nostalgia, or was it something more?
In this video, I conduct an experiment: Can I perfectly recreate the authentic 1980s Saturday morning cartoon experience in 2025?
It's not just about the shows. It's about the entire ritual: the strict schedule, the mandatory vintage commercials, and watching on a glowing CRT TV. I set ground rules for myself to see if the structure and scarcity of 80s television is what actually made these shows feel so special.
Join me as I dive into a curated block of 80s classics and cult favorites, including:
Speed Racer (1967): The fast-talking anime classic that became a hit for a new generation in the 90s.
Dungeons & Dragons (1983): The surprisingly great adaptation of the iconic RPG that totally hold up.
Mighty Orbots (1984): The visually impressive "secret anime" doomed by a trademark lawsuit.
Star Wars: Droids (1985): The often-forgotten cartoon animated adventures or C-3PO and R2-D2.
Mobile Suit Gundam (1979): My special "what if" show: the "real robot" epic war story that could have changed everything if it had aired on American Saturday mornings in the 1980s.
Does the experience hold up, or are some things better left to memory?
We'll explore how Reagan-era deregulation created a toy-driven cartoon explosion , why a PS3 is the ultimate CRT companion , and how creating an "island in time" for our media might be more important now than ever in our age of distractions.
#SaturdayMorningCartoons #80sNostalgia #Retro #MediaAnalysis #Gundam #DungeonsAndDragons #StarWars #crt #RetroCartoons
Chapters
[00:00] Remember Saturday Morning Cartoons?
[00:31] My Cartoon Experiment
[00:53] My Central Question/Thesis
[01:13] History of children's media de-regulation
[01:47] Limited Cartoon Blocks
[02:17] The Right Gear
[02:48] My CRT Cartoon Secret Weapon
[03:21] The Rules of the Experiment
[04:08] The Shows of the Experiment
[06:14] The Plan, The Cereal, the Coffee
[06:38] Stress & the Modern World
[07:10] Did we like the cartoons?
[07:23] Speed Racer
[09:00] The Joy of Commercial Breaks
[09:31] Back to Speed Racer
[09:59] Dungeons & Dragons
[12:08] Mighty Orbots
[14:02] Star Wars: Droids
[16:44] Root Beer and Robots
[16:52] Mobile Suit Gundam 0079
[20:31] Conclusions
[21:20] A Very Rewarding Endeavor
[22:05] Streaming, Phones and your Attention Span!
[23:10] My Big Takeaway
Links:
Emma Yu - How Ronald Reagan Made He-Man the Master of the Universe
• How Ronald Reagan Made He-Man the Master o...
Music by Otis McDonald
Creative Commons: Used with permission
/ @otismacmusic