Before and After: Happy Meals and what they were yesterday and what they have become today.

Well folks, coming June 16th kids everywhere will be munching upon pounds of greasy burgers and fries to get themselves pokemon happy meal toys, including a pokemon TCG card. Now I am too old to play in this game of shadows, “eat our food you get the prize” gambit.. but you got to admit it gets the kids excited to eat fast food. Once upon a time: we were those kids who were gorging upon those double cheeseburgers to get those damn toys. I remember fondly of one those ultra hot meal ticket promotions: POKEMON THE FIRST MOVIE.

There wasn’t a household that year that didn’t have a kid jumping off the walls for this movie.

I was a fan, I played the games,the cards,and have just about anything that said Pokemon on the box, hell I still play the game boy games, I’m a fucking nerd. The movie was mindblowing, it had more action, exciting orchestrations, and a deep meaningful plot (though not executed greatly when examining it now as a 21 year old) that would take 3 episodes to cover. It was a helluva time back in 1998. But back to the happy meals, it’s kind of funny that back in 1998 that happy meal promotions were executed with more attention to detail and hype.. in other words: MANIPULATE (due to misinformation and lack of internet.. so parents didn’t had the knowledge back then) Plus there were more toys, and also there separate things to purchase outside of the happy meals (or in this case Big Kids Meals), like there was Pokeballs with “gold karate” blocks with Pokemon on them. Holy shit, overkill! So that in turn would absolutely require kids to go to Burger King multiple times a week to “BUY THEM ALL!”, and I regret it health wise now. But you know what, I don’t care.. life is short and I will enjoy the times that I was a kid, and 1998 was a bitching good time.

I still have these lying around somewhere.

Now 14 years later, the world has become more informed about the vile, gross, and health destroying fast food!* *quote from a semi rational health nut. McDonalds is trying to recreate that very successful campaign with doing some ludicrous promotions with other places. But here is the important stuff to know: Starting June 16th, McDonalds Happy Meals will come with a Pokemon toy and a reprinted TCG card. The six toys are Pikachu, Servine, Pignite, Dewott, Woobat, and Axew. That’s what you really need to know. I don’t know if it’s because I am older now, but I am not excited for this. I feel nostalgic, but not excited. There’s just something about being bombarded by ads from televisions with their semi clever tag lines and the announcer telling me that “such and such is now at this and that”. The magic is gone, gone are the overblown commercials with creativity and in with the conservative bastardizations of what we call commercials nowadays, and I don’t see them coming back anytime soon.

Cartoon Network brings back Cartoon Planet and Toonami: A step in the right direction?

How did this happen? Remember all the cries of "BETRAYAL" when Cartoon Network turn their back on their loyal fans when they slowly got rid of their old cartoon shows such as Johnny Bravo, Dexter's Laboratory, and Courage The Cowardly Dog, and then went for the jugular vein with cancelling Toonami? Remember when they started pumping out live action shows, and importing Canadian cartoons and basically said "We don't feel like making original shit anymore."? Well apparently they heard your bitching.. er I mean campaigning for "Bring Back The Cartoon Network of old.".

Toonami: An Important Part Of My Childhood, Reborn. Plus A History.

For those who are unfamiliar with Toonami (primarily those from overseas), Toonami is a daily*/weekly programming block consisting of action cartoons, primarily consisting of Anime (japanese cartoons). I think I got it down right, anyways let's begin. It began in 1997,

An update: Name change and the mission statement of the website.

I know I haven't been posting enough this month, but I haven't really the time to do so.. I need to get myself ready for the two episode premiere of my show and have to move out of the house in a few weeks. Times are crazy, but I will get through it.

Now the name change: I didn't like my name so I changed it. My name is Paterfamilias, and it is a reference to "O' brother where art thou", one of my favorite movies. It rolls off the tongue doesn't it, and i think it has more presence than my last name.

And with that I also changed the name of my site to BEYOND THE TAPE. Because I really love VHS, I grew up with VHS'. That old beeping noise when you start the tape still gives me goosebumps. Plus the name gives you an idea of what I am about: Nostalgia. I believe that the single most relate able thing in this planet that sew us together is the past. We love the old tv shows,movies,and video games; that's why TV give us reruns, movie theaters re release movies, and the internet show us old clips of of everything including games. It's the past that shape us of what we are today, memories; GOOD AND BAD. That's is why critics like The Nostalgia Critic, James Rolfe, and Spoony is so popular on the web, they recognize what their audience is and they deliver week after week . Hopefully I will be able to do that for you, forget about what the hell is going in this mad,mad,mad world of ours, and watch my videos to get your mind off things and bask in the glory days.

And with that, I am off to write some more scripts for upcoming episodes. Bye!