Episode 19: Nickelodeon

In episode 19 the gang takes a seat on the big Orange couch to dive into the world of Nickelodeon. Assisted by all-time great Nerdificent guest Hector Navarro, the three touch on the shows that made your childhood. From Catdog, Rugrats, and Spongebob to Salute Your Shorts, GUTS, and Legends of the Hidden Temple - get ready to get Slimed with this deep dive into Nick!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hello, Hello, Hello, and welcome to another edition of Nerdificent.
I am one half of your host, Danny Fernandez, and
sitting across from me, it's your boy if you anyway,
as always looking fresh, and today we are joined up
top by some of y'all's favorite guests. I would say
he was on our most listened to episode of Nerdificent

(00:29):
so far m CU episode if you haven't checked that out.
As a history of the m c U, we have
the host of the Nickelodeon Animation podcast as well as
animation investigation on Nerdiced, Mr Hector Navarro. Thank you guys
so much for having any to be back. And I
feel like there should be a round of applause, but
there can we like, we can we can add that in.

(00:50):
That's okay. That em CU chat was fun. Yeah, it
was two hours. It was I got messages. People were like, man,
when you were talking about Captain America, Man, I was crying. Awesome,
great and we did our job. Yeah, I mean it
was so I think I tweeted this. But you're someone
that has this encyclopedic knowledge of comic books and yet
you don't gate keep at all. You just want everyone

(01:11):
to enjoy the fandom, whereas like other people, especially men
that have the level of history and knowledge of comic
books and and nerd lore, I guess that you do,
they often try to gate keep it from people and like, oh,
you didn't know this, and you don't do that at all.
You just want everyone to enjoy it and whatever you know,
capacity that they do, whether they enjoyed as much as

(01:32):
you do or they're just casual fans, that doesn't bother
you at all. Have you guys seen Ready Player one? No? Not?
Did you guys? Do you guys read the book now Future?
You're not missing a whole heck of a lot. I
love me some Stevie Spielberg, But like that movie deals
with how in the future, and it's probably true today
that like geeky knowledge is power, geeky knowledge is like currency,

(01:56):
and sort of the more you have, the higher your
status is. And I feel like it's fun to do
that stuff in certain regard, in certain circles. If you're
with your buddies, if you know that your friend knows
the thing, and then here she messes up and you
call them on a you know what I mean, in
a fun way to just like rag on them or whatever,
like that's fine. I get the appeal of of feeling

(02:21):
like you are um deserved of a fandom or deserved
to like have a place at the table because you've
invested time and you love a thing. That's how I
feel about cartoons and comic books. And for me, I
channel that by doing research. I channel that as somebody
who when I get into a thing, like I brought
my Nicktoons book because of what we're talking about today,

(02:42):
and you and I got it when it came out.
I got it before I started doing the Nickelodeon Animation
podcast a couple of years ago, and and hosting this
new show for notice, and I went to school for animation.
But if I get into a thing, if I like
a thing, I will do the research and and get
into it on my own. I just watched a new
mission of Possible movie. I started watching the original nineteen
six mission Impossible TV show on my own. It does

(03:06):
not hold up, but I'm having a good time, and
it's like and I take that challenge, and I love
that feeling of like, Okay, if I love a thing,
I want to learn as much as possible about the
thing so that I can, you know, know every know
it from every sort of angle and understand it. And
if it's something that is easily critiqued, if something that

(03:26):
needs improvement, and most fandoms do. Most things that people
love are problematic in some way, some more than others.
That's okay because if you know what's wrong with them,
even from those other angles, and you can still sort
of talk about them and talk about what you love
about them, it makes them stronger, do you know what
I mean? Like, if people are like, like, let's talk
about superheroes. I think Batman is better than Superman, I'm like,

(03:49):
let's have this conversation, like I want to. I want
to talk about Superman. I want to talk about Spiderman.
I want to talk about what is good and bad
about these things. So I would say to people listening
that it is absolutely bad to gate keep, but it
is not bad to just research and love a thing
and learn all about the thing and become an expert
in that thing if you want, and then if you

(04:09):
have that, share that expertise and then curate things for people.
Like I just said the Mission Impossible TV show, you
guys aren't missing much if you don't watch that, you guys,
aren't missing much if you don't watch Ready Player one,
but I will tell you to watch you know, this movie,
this movie, this movie, or this cartoon show. As we're
talking about the history of Nickelodeon, I'll be sure to
be like this cartoon show in particular, Special Cat Cat Dog.
You can probably skip it. It's okay, it's how dare you?

(04:33):
But you know, if you're not, if you haven't seen
Avatar the Last Airbender, if you haven't seen Hey Arnold,
like you're you're missing out on some real special stuff.
So yeah, I mean, and it's it is funny because
I feel like Nickelodeon is one of those brands, one
of those companies that really not only screams nineties, but

(04:53):
also it's kind of lived on beyond it. Like it's funny.
I think about this a lot. I feel like online
you're seeing a lot of SpongeBob memes as of late,
and a lot of these new SoundCloud rappers they're they're
referencing SpongeBob, Like one song I was listening to referenced
doodle Bob. And it's funny because to think at their age,

(05:15):
because a lot of these guys are, you know, twenty
one and younger, and that was the cartoon when they
were growing up, Like that was the one I remember
when they premiered the pilot of SpongeBob after the Kid's
Choice Awards. I remember seeing the first episode. So to
know the longevity of shows like SpongeBob and to see

(05:36):
how it has such an effect that it is like
the cartoon of the younger generation that they can make
so many references to. That's what I love about a
lot of this stuff, tun especially SpongeBob. SpongeBob is really
unique in that, Like I'll give you an example. There's
a show that's on uh that's a fairly recent show
called The Loudhouse where originally the creator's idea was to
make a show about a boy bunny and his like

(05:59):
ten sister bunnies that were all family of bunnies. And
when he was developing the show, one of the executives
at Nickelodeon was like, consider making them human. And that
was the best advice that this person got, because as
soon as they turned it into a show about an
actual human family, they were able to connect to it more.
They're able to do this and this and this, and
that's great, but there's also something to a character like

(06:20):
SpongeBob SquarePants who harkens back to a character like Bugs
Bunny or Donald Duck or Mickey Mouse or all these
classic characters that technically don't have any ethnicity. Technically, kids
of many, many, many different backgrounds can like attach themselves too.
And I've seen this and we talked about this with
Goofy and a Goofy movie. How a Goofy movie from

(06:41):
is like the blackest Disney movie that Disney ever made
and there's no humans in it it, yet it still
has these things that are like that speak to what
it is like to be a young Black American probably
And I'm a I'm a young Mexican American, so I'm
I'm kind of you know, I'm I'm talking about this
from the outside perspective, but I know that like SpongeBob up,
especially in SpongeBob memes, and people have talked about this, like,

(07:03):
how is it that that, uh, like black youth has
latched onto what SpongeBob is. And there's been articles where
people have talked about this and they've asked young people
and they're like, well, that's because SpongeBob is black and
you know, they'll see like their background or their ethnicity
on these characters that again don't have when and other
people will be like, like when I was a kid,
I was like, no, Goku's Mexican because I'm watching you

(07:25):
watch watched it though I watched it. I watched it
and it was Dragon Ball set that and here was
this character that had brown eyes and black hair and
messy hair, and I'm like, this is a Mexican. Like, yeah,
his wife's name was Cheech. Yeah, it all makes makes sense,
you know, and people make that joke. But today, but

(07:46):
like there's something to that that. Like, for years, Star
Wars did not have a Mexican character unless you counted
Chewy Chewbacca, who was this silent, hairy guy that was
good with fixing up a car. Like that's Chewy. Everybody
had a cousin Chewy. So so go back to SpongeBob SquarePants,
you go back to um, you know, uh, like Ren
and Stimpy and and other characters from like other cartoons

(08:08):
that we grew up with, especially the Looney Tunes, especially
those classic ones like Tom and Jerry. Like a lot
if you go back and watch a lot of those
actual shorts and stuff, too, Like they'll be moments where
they'll have Tom from Tom and Jerry like play like
a bass like a cello, and you're like they're doing
jazz music and you're like, whoa is Tom Black. It's like,
you know, like as Daffy Duck Black, like this really

(08:30):
interesting things that are happening. And all we had was
speedy Gonzalez. That's all we had and horrible stereotype, but
not really because he was fast. The stereotype was his cousin,
Slowpoke Rodriguez. That was the speedy All Mexicans love speedy.
Speedy is great. Bad, but I've diverted the conversation. No, no,
it's fine because he said let's go back, and you're right,

(08:51):
we should go back. I think we should go back
all the way to December one, nine seven, when Nickelodeon
launched as pin Wheel, a channel developed by Vivian Corner.
Prior to Nickelodeon's creation, most preschooler programs were very limited
because they could only tune into their favorite shows on
Saturday mornings. On the other hand, that only had Saturday
morning to watch their favorite shows, but weekdays too because

(09:13):
they can watch sesame streets for preschoolers and grown ups
in Columbus, Ohio, they had a new television system called
cube qu b E. Yeah. Did you actually know actor
that Nickelodeon started back in I didn't. I knew. I
thought it started in the nineties. Yea, yeah, because because
Nickelodeon as we know it today started with Nicktoons, started

(09:35):
with you know, the cable channel that aired three cartoons ships.
It was the big three, the Big three which were
Rent and Stimpy Doug and Rugrass. And in doing my
research as a young person in two now, like I
did learn like, oh yeah, Nickelodeon was a thing, and
a lot of people remember, but I don't remember. Nickelodeon
was a channel called pin Wheel before was Nickelodeon, and
Nickelodeon was around since the eighties, and it was kind

(09:56):
of like a preschool sort of a kids programming channel
and uh but it's nuts. But again, to me, Nickelodeon
was always the cartoons, and then they sort of branched
off and did other stuff, which we'll talk about later,
things like Nick at Night and I'll you know, live
action programming and all that stuff. But for me, it
did it did begin with the three original Nicktoons. Well,

(10:19):
actually Nick at Night came before those three, so so
like if he was saying, they launched pin Wheel and
then pin Wheel on April first, nineteen seventy nine, Pinwell
relaunched as Nickelodeon. So then in Nickelodeon started showing advertisements.
On October eighth, they introduced their famous splat logo, and

(10:40):
then on July one, Nick at Night was launched and
Nick became a twenty four hour service, which is true. Yeah,
that's actually I remember now, Um, you know, even in
the nineties watching the cartoons and then I could stay
up and watch Nick at Night, like maybe an episode
or something. Do you remember some of the lineup for
Nick at Night? I mean by the time I had

(11:01):
because here's the thing, I did not have cable when
Nickelodeon first premiered. I was a poor little boy. I
was one of these things where I didn't get cable
until later, until like the mid to late ninety nineties.
So by the time I got Nickelodeon and Nick at Knight,
they were already doing stuff. Like maybe maybe I'm thinking
it was too early, but I feel like even like
Fresh Prince of bel Air was on there at Nick

(11:23):
at Knight at one point. But I remember stuff like
I Love Lucy was on there. Yes, that was the first.
That's what I remember. I got lucky because my dad
was the manager of our apartment complex and for some
reason that meant that he got free cable from the company,
and so I remember what in and the first thing
that will pop on was I Dream of Genie and

(11:44):
then I and so sometimes I would like actually watching.
That's kind of how I got introduced to those older
shows was because I usually checked out as soon as
as soon as Nick and Night came on the sort
of reruns of live action stuff because I was I
was obsessed with cartoons. That was usually my indicae. It's like, okay,
it's time to go to bed. But I do remember
later when they would get sitcoms like like Fresh, Prince

(12:05):
of bel Air and other like really good sitcoms from House.
I believe all that stuff was on Nick and I
was like, oh, this is cool. Yeah, yeah, no it was,
but it was great because yeah, those are the huge staples.
And I think what's great is out of the three
shows that launch, you know, rug Rats, Doug and The
Ren and Stempy Show, I feel like the Ren and

(12:26):
Stimpy show, well there's nothing like the other two, but
also like Doug. I mean, there are some similarities between
Doug and Rugrats, but even Doug versus rug Rats, those
were super different shows. Also, I feel like those were
based off of kind of like their viewership. You have
your very young viewers. So August eleven is when Rugrats,

(12:48):
Doug and Ren and Stempy first premiered, so you have
by then I was three, I think, so, so you
have your three to five year olds, you know, or
your elementary school kids. They're going to watch or resonate
the most with Rugrats. You have your middle schoolers who
even though I watched Doug, but probably middle schoolers, high
schoolers you know, are going to resonate with Doug. And
then you have the Rent and Stempy show, which is

(13:09):
like your high schoolers you know, and and older are
going to resonate with that. So I think they kind
of did it smart, very smart. I mean, go I'm
going back to the beginning of Nickelodeon, even before the
Three Nicktoons premiered, I know that there was a story
about how like in the mid to late eighties when
they were trying to figure out the branding of the network.
They brought in people from MTV that had recently sort

(13:31):
of like solidified, like like I want my MTV like,
they designed the logo, like they turned MTV into what
it was, and they brought Nickelodeon from the lowest in
the ratings to the top. And one of the things
they apparently did is they held focus groups with kids,
and a thing that they learned was like, you cannot
put on a show the kids think is for babies,
and anything that a kid, no matter what age they are,

(13:54):
if anything is like if if a if a child
one year younger than them watches a thing, that the
show is for babies. Do you see what I'm saying?
So like a six year old will be next to
a five year old, and if the five year old
likes the thing, the six year olds like this shows
for babies, I don't want to watch this anymore. So
those kinds of thinking, we're going into the choosing and
the picking and choosing of like what shows they were

(14:15):
going to make it as cartoon shows, And that kind
of explains how Rugrats came to be. Because Rugrats I
love because it was a show that I would get
sucked into even though it was literally about babies. And
as a child, I do remember that there were times
where I was like, wait is this for like Todd,
like should not be watching this? But it sucked me
and because it was like ugly, beautiful and crude. And

(14:36):
the humor was the humor doctor doctor lipshits was the
was the child psychiatrist that they were always listening to,
had all this innuendo and all these jokes. And Angelica's mom,
Angelica's was an alcoholic right then her and then her
always yelling at Jonathan, her assistant, and then Angelica herself
just being a diva brat, and then um Stu and Lou.

(15:00):
They had a lot of like adult humor between them. Um. Yeah.
But it's like it's like when you think, why would
Because here's the thing I was thinking about this on
the drive over. When you say names of brands, when
you say names of like studios or TV channels that
you recognize as a kid, When I say things like Disney,
Warner Brothers, Looney Tunes, Hannah Barbera, Nintendo, you can kind

(15:23):
of visualize what all these things sort of are, you know, Muppets,
Jim Henson, Sesame Street, uh, and if I say Nickelodeon,
you kind of know what that is too. Even though
from the very beginning to people at Nickelodeon sing we're saying,
we have no specific house style, you know, they they
sort of approach each one of their shows that they
green light is like, we don't know where we're looking
for until we see it, kind of They're usually You're

(15:45):
usually isn't mandates of like, well, you know, we're looking
for an action show, we're looking for a comedy show.
Usually there isn't the very creator driven and eventually the
process at Nickelodeon, as far as I know kind of
from an outsider looking in, I mean I interned there
for a summer and I and I sort of worked
there when I was doing the Nickelodeon Animation podcast, is
that they would have certain artists and creators working on

(16:07):
one show and then they have an opportunity to pitch
stuff later. The creator of SpongeBob SquarePants, Steve Hillenberg, he
worked on Rocco's Modern Life, The creator of Avatar, The
Last Airbender and then the Legend of Cora. One of
the creators Brian Kanitzko, he worked on Invader zim So
it's this thing where like these artists are encouraged to
like go home and work on stuff, and if they
have stuff, to go and pitch it and so so
it's like there's no Nickelodeon style, and yet there is.

(16:29):
And those first three cartoons you can look at I
think basically every Nicktoon except for a couple here and there,
one of them kind of being avatar, and you can
point to seeds being planted in either Ren and Stimpy,
Doug or rug Rats, you know what I mean. And
Rugrats especially is like I mean, Ren, Stimpy is but
all of them, especially Doug later influenced Hey Arnold and
things like as told by Ginger and all, you know,

(16:52):
all those kinds of things. But Rugrats was like that
classkey chupo style. That ugliness, that crudeness like that was
so appealing to us as kids, and it was out
of Disney beautiful stuff. It goes against with this type
of stuff you learned in art school. If you're trying
to design appealing characters, they're not appealing yet they are. Well.
What's also so interesting is everything about that show was

(17:14):
pretty disruptive. If you think of the theme song, where
it was like done done, Done done. Doo doom doom
doom doom, Like it's not an actual melody. It's almost
if you it's like uncomfortable, but as kids we've grown
to love it. And you bring up the music to
like Doug kind of similar. It had a very like

(17:35):
doe do Do Do Do Do Do Do do dode.
It was nice, but it was all mouth sounds, which
was weird and cool than you. And then Brent and
Stimpy was like like very disruptive and very loud, loud,
and it just set the stage for like these shows
had way different styles than the things that you're so
funny that you bring up that Doug kind of laid

(17:55):
the groundwork for Hey Arnold because Doug, I felt like
Doug that whole series is kind of like really smooth,
and that's how Hey Arnold is as well, and kind
of this like non confrontational character that's really intelligent and shy.
I was always mad at Doug when I was a
kid because I was like he never does homework. I
was like, I'm in middle school and I get homework.
I have to go home and work on this crap

(18:16):
and I can't go and just like hang out and
go to concerts, and Doug like, this show is unrealistic
because he never had home. Yeah, the what was the
name of his band, the beat Beat beat Sets was
the name of like the famous band. Yeah, and I forget,
what does more allowance you? Like, I can do this.
I was mad at Dug for a completely different reason

(18:38):
because I was like, why hasn't he just like clocked
Roger clocks? Like, I was like, I was team body
that dude very early on, Like Skeeter was never any backup,
you know, he was just there. Um. And that was
like the first kind of rendition of like race without race,
because yeah, the characters on Doug didn't really they were
just different colors. But everyone's like Skeeter's black, and Skeeter's

(19:01):
dad was so like just the coding in the design
of Skeeter's dad, I was like, oh no, this is
straight up a black dad. I'm looking at a bunch
of different characters right now from the from the show
and like Patty Mane like, yeah, they weren't supposed to
have skin tones, but Doug Funny just happens to be
light Peach and his parents how to be sort of tanned.

(19:23):
And then you have characters like Skeeter who were like
blue but everybody, like you said, if he like every
everyone was like like Skeeter's black. Roger was like a
rich white kid. Eventually he became rich. It was like
a poor like bully kid. He was like a white kid.
He reminds me of Sid from Toy Story. Patty Maynaise
was like like a tanned skin, you know, maybe like

(19:43):
probably she was probably white because you had a very
like kind of a Southern accent. I don't know if
I don't remember if she was a new kid or whatever.
But but this show was the sweetest show and as
a kids, it was sometimes difficult for me to connect
to it. But I did love the show because it
did actually teach me lessons and years later when I
actually got to meet the creator, Jim Jenkins, he's one
of the nicest human beings I've ever met in my life.
He has just like Mr Rogers quality to him. He's

(20:05):
just like a nice guy that I'm like, oh, of course,
Doug was the way that it was like, it's such
a nice show because Jim is nice like, and that's
what it was about. And it was great, and I
think the beautiful thing about all this is like we
just kind of like picked and choose what we thought
everyone was. And there's probably someone listening who's losing their
mind because it's like, no, I Doug was like, you know,
Indian American, and Roger was Latino, and of course it

(20:29):
was of course they were whatever you want, but like, yeah,
you're right. I really related to Doug because I was
a kid who doodled a lot and I wanted to
make comics. So he had Quailman, and I was like
that was always very cool to me. Uh, and I
really resonate we've we've sat in this because we're in
our nostalgia corner because this is like our show. But

(20:51):
let's talk about Snick. So almost a year later, Nick
went ahead and launched a prime time block called Snick,
which was Saturday Night ni Alodi in, which would go
on to be just housing so much it had eventually
are You Afraid of the Dark? We had all that
you had Nick News, which I thought, you know, that

(21:13):
show was really ahead of its time when I think
back on it, and it blows my mind that something
like that isn't around now because it was a show
that you know, it would talk about It wasn't like
slanted anyway. It talked more about world issues, but like
it kept kids grounded because you're talking about what's going
on in the rest of the world, other problems, and

(21:35):
like I remember, I forget her name, but there was Yes,
she was such a neutral, calm voice that it just
kind of pulled you in. And just remembering that and
just seeing the impact of like just a Saturday wrap
up of world news to go like, hey, you're watching
all this stuff, you're probably having fun. Why don't you

(21:57):
take a peek home what's going on all around the world.
I would love it if they brought that back. Yeah,
for sure. Also, I was going to say, because you
brought up all that, and a lot of people talk
about growing up with sketch comedy as far as SNL,
but dude, the kids on all that killed when you
think back to them being like thirteen years old and
doing sketch comedy in front of a live audience. They

(22:19):
were so talented, so talented, and Amanda Binds as much
as people you know, give her crap now, she was
amazed and then she went on to have her own show.
But she was so young and so good and obviously
that's spent off into Keenan and Kell, which gave us
a good burger, And we are going to get into
all of that right after the break and we are

(22:49):
back joined here with Hector Navarro. Yeah, I was gonna say,
if you had some things that you wanted to say
about all that, Well, it's so funny because you know,
you do go back and you're kind of like, this
is a very kid centric sketch show. But some of
the writers on the show turned out to be some
big names in the past. So you had Amy Berg,
who I think is one of the most outspoken, outspoken

(23:12):
television writers on Twitter right now. She did a dope
guide for People's First Writing And Neil Brennan, who went
on to create The Chapel Show, wrote for All That
he went from all that to creating The Chappelle Show.
It's and it's so wild to see just the jump
from these writers and and how like, when you think

(23:35):
about it, can you if you were watch both all
that in Chappelle Show and be like the same dude,
you would probably lose your mind. And then I feel
like the breakout star or ended up being the sort
of breakout success in the long run, not in the
short run and the long run was Keenan Thompson. Keenan
who in a lot of ways graduated to Saturday Night Live.

(23:56):
And I remember when he got on SNL, I was like,
holy crap, that's keen In from all That, from Good Burger,
from Nickelodeon, like, and he maybe made it like he's
gonna do comedy for the rest of his life because
a lot of the actors on that show, a lot
of the kid actors, like, they either didn't pursue it
for the rest of their career, or they did and
didn't find as much success or retired or for various reasons,

(24:16):
like you know when you're a kid actor, like are
you going to go to college and do something else?
Or do you want to keep acting or whatever. And
it was awesome to see Keenan actually make it. I
remember there was an episode of SNL where Shila Buff
hosted Yeah, and he stood up next to Keenan and
during the monologue and he was like, made it, man,
we made it Disney, Nickelodeon, Disney, and Keenan was like
not having it as part of the bed He's like yeah, man, okay, yeah, great,

(24:39):
but um, like Keenan, Like, I love Keenan. He's real
hit and miss with me. Sometimes sometimes his skits are
hysterical and I love them, and other times I'm like,
this isn't working for me. It's like a little too silly.
And sometimes still watching Kenan to this day, I can
still see a little bit of Keenan and kel all
that of his sort of like delivery and his like
especially when he has that like smile on his face

(24:59):
where he knows he's he's being funny and he's like,
you know, trying to be funny. Like when I was
a kid, I was real there's real snobby about all that.
I didn't like the show, and I didn't understand why.
And I never rooted against anybody in the show. I
know that, you know. When I was a kid, I
was absolutely jealous of those like other thirteen year olds
that got can you imagine, like, you know, where do

(25:20):
they shoot it with it? Was it in Hollywood or
was it in Florida? In Florida in front of a
studio audience used to say it after all of their
shows Universal Studios or Nickelodeon Studios, whatever it was called.
And I was super jealous, and I would love that job.
But I remember sometimes some sketches worked for me, some didn't.
Sometimes it was crossover. Keenan Thompson as a kid, did
a sketch with Chris Farley. Chris Farley showed up and

(25:41):
they both played the crazy Chefs, where where Keenan loved
chocolate on everything and Farley wanted want a catch up
on everything. And as a kid, since I knew who
Chris Farley was, my mind was blown. I'm like, this
guy gets to do a sketch with Chris Farley and
and I think Farley he may have passed away, like
not a year later, do you know what I mean?
Like it was this crazy thing. But but when I
was a kid, all that sometimes it was tough for me.

(26:02):
And then years later I tried to I think I learned.
I'm like, I think it's because in classic Saturday Night
Live sketches, which at the time is sort of what
I thought all comedy was, or any good sketch today,
there's always there's always kind of one element that's out
of the ordinary, one crazy character or one crazy idea
or theme or whatever, and everybody else is kind of
playing a grounded reality, like there's you know, and they're

(26:25):
like a voice of reason or like a straight man.
Sometimes in all that sketches there would be like two
or three or four crazy, you know characters, and there
was it was tough to like to like bring it
back down. It was repair man man man man, you know,
like Perrs Cargo, Keenan's Pierres Cargo, just like him trying
to do French accents in a bathtub. Yeah. No, but

(26:47):
the alumni was pretty good. I mean there's some like
deep cut alumni that I didn't know, Like it's season six.
Gabriel and Glaciers was part of the cast, remember that.
And you know, Cannon was one of the biggest ones
who came out of it. Keenan Thompson, we just talked
about him. Laurie Beth Dinburgh went on to the Steve
Harvey Show and then she did a few work after that.

(27:09):
I actually was in the big Freedom music video with her.
And then you had like Amanda Binds, even though you
know she kind of fell off a bit, but like
she was like, who's my neighbor, shout out to Josh.
So it was like this was also like brewing talent,
and you're right as someone who like all his life

(27:30):
wanted to act. This was the main source of my
sevening jealousy of like how do I do this? And
you have this Nigerian father who has one doesn't want
me to act to doesn't know how. And you know
my mom she's from the South, you know she she
also doesn't have any clue to where to send me.

(27:51):
But that's all I wanted to. I would watch these
kids and I was like, if I just had one shot,
it's inspiring. Yeah, it was inspiring, you know, like and
and I love so many of those classic sketches and
and uh yeah, Amanda Bindes was my favorite when I
was a kid, so that when she got her own
show and then later was showing up in movies, I
was like, yeah, that makes sense. Like she was like
the best on the show, Like she was fantastic. So

(28:12):
you know, it's so weird listening to y'all talk about
this is that you both saw them and like I
want to be them, And it's so weird because I
feel like growing up, for me it was a little
bit different. I didn't really see Latina's on screen at
all at all at all, And for me it was
more like, oh, I want to date them or I
want to marry them. You know that's funny, but that's
like how we're raised, like you need to find a

(28:33):
good husband, you need a husband, And so I grew
up wanting to marry these guys and then realizing when
I was in college ish like, oh no, I'm my
own thing. Like you didn't want to marry like members
of in Sync or bactually, but you wanted to marry
You wanted to marry the cast members. I wanted to
marry Brian from Backstreet Boys. I also had a crush

(28:53):
on Max Goof, as you do, because he was a
smooth teenager. I was very sexually confused by that, having
a crush on a dog. One of my ex girlfriends
told me that she had a crush on SpongeBob SquarePants
when she was much and told like classmates like, oh,
he's my boyfriend, Like SpongeBob is my boyfriend, and I
think that's what I call him, Bob. Yeah. I thought
it was like real cute and real funny that, like,

(29:15):
because because she went on to do comedy and stuff
like that, and I think it's real funny that, um,
you had a thing for Max Goof that she had
a thing for SpongeBob, like there's something about It's because
SpongeBob was like good and very funny. Yeah, I don't know,
that's I think that's really interesting. I know it is funny,
how like Yeah, for you to fall for like someone

(29:35):
like Max or SpongeBob, it has to be their good
personality features, where someone like Lola Bunny it's like, oh no,
she was drawn as a sex and that's why we're like, yeah,
that's my girl, like Jessica Rabbit, like right, right right.
It's just you know once again that you know all
the little ways that the patriarchy isn't work. I did

(29:57):
want to say before we fully move on. I just
had two points I needed to make in the um,
like we were saying, Nickelodeon studios opened at Universal Studios,
that's where they filmed a lot of their live stuff.
And then also in magazine, don't you remember those commercials?
Good Lord, like just begging. I'm sure that everybody of

(30:18):
parents existed everywhere to Jake Magazine, you're their kids, just
like god, Momzin, did either of you get them? No? No,
I did, oh my gosh, because you know when they
get it now. And I still fall for these traps
every time when it's like sign up, we're giving you
a free magazine. And so my dad was like he

(30:41):
got it, and he was like, okay, pick the magazine
and right there was Nick mag for free, and I
got to get it, and I that was the one
I would wait every month for it. It like drove
my childhood because it's a magazine. Yeah, it was like
good magazine had like little tongue to it. Also gave
you like the celeb updates for all the stars on

(31:02):
Oh my Gosh. When Yeah, when I was a kid,
my mom and dad would frequently get me Disney Adventures
were like little magazine, just highlights. And I really I
didn't want Nick Magazine as much as I think Zoo Books.
That was the other commercial as a kid where it
was like, oh my god, there's the like and it
was like I never got it. That was I got
close to Zoo Books. I got my dad to fill

(31:24):
out the form during a book fair and then at
the last second he was like, no, yeah, just go
to the library. Yeah, but yeah, I don't want to
skip over Good Burger because you mentioned it. And that
was a moment in history because we went from not
only because I liked the parallels between all that and SNL.

(31:44):
And this was one of the biggest steps that happened
in SNL was where a sketch is so popular it
turns into Brothers cone Heads. And then in the nineties
it was Wayne's World, That's what it was all about. Man. Yeah,
and even stuff like now at the Roxbury Yeah, the Ladies. Man,
it's Pat Stewart saves his family and my maybe my
personal favorite MC gruber, but I love the Yeah, I

(32:08):
love that when good Burger made that leap. And again
it just speaks to like Nickelodeon when they were sort
of on top of everything, they were branching out there
trying to do live action sketch shows, They're trying to
do news programs, they're doing Nick at Night programming, they're
doing a magazine, they're doing at Studio in in in
Universal down in Florida. They're doing a movie. And eventually
that led to, you know, there were other Nickelodeon movies

(32:31):
based on their cartoon properties. Um, you know, I think
Nick Nick games is a thing is another branch of
of Nickelodeon as a whole, like you know, like interactive
video games, eventually became a thing. The magazine we talked about,
uh nick dot com was a big website when we
were kids. Like it's cool that they were branching out
to just do other stuff that they weren't just like
content with, like no, we just have original cartoons and

(32:53):
wear a cable channel and that's it. Like they're trying
to do other stuff. And I think that it helped
cement them as being parts of our childhood and also
just being like a relevant and important brand to this day.
So yeah, so Good Burger came out and is still
one of my favorite films from my childhood. I always
if you follow me on Twitter, I'm always pitching a

(33:15):
Good Burger two. I think we just need Keenan to
come back, like I'm sure Kel is down. And also
I just want to say I've read interviews with Kel,
who also auditioned for SNL, but Um said that he
had a weird audition, that he took a risk and
it didn't it didn't really pay off. But he is
the nicest man. I have friends that that have performed
on shows with him. He still does stand up and

(33:36):
he said in this interview about how people like waiters
whenever they see him when he's ordering, they're like, oh,
do you want orange soda? You know, like they'll say
that and he'll be like yeah, sure, like and because
he doesn't want to ruin because that was such an
important part of their childhood that he when he goes
to restaurants, he's not like no, like just you know,
give me my beer or whatever. He is like yeah,
and he's like, they'll bring me orange soda, and I

(33:58):
like also order some an els, but like he doesn't
turn it down because he just like seeing how excited
people are that they still remember his character. And I
loved him in Mystery Man. He was so funny. Oh
my god. Yes, Mystery Man heavily slept on ahead of
its time. Yeah, also ahead of it. So yeah, what's
what's your pitch for Good Burger too, Danny? Can you
share it now? Um, we don't have time. No, we

(34:20):
don't have time. I would have to do like a
whole thing on on all that, which is another thing
I wanted to say, Like we didn't even really have
we might do a full episode on something like rennin Stip.
You don't actually get to talk about, yeah, the way
that we did with like teenage mutants and things that
like it. It had a comic like my dad used
to buy me the rennin Stippy comics, which you know,

(34:40):
and it's so like grotesque and I probably shouldn't have
had it when I was seven, but that reboot that
was yeah, yeah, yeah, that was weird. And then their
creator got outed as being a very very bad person. Yeah,
who had a sixteen year old girlfriend at a time
really oh yes, text her. He actually his lawyer like

(35:04):
came out with a statement saying, yes, there was a
period of time when he, as an adult man, had
a sixteen year old girlfriend when he was working at
the studio. And it's a lot um So maybe we'll
skip it or not. I mean, you know, we can't.
Just I would just like to say too that if
there's people listening to this right now and they're like

(35:26):
they're kind of going back and remembering certain stuff that
they grew up on, or they haven't had a chance
to check out Nickelodeon like currently, or you know, because
everybody talks about the nineties being the Golden Age, and
I think there's there's two reasons why that happens. Number One,
I think people our age just kind of did stop
watching cartoons at a certain so they did sort of
miss on a bunch of cartoons kind of around after

(35:46):
Invader Zim and Beyond and then maybe Avatar the Less
and Brander broke through and they check that out as
a cartoon watcher. But I think number two is I
think that there is some truth to Nickelodeon being in
its golden age in the nineties because they were so
all about taking risks, at least as far as their
cartoons were concerned, that it's kind of weird to make
your whole business model around taking a risk, because if

(36:08):
they would do that later and it didn't pay out,
then people are like, well, that's not like Nickelodeon enough.
And it's like, well, they're trying to take a risk,
and sometimes if they played it safe, because they're a
huge business, then it wouldn't be Nickelodeon enough. So I'll
just say to people listening to this right now again,
I encourage you too. If you feel like watching some
of these shows again, go back and watch them, go

(36:28):
and do the research. Go go get booked, or you know,
just look online and then do this kind of Nickelodeon
research about the history of the company. Because it is
fascinating and really cool. Dude. I bought a season of
All Real Monsters. That was my favorite Nickelodeon show. Got
canceled way too early. It only has four seasons. Good
concept and low key kind of was like, I mean,

(36:53):
it was very monsters inky. It's so good and funny
and I love it. And yeah, that premiere to Modern
Life was Rocker's Modern Life, of course, which we didn't
when we found out that he's a sex worker. Like
those are things when you go back and watching as
an adult, you're like, oh crap, they were sliding things

(37:16):
in here. Yeah, because I think it was the fun
thing of like trying to especially when which shows like
rent and stimpy, And I think that's why the reboot
was not as great as the original, was the constraint
of trying to see what you can get away with
while still making its acceptable for children out going full
on crass and disgusting, because if you do that then

(37:36):
it's not as funny. Yeah, it's not as funny. But
you were saying, how you know people look at the
nineties of the Golden Age because you know all the animation,
And I do think you have a point, because we
when we get to the late nineties and the early odds,
we start having the live action shows, your Ned's Declassified
school Books, You're Different stuff, And also they launched Noggin,

(37:59):
which was a big point because de Grassi was there.
We can jump in all of that fun stuff right
after these messages and we're back. So I don't want
to move on without talking about some more of the

(38:19):
really iconic live action slash light competition shows that we had,
which was Legends of the Hidden Temple. That was something
that I did want to compete and I always was wondering, like,
am I going to see someone from my school on this?
For some reason? I know, because maybe because they were
actors Global Guts Guts. So Legends of the Hidden Temple
of first episode aired on September eleven, and uh, you

(38:44):
also have Guts, which aired September nine, So a year
after Guts, they did Legend of the Hidden Tiple. Fun fact,
Michael Malley, who was a presenter, he's still out here.
He actually is the creator of the show Survivor's Remorse
on I think formerly Survivor's Remorse. I don't think it's
on the air right now, but that's the show that
he made with Lebron that was kind of like based

(39:05):
off of Lebron's life and yeah, so he's like still
out here making some dope moves and it's funny to
see how like that's funny with like the Neil Brennan
thing and now you have like he went the stuff
he works on is is so crazy when you think that,
you know, he went from guts to you know, working
with Lebron James. Those game shows were awesome. Yeah, And

(39:28):
I don't know if you all know, but Double Dare,
which was with Mark Summers, actually first aired in six Yeah,
I didn't know that. That's crazy. Yeah, that's what that means. Yeah.
And also back of course, the iconic green slime, the
slime covered in it actually first came out during a

(39:50):
skit that they did back in nineteen seventy nine where
a kids chained up for detention in a dungeon and
he's told not to pull on his shackles and when
he does, a toilet flushes and the signature green slime
comes down. And then that was a great gag that
they then later used throughout Nickelodeon, but also at their
Kids Choice Awards and getting slimed was an honor. I

(40:12):
love the Kid's Choice Awards. When I was a kid,
it was like the Oscars but for kids, and you know,
and and and like you said, if they would air
cool stuff right after, like the pilot episode of SpongeBob
and and I had a chance to go to a
taping of the Kid's Choice Awards, and it is insane.
I went as well. So this year, Ishmael Sahid of
White Women is on a Nickelodeon show called Cousins for Life,

(40:33):
and so I get a text room and goes. For
those who don't know, Ishmael is a very quiet dude
and he's very like Moby all the time. And he
was like, hey, if you want to come to the
Kid's Choice Awards, And I was like a hundred percent
a million times yes. And not only was I the
kids store, I was the v I P. And I
had the nosebleeds, so I was the v I P

(40:55):
in the back with all their snacks. And it was
wild because you'd see all these kids who I felt
bad because I didn't recognize any of them because they're
like current Nickelodeon stars. And then you had Kevin Bacon
and so so yeah, our buddy Ben Schwartz. He now,

(41:15):
I'll tell you my whole experience. I walked there, I
get my badge, and they remembered me because I just
got done doing my Blues Clues audition. I was like, oh,
please don't remember that because it went whack. It was
not like basically they I guess I had the voice
actor for Blue in there while I'm doing it. I
didn't know. I'm doing my lines. She does the Blue songs.

(41:37):
I physically jump back and they're like, okay, let's move
on to the next scene. I was like, wait, we
don't want to take that back. I literally got shocked
by what you're supposed to be my co star. So anyway,
he did not get that, but they're like, oh, yeah,
if you just came in for that, yes, that is
the exact sound she made. And I was like, because

(41:58):
you know, I'm thinking, you know, they're just gonna be like,
all right, you're just reacting to your imagination in retrospect.
That's a good thing to actually have something to react to. Anyway,
So we get there and Ishmael has to walk the
orange carpet with his fake family and I was like, yo,
we gotta do it together, and he was like, no,
it's like this my moment. And I was like, all right,

(42:19):
I understand. I really wanted to walk the orange carpet.
Though I will remember this for the rest of myne
never I will not be on a Nick show probably
you know who know who knows we'll see. So then
they were hanging out in the backstage and I'm looking
around and I see all these kids. Also I dressed down,
okay because I was thinking, well, yeah, because I was like,

(42:41):
I might get slimed, so let me dress down. These
kids are fresh to death looking fresher than me. So
now mad, I was like, I knew I should have
worn up good gear. But I'm like, I was like
these I'm talking about these kids are wearing off white.
These kids are wearing like yeazys, they're bape And I
was like, I got all this. I would have been
impressing these kids. But now I'm like a like a
herb standing over here in my light dressed down. I

(43:03):
was so salty. Uh So then I'm sitting no, of
course not why would exactly. I was looking at this
also like they slimed. There's all these kids who would
literally look weird if there was like all these kids
in big old If. He's like, yeah, we're slimed anyway,

(43:24):
I'm looking around. I was like, I don't know anyone.
And then I see Ben and I was like hey, buddy,
and I was like, wait, what are you doing here?
Because it was before they like officially announced it. I
mean they announced it, but like only if you're paying attention.
And he was like, oh, I'm a ninja turtle. And
then Omar Gooding was there as well, and I was
like this is tight because one you're a ninja turtle

(43:47):
to Omar Goodness that guy. I used to watch him
all the time. And and then long story slow, I
didn't get slimed, but the you know, it was fun.
I wish I got slimed. Yeah. Yeah, we still gotta
get slimed, y'all. What we we're going to do it?
I bet all of us will well. I technically have
been slimed, not offacially slimed. I did a it was

(44:10):
this like Turf Company. They did this Facebook live kind
of event where we did like a double Dare type
event and we actually had the who's the host of
Double Dare again? Marks? Yeah, Mark Summers actually came out
and like did it and they end so like they
did the one event where there's the balloon filled with

(44:31):
slime and you have to pop the most balloons. When
I say I wrecked that, When I say that, all
that energy I had as a kid, when I was
like I need to be out there. I had something
to prove. And me and the twenty people who were
watching that Turf Companies Facebook live video knows that I
the real cheat. I didn't get to walk the orange carpet,
but no, I'm going to get good for you if yeah,

(44:54):
you know, so I got slimed up. It's it's nice,
but yeah, no is so then uh yeah, so we
have July of Yes, this is the big one that
is when SpongeBob square Pants officially premiered. So for all
of us, like older people, I mean, SpongeBob is their moneymaker.

(45:16):
SpongeBob I think to this says as of late SpongeBob
has generated thirteen billion in merchandizing revenue for Nickelodeon. It's
so funny because, like you were saying, for us, it's like,
oh no, it's Rugrats and we grew up with a
grand and Steff no SpongeBob. Yeah, SpongeBob needs more credit

(45:37):
for everything that it's done. For that and how long
it's been because it's still running right actor. I think
as of right now it is and if if it's not,
they're at least doing another movie. Was there a time
when Tom Kenny, who's voice of the famous voice of SpongeBob,
did he drop out or piece out or like I
thought he wanted a piece out, but then they were like, well,
you can't do this without him. No. I think the

(45:58):
thing about Tom that people might not know is I
had a chance to talk to him for the Nick
podcast and he said that he tried out for SNL
and made it in the top three and he was
beat out I think by like David and Rob Schneider.
This is back in like the mid to early nineties.
And he so he got beaten out by two out
of the top three spots, so he couldn't get it

(46:20):
because it only had two spots or whatever. And he
goes on to talk about how devastated he was by that,
because when you're a comedian, when you're stand up comic,
that is the end goal. If you don't make that,
what then? Right? And I know, athletes deal with the
same thing, where like if they don't win the World Series,
if they don't win the World Cup, you know, this
kind of like horrifically depressing, um devastating thing happens. But

(46:43):
Tom goes on to describe it like if he had
gotten SNL, he wouldn't have gotten SpongeBob SquarePants. He wouldn't
have been there, he wouldn't have been in the room.
And ultimately he always wanted to do a thing like SpongeBob.
SpongeBob and voice acting was his dream job, that was
the end goal. And so he has always loved doing
the character and being the character. As far as I know,

(47:04):
I don't know if there was ever a time where
him or anybody else in the cast didn't want to
do it. I mean that cast is just insane. You've
got Bill FAGERBACKI who does Patrick Starr, who is underrated
as a smart, dumb character. It is tough to play
a dumb character, and Bill like Patrick is like next level.
Then you've got Clancy Brown, Clancy Brown from The Highlander,

(47:26):
from the voice of Lex Luthor from the DC Animated Universe,
Like who's got this amazing voice who sounds like this,
he's Mr Crabs and he loves doing Mr Crabs because
he loves to like surprise kids and people once they
learned that he is Mr Crabs. That's like his favorite
character that he does. And he's this this he is
this incredibly imposing, like very intimidating, super nice but like

(47:47):
intimidating guy. He's got this great presence and he's the
voice of Mr Crabs. So it's like, yeah, I mean
there was stuff that came before SpongeBob to round out
the rest of the nineties. It was Hey Arnold Blam
was another show that I loved as a kid, was
like a sketch shows well live action was The Kids
Robot Chicken. Before Yes, it was Angry Beavers was also

(48:08):
a lot of fun, and Angry Beaver is one of
those voice actors went on to voice Invader Zim So
again up there kind of you know, reusing their very
talented cast. Cat Dog premiered in a year before Tom
Kenny was the voice of Dog and Cat Dog there
you go. Also, I just want to talk about like
Tom Kenney still out there getting like he is most

(48:29):
famously known for SpongeBob, but he is also Commissioner Gordon.
He has also done a ton of different voices on
Rick and Morty, so you definitely heard him there. All
of the top tier voice over talent. You should do
yourself a favor if you like any of these characters,
find out who does the voice, and then go to
their IMDb and your jaw will drop. And how often

(48:51):
these people work it is insane. Yeah. Tom Kenny's also
Heifer and Rocco's Mardern Life. He plays the Ice King
in Adventure Time. He's a narrator and mayor in there
Puff Girls, who I love the mayor Well yeaheah. He's
done a ton of stuff. Yeah, it's it's great, and
it also lets you know why it's so hard to
break into the voice over industry, because really, because they

(49:12):
do it all. Yeah, they basically yeah everyone, once you're
in the family, you're you're bouncing around. But so yeah,
looking at you. Chris Sabbott voices every Dragon ball Z
character ever. Yeah. Another cool thing that I love that
Nickelodeon did, and I think Cartoon Network did the same
thing around the same time as Oh Yeah Cartoons, which
was like they're like pilot, you know, the thing that
where they would produce pilot shows where I think, like

(49:34):
fairly odd parents came from that chalk zone a bunch
of shows, you know, they were like trying things things out,
my life as a teenage robot the Wild. Thornberry's premiered
before SpongeBob, and that was the last show before SpongeBob.
Thornbury's was a great show. Tim Curry as Nigel Thornberry
was fantastic, so much so good so then SpongeBob even
though it premier so many people, even Nickelodeon itself, I

(49:58):
have a Nickelodeon backpack that didn't bring I should have
brought it. That is like nineties Nick and SpongeBob premiering
in the nineteen ninety ninety nine means it's a nineties
Nick show, but it's not. Nobody considers it that because
it because it took a few seasons to become what
it is. It took like three or four seasons for
people to catch on and the world to catch on.
But he represents that sort of shift of like, Okay,
Nickelodeon's back I get not that they were ever gone,

(50:21):
but like man, what a what a what a phenomenon? Also,
what that means is July sevent of next year, will
mean that it's been on the air twenty years. It
has been on the air longer than some people who
watch it. Oh he has been born absolutely, I mean
multigenerational at this point, which is crazy. You're on a

(50:43):
page because he's going through his nio. This was a
very formative for me as a California kid. Rocket wanted
so bad, I was everything. I would watch that show
and then go outside and yeah, remember when Tony Hawk
was on it. Oh that was after after Rocket Power,
which again came from like class Key Chupo, as told
by Ginger, was a show that I was not the

(51:05):
target demographic, but I was like, oh, this is awesome.
It's a great, great show. The Fairly Odd Parents was
a huge show premiere to two thousand one, huge show
and another huge money maker. I feel like if SpongeBob's one,
the Fairly Odd Parents has been consistently a solid sort
of number two to to the pop culture phenomenon that
is SpongeBob, because it's just it's just so consistent. Fairly

(51:27):
Odd Parents was so good and so funny. Two thousand one,
Invader Zim was a big deal. This show was canceled early,
uh famous famously because the creator could not compromise. And
it's so interesting because Joe Nenvasquez is a genius and
he had such a vision for what the show was.
He was in his early twenties when he got this show,
he was a young man. And famously, the story goes

(51:51):
that there was a meeting where there were and this
is all here say, I don't know what the actual
thing was, and this is all stuff that I did
not learn from anybody at Nickelodeon, but rather when I
was an at school for animation from two thousand six
two thousand nine, I was already hearing the lesson of
what happened to Invaders in when it was canceled in
two thousand two. Because it's only gone for a year,

(52:12):
that's twenty seven episodes, it's like a season and a half.
Because my our teachers were telling me, here's a lesson
you need to know if you want to work in
this industry, if you want to work in animation, it
is a collaborative process. It is not a rock star show.
You cannot get away with being a jerk. You cannot
get away with not being able to work with other people. Famously,
Walt Disney collaborated with Salvador Dolly on a project back

(52:32):
in the day, and then he fired him. Do you
know why? Because salvad Or Dolly was an asshole and
people are telling Walt, Walt, you can't fire him. He
salvad Or Dolly. He's like, I don't care. This guy
doesn't know how to work with other people. That that's
not what I'm interested in. You know, it doesn't matter
who the person is. So love Jon and and and
much love to him, and I'm so glad that he's
able to come back and do a made for TV
movie that's coming out hopefully soon ish. People don't know

(52:53):
when it's coming out yet, but like, but he talks
about it. He was a different man then, and the
famous lead. The story I heard when I was in
college was like the at work came with changes that
they wanted to make compromise because he has a very
dark humor style. Everybody knows that about Invader Zim and
apparently they were relatively minor and he said no way
and walked away, and it's like, look, man, there are

(53:14):
other people working on this show. There were the people
that like they are required, They need that paycheck to
get by, and it's and it was tough, but but
it got such a fan base and so much love
that like, the reason is he was even able to
come back is because so many people, especially of our generation,
loved it and kept asking for it to come back.
So I think also, like you know, Johan uh not

(53:35):
only had the show, but also at the time, he
was doing comics and he was crushing it there and
that kind of helped his ego and being like, Okay,
I just won't do this and I'll go back to
making you know, the comics, which, if you haven't squee
is amazing. I mean, I've remember when I liked it,
so I can't I can't attest that it holds up.

(53:57):
You know, what does hold up the Invader Zim comics
they've done in the past couple of years that Jonan
has has sort of overseen and like a lot of
the talent that worked on the show work on it now.
They're freaking great. They're really really great comics. After Invader Zim,
you had Choc Zone, which is kind of a this
is where it starts to get to where people that
forget the Nicktoons people choc Zone, but choc Zone was

(54:17):
it hit? It was cool. Two thousand two was Jimmy
Neutron boyg was This was a big deal because they
got they got a movie first and this was a
very came out in two thousand and one, came out
two doesn't one. It's very interesting deal where like they
had a show greenlit and part of the reason they
got the show was like, oh, but can you guys
also do and it was the first like c G
show on Nickelodeon, But can you also with all the

(54:37):
models that you guys created, everything you created with the
budget you have, if we gave you more of a budget,
could you also do like a full length feature film
to sort of kick it off and then do you
know our series order of however many we need. So
that was a big deal and that movie, even though
I didn't love it, got nominated for an OSCAR for
Best Animated Feature. That just to show like it's it
shouldn't it's not all about Disney or now Pixar every

(54:59):
year year in and year out witting it. It's like
you had Shrek, you had Dreamwork, yet all there's other
animation studios doing stuff. So that was cool that they
were able to branch out into movies, and I think
even before then rug Rats had a movie, which is
a big deal in the late nineties or the two thousands,
eventually found out about Chuckie's mom. It was very emotional,
very emotional. My Life as a teenage Robot premiered in
two thousand three, which had a real cool style Where's

(55:21):
Where's mega xlr Oh, I don't know if that's that's
not Nickelodeon, that's Cartoon Network. That I think goes to
a test when and I don't think it's necessarily a negative.
I feel like it's when you have competition, you borrow
from each other, and a lot of times that kind
of lens into a little bleeding of the lines. You

(55:44):
kind of go like, this could be either a nick
or Cartoon adventure time I think was a Nickelodeon short
that they passed on and then Cartoon Network picked it
up famously, So that was another like, oh, you guys
really missed the ball on this one. Rug Rats All
Grown Up premiered in two thousand not the same. I
was so geeked. I was like, Yep, this is what
I want, an adult version of a kid show. I

(56:05):
like Danny Phantom was a big deal. Danny. People loved
Danny Phantom premiered in two thousand four. Another Butch Hartman show,
which was just recently left Nick. He just it's true, Yeah,
he did very recently. I didn't click on the video
I followed Butch Hartmann on social I didn't click on
it where he's like, here's why I left Nickelodeon. But
he has been so prolific. Uh and um, yeah, you

(56:25):
know it's it's gonna be really interesting to see what
he does next. Because he clicked on the videos. I
was like, I need the draw. But it was he
has some drama going on on his Twitter account right now.
He's been there the whole He's been there like his
whole career. Twitter. We can then we gotta but yeah,
but Butch the only just for anyone who's like, why
did he leave, he was like, oh, I've just been

(56:46):
there long enough. It wasn't drama. It was click. Butch
maybe my favorite nicktoon of all time premieres in two
thousand five. So Different Avatar, The Last Amberender. You can,
guys can do a whole episode about that. If you
guys have not seen this show, you need to do
yourself a favorite and invest and watch those first three
seas into that first show, and then go watch the
Legend of Court because they're gorgeous. Here's amazing. This was
a big moment. The Avadar was a big moment in

(57:07):
the anime community because there was a schism. Yes, there
was a huge schism between all the anime elitist because
it garnered the argument is this anime and you had
people who believed it was people who believed it wasn't,
and they shot barbs at each other because of it.

(57:28):
Then they coined that weird term American aime. I've never heard.
We never heard that, dude. It was like it was
because of Avatar. They started calling like American produced anime,
American anime and uh, you know, a long time ago
on krillin Super we had Thomas Sean Thomas who was
who explained that anime is just Japanese for animation, so

(57:51):
there really is no difference to say what is anime.
I I'm under the belief that it is colloquial now
at this point of a certain art style, which would
mean by that banner you would look at Avatar's anime.
I remember having that same discussion about Boondocks. A lot
of the style of Boondocks very anime and overseas literally anime. Yeah,

(58:15):
Lashawan actually worked on Legend of Cora and Boondogs, and
he said, and now he is doing Children of Ether
and Cannon Busters and he works over there. And he
just was like, nobody has this conversation in Jared and
nobody cares. Only you guys care. Oh, that's only a
conversation I hear from Westerners. Literally, nobody says that or

(58:36):
cares or is busy or bothered or well, because there
is that line in anime fandom where there is a
level of fetishization of Japanese culture. And so that's where
that is the root of that, that is the route,
that's the whole root and why people are like, oh
my hero academia, no call it boku, no hero like

(58:57):
you know, like that that is where that is sources like,
and it is all under the veil of oh, I'm
just trying to respect. It was like, well, the way
you respect is just enjoying it. And they don't care
what you call it. They don't care if you say
hunter hunter or hunter x hunter. If you're watching it
and enjoying it their chill. Trust me as someone who
has interacted and a lot of these creators some of

(59:19):
them are not a lot, but like I don't want
to like guests, well, I would say like, yeah, I'm
curlling it. We would have Japanese American creators on our
show and it was so funny because they were like, yeah,
white people correct me about like how I should be
calling it yeah, you know, And it's just so like
you said, if he they fetishize this culture that isn't
their's and then try to correct people about how what

(59:41):
it is and what it's not. I think I I
learned a couple of years ago, which is really interesting,
is about cultural appropriation. What is it and what isn't
it is. I was talking to a comic book artist,
a guy named Philippe A. Smith who actually created co
created um the New Latino Ghostwriter. So he's been riding
that wave and he's so still he's like friends with
the actor and he's like so stoked about the Ghostwriter

(01:00:02):
appearing in like Agents of Shield and so on and
so forth. But Philippe A. Smith was born in South America,
raised in the US. I think he's like half black,
half white, and he is the first ever Westerner to
move to Japan and actually produce comics there at a
Japanese comic book company. So he was producing manga. And

(01:00:22):
this manga was about an American character who um is
obsessed with Japan and then he gets a chance to
go visit Japan and then like it's kind of different
than what he expects, and it's comedic and it's crazy,
and it's also about how Japanese people in Japanese culture
view American culture and like gangster lifestyle and all this
this really interesting intersection of like cultures. And because he's

(01:00:43):
this guy who's kind of worldly and grew up in
different places and moved to Japan and lived there for
years and actually does it, there was that argument back
then of like, hey, is it manga if um, if
you draw it and you do it here in the States, no,
it's not. Well is it manga if you produce it
in Japan? Yes it is. Well, what if it's done
by west Stern, No it's not. Well that's bullshit, because
that's what Philippe I did. And he was kind of,

(01:01:04):
you know, showing us like it doesn't really matter ultimately,
but what's interesting is the different combinations of cultures and
kind of what you can get. So, yes, Avatar the
Last Emberander hugely influenced by Eastern animation and animators themselves,
and they would send stuff, you know when you send
it over to the show they eventually had. It wasn't

(01:01:24):
just American produced and United you know producing the United States,
but eventually they had animation directors, like a lot of
these shows where they're in Korea or they're in Japan,
or they're in you know these places where you're in
charge of this whole sequence and then they do it,
and it's just as much there is as it is
the writers who wrote the English words that are gonna
be spoken by the American voice actors, you know that
are they're like that're sort of in the final mix

(01:01:45):
of the show. So it's this really beautiful and interesting combination. Um,
I think you guys nailed that. It's it's it's the
topic of like what is and what isn't is interesting
but doesn't matter. And I think as the years go on,
that kind of line is going to get blurred because
I can watch show that's on Cartoon Network right now,
like okay kao Let's Be Heroes clearly has animate influences.
It's not a show that is that is animated in

(01:02:08):
that style per se. It's a little cartoony show. And
yet here we are. So yeah. So then two thousand twelve,
after the SpongeBob, we went down a nice deep dive
of these young dope cartoons. But then the end launched
Ona and that was the moment that everything changed for
me because that is when we were able to watch
Degrassi in the US for too long, and that was

(01:02:32):
actually my first introduction to Aubrey Drake Graham, who eventually
went on to become the rapper known as Drake Drizzy
Drizzy Drake. But then from there it turned Nicktoons TV
came on when it was a channel just for Nick's
animated series which launched in two thousand five. Then you

(01:02:53):
had um, you know, a new logo in two thousand nine.
Then Nick Splatt was actually really fascinating that came out
in twenty which was like a block for Nick's like
golden era, the ones that we were just talking about shows.
And then they came out with like a crate essentially
of that Nick Box, the Nick Box, and it's just

(01:03:14):
so funny because we're all so like, I see a
lot of these companies trying to capitalize on nostalgia, and
I feel like that's exactly what that is. It was like,
here's here's all your old favorite shows and then here's
a box of like you can have Chucky, a doll
of Chucky from Regrets, you know, and I'm actually what
they had in there was a Cynthia doll from Regrets.
It was awesome. Well Angelica had. What's so wild too,

(01:03:36):
is just how much merchandizing nick did have in its
golden age. Like I remember Jack Boy, I wanted gag
so bad. All it was was just this kind of
like putty, but like because it was the Nickelodeon. Ghack,
I lost my mind about Then they had the Slime
that you that was basically just putty, Like they all
this Nickelodeon branded stuff, and then now it lives on

(01:03:59):
still creating dope cartoons like Ko that's also Cartoon Network.
And sorry, many didn't mean to if anyone knows, I
do want to bring up to that. Yes, I'm so sorry.
We're not gonna be able to mention all of your
shows on Nickelodeon. That would be a whole another hour,
but two major contenders. I would say I Carly was

(01:04:20):
a big deal in Victorious because that gave us are
On a Grande Victorious and then she went on to
have Salmon Kat or whatever, and that was our first
I feel like real introduction played someone totally different, didn't.
It's really funny because Victoria Justice was, you know, the
quote unquote like star of that show, but everyone kind

(01:04:40):
of like latched onto Ariana Grande who then completely broke
out and then end up dating snel cast member. It
all comes back together and now they're getting married. And
I also want to point out to when Nickelodeon acquired
the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a little scary for
Turtles fans. It's like, I don't know what are they
gonna do. So far as far as I'm concerned, Kelodeon
has been doing them right, and he's had some great shows,

(01:05:02):
great shorts. The movie side, that's a different story, Michael Bay,
But the cartoon stuff and the stuff that Nickelodeon has
been in charge of, I think that we're doing great,
and all the Turtle stuff since then has been awesome.
And of course we had Nick Jr. We had Little Bear,
We had as if he was saying Blues Clues. We
had my girl Dora trying to teach us all to
these kids. It was huge. We didn't even talk about
I didn't want to talk about Drake and Josh and

(01:05:25):
just how Drake, Yeah, the other Drake. But yeah, now
I feel like we did a pretty good job of
capture and everything. Just looking at the lineup, I mean
we had Zoe one oh one, you know, and p
Secret World of Alex Max Salute your Shorts. Yeah, there's
so many. We are going to do a deep dive
of some of these. Yeah, I feel like, yeah, especially

(01:05:46):
like some of these that we can really jump into it.
And of course Clarissa explains at all, which was my
first huge crush. You know, she was dope as hell.
But also now that I'm older, I'm like, my parents,
why did they let me watch this boy that had
a ladder that would crawl into her bedroom and gave
me some ideas inappropriate? Not my fault, Mom and Dad,

(01:06:07):
But yeah, no, it's been super great and it seems
like Nick's just keeping that fun train rolling and for
you know, little Naomi's gonna be watching nixt soon enough
and she's gonna have her shows. It's it's wild. I
think it's fun to see the generational stuff. But for everyone,
I think some of these shows to check out. I
think if there was one shows out of all the
shows we talked about that you can recommend, will go

(01:06:30):
around the table, let someone go back and watch one,
only one, I feel like it would it be Especially
for kids, I would pick Hey Arnold. I thought Hey
Arnold was it because, like Avatar is different. That's cool
when you're an adult, super different, super cool. But Hey
Arnold especially was like, here's a group of like inner
city kids, a bunch of different backgrounds. You learn things
like Harold the bully, he's not just a bully. He's

(01:06:50):
got his own troubles, He's got his own stuff, and
taught me lessons and maybe want to live in a
city and made city living cool. Whereas before Hay Arnold,
I felt like everything was in a suburb, everything was
the bit to Beaver. But then you get to hear
On and it's like, look, man, they got there. They
got a train in their backyard, just like we do.
So I would pick that. What about you? If you?
What would be your recommendation. Who if I had to
pick my recommendation, I'm sorry, I'm gonna say Invader Zim.

(01:07:13):
It's a fun watch. It was scary that spooky enough,
you know, and to me, I feel like it really
shaped the comedy in it was really ahead of its time,
just when they were fighting with the planets and it
drops on that guy's cup and he's freaking out, like
when he really could move, you know, like if he

(01:07:34):
just moved from that cup, he would be fine, but
he just was holding onto it and losing his mind.
And that made me laugh for so long in my life.
And I went and looked it up. It was. It
was very It was very reminiscent to the Austin Powers
bit with the car coming and the guy, yeah, move,

(01:07:54):
move out of the way. So yeah, man, this is hard.
I guess I have to go for all my little
horror babies that love Halloween. A real monsters. Yeah, it's
a good one, all real monsters. It's just it's fun.
I don't know. I had to like write one day
and I just like bought it and put it on
in the background. Um, but I just I loved it

(01:08:15):
so much and I'm a big fan of Halloween, and
it's Halloween all the time for them, So yeah, that's great, right, Well,
where can people find you, actors? You can find me
on the internet at Hector is Funny. Check out new
episodes of Animation Investigation that are appearing on YouTube dot com,
slash and Noticed every Thursday morning. And also listen for
the newest episode of the Five Greatest Films podcast for

(01:08:35):
me and my roommate and good buddy Keller not Black.
Watch a different movie each week with a different guest.
And it's going to take us ten years to complete
the list of the five greatest Huh. Yeah, that's a lot.
Yeah uh. And also you can go back and listen
to old episodes of the official Nickelodeon Animation podcast Hector
did because he spoke to a lot of creators and
voice actors. If you like this, go take a further

(01:08:58):
deep dive. Go do that, you go even deeper. I
appreciate that, Thank you. It would be cool. And you
know me. You can catch me here every Tuesday, right
where you are and Monday's on Candy Dinner, uh and
on Twitch ifties lots of hashtag nerd fam hashtag ify
Nation coming in with those Twitch Prime stubs and I
can't thank you enough, but I do have to remind
you that they do not auto route new and every

(01:09:20):
month your boy has to come through uh and give
me that love. Uh. So just a reminder. It's it's
I think it's a new month for some of y'all.
Come back if you wait. On Twitter and Instagram, I'm
at miss Danny Fernandez on all the socials. Check out
our t public site. We have merch and I actually

(01:09:42):
was wearing our Stay Nerdy shirt at the airport and
got multiple compliments on it, and I felt weird because
I want to be like thanks, it's my podcast, but
I didn't. I just said thanks. Oh man, I need
to get over and be like thanks, it's my it's
my podcast. Ounity. Um. But it's a dope and really
cool shirt. And we have new designs coming up, and
I believe eve that we are also going to allow
people to submit designs that you will get paid for,

(01:10:04):
so every shirt that's bought you will get a portion
of that as well. So I think we need to
tweet will tweet out the link to that. Yes, yes,
and yeah, by now our new design is up. It's
a real cool custom Ner difficent cover where Danny is
Batman and I am Robin. I looked like a little
bank robber. I like it, like yeah. Big shouts out

(01:10:25):
to Eve's Jeff Coat Christopher Hasiotis, our researchers who held
it down, got all this juicy info for us. Big
thanks to Hector for coming in. I think you know
super producer Anna, editor Dan Goodman, and you know our
man Zach McKeever and the booth holding it down and
as always staying hurt.