Nothing was quite as rewarding as a kid as running downstairs at 7 a.m. Saturday morning to settle down in front of the TV. I‘m not sure which was more unhealthy: the hours spent watching cartoons or the vast amount of Count Chocula that was consumed. Some of the programs being pumped through the set were just flat out weird. Thankfully YouTube is around to help us remember and to check out the strange things from before our time.

Tales From The Cryptkeeper (1993)
This cartoon was seriously awesome. Each week, EC Comics’ Cryptkeeper introduced an animated scary story. There was never anything too graphic or horrifying for kids, and there was usually some sort of “tell the truth so the vampires don‘t get you” lesson in there. What’s weird, though, is that this is a made-for-children spin-off of the popular HBO original show “Tales From The Crypt.” Can you imagine if they did that today? Something tells me that “Recess Entourage” or “Curb You Enthusiasm’s Adventures of Little Larry” wouldn’t go over too well. Too bad.

Rubik The Amazing Cube (1983)
Yep, that’s right: A show about a Rubik’s cube. There was an evil magician who brought a Rubik’s cube to life and was transporting it in a trunk on his stagecoach (which is how all legit evil magicians travel). The trunk falls out, and Rodriguez siblings discover the cube. They solve the puzzle in about two seconds, and the cube grows an ugly troll looking face and a pair of legs (no arms though). Even though he can fly, start fires and grow to be six feet tall, Rubik could never figure out how to speak with proper syntax.

The Amazing Live Sea-Monkeys (1992)
What’s truly amazing about this show is that producers gave it the green light. The live action show centered around a professor, played by Howie Mandel, and three human-sized sea-monkeys that he grew. The creatures got into all kind of trouble, including one particularly disturbing episode that taught about “stranger danger.” (Apparently, there are a lot of sickos out there that want to inappropriately touch brine shrimp that wear overalls.) Mandel told Entertainment Weekly that “it could be the next Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.” The show was cancelled after eleven episodes.

Lidsville (1971)
The Krofft brothers, creators of “H.R. Pufnstuf,” brought this strange series to television in the early ‘70s. There are two things that make “Lidsville” stand out as super weird among their arsenal of bizarre shows: giant talking hat puppets and Eddie Munster. An 18-year-old Butch Patrick plays the main character, who is transported into a land with giant hats. An evil wizard (different than the one from Rubik) named Horatio J. Hoodoo wreaks havoc on Lidsville and Butch Patrick must stop him.

ProStars (1991)
Michael Jordan, Bo Jackson and Wayne Gretzky joined forces in this cartoon that was “hot, cool, jammin’ and slammin’.” The three live in lockers at a rundown gym and do good deeds via Jordan’s rocket shoes, Gretzky’s rocket skates and Jackson’s steroided-out muscles. Sometimes evil robots were thrown in for good measure, but in the end “it’s all about helping kids.”

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