Cartoons I Grew Up On: Thundercats

With the planet of Thundera about to die, some of the nobility, the Thundercats, escape to safety in a space ship.  They enter sleeping pods on the ship in order to go into suspended animation until a suitable new home is found.  Unfortunately for the young Lord of the Thundercats, Lion-O, his pod malfunctions and he ages during his sleep.  When they awake, they find themselves on a planet called Third Earth, where they try to get along with and aid the friendly inhabitants of the planet, while at the same time constantly defending attacks from the evil ones, such as Mumm-Ra the Ever Living.

I once tried to introduce a friend to this series, making the mistake of having not watched it myself since I was a kid.  I had forgotten just how cheesy this show was and even though my nostalgia (and my love of cheesy cartoons) was able to help me ignore the cheesiness, my friend was not so lucky.  Just like many shows of the 80's, this series is fairly predictable as a whole.  The good guys will always win by the end of the show (unless it's a two-parter) and their method of success is almost always the same.  Just when things look their worst, Lion-O will use the power of the Eye of Thundera in the hilt of his Sword of Omens to break whatever enchantment is on the ThunderCats, give them strength to overcome their enemies, or overwhelm their enemies with fear.

Part of the cheese factor was that every episode would end with a life lesson teaching good morals and values.  This is precisely why I think showing this show to your kids is a great idea.  And as I am overly excited to tell everyone I can, Panthro is voiced by the grandfather from the Cosby Show, which is also very awesome.