animation – Around the World in 80s Movies Podcast

Fire and Ice (1983) | Ralph Bakshi

March 20, 2020 qwipster Comment is Closed

This animated story involves a fantasy world imagined before the last ice age, featuring human civilizations and exotic dinosaurs coexisting. It is a time where the lands are divided among two factions, the evil Ice Peak sorcerer warlords, Queen Juliana and her wicked son Nekron, leading an army of ape-like subhumans, and the goodly Fire […]

Akira (1988) | Katsuhiro Otomo

May 26, 2019 qwipster Comment is Closed

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In this breakthrough anime masterwork, Akira starts out in 1988, much of Tokyo is destroyed by a mysterious that spreads like a dome of energy over the city. The rest of the film is set in the year 2019, as we peek into the post-apocalyptic megalopolis that has been rebuilt as Neo-Tokyo, where the government is […]

G.I. Joe: The Movie (1987) | Don Jurwich

June 8, 2018April 18, 2019 qwipster Comment is Closed

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Rounding out this trio of Hasbro toy-based films put out by Marvel/Sunbow in the mid-1980s, “GI Joe: The Movie” has the dishonorable distinction of being funneled straight to video and subsequently syndicated on television due to the lack of success for the “Transformers” and “My Little Pony” movies at the box office the year before. […]

My Little Pony: The Movie (1986) | Mike Joens

June 2, 2018April 18, 2019 qwipster Comment is Closed

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Marvel joined with Sunbow to deliver the first of four animated feature films based on Hasbro toys in the 1980s with 1986’s MY LITTLE PONY: THE MOVIE, which took the popular toy line of dolls resembling ponies and other animals (plus a few humans) and pitted them against three dastardly witches who can’t stand their […]

The Transformers: The Movie (1986) | Nelson Shin

May 25, 2018April 18, 2019 qwipster Comment is Closed

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The first of four feature-length ventures between Marvel Productions and Sunbow Entertainment that centered on toys made by Hasbro, THE TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE would make for an ambitious way to not only sell toys and entertain fans, but also to set for a new course for the animated TV series, in this bridge between the […]

The Black Cauldron (1981) | Richard Rich & Ted Berman

May 5, 2018April 18, 2019 qwipster Comment is Closed

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1985’s THE BLACK CAULDRON represents Disney at its nadir as an animation studio, resulting in a box office failure and years of obscurity. It’s first PG-rated animated feature struggled to find an audience clamoring for its dark and violent tones. However, it has garnered a significant cult following over the years, with its tales of […]

The Last Unicorn (1982) | Jules Bass & Arthur Rankin Jr.

March 10, 2018April 17, 2019 qwipster Comment is Closed

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Rankin and Bass, the team that brought us Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer as well as the ThunderCats, brought this charming animated feature featuring Japanese animation from the team who would go on to form Studio Ghibli, and voiced by stars like Mia Farrow, Jeff Bridges, Alan Arkin, and Christopher Lee. Peter S. Beagle adapts his […]

The Secret of NIMH (1982) | Don Bluth

December 30, 2017April 16, 2019 qwipster Comment is Closed

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Don Bluth’s first big screen effort under his own name after splitting from Disney, along with several other Disney animators and artists, in order to try to return to the kind of groundbreaking style and commitments to storytelling that their former company had been skimping out on during the 1960s and 1970s. THE SECRET OF […]