“Undeclared” was Judd Apatow’s next foray into television after the demise of “Freaks and Geeks”. He even cast a few familiar faces in the pilot. The show follows the hilarious adventures of a group of college freshmen. Much of the dialogue was improvised, so I think that really heightened the humor.

Some people say it wasn’t as good as its predecessor, but I love both shows. It was the American debut of Charlie Hunnam, star of the British version of “Queer as Folk”, so I watched “Undeclared” first (and thus without predjudice for F&G). Not that it mattered much, since in typical Fox fashion, the show was short lived.

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Since the Wachowski’s Speed Racer has been giving the franchise a bad wrap, I decided to scour the internet for fond memories of the “Speed Racer” cartoon. Maybe by doing so, people could forget about the bad reviews.

Let’s start off with a little historical background from SpeedRacer.com:
“Speed Racer began as a Japanese “Manga” entitled Mach Go Go Go created by Tatsunoko Productions in 1966.

In 1967, the 52 episodes of the series were dubbed into English and syndicated nationally on television. For nearly 20 years, Speed Racer ran in the afternoons five days a week. During this time the world of Speed Racer was deeply etched into the memories of millions of youngsters who would rush home from school to see the show.

Speed later enjoyed a comeback on TV in the 90’s on MTV, and then ran for almost 5 years on the Cartoon Network.”

I’m pretty sure I watched it on Cartoon Network in the wee hours of the morning. I don’t remember much about the plot but I do love the characters.

In both the film and the show, I’m most drawn to Racer X.

Maybe “Speed Racer” was too simplistic and thus wasn’t the best candidate to become a movie. I know it’s supposed to be a kids movie, but that’s no excuse for mediocre screenwriting. Even “Dora the Explorer” has a plot that makes sense and is entertaining.

My advice is to skip the IMAX version and just watch it on a lcd television, so at least you can still enjoy the special f/x without having to stress about the meandering plot.

More sad new today, The Weinstein Company are making a live-action “Fraggle Rock” movie.

Is nothing sacred? Are the 80s just pure fodder for film remakes? And why can’t they stay true to the original format? Not so long ago, if the original tv show had puppets, then the movie would obviously have puppets (i.e. The Muppet Movie). Or if it was a cartoon, then the movie would be a cartoon like with The Jetsons: The Movie. Honest and true to the source.

I don’t see the absolute need for a “live-action” interpretation. I really think movie audiences can handle the puppets. Plus, I’d much rather have it stick close to the original instead of turning into some bloated cgi-character mess like Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Source: I Watch Stuff