SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron

Hey everybody it's Chuck and Stacey from VO Buzz

Weekly and you are listening to geek geek geek

geek geek geek geek geek one more one more epic

fail Welcome to episode 75 of Tooncast Beyond,

brought to you by the Geocast Radio Network.

I am your host, Steve G, and joining me today

is Steve Megatron. I return, yes. Yes, and we're

here to talk about a 90s cartoon that we both

loved at some point or another. This is before

Beast Wars, but after Turtles had already started,

yada yada yada. today we jump in the turbo cat

to talk about swat cats the radical squadron

originally we were going to talk about season

one by itself but since swat cats the radical

squadron only had two seasons with a total of

23 episodes for the whole thing we're going to

talk about both seasons later in the season breakdown

For now though, let's head to JT and Just the

Facts on Swat Cats the Radical Squadron. Hey

guys, JT from Saskatoon here with the Just the

Facts all about Swat Cats the Radical Squadron.

Taking place on an alternate reality earth populated

by anthropomorphic cats, Swat Cats follows the

adventures of Jake and Chance aka Razor and T

-Bone, the titular heroes as they fight crime

in Mega Cat City. Once part of the police -like

enforcers, they were dishonorably discharged

from the service after being blamed for destroying

Enforcer HQ while pursuing Dark Cat, the primary

villain of the series. The boys are forced into

an indentured servitude of sorts, running the

city's salvage yard in order to pay back the

millions of dollars in property damage they allegedly

caused. While lamenting their fate, Jake and

Chance discover the salvage yard contains a wealth

of advanced military technology and machinery

and decide to become vigilantes. They construct

a hangar underneath the scrap yard containing

their highly advanced fighter jet, the Turbocat,

as well as other assorted crime -fighting vehicles

and gear like the Glovatrix. Regularly facing

off against villains like Dark Cat, the Passmaster,

Dr. Viper, and the Metallicats, Razor and T -Bone

must also deal with the fact they are wanted

fugitives, being constantly pursued by Commander

Ulysses Farrow and the Enforcers. Farrow, incidentally,

is kind of an asshole, and the one responsible

for the destruction of Enforcer HQ to begin with,

which also kind of makes it his fault for the

Swat Cats being born anyhow. However, not everyone

is against the Swat Cats as they have an ally

in Callie Brakes, the deputy mayor of Mega Cat

City under the cowardly Mayor Manx. She summons

the Swat Cats with a special communicator whenever

the enforcers are unable to handle whatever is

threatening the city. Created by Christian and

Yvonne Tremblay and produced by Anabarbera Productions,

Swat Cats premiered on September 11th, 1993 as

part of the syndicated animation block, The Fantastic

World of Anabarbera. SWAT Cats also ran on TBS

as part of their Sunday morning in front of the

TV block and was a mainstay on Cartoon Network

throughout the mid -90s. The series ran from

1993 to 1995 for a grand total of 25 episodes

and one special across two seasons. The show

is most fondly remembered by fans for its distinctive

voice cast. Series leads Razor and T -Bone were

respectively voiced by Barry Gordon and Charlie

Adler. might be familiar with their work? Both

worked in voice acting throughout the 1980s,

with Mr. Gordon voicing Donatello on the original

TMNT animated series in 1987, and Mr. Adler voicing

Silverbolt, leader of the Aerial Bots on the

G1 Transformers animated series. SWAT Cats also

featured Jim Cummings as Mayor Manx, Tress McNeil

as Kelly Briggs, Frank Welker as Dr. Viper, and

Gary Owens, the original Space Ghost, as the

voice of Commander Farrell. The show also featured

the likes of Mark Hamill, Neil Ross, April Winchell

and Rob Paulson in recording and one -off voice

roles. In addition to the voice cast, the show

featured a few notable touches that endeared

it to fans even to this day. One of which is

surely the somewhat cliched use of guitar riffs

and power rock music in each episode. I say cliched,

but I loved every chord. A main feature of the

show was one of the most recognizable theme songs

of the early 90s. I would put this right up there

with Ron Wasserman's go -go Power Rangers in

terms of sheer get -you -pumped -up kind of energy.

Another reason the show has remained such a fan

favorite may be the switch from Anna Barbera

in -house staff animation to Japanese animation

studio mook animation for the entire second season.

This resulted in a more dynamic anime style which

also increased the intensity of the on -screen

action. And despite the kid -friendly nature

of the series the show featured some darker story

elements than most shows at the time were likely

to use. A good example of this was in the first

season episode, The Giant Bacteria, where Dr.

Viper horribly mutates a one -off villain named

Morbulous into a hulking monster comprised of

bacterial cultures in order to steal some chemicals

from Mega Cat City Labs. I don't think it's escaped

any fan's notice that the show was largely created

as a response to the overwhelming success of

Ninja Turtles in the 80s, which in and of itself

kind of created a small anime Thank you so much,

JT, for those just the facts on SWAT cats. Now

it is time for our history with the show. Steve,

did you watch this show as a kid? I did. And

it was great. Yeah, you were seven, eight when

this came out. Something like that. Yeah, I was

13 in 93. So I used to watch a lot of television,

though. So not anymore now. Yeah. And I just

don't have time for that anymore. among other

things, but so yeah, I think I saw some of it

initially when it came out on TBS, but I believe

that most of my rewatching was on Cartoon Network

and Boomerang. Right. And I just remember enjoying

the show and I was like, oh, so it's like Batman

and Ninja Turtles if they were cats. Yeah, pretty

much. I was like, it's awesome. I'm going to

watch it. And I never realized how many people

were in it that I'd heard in other programs.

Like I knew Jim Cummings was in it. I knew Barry

Gordon was in it because of Ninja Turtles. I

was like, oh, that's Donatello, you know, in

there. And then, you know, Gary Owens and Some

of the other characters I just I couldn't play

some when I first listened to it and even now

I still can't play some of them. I know that

Frank Walker's a particular character in there

as well and The the show like one I love the

theme Which is why it's used on GCR and wars

I love the season 2 version of the theme Is it

the one that I use on Warner's? I don't know.

But that's the one that I love. So, I'm looking

through here. I'm gonna find out. To see if we

have Brock Peters as Dark Cat. Dr. Viper was

Frank Welker. I knew he was. I just couldn't

place the name. Yep, Season 2's intro is the

one I like. Yeah, me too. It's the, and then

it goes, and then you see the jet, and yeah,

I love that theme so much. That was the theme

that I was like, that is the most awesome theme

in the world. It is very much so. And that's

why I still use that GCRN wars. I got another

excuse for using it too because Dark Cat was

in the tournament, so. True, very true. Did you

know that T -Bone is voiced by Buster Bunny?

Charlie Adler? Yep. Yeah, I wasn't, I could place

it, but I couldn't place it. Yeah, I couldn't

place it at all, like until I just looked at

it. I know I like T -Bone's voice, I've always

liked T -Bone's voice, but I never could place

that it was Charlie. Nope, I never could either,

and like I said, Barry Gordon was very easy to

pick out. Yeah. But he doesn't really change

his voice all that much he just kind of You know,

yeah his voice is his voice and he used his voice

He uses different inflections in different things

depending on the lines But it's essentially still

his own voice Which that's one thing that I absolutely

love about him because he doesn't need to do

him There's so many other people that do impressions

or mimics or whatever and that's great I love

those but I also love someone that can just use

their own voice to create characters with, which

is so cool. When was the last time, before you

went back this time, you saw the show? So before

we'd researched it for this podcast, when was

the last time you actually watched this? About

two years ago. Really? Yep, because I actually

bought the DVDs. Cool. Yeah, I caught one or

I looked up one or two episodes a couple of years

ago But I never actually like sat through and

watched the whole show So for me, it's probably

been about 15 years or so somewhere around 2000

or 2002 or so that I saw it last I Think I got

that. I'm not entirely sure if I got that for

review or not. I want to say I didn't But I remember

getting the DVDs. I just I can't for the life

of me remember when the DVDs came out What did

you remember about most about the show before

catching up with it recently Well one the jet

Turbo cat. Yep, the jet is like my main and then

the gear that t -bone and razor have when they're

going through And then of course you have, you

know, the Metallic Hats, Dark Cat, Dr. Viper.

Those were, those are my main memories of the

show. Right. Prior to this. And you almost got

like a Bebop and Rocksteady out of the Metallic

Hats. Oh yeah. And Dark Cat, you had like the

Shredder. Yeah. If you were a crime boss. Pretty

much, yeah. Mixed with Dr. Claw. Yep. So, it's,

yeah, I really enjoyed a lot of the nature of

the characters and what they were trying to go

for. Absolutely. For me, I remember most, obviously

we talked about the theme song, but I remember

the theme song the most. I remember both T -Bone

and Razor as characters. I remember... Remembered

one of the villains, but I used the wrong name

for him when we were we were originally gonna

do this a while We're gonna record this like

six months ago folks. We just couldn't get to

it then And I asked you oh, what's that villain

on swat cats? Is it the taskmaster the this master

the and I'm like, oh, it's the past master Yeah,

the time -traveling villain. I kind of liked

him only because of the dark cats the dark swat

cats thing that had that i love that episode

that's my favorite episode of like storytelling

kind of thing because let's face it like these

this series does tell a story and it is very

good but it's still at the same time is a 90s

cartoon that does villain of the week stuff You

still have overarching things in this cartoon

like Feral's always like oh those SWAT cats I'm

gonna arrest them. Well, I kind of get like if

you had J Jonah Jameson as Commissioner Gordon's

job and they're like I'll get you you know and

I'm just like okay I get it. Yep. He hates the

you know I'll get those SWAT cats. Yep. absolutely

and what level of a fan were were we heading

into the prep work for this record I love going

back and watching this show can I watch all 23

or however many episodes there are no I can watch

specific ones though I mean there's at least

Seven or eight out of these episodes that I would

love going back and watching like if I was There

is a thing a while ago on another podcast on

the network talking in circles They did like

what is your cartoon TV lineup or weekday afternoon

TV? This is most definitely be in my lineup one

of those days Yeah, I mean I could see that too

I I was a pretty decent fan of it back in the

day. I mean I like I said, I used to watch a

lot of cartoons so this was on my my list of

things to to watch between like the various Batman

series or Marvel series or Ninja Turtles or at

the time Beast Wars, so I watched an obscene

amount of animation during the 90s. Yep, absolutely.

So it is now time for the season breakdown and

we are going to talk about SWATCAT Season 1 after

this. And I guess you must have stopped the bomb

from wrecking the city. Basically, yeah. But,

uh, you better pick me up at Enforcer headquarters

before Feral comes back and sticks us with another

bill. On my way. Alright, we are back talking.

SWATCAT Season 1. Do you have a favorite episode

or story arc or character moment from Season

1? Uh, I have... Have some some episodes I like

the metallic hats Because you kind of get your

introduction to them And I kind of like whenever

We get an episode well one you get the past master

showing up which is the first episode But then

the wrath of Dark Cat, like, I love the character

of Dark Cat. Yeah. Just because he's so menacing,

it's kind of hard to think of how, you know,

just how would they beat this guy, like, who's

very brilliant. Yet always loses. Yeah. much

for me with this one I I like both t -bone and

razor but if I had to pick one between the two

of them I would probably pick razor because he's

just slightly cooler in my personal opinion Favorite

episodes out of season one there really aren't

there is an overall story arc, but there really

isn't like individual story arcs or anything

like that I like the very first episode the past

semester always rings twice. I think that's very

very cool The dark cat episode so wrath of dark

cat night of dark cat I like the metallic cats

episodes you know that episode you have the professor

who's trying to do something good, but just can't

do anything good with the Metallica hats. I like

Chaos and Crystal because that's the one with

Rex's shard. For some odd reason, I really remember

that villain. I remember his design. I remember,

you know, and I hadn't seen this in years. The

ghost pilot was good, the red links and the blue

manks, because apparently the blue manks is the

great grandfather of mayor manks, of course.

And then enter the mad cat. They have to do a

late night television parody. That's just hilarious.

And you basically have like the trickster joker

type of character. Yep, pretty much. absolutely

I think the pacing of the season was done well

I think that each episode went fairly well nothing

was too fast nothing was forced there were no

real cringe -worthy moments or lines or jokes

or anything like that did you have any highlights

or lowlights from this season not really I mean

the only thing you kind of get is like commander

feral kind of uses the same canned lines of You

know He almost seems like your your typical 60s

Kind of character, you know It almost like how

you would have the police in the Scooby -Doo

episodes Oh, yeah, it would have gotten away

for you know, if it worked for these these meddling

kids, you know, I mean, it's the same type of

tone basically you're getting with him but he's

like you know kind of a bumbling idiot that's

put in charge and then Razor and T -Bone have

the hots for Briggs and Farrell's daughter. What

I find so infuriating about Farrell is even in

the first season I think it's even in the first

episode Where the episode where they go back

and give the origin for chance and Jake Chance

uses the same line, you know, that's our Mark

or whatever it is feral, you know It's our tag

or whatever. He says that twice both not as a

swat cat and then later as a swat cat you'd think

feral being a Police chief or commander or whatever.

He would you know put two and two together. Apparently

math is not that cat's, uh, strong suit. No,

definitely not. No. Up next is Swat Cat season

two breakdown. We'll be back after this. I told

you not to take this hero stuff too seriously,

sir razor. We can't let her marry the past master.

Sunrise is only a couple of hours away. Alright,

we are back here on Tooncast Beyond Episode 75

talking Swat Cats The Radical Squadron Season

2. This season had some really cool episodes

in it. A bright and shiny future, which is a

past master episode. I love that one. Razor's

Edge, which is pretty much all about Razor who

thinks he's injured some civilians when it's

not really what happened. It gives great character

development to Razor. I thought that was really

cool. Swat Cats Unplugged was not exactly what

I thought it was going to be. I thought it was

going to be them, you know... At a rock concert

that was acoustic or something for some odd reason.

I don't know why I thought that but yeah The

origin of dr. Viper I love that because it's

an origin episode the dark side of SWAT of the

SWAT cats this to me Should have been the series

finale or at least the season finale if the series

was going to continue basically flip -flop episodes

9 and 10 and I would be more than happy to say

that the dark side of the swat cats was the series

finale for this because this is the one where

they get hurled into an alternate dimension where

evil versions of themselves are not only wanted

for just about every crime but they're also working

for dark cat yeah I What's funny is I completely

agree with you with all of these episodes that

you've picked so far for season 2. The only one

I would add to it is the unlikely alloys. Yeah,

I like that episode. I don't dislike that episode.

I'm just saying that I wish that 9 and 10 were

reversed. So unlikely alloys would be... The

second, it would be the penultimate and then

the dark side, the dark side of the SWAT cats

or whatever it's called would be the finale.

But yeah, I like Unlikely Alloys as well. What's

unfortunate is there were six other episodes.

Yeah. That never made it to the light of day.

Yeah. Which is sad. Yep. And then kind of rounding

that out. There's There was at some point who

knows what stage in this it is now, but Tremblay

Brothers Studios was back in 2015 It's been that

long, which is ridiculous that it's taking this

long, but There was an estimated delivery for

November of 2015. Yep for the revival of it.

Yeah for the revival And their pledge goal was

50 ,000. They got 141 ,500. Yep. And... Nothing

has ever come of it. No. And it was... I would

love to see this. See, what I'm wondering about

this is... You know, I know people have told

me how Kickstarter works. If you don't get funded,

you don't... The project doesn't have doesn't

happen or something or other this this is what

essentially the funding got the funding stage

is the basic funding for the 50 ,000 they met

the goal of the new TV series Bible three scripts

character design and concept art the Hundred

thousand dollar goal was production of a two

-minute animation teaser to establish the look

of the new series Had they hit 200 ,000 there

would have been a production of an all -new complete

episode of 22 minutes So there's actually really

nothing to see Aside from a two -minute animation

teaser if there is one If they'd hit a million

there would have been a production of a five

-part miniseries of episodes So 22 minute episodes

five apart and if they would have hit 1 .5 million,

they would have done a 70 minute directed streaming

movie Right See like And it says they're looking

for or they were looking for investors to you

know I think this would be perfect for Netflix.

I really do. I wish they would take it. Yeah

That would be the only way I'd sign back up Yeah

But yeah, no swat cats the reticle squadron season

two highlights for me from this season are The

storytelling in the dark side of the swat cats

The origin of dr. Viper because I never expected

to see that but very very cool Anytime chance

and Jake are messing around with each other but

that was really really cool I was hoping in the

episode that it's chance has the fear of Swimming

He doesn't know how to swim. I thought they were

going to show Jake having some sort of thing

that they could help each other with, but they

never actually did. The pacing of the season,

I thought, was very well done. I really grew

to enjoy Feral's daughter as a character, because

she was pretty much a kick -ass kind of... Well,

and she was starting to kind of grow in season

two. Yep. Yep, so So we are going to head on

to see how the season held up So possible Topics

here that we can talk about did the season keep

your interest throughout? Are you itching to

watch the next season now? Well, there is no

next season for the series, but well there could

be if there could be market this Would you continue

to watch this show after this season? Would you

recommend this season of the show to people?

Would you show your children this show? That's

a question for you later. Which I'm pretty sure

isn't new, but we'll talk about that later. So

the season, both seasons of SWATCast, since we're

talking about both of them, they very much did

keep my interest. There was only a few times

that I... was disinterested and most of that

had to do with mayor manx and his golfing oh

my god looks like sultan in aladdin like literally

i don't want to yeah um as i said earlier as

far as are you itching to watch the next season

now i can go back and watch various episodes

of this and very much enjoy myself because it

takes me back to the 90s and absolutely love

that I would definitely recommend for people

to watch this series I would so tell people to

watch SWAT cats because it was just a fun little

action cartoon What about you? Everything except

your the the kid question. What are your thoughts?

I Think it's held up pretty well. I I didn't

really have any moments where I was Disinterested

other than the fact that the mayor is is the

most boring part of the show and I get it like

they have them there but I would continue watching

it if they revived it and came up with the Swamp

Cats Revolution and I would be itching to see

more if they had it but they don't. But yeah

I would definitely recommend this season and

this show to people. Absolutely. All right, now

let's talk about cartoons and kids. Would you

show this to your kids at any point? It's hard

to say. Would you like to expand on that? Not

really. Okay. Alrighty then overall grade for

GCR and Universal Ratings scale. Let's see zero

to five stars What would you give SWAT cats the

radical squadron a series as a whole? I'll give

it a four point five Because it's it's got its

couple of moments, but it's not I like it graphically

and I like the the story and The voice acting

and it's it's just it's a pretty solid show the

only gripe is Between the Annoyingness of the

the mayor and the the fact he didn't get enough

episodes. Yeah a proper send -off Yeah, I'm right

there with you 4 .5 as well Animation is well

done in my opinion the meat. I love the music

of the series Love the theme song The characters

are all very well done Very very interesting

stories overall I'm hoping if we do get Revolution

that we get more stories with the villains that

were there. Other villains as well. So there

is that. We are gonna take one final break and

then we're gonna have the last word after this.

Then Saturday morning rewind is the podcast for

you Join them each month as they talk about classic

cartoons and interview legendary voice actors

like Jim Cummings Cory Burton Rob Paulson Nancy

Cartwright and many more so grab a bowl of Lucky

Charms Put on your hammer pants go to Saturday

morning rewind calm And be prepared to feel like

a kid again Once again, that's Saturday morning

rewind calm Saturday morning rewind was voted

best podcast ever by its host him Nydell So it's

gotta be good on the simplistic reviews podcast.

We talk movies We talk TV We talk trying to make

our spot sound more exciting by adding explosions

Yeah, I'm pretty sure you did it got the point

across with sound effects. Not the real thing

Download the show on iTunes or simplistic reviews

dot blog spot dot com. I'm sure your insurance

company will cover that No, they won't. No, they

probably won't. I know what we're doing today

We're going to tackle this podcast thing. We've

got to do something really special. It has to

be cool Daily in audio form and undetectable

by radar something that screams summer. I know

let's do a Phineas and Ferb review podcast We'll

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I think if we're not careful Candice is gonna

bust us You can find Pauka on the GeekCast radio

network iTunes blog talk radio and all of the

other methods you find podcasts Okay, then carry

on we are back here on to cast me on episode

75 And we're gonna close out swat cats the radical

squadron Steve what? Would you like to say anything

else about the show anything we missed or any

of that kind of stuff? I don't think there's

anything I missed but I would definitely say

it was a fun and entertaining show to to watch

and great DVD series even though there's not

really anything in the way of special features

it's literally just episodes which is something

that Warner Brothers home entertainment is terrible

for for old stuff like there's no extras it's

it's literally just DVD yeah that's yeah they

are terrible at that at times yeah at times unless

it's a new show if it's a newer series they're

they're awesome but Yep, so the show is on DVD

so you can get it that way That's gonna do it

for today's episode of tooncast We'd like to

thank you for joining us here on the show and

of course we invite you to get into contact Leslie

feedback for our shows This is the website geek

cast radio .com leave the chose feedback in iTunes.

Please do this follow us on Twitter You can follow

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enjoyed this episode of Tooncast Beyond which

will join us next time when we will be giving

you our thoughts on X -Men 1992 the animated

series with myself and Eduardo talking about

season 2 of that show For now I am TF2 and Mike

with Steve Megatron Phillips Thank you for listening,

until next time.