Jonny Quest!

Melashaan posted a neat meme that I think I'll end up taking part in as soon as my brains are unfried from finals. Right now though, my brain is latching onto this:

I still wish that the Jonny Quest mini DC teased would've made it out (I blame Venture Brothers for this). But it just seems, overall, that this long dead market has been revived, and I'm actually a little surprised.

There was going to be a Jonny Quest mini?! Really?!

I LOVE Jonny Quest! Pretty much any version of Jonny Quest, though my heart beats hardest for the original version that I watched in already twenty-year-old reruns as a kid. I rented the DVDs a while back and actually, they hold up surprisingly well as adventure stories.

Well. Okay. With one ENORMOUS caveat. Because the racial/ethnic portrayals in the show are horribly horribly problematic sometimes.

And by "problematic" I mean of course "racist as hell". At eight, of course, all of this went right over my head. (The privilege of being white and not having to think about things like that.) Hadji's "Sim-Sim-Salabim" was the least of it, really. Cringe-worthy doesn't really cover it.

For the record though, I was CRUSHED that Hadji never, or almost never, did that in the 90s version of the show with the stupid 3d stuff. I mean, even by that point, I was old enough/aware enough to know that there was quite a bit of racism involved. But I never could quite get my inner eight year old past the point of "But magic is AWESOME!"

Hadji was always my favorite character. And while I loved the addition of Jessie in general, I was always annoyed that he seemed to get the shaft in favor of all the stupid Jonny (Johnny?) and Jessie 3d adventures. Hmph.

The one thing that never went over my head was how, well, gay Benton Quest and Race Bannon were. Though I'd forgotten how blatant it was. I'd actually gone into watching the DVDs bracing myself for disappointment. Quest and Bannon were kind of sanitized into standard adult-character-asexuality in the later versions of the show I think. They were still constantly together of course, but it was fairly able to be dismissed with at least potential readings of them as straight.

The sixties version...um...no. Not at all. And there is no way that animators/writers in the 1960s didn't know exactly what they were doing. There's outright entendre (there's this whole bit with a whip in one of the early episodes, I think they're in Egypt. Admittedly, it's all set up so Race can use it to dispatch a scorpion planted to kill Dr. Quest, but, yeesh), long lingering looks, unnecessary physical contact, and scenes drawn to resemble old pulp comic images, with Dr. Quest usually drawn in the damsel-esque pose. Usually with the most awesome expression of arrogant disinterest ever.

Seriously, it's all "Yes, I don't want to get bitten by all the snakes, but honestly, you're a moron and my boyfriendbodyguard is totally going to kick your ass. You should just shoot us. Imbecile." (Favorite. Couple. Ever.)

Whoever does the expression work for the original show should be kissed. Because where later series Benton tends to look all absent and vaguely befuddled, 60s Benton Quest ROCKED the arrogant scorn. His expression's constantly all "Yes, I AM smarter than you. And so are my kids. And my bodyguard is hot. YOU are a pathetic little pissant who only wishes you were lucky enough to be me." It's awesome.

I think the quintessential episode of the original sixties version of the show is the one where natives capture Dr. Quest and some other scientist, and Race and the boys have to rescue them in a complicated scheme that amounts to Race dyeing himself purple and emerging shirtless from the river to convince the natives that he's the avatar of their god. Can we say 'Horrifically Racist', boys and girls? Egads. At the same time, the other scientist's reaction is priceless. Quest is all smug, in the "See, we're fine. My bodyguard will save us" sense And the guy just keeps staring at the large near-naked purple man with an expression that clearly says "bodyguard. Right. So THAT's what they're calling it these days. We're all going to die."

To be fair, a lot of the toning down probably had to do with the increasing focus on the kids. (No one wants to imagine their parents as anything but asexual, I think. :-)) The original sixties show was, despite the name, a lot more centered around the adult characters, with the kids as basically subplot characters via investigating stuff, coming to the rescue or being kidnapped. On the plus side, the racism got toned down as well, which is good. On the downside, so did the random and gratuitous violence. Which makes me a sad kalinara.

The show's a horrifically guilty pleasure. And honestly probably the reason I never much cared for Venture Brothers. The sixties version has more sexual overtones, more offensiveness, and more moments of hilarious WTF than the Venture Brothers could ever pull off. A parody is simply superfluous.

I do love the later versions as well (far less guiltily, too) and I would totally buy a miniseries! Darn you DC!