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Prepare Your Child for a Lifetime of SF
Monday, May 04, 2009
So I'll assume that after reading my previous article “How to Get Your Girlfriend to Want to WANT to Watch SciFi” you've already conquered that hurdle, and are now moving on with your family. Next up for SF assimilation is your unwitting offspring – they'll thank you for it when they're older.
There's only one thing you need to bear in mind when choosing TV for your spawn to watch:
Sound.
Wait, I'll say it again:
SOUND.
No matter how developed the urchin is, he or she will be instantly attracted by good sound design and great theme songs. To this end, here's three ways to get things off to a good start, catering for the most 'antsy-in-the-pantsy' child you could present:
1. Star Wars
You should probably stick to the first one (IV: A New Hope), as the other 'episodes' have a lot more graphic stuff, that you might not like your beautiful young person imitating – notably, Salacious Crumb happily picking away at C3PO's eyes... I still wake up at night, terrified that my son will have found his way into our room, cackling quietly... Of course, if your child is a little older, you can provide some more of Ben Burtt's (Star Wars sound designer) work in the Indiana Jones films and Willow. On a side note, it can be fun to stand by the TV and read the 'crawler' whilst pointing to the words – gotta get that literacy education in where you can.
2. Haim Saban & Shuki Levy
These guys are the unsung legends of eighties and nineties kids TV, moving between writing music and producing shows. Depending on your taste, and quite how much violence you're prepared for your child to see, there's a lot to choose from:
Attack of the Killer Tomatoes (the animated series, not the weird Troma film)
Dino-Riders
He-Man
Inspector Gadget
Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors
MASK
Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers (and its spin-offs)
Samurai Pizza Cats
Ulysses 31
The Real Ghostbusters
StarCom
Mysterious Cities of Gold
Saban has made himself a bona fide, honest-to-god BILLIONAIRE from these and other shows, and as much as it's popular to hate on big business... well, I think he deserves most of that cash. Many of these are available cheaply on DVD – go get 'em.
3. Transformers: The Movie
No, silly! Not Michael Bay's boring 2007 Transformers – the awesome eighties Transformers, complete with ecological messages, Frank Welker and Stadium Rock soundtrack! Nothing will bring a tear to your eye quite like hearing your kid sing along to Lion's version of the theme song:
“TRANSFORMERRRRRRRRS!
[in robot voice] ROBOTS IN DISGUISE!”
...yes. My two year old boy does the robot voice. Envy me.
