What A Cartoon!

Another month has passed at the Talking Simpsons Network, and that means we've got another awesome podcast about an animated feature film! This month, our $10+ Patreon subscribers get to hear us talk about 1992's Cool World! Listen now to this free extended preview, and then subscribe at the $10 level (or up your current pledge to $10) to hear the whole thing and all of our previous What A Cartoon Movie podcasts. Sign up today!

Chosen by premium Patreon subscriber Duckmeat, we're chatting about one of Disney's best recent cartoons, The Owl House! We first cover the career of series creator Dana Terrace and the show's many interesting inspirations. Then we cover the fourth episode of the series which is full of excitement and lore. So give a hoot and listen!

Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow our official Twitter account, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

CHOCOLATE! And by that we mean, we're returning to SpongeBob this week at the request of our guest (and one of our top Patreon supporters), Devin! First, we delve into the careers of a few unsung artists in the world of Bikini Bottom. Then we cover two of the best episodes ever from the end of the third season, so grab your candy bar bags and get ready for some fancy living!

Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow the official Twitter, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

Hokey smokes! Chosen by premium Patreon subscriber Phil, it's time to cover one of the most important (and best) TV cartoons ever made, Rocky And Bullwinkle! We delve deep into Cold War history to chart how this show blazed a trail for smart writing in kids TV, its crossover appeal to adults, its enduring legacy, and so much more. Then we discuss the finale of the season 2 classic "Rue Britannia" (freely available on YouTube), so listen and enjoy our friends Moose and Squirrel!

Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow our official Twitter account, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

Chosen by premium Patreon subscriber Royce, we're returning to Marvel's merry mutants and their Kids' WB incarnation! Yes, it's time for the often overlooked X-Men: Evolution, a show with ups and downs but far better than most people expected. Learn how the series came to be, the surprisingly strong animation it had by TV standards, and a good deal about Captain America and WWII in this week's early '00s appreciation podcast!

Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow our official Twitter account, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

Hey now, it's a preview, of a podcast, 'bout Shrek! Yes, this month's premium podcast for the Talking Simpsons Network is about the 20th anniversary of one of the most influential (and memed) films of the millennium! This month our $10+ Patreon subscribers get to hear us talk about 2001's Shrek! Listen now to this free extended preview of the adventures of an ogre, a donkey, and a princess. Then subscribe at the $10 level (or up your current pledge to $10) to hear the whole thing and all of our previous What A Cartoon Movie podcasts! Sign up today!

Chosen by premium Patreon subscriber James, we're exploring both the edgy comics of the '90s and the USA Network in the forgotten Savage Dragon adaptation! The series resurfaced unexpectedly on Peacock's streaming service, so we dive into its strange creation, the early '90s comic boom, as well as some tangents about the weirdest stuff that's happened in Savage Dragon comics. Listen now for a ride on the Cartoon Express!

Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow our official Twitter account, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

Hey everyone, the podcast embedded in this post provides an audio version of this update, but if you want a text-based version that's easier to reference, we're more than happy to provide it below.

Starting in July of 2021, we're changing the What A Cartoon schedule a bit—and don't worry, the PTA has not disbanded. As we did at the start of 2020, we're scaling back What A Cartoon a bit to better suit our production pipeline, and because of that we'll soon be producing two episodes of What A Cartoon every month. (And the What A Cartoon Movie schedule will remain unchanged.)

There's a much more detailed explanation of our decision in the podcast, but to make a long story short, our What A Cartoon episodes take a lot of work—often three to four times as much as an episode of Talking Simpsons or an episode of one of our miniseries. And for the sake of transparency, What A Cartoon isn't the most popular podcast we produce, so while we would never want to end it, we've decided it would be a better idea to shift some of our limited resources to content that's more in-demand (and give ourselves more time to produce each WAC episode).

So how will this change our podcast output? Not much, actually. So we don't have too many gaps in content, the first and third Monday of every month will feature a new episode of What A Cartoon, while the second Monday of every month will be the new home of Talking Futurama. And we'll still be posting What A Cartoon Movie on the final Monday of every month.

Of course, a handful of months out of the year feature five Mondays, and in that case, the fourth Monday will just be an off week. (This schedule, of course, is for our Patreon listeners on the $5 and up level, so if you're listening to this as a non-Patron, shift our new schedule forward one week and remove Talking Futurama from the equation.)

Because this new schedule means there will be fewer episodes of What A Cartoon per year, we're also winding down the $50 episode request tier and currently working with those patrons to get their final selections in. But this doesn't mean your input on What A Cartoon is over, and in the future we may have some ways for our listeners to choose the subject matter of certain episodes.

So, to wrap things up:

• Our new What A Cartoon schedule begins in July.
• What A Cartoon will now release on the first and third Monday of every month.
• Talking Futurama will now release on the second Monday of every month.
• What A Cartoon Movie will continue to release on the final Monday of every month.
• For the months of the year that feature five Mondays, the fourth Monday of the month will be an off week with no new episode.

Thanks for understanding, and once again, we couldn't do any of this without our great listeners. Scaling back on What A Cartoon will allow us to be more productive and also give us the opportunity to spend more time on every WAC episode without taking too many resources away from our other podcast series.

This week, we're covering a crossover anime hit sponsored by premium patron Loki! On the surface, the premise for Death Note sounds absurd: a magical notebook that kills someone if you write their name in it. Despite the outlandish premise, this hit manga series captured the attention of readers worldwide with its cat-and-mouse psychological thriller antics—all built on the foundation of very sound internal logic. And thankfully, the anime version adapts this compelling story as faithfully as possible. So listen in as we discuss the very first episode of Death Note, and try not to get hooked!

Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow our official Twitter account, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

Happy April Fools 2021 as we continue our podcast tradition of covering a live-action cartoon, and we've got a real cult classic for you! Created by Chris Elliott, Adam Resnick, and David Mirkin, Get A Life was a weird and transgressive Fox sitcom from 1990, and it has grown as a cult icon in the years since AND had immense influence on some of the best years of Simpsons. Listen now to learn how to stand in the place where you live!

Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow our official Twitter account, @TalkSimpsonsPod!