Toonami. Oh, Toonami.

The action block of Cartoon Network, it contained lots of anime and otherwise harder-hitting shows than the other hours of the day.

But what I think really set it apart was the idea behind the narrative. There's a humanoid robot, sitting way out there in his giant spaceship (the Absolution, I mean really, that is an awesome name), beaming television programs into our homes. And he wasn't just there for show, either. TOM and his various incarnations managed to give the ad bumpers personality, along with his swarm of little CLYDEs and SARA. Whether they were marching through the ship, landing on some barren planet to drill into, or bashing the camera across the ground, TOM and his buddies managed to add a little mini-narrative to tie the block together. Honestly, I don't remember that much about the shows they had on. I remember watching Sailor Moon, ReBoot, the Clone Wars shorts, and the first BIONICLE movie, but nothing else sticks out in my mind.

What does stick out is the sequence of TOM 1 walking down the halls of his ship before jumping into his chair to start the broadcast. TOM 3's awesome bulked-up form (and voice by Steve Blum) and the holographic SARA presiding over that night's boradcast. The stylized logos and bumper pages, and the simple accompanying percussive tracks. The beetle-like CLYDEs boring into the planed and shooting data (or energy? I never figured that out) back up to the Absolution. The amazingly well-put-together trailers and promos for different shows, all narrated by Peter Cullen.

It wasn't the shows that made Toonami, it was Toonami that made the shows.

May 26th. Let's hope it's done right.

In other news, I can no longer put parenthetical comments in the tags section because it is now stupid. I am not happy about this.