Wednesday, June 9, 2010

JEM is Truly Outrageous



Jem, getting her mack on

OK, do you guys remember Jem? I was going into Jr High when this cartoon came out, so I was too old for it (which didn't really mean anything because I still watched The Gummi Bears.) I remember not liking the Jem cartoon. There were three reasons for that. One was because there was a shot of the main character making out with some guy during the opening theme and that embarrassed me. Two was that I was a die hard fan of Barbie and I didn't like the fact that another doll was coming out and trying to compete. Third was that I found the song ridiculous- most of all the part where it says "Jem is Truly Outrageous, truly truly truly outrageous"- I thought the pairing of the words was odd. When you are saying something is outrageous, that usually sums it up without adding truly. And then to even say a person is outrageous as their main adjective...It is just...odd. Unless you are a drag queen or design for Heatherette- then that is good, of course.

I mean...her mouth is open!

With that being said about the cartoon, let's focus on the dolls! I found that I love them. I didn't love them then, but I love them now. I ADORE the packaging, which looks like some sort of Popsicle box. For those of you who are like me and don't know these characters, let me tell you: These ones below are the good guys (Pictures are from Jemgirl on Flickr by the way, these are not mine.)

I know the guy is Rio, the purple hair is...shit..I need to find out, either Shana, Kimber or Aja. The blond is Jerrica and the pink hair is Jem.


Below are the bad guys, The Misfits. In case you were not aware, the thing that makes bad guys bad guys is that they are not as pretty as the heroine/hero. They are usually downright ugly, with more angular features. Smaller eyes, pointier noses. In this case, they got the yucky colors: Acid green and such. Pinks and lavenders are reserved for good guys!
 


Pizazz- watch out bitches!

Roxy- Loving the Lada Gaga eye makeup

Stormer



Jem/Jerrica

Aja

Shana

Raja

Synergy!

Kimber

Danse

the Jem Star Stage!

A Fierce Outfit!

The contents of the Jem Starstage- totally awesome

This is Jemgirl's display room- I actually think this is really cool.

So check this out, the whole idea for the Jem cartoon was all marketing for the toy. Hasbro had the idea for the doll, and wanted to create a cartoon around the doll to market it. They hired some Japanese animation studio to do the cartoon and American Writer Christy Marx to create the story lines and characters. Marx had already done some successful cartoon/toy stuff, such as G.I. Joe and Transformers. There has been a renewed interest in these 80's toys because of cuckoos like me I presume, so Hasbro has re-acquired the rights to a bunch of their old toys that they thought were over. Jem might be coming back out, y'all. I am mentally adding her to my list of future Halloween costumes.

 
Opening to the cartoon: