90s | Pop Culture | Cartoons

5 Cartoons Whose Worlds Are Pretty Terrifying When You Think About It

Have you ever actually sat down and thought about the shows we loved watching as a kid? Maybe it's just the gift of hindsight talking, but it's pretty hard to do so without going "Man, how did I never notice how weird that was?"

Even if we kinda noticed it, we definitely never thought hard enough about these shows to realize that the worlds they take place in can be pretty messed up. In particular, these 5 are especially weird.

The Flintstones

You're probably confused right now, as The Flintstones have been a kid's TV staple for decades now, always with wholesome fun and telling kids to take their vitamins. What could be dark about this?

Hanna-Barbera

Think about this; have you noticed something in common about just about all the appliances and construction vehicles in this world? Yeah, they're alive, and can usually talk. In this Stone Age world, almost all of our manual labor is done by dinosaurs and early mammals.

Hanna-Barbera

Not only that, but we see some of them going through some pretty horrendous conditions, usually with a comment of "Enh, it's a living." It's basically animal cruelty that everyone's completely fine with.

Hanna-Barbera

Hey Arnold!

Okay real talk for a second here; the world of Hey Arnold! is so freaking haunted it's insane. Almost every week the kids have a new story about some weird urban legend that may or may not be true. Things like The Pigeon Man.

Nickelodeon

Sure, Pigeon Man just turned out to be a misunderstood guy who looked after his pigeons and lived on a roof, but a bunch of times these episodes end with straight up assurances that the ghosts are in fact VERY real.

Nickelodeon

Like when Four-Eyed Jack turned out to be a legitimate thing.

Wikimedia

Or the ghost train

Nickelodeon

If you thought those were messed up, wait 'til you see the rest...

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Fred Wolf

Seriously, how would you react if you stepped outside your house and saw four giant, green, humanoid turtles walking around in the worst trenchcoat disguises ever? I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be to yell "cowabunga, dude!" and offer them some pizza; it'd actually probably be screaming and running away.

Fred Wolf

Even aside from all the mutants that constantly pop up in the show, remember Krang and his army of Rock Soldiers from Dimension X?

Fred Wolf

There is literally an evil talking brain in a giant robot body from another dimension, who has an entire freaking ARMY at the ready to spill over into our world and wipe us all out. This is some scary stuff!

Fred Wolf

Scooby-Doo: Where Are You?

Hanna-Barbera

So for starters, there are more monster and ghost sightings in a single season of Scooby-Doo than there have been in the history of the world.

Hanna-Barbera

Sure, all of them turn out to be bogus, but could you imagine if there was a story about a massive haunting in the news every single day?

Hanna-Barbera

Not only that, but the monsters are always revealed to be these super-genius master criminals who are trying to get ahold of some kind of wealth. Are jobs really that few in the universe? Can none of these guys even get a design job or something?

Hanna-Barbera

Every superhero cartoon ever

Warner Bros.

Whether it's Batman: The Animated Series, X-Men, Spider-Man, or even The Tick, the 90s were absolutely filled to the brim with awesome superhero cartoons that we couldn't get enough of.

FOX

Y'know what's not so awesome though? Being someone in these cartoons who doesn't have superpowers.

FOX

Think about it. Every episode you see the heroes fighting off some awful, world-ending supervillain who probably have body counts the size of Texas. Characters like Apocalypse, The Joker, and Dormammu are all some of the scariest mofos around, and sure, if you have quick healing, super strength or thousands of gadgets, maybe you'll stand a chance against them.

Sony

For the rest of us? Well, better hope you never get in their way at any time ever, because otherwise you're pretty much guaranteed to just flat-out die. If you're LUCKY.

Warner Bros.

Share with anyone you know who loves old cartoons!

More Throwbacks

90s

Remembering NFL in the 90's

NFL in the 90s. The Golden Years of FootballIf you can cast your mind back to what the NFL was like in the 90’s, you can perhaps remember some of the great teams and players of the time, not to mention some of the important milestones as well. Maybe you remember the Dallas Cowboys winning three Super Bowls in four years or when the Denver Broncos won a perfect season in 1998. Of course, there are plenty of memorable player moments too. Like when Dan Marino won the title of the best all-time passing leader. Or when Jerry Rice

90s

Brace Yourself: The Backstreet Boys Released A New Song And Are Going On A World Tour

The Backstreet Boys have been one of the biggest bands in the country, well, the world for several decades now. After getting their start in the early 90s, they've managed to be one of the very few bands that has stuck together and continued performing. They didn't need a big reunion, because they didn't break up. Well, let's just pretend like that whole Kevin fiasco didn't happen. But anyways, they've been putting out music and performing together for 25 years now, and they have no intention of stopping. To be fair, they did warn of this two decades ago. They

90s

Lip Smacker's New Christmas Collection Brings Back Your 90s Favorites. All Of Them.

If there was one product that you had to pick that would best represent what it was like to be a preteen in the 90s, I think a lot of us girls would agree that Lip Smackers would be the best choice. These little tubes of oftentimes glittered, scented, colorful lip-balm made us all feel like the fanciest of ladies, totally ready to grab our purses and do whatever it is that our moms did when they weren't paying attention to us. You had so many different choices too. You'd have a classic berry scented red Lip Smacker, you'd have

Pop Culture

The History of Roulette

Roulette is well-known as a classic casino game in both land-based and online casinos. It is based on the fundamentals of placing a bet to see where a ball will land once the wheel is spun. Offering a thrilling and elegant kind of entertainment, it has been popular for many years. But what are its origins, and how has it developed? Beginning of the Roulette WheelThere are various tales of where the Roulette wheel has its origins. The name itself points to where it was born; ‘roulette’ means ‘small wheel’ in French. Some sources date the formation of the game

Pop Culture

Top 5 Movies Set in Las Vegas

There’s something about Las Vegas that has always made it a place of great fascination for filmmakers. One of the main reasons has to be the way it looks – quite unlike anywhere else on earth. With the flashing signs that can be picked out by orbiting spacecraft and the sheer investment that has gone into creating this amazing oasis in the heart of the Nevada Desert it’s a film set that’s already been built. The fact that it’s only a relatively short distance from Hollywood itself – an hour by plane – is also strongly in its favour

Life

The Evolution of the NFL

The NFL may be the single biggest sports league in the world, but it’s been a long and winding route to reach this point. Many of the major changes that have brought us here have taken place in the last thirty years, but none of these could have happened without what had gone before. For example, while there are now 32 teams split between the National Football League and the American Football Conference, this division dates back to merger that occurred in 1970 between the NFL and its rival the American Football League. And, while there have been countless