Worst Of The Worst: Blatant Kid Show Rip Offs

The Biskitts

What It Was Ripping Off: The Smurfs

While a more obvious choice in this instance may be The Snorks (essentially Smurfs living underwater) the short lived cartoon The Biskitts was an even worse offender. Essentially The Biskitts were tiny dogs dressed like Robin Hood who lived in a forest and were chased around by a dastardly King, his court jester and a dog. Hmmmm, magical forest creatures and a dastardly evil villain who lives in a decrepit castle trying to catch them. Sound familiar?

Samurai Pizza Cats

What It Was Ripping Off: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Lots of cartoons rode the popular coat tails of the TMNT formula by taking anthropomorphic ______ who fought crime and were totally radical. None were so eye rollingly obviously stereotypical than Samurai Pizza Cats. I mean the name alone makes you wonder how they didn't get sued for copyright infringement or plagiarism or something, despite the slight tweaks and changes. Just watching the intro. makes me want to bang my head against my keyboard.

Too Many To Name

What It Was Ripping Off: Scooby Doo

Once Hanna Barbera realized that Scooby Doo was a hit, they decided to mass produce the formula ad nauseum. Typically it involved: Teenagers + (insert dog/animal/anything sidekick here) x solving some sort of mystery - originality = Cartoon . While I admit that as a kid I watched a good chunk of these, it still boggles the mind how many Scooby knock offs were released. (Just a note: I did not compile the above video in any way shape or form)

Tiger Sharks

What It Was Ripping Off: Thundercats

Like Hanna Barbera the creators of Thundercats wanted to see if they could catch lightning in a bottle twice...hence the Tiger Sharks. Part of a variety show The Comic Strip Tiger Sharks was so painfully similar to Thundercats that it could've easily been a parody. From the opening which is almost frame by frame the beginning of Thundercats to the premise that simply replaces people from an alien planet that have cat-like abilities with people from an alien planet that have aquatic animal abilities. Not surprisingly a lot of the same voice actors were used as with Thundercats.

Tattooed Teenage Alien Fighters From Beverly Hills

What It Was Ripping Off: Mighty Morphin Power Rangers

Similar to TMNT once MMPR took off so did tons of shows that copied the basic structure, which involved teenagers getting powers beating up weird Japanese rubber monsters. Not only does TTAFFBH have a ridiculously long comical name (seriously that could be the worst name in television history), but the opening is pretty much the mirror image of Power Rangers.

-Astroboy