For TV shows:
Earthworm Jim - Funniest random show ever. I can't believe I missed out on this show as a kid. Peter Puppy's quickly become my favorite character on that show. For laughs, my favorite episode was Peanut of the Apes (same episode where Peter transforms into a haggis in the third act). It's also one of those shows with a bunch of famous voice actors (remember, Earthworm Jim was voiced by the same guy who voices Homer Simpson), though what I tend to enjoy is that they don't make much of an effort to disguise their voice. Professor Monkey-For-a-Head sounds exactly like Ed Bighead.
As TV Tropes points out, this show "played with and subverted about five tropes per week".
Family Guy - Usually funny. It's true that it's basically random jokes, but I like it when they catch me off guard. Favorite joke is
Peter with the anvil (it would take longer to describe than to just show it).
Futurama - Pretty good all-around. We turned to it after the Simpsons got too out there and dumb. The only trouble was the botched scheduling of the show during its original run. We watch it on Cartoon Network now, but hate all the weird commercials they show in between.
New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh - I usually overlook this because this seems like one of those "for kids only" shows (although some of the Nick Jr. shows would better qualify), but it'd be a shame to forget that I adored Eeyore and Rabbit. What ended up becoming my favorite episode was one I would have hated as a kid for not having enough funny: "Find Her, Keep Her" which is a sentimental episode about Rabbit taking care of a bird named Kessie, then being unable to let go once Kessie grows up and wants to fly off on her own. The ending was so perfect that I didn't want an inevitable sequel because it could never live up to the original. And a sequel came and it couldn't live up. Special mention to Gopher and his involuntary whistling during his speech.
Robot Chicken - Liked it in the first two seasons before it relied too heavily on the low-brow jokes. What I tended to like were the sudden violence parts. A few sketches that were my favorites were Napoleon Bonamite, Numbchucks (kid tumbling down a hill while numbed from novocaine), and Super Mario Bros. meets Grand Theft Auto.
Sonic SatAM - Way WAY better than Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog. Everything the Nostalgia Critic said about it is true (and he gave it a glowing praise-worthy review too), including the injustice of the show being cancelled after its second-season cliffhanger (though in retrospect, they finished off Robotnik by then, so the only loose end was how they'd continue the story after they pretty much wrapped it up). Drives me nuts that Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers was responsible for kicking it off the air.
South Park - I only watch the stuff from recent series, and even then I usually forget that it's on. But sometimes it's pretty good. I started watching it when Nintendojo said the next episode would feature Cartman waiting for a Wii and having to deal with sea otters in the future. I was more jazzed about seeing the sea otters than the Wii, but it was still an awesome episode. And there was also the excellent "Make Love Not Warcraft" (especially when Cartman flips out in rage after he's killed a second time). But my favorite South Park episode of all time is Season 8's "Woodland Critter Christmas". Not because of the evil animals, but because Stan fights against the narrator the whole time, not wanting to take part in what the episode wants him to do, and yet he's forced to anyway.
Super Mario World - The show kinda sucks in retrospect (I preferred SMB3 mainly for the "Mush-Rumors" episode), but hey, seeing Mario on TV was awesome back then. And I wasn't aware of Sonic SatAM at the time. The reason I remember this show so much is that I wanted to see an animated Yoshi, which was before I heard his voice. But easily the best episode was the last, "Mama Luigi". It's kind of fitting it's since turned into the foundation of YouTube Poop along with the Zelda CD-I cutscenes.
Tiny Toon Adventures - My cartoon of choice as a kid (whenever Looney Tunes or a Mario cartoon wasn't on). Favorite episode is Kon Ducki. I mainly watched the show for Fifi the skunk, one of those cartoon characters I had a crush on.
There used to be a Redwall cartoon where each season covered a different book, the first season being "Redwall", the second being "Mattimeo", and the third being "Martin the Warrior". I was a big fan of the books, and seeing a screenshot of Martin from the third season influenced me to read that book early on, which quickly became one of my favorite books in the series. So naturally I wanted to see the third season. And I did, by buying it on DVD. And it was awesome. Then I was... er... *cough*partially responsible for the whole series getting uploaded on YouTube*cough*. Which gave me the opportunity to see the other two seasons. First one sucked but featured some iconic characters of the series, and has the best-looking design for Cluny the Scourge ever. Second one was, surprisingly, better than the third. I had forgotten, Mattimeo just had a better storyline. Tim Curry as the voice of Slagar really made that fox villain shine.
I had hopes that animated films would be mentioned, but I guess not. So I'll talk about them:
Balto series - The first film was brilliant (although the real-life story is much more interesting). Lots of memorable characters in here like Balto, Jenna, Steele, and my favorite of the bunch, the overlooked Star. Kevin Bacon does the voice of Balto here, which I'm sure will open up the possibilities for Seven Degrees of Kevin Bacon quite a bit more. It's also something of a cult classic film for furries (along with Disney's animal version of Robin Hood). Second film sucked with its weird "get in touch with your spirit, find out who you are" theme, but it had Aleu and some beautiful backgrounds. Third film... some think it was wonderful due to being closer to the first film, but I thought it sucked even harder for playing it safe. Stella being one of the most embarrassing characters in history didn't help. I had more fun watching some YouTuber try and fail to understand the movie in Spanish.
Ice Age series - First film, wonderful. Second film, not quite as much. Third film surprised me, it wasn't bad (although I mainly paid attention to the antics of Scrat and the female squirrel-thing Scratte). But looking back at them all, the main thing I enjoyed was Scrat. So really, give us a Scrat-solo film already!
Lion King series - First film is iconic and is still surprisingly good. I recommend getting the Special Edition DVD (or whatever the latest re-re-release of it is) for extra-sharp details. IMAX version was awesome (particularly the opening shots) and I hope that's the print they used for the Special Edition DVD, because I don't remember it looking that good. Second film... well, I thought it was great, kept getting better each time I watched it (I was suppressing the lame parts apparently). Kovu's my favorite character in the series. But the third film is even more of an accomplishment for giving Timon and Pumbaa serious character development, enough to make me finally respect them as characters rather than sidekicks. The scenes with young Simba are priceless. But what I like most of all is that nearly every Lion King song sounds awesome in any language. Try it, go to YouTube, they have every song in almost 30 different languages. I always thought Scar's German voice was the best for him.
"No King, No King, Lalala" scene in multiple languages. You get to hear the word "Idiot" in almost 30 languages!
Plague Dogs - It's very violent, depressing, and hard to sit through. I wouldn't say it's as hard to get through as the book, since the book insists on going into every gory detail (I only got a third of the way through). So it's even more of a miracle that it exists at all, and it's even more daring than Watership Down was. What I liked most about the film was the Tod and his Geordie accent, just adds a irresistable flavor to everything he says.
Ratatouille - The problem with Pixar films is that they're all so good that they cease to be super (or you're just getting sick of Pixar topping the ratings list every single time), so I can't name a favorite Pixar film (and don't you DARE bring up Finding Nemo. I've already seen that 20 times). This was the exception. Somehow, this film stood out as being my favorite of them all. Was it because it had a talking rat in it? Probably. Or maybe it was the realistic-looking food. Or maybe it's the amazing attention to detail, like when Seymour darts his eyes when reading a letter (which is how reading normally works). I can't describe it except that Ratatouille had some kind of magic the other films didn't have.
Spirit Stallion of the Cimarron - I just watched this for Rain. Most attractive mare ever (
screenshot), used to be #1 on my Favorite Characters list until I found out about the Redwall series. But it turns out the film also has some stunning backgrounds (since backgrounds were one big part of what they focused on, going so far as to make the whole film Cinemascope because of it, it better be stunning). And it was a pretty enjoyable film by itself too.
Watership Down - It may be flawed, but you will never find a more faithful adaptation of the book. I heard that when Americans first saw it, they sure weren't expecting it to be as violent as it was. But I say good, because I don't think you'd ever get away with a film like this nowadays. I loved the book for many things (such as balancing several main characters), but what I liked most in the film was Kehaar.
Special mention to Opus & Bill in "A Wish For Wings That Work". I thought the movie was terrible, but at least now I know what Opus & Bill are like in animated form. Somehow Opus being voiced by the same guy who did Chaz Finster in "Rugrats" totally fits.
