What did you Read and Watch As a Child? (2000, cartoons, tv show)

[nightbird47]

I read lots of science fiction and history. I also loved Mary Steward and her sort of novel. I read at an adult level early on so the kiddy books got boring. I also delved deep into history and science. But I'd say my most favorite genre is/was Science Fiction. For my senior year I wrote an analysis of Arthur Clarke's fiction which was over twenty typed pages and even listed all his stories and novels.

I found a taste then for the intellectual which I have never abandoned. Give me a great, feel good movie or a well done, deeply delving documentary, I'll go for the documentary.

I also took well to the darker story lines, and my favorite books, and tv/movie stories are dark. I also like survival of humanity sorts of stories, as some disease or alien wipes out most of it. This taste started back then in my early teens. Most of my fan fiction takes a darker turn than the stuff its based on. My trek stories are often about after our hero's lose the war. (of course, the pro stuff has also followed this path, and my stuff could fit well in the official stuff.)

[Gifted Lunatic]

Let's see, things I watched on TV:
The Cosby show
Happy Days
M.A.S.H
Punky Brewster
Family Ties
Duck Tales
Perfect Strangers
Full House
X-Files

I liked movies like
Clue
The Omen
Made for tv dramas, meant for adults lol

By the time I was 10 I was reading biographies like "Mommie Dearest" and "Alex: the Life of a Child, and some scary/horror books for both kids and adults, and the comic strip "For Better or For Worse"

[magpiehere]

I was addicted to all Nancy Drew books and read The Secret Garden and Willie Wonka over and over again.


Wasn't much of a TV watcher but The Brady Bunch was very popular and The Hardy Boys on Sundays nights as well.

[Hefe]

Originally Posted by magpiehere

I was addicted to all Nancy Drew books and read The Secret Garden and Willie Wonka over and over again.


Wasn't much of a TV watcher but The Brady Bunch was very popular and The Hardy Boys on Sundays nights as well.

Wow, you just reminded me of my Hardy Boys novels addiction!

In grade school I devoured books of every sort, way beyond my "grade level" probably because of my home situation I realize now looking back. Books were left in a bookcase in my bedroom from my uncle I think, & I just got lost in them staying up late reading, all sorts of books - novels, textbooks, science, poems...

No one else in the house read anything. I even conned the librarian at the library to let me into the adult section to get books, I was in 4-5th grade & wanted to read all the PG Wodehouse novels I could find. At about 16yo I gradually became more motivated to be more socially engaged & the reading levelled off, especially novels, but I still loved nonfiction.

One of the tv shows that struck a nerve for me was The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, besides the allure of being a teenager to this preteen, I was struck by Maynard G Krebs, the Kramer of that era. I became fascinated by beatniks & read everything I could about them, even listened to jazz (before the Beatles).

[Italian (x)lurker]

I'm 40
As a child I used to like sci-fi and still do
I watched stuff like Invaders, Visitors, Doctor Who, Man from Atlantis, Land of the Lost, Star Trek, Space 1999, Otherworld, Chronos, Land of Giants etc

beside The Edison Twins, Supercar, Automan, Manimal, Riptide, Chips, Starman, TJ Hooker, He shoots he scores, Life goes on, ALF, The wonder years, Starman, Little house on the prairie, The hitchiker, Twilight zone, Max Headroom, Small wonder, Sledge Hammer, Hunter, The Cosby Show, Megaloman and then Italian serials you never heard of so I won't say

I didn't read a lot, stuff they gave me at school was enough, only Mickey Mouse...

I was a very 80s tv kid

[stan4]

41.

When we were overseas (76-85), there really wasn't much English TV.
At 530 most week nights, there was a cartoon from the U.S. (Scooby Doo or something).
At the club (at American Embassy), there were sometimes cartoons running in a small theater.
They would also do movies in their big theater from time to time.
When we flew to Singapore or Japan or visited the U.S., we loved I Love Lucy, Gilligan...

What I did was read constantly. Won't make a list. It's just too huge. Everything from kid books to adult books to encyclopedias to folk tales to comics (my fave).
I remember a book I got in Amsterdam when I was 8...The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole. Love it to this day.
We moved back to the U.S. when I was 9 and I never really much got into tv (except TGIF with my family became a tradition).
Also watched Family Ties and Cosby.

My little brother liked He-man and GI Joe and other Saturday morning stuff, so I watched that with him for a while.
My dad loved Star Trek, so I became a fan.

I still read a lot. 5+ books a week. Almost any kind of book. Fluffy adventure books to business books to biographies to comics (STILL!) to horror to mystery. Guess romance is the only genre I don't do.

[sas318]

Originally Posted by jbgusa

You don't read or watch?

I don't like to read anymore. Believe me, I've tried. I have a really short attention span and find it difficult to stick with a book. I only have an attention span for short news articles. If there's a long article I'm really interested in, I'll stick with it even though I want to quit.

I still like watching TV, but on Netflix, but it's really hard for me to find a show I'll stick with. I'm really impatient with having to wait for plot and character development. But I still do it because I need a hobby to pass the time.

[crd08]

I read way more than I watched TV as a kid, but some of my staple shows (from elementary thru high school) were The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Lizzie McGuire, Power Rangers, anything with the Olsen twins, House and Grey's Anatomy...

I read too many books and series to list. I literally grew up with the Harry Potter series, so that was a big one. I remember waiting for the next book to come out. I read anything and everything from Goosebumps to Schindlers Ark. A healthy mixture of genres

[Kandamby87]

Though I am not a child now. But at this stage of age I like to see Cartoon a lot. Here is the list of Cartoons which I like at this stage of age "Tom & Jerry" "Nut Bolto" "Sisumour" is one of my favorite one.

[Maliblue]

Hmmm, I've never really tried to make a list of my childhood favorites before. Not sure where to begin or end it.

I will try to keep this to what was contemporary at the time (late 60's- mid 70's), which was about age 4-10 for me

TV:
1969: I missed the moon landing, but I remember my parents calling me in to watch it. I remember nothing happened for a long time, I got bored and whiny, and finally my parents gave up and let me go.
1969: I do remember watching the debut of Sesame Street on PBS; the musical, animated yellow dots on the blue field excited me the most.
1969: The Banana Splits (sub-Monkees for kids)
1970: Saw the debut The Electric Company on PBS.
1970-1973 My bedtime was still pretty early, so most of my TV viewing was before prime-time. So, I watched reruns of I Dream of Jeannie (Barbara Eden was my first crush), Batman, Lost in Space, Adam 12, Dragnet, The Mod Squad, and Mission Impossible (which bored me, but for some reason I liked the cars on that show)
1974 This was the first year I remember watching prime-time TV. I was into Emergency!, The Odd Couple, Chopper One (short-lived police show), Little House on the Prairie (which I kinda hated, but watched anyway), The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and the Bob Newhart Show (the last two because my mom always watched them) On PBS, I watched "Zoom!".
1975 Movin' On, a short-lived series about truckers, became my unlikely favorite (I grew up in New York, didn't know any truckers, never even heard a country music song before)

Radio:
1969-1972-ish WTFM I don't know why, but my toddler self preferred "Beautiful Music" stations (which was essentially muzak), and I used to fall asleep to mellifluous orchestral versions of pop standards.
1973-1975 WABC Top-40 hits. Anyone remember "Beach Baby", "The Night Chicago Died", "Billy Don't Be A Hero"?

Books:

1969: I learned to read with Richard Scarry's picture books, which also taught me how to draw.
1970-1972: My mom gave me a bunch of her old books. I was particularly fond of two of them, "The Moffats" and "Rufus M" by Eleanor Estes, which were written in the 1940's. I also got into the Henry Higgens series of books by Beverly Cleary (who is still alive, believe it or not, at 101 years now)
1973-1974: I got really deep into the "Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators" series of books about some crime-fighting sleuths who were still in grade school. Kind of the boys' version of "Nancy Drew".
1975: I recall "The Glass Inferno" being the first adult novel I ever read; I was obsessed with "The Towering Inferno", the movie based on it. I also read "Jaws" that year, after the movie became an obsession. "Jaws" is where I learned the proper word for a woman's private parts, incidentally...

Movies:

1969: My parents tried taking me to "Yellow Submarine", which I dimly recall, but got bored and acted like a baby, and they took me out.
1970-1973: I don't have vivid memories of going to the theater this time for new movies, but I do remember seeing 101 Dalmations and some other Disney stuff. "Island at the Top of The World" is one movie I recall seeing when new.
1974-1975: Ahhh...the greatest time. Disaster movies galore! The Towering Inferno! Earthquake! Airport 75! The Poseidon Adventure (re-released)! Jaws!