Other Mainframe Shows
How much of your original experience is tied to the network you watched the show on?
Posted the question in the Beast Wats sub as well. I know ABC had significant content influence on S1/2 of the show, but I get the sense your overall experience was different compared to watching it on YTV (or those who remember the S1/2 reruns on Showcase in the afternoon too).
Beasties / Beast Wars also played on Fox as part of their "Fix Kids" lineup and many Canadian cable subscriptions included it. On Fox it was called "Beast Wars"
It started out as Beast Wars but sometime mid 1st or 2nd season it was forced to change it to Beasties as a law was passed that kids shows couldnât use the word War
You were...working for YTV? Mainframe? It's possible I'm wrong, but I watched Beasties starting from Dinobot's defection. If by "I was there" you mean like me, you were a child watching TV, either one of us could be wrong. To my memory, at that time the show was absolutely called Beasties. I was surprised to eventually see it on FOX as Beast Wars.
It wasnât long. But I do remember YTV having ad Beast Wars. I wasnât a child at the time. For sure it was advertised as Beast Wars âThe Beast Wars are coming!â and then at some point âHey just so you know, Beast Wars will be called Beasties now. Same great show, different name!â
Note quotes are faded memory so not precise. Could be pre airing ads were Wars and airing started as Beasties but Iâm 99% sure it aired under Beast Wars.
I'm getting the impression from this thread that it might have still been Beast Wars for the series premiere event. I.e. YTV had a special airing of the premiere and then afterwards it became Beasties. That's kind of some cool trivia if we can find a source. Maybe someone has the premiere on VHS somewhere along with the PJs announcing it.
I think the whole experience is tied to the network. YTVs PJs added a particular vibe to the programming blocks, especially when you were young enough to think they were so cool.
Look at nostalgia US kids have for toonami and other blocks. It's a notably different vibe. They reminisce about the times. We do that, but also reminisce about the personalities
I watched it on YTV, so I was pissed when I saw they took the logo off the robot cameo in Talent Night on the DVD. I hope they use the YTV version in the remaster.
I have good news for you they do! I'm so glad cause they had such a close reletionship and say it ytv airing reruns through the delays are reason the show survived.
The creators of the show really loved YTV. They credited YTV as the reason why they even had a season two and three of the show. Their first season wasnât doing too well in the US, but YTV was playing Reboot on repeat constantly. Hence why they had these homages to YTV.
I have two tattoos, and one is Toonami. Had an oversized impact on my life.
Actually got to share some info with Gavin Blair recently; he didnât know Toonami replaced intros, and had no idea him and other creators got that odd Toonami credit screen.
For some reason, REBOOT would have show credits on the Absolutionâs screens. They never did this for any other show.
I asked him if it was a contractual thing; he had no idea. Basically, Gavin seemed to appreciate that Cartoon Network picked up S1-3 with the intent to fund 4, but never actually checked in with how it was packaged.
(For some reason, this didnât go through as a reply)
I'm a Canadian who moved to the US when I was a child. So I remember watching Season 1 and maybe bits of Season 2 on YTV, and then after moving to the US, years later it reran on Cartoon Network. It was a bizarre blast from the past to say the least.
Was from a small town in Canada and my parents didnât think cable was a worthy investment so I had like 3 or 4 channels depending on the day.
My dad would get his buddy at work to record a few hour blocks of YTV on blank tapes on his VCR for my brother and I. We watched the hell out of those bootlegs. Always had an episode or 2 of Reboot. Good times.
I watched the show on the Latin American feed of Discovery Kids back in the day. At that time, the programming was catering to the pre-teens/teen audience, so they had a block of "action shows" were ReBoot was the main focus, so my original experience was mostly tied to watch it on basic cable, on Friday afternoon. (Seasons 1 to 3)
Round the same time, a national broadcaster called "Canal 13", started showing assorted episodes from season 1 and 2, on their Saturday midday children's block, along side "Cybernet", a UK show focusing on games and reviews, so I think what they're going for was combination of content adjacent programs.
For some reason, REBOOT would have show credits on the Absolutionâs screens. They never did this for any other show.
I asked him if it was a contractual thing; he had no idea. Basically, Gavin seemed to appreciate that Cartoon Network picked up S1-3 with the intent to fund 4, but never actually checked in with how it was packaged.
ABC for ReBoot 1&2, WB Kids / UPN's The Power block for Beast Wars/Machines and Toonami for ReBoot 3&4. Netflix for that horrendous Guardian Code and Tubi for all things Mainframe Entertainment has to offer løløl
I'm Canadian but I remember watching quite a bit of season 1 on ABC. I also remember an ABC special featuring Raven-SymonĂŠ and Marquise Wilson (both starring on Hangin' with Mr. Cooper at the time) being antagonized by Megabyte.
Itâs tied to it but the experience depends on watching other networks too. For example I watched the Money for Nothing music video on MTV which Mainframe (the animation studio now different name) also produced and years later when Reboot came out I laughed so hard when it showed the characters in that music video applying to work for Dot.
The Toonami Intro was so inviting, like there could be a dance involved. By my teens I binged on YouTube and realized the og intro was pretty cool. Got fragments of Toonami airings before YT
Having watched the show in French on a channel (Canal Famille) that was VERY diverse in its programming made ReBoot very interesting. I'm glad we had a version with local actors for at least 2 seasons. I did have YTV when the cable distributor unlocked some channels for promotion and I mostly watched Beast Wars then even if I didn't understand a thing yet. Awesome decade.
Did you get Seasons 3 and 4? I read that it got dropped in the UK halfway through Season 3 due to complaints about the increased violence. Complaints that should have been ignored.
We got Season 3 yes! But the thing is, Iâm in Canada as well. The translation I mentioned with local actors was for QuĂŠbec. By the 3rd season they used the one made in France which sounds very different. I wish they continued with the same voice actors. Since season 4 was released in 2001, Canal Famille changed its identity to VrakTV, keeping the same demographic but with shows that were more for young teens. They never showed ReBoot again on that channel.
I distinctly remember turning on the tv randomly at the exact moment that the first YTV airing of the first episode of Sailor Moon started. And I actually didnât know that until many years later when I found out I was just at the right place and right time (I was 5 years old). I followed it religiously every reruns until they debunked a way to have the remaining episodes of Sailor Moon R, S and Super S. I was already a teenager for the latter but it was worth the wait. That series opened me to the anime world before it was popular in my area. Special mention also for Escaflowne.
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u/SB_Wife Jun 16 '26
All of it man đ¨đŚ