The 1980s were a time of excessive everything: excessive clothing patterns, colors, money (wealth or lack thereof), hair volume, glitter for some reason...

One particular excess was the "toy cartoon" (or "30 minute commercial" if you prefer). All "your" favorites fall into this category: He-Man, GI Joe, My Little Pony, Care Bears, Transformers, and even my beloved Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

By the time you get to the end of the '80s, companies had turned to video games for "cartoon worthy content." Shows like Captain N: The Game Master and Legend of Zelda (obligatory "well excuuussssee me, Princess!") fall into this category.

For some reason, when the 1990s roll around that content search had extended to turning '80s movies into kids cartoons - and many times those movies were rated R! And that's the setup for this list...

This segment was used in the full 2 hour long episode #101 of the RubberOnion Animation Podcast (click to listen to the entire episode)
 

You can also listen to just this 20 minute segment on SoundCloud

To the list! Starting with...

#5:
"Conan: The Adventurer" (1992)

Ran for: 65 episodes
Source R-Rated Movie: "Conan the Barbarian" (1982)

You know what was popular? He-Man and the Master of the Universe. Kids loved that cartoon. It had monsters, sorcery, an annoying sidekick, a prince who turned into an unbeatable superhero who rode a freaking tiger for crying out loud! At the time, the toyline was a must-have. If you had “Castle Grayskull” with its inexplicable array of stickers, you were king of the block!

This seems like a deviation, but it’s not. There was a rumor in the ’80s that He-Man was based off the Conan the Barbarian (see? it’s coming around). The rumor continued that the cartoon/toy character was altered a bit in appearance, background and name in order to avoid being associated with the very adult themed apparent source material. Roger Sweet, the designer at Mattel who created He-Man, denied the rumor since he designed the character a couple years before the movie… but Mattel was still sued over copyright infringement. They won. He-Man lived on.

The point being that a little less than 10 years later, executives in a room somewhere went (and I’m paraphrasing/making this all up) “Hey! Remember how He-Man was kind of Conan the Barbarian for kids? Let’s actually do that. Making the same thing a second time with even less originality is ALWAYS a good idea!” That was pretty glib, but you get the point. Here’s a quick list of scenes that were in the original movie taken directly from IMDB:

• A sex scene involving a witch becomes violent when she turns into a demonic creature. She is then thrown into a fire only to return as a ghostly ball of light and flies around chaotically.
• A camel is punched in the head and falls unconscious to the ground.
• In an orgy chamber, disfigured men are seen hacking human corpses and dismembering the bodies in preparation for a cannibalistic feast.
• A man is hacked numerous times in the neck until he is decapitated; blood sprays from his wounds graphically. The man’s head is thrown at a crowd of onlookers and rolls down a long flight of stairs.

If that doesn’t scream “kids cartoon” I don’t know what does. Now I’ll grant you that Conan the Barbarian was a literary character created by Robert E. Howard but even that incarnation was also an incredibly violent thief. You don’t get a title like “the Barbarian” for nothing (setting aside for the moment“Thundarr the Barbarian” which was arguably a successful second take at a Conan-like character which met some success).

The Conan the Adventurer cartoon was actually brought to us by the great Sunbow Entertainment who brought such shows as: GI Joe, Transformers, Jem, My Little Pony ‘n Friends and The Tick! As a matter of fact, out of that lineup, only The Tick and Conan the Adventurer were original productions (not original properties). At least one of them was successful.

The way they got around the violence was by having the Serpent Men (they were the main baddies, part of a cult) banished at the touch of Conan’s sword, not killed mercilessly. It should be noted that this series spawned another called “Conan and the Young Warriors” but the poor thing only ran 13 episodes.

Check out the opening theme song which has the narrator jump into to tell the plot of the show and then jump back out again almost random.

#4:
"Swamp Thing" (1991)

Ran for: Only 5 episodes
Source R-Rated Movie: "Swamp Thing" (1982) by Wes Craven (technically PG but see below)

Swamp Thing was created at DC Comics in 1971 by writer/artist team Len Wein and Berni Wrightson. It’s basically a vegetable monster defending the environment… violently. Even though it was originally a horror comic, it wasn’t until Alan Moore took over writing the character inSaga of the Swamp Thing (in 1982) that he truly earned the “horror” title. As a matter of fact, that run pushed the boundaries of the Comics Code Authority (remember when that was a thing?) so much that eventually they just left that mark off the book’s cover. Innocents would die horribly and would never be avenged; the villains got it even worse.

The same year as Alan Moore took over the horror comic duties, the movie “Swamp Thing” by horror icon Wes Craven was released. Now I have to clarify something, this is a bit of a stretch to the titular Top 5 list. It’s not technically rated R. BUT… keep in mind two things. This was at a timebefore the PG-13 rating even existed, so the line between PG and R was thinner and it actually was going to be rated R before some gratuitous nudity and sexual content (remember, vegetable monster) was removed – although it remained in the international cut. There was still violence in the movie like a guy’s head getting squeezed until blood comes out but cutting the nudie-bits was enough to get the rating to an R… leave the violence in-tact. By the time the sequel was made in 1989 it got a rating of PG-13, because that existed then.

The cartoon is an absolutely shameless plug for an unsuccessful toy line. It’s basically a miniseries. There was also a video game attempted for the NES and GameBoy by THQ. I say “attempted” because… THQ. The “Swamp Thing” cartoon was another in a long list of environmentally conscious shows like “Captain Planet” and our #2 cartoon series on this list.

Check out the “Swamp Thing” cartoon intro which is basically a butchered version of Chip Taylor’s “Wild Thing” with the inventive lyrics:

Swamp Thing!
You are amazing!
You fight everything....
...nasty!

#3:

"RoboCop" (1988)

Ran for: 12 episodes
Source R-Rated Movie: "RoboCop" (1987)

What could I possibly say about this movie turned cartoon series that hasn’t been said already. Let’s start with this, the movie was almost slapped with an X rating! Let that sink in for a second. In 1987 an R-Rated movie came out which was almost rated X. The very next year in 1988 a kids’ cartoon premiered featuring the titular character. “What’s the big deal? He’s just a robot cop” you might say. Well firstly… he’s not a robot cop. He’s part man, part machine, all cop. Let’s run through some of the violence scenes depicted in this movie, shall we? Again, taken directly from IMDB:

• A man crashes into a tank full of toxic waste. When he comes out, his skin is melting away. A car then drives into him and he explodes.
• A swarm of men have their genitals shot off. Very graphic. It is zoomed in on.
• [A] man is shot so extensively, his body appears to be practically ripped to shreds while he screams in agony. Still he survives this attack and one of the men finishes him with a single shot to his head. The back of his skull is visibly blown out.

Let me further paint the picture for those who haven’t seen it. This movie was resubmitted to the MPAA eight times to receive an R-rating instead of an X-rating. Want another? Since the cartoon and toy line was released the year after this original wannabe X-rated movie, “RoboCop 2” came out after the cartoon and toys and it was even more violent and over-the-top!

Even after all this, the idea of a kids-friendly RoboCop franchise persisted with a new cartoon series in 1998 titled “RoboCop: Alpha Commando” which lasted 40 episodes. It was basically Inspector Gadget.

#2:

"Toxic Crusaders" (1990)

Ran for: 13 episodes
Source R-Rated Movie: "The Toxic Avenger" (1984) by Troma Entertainment (technically unrated)

Oh man. Where do I start with this one? First off… “The Toxic Avenger” is a Troma film. If you don’t know what a Troma film is, I’ll let this selection from this movie’s parental guide area of IMDB give you a hint:

• A child on a bike is hit by a car, the car then backs over his head, crushing it completely.
• [A man’s] arm is ripped off and is put in a pizza oven.
• [A man] has a milkshake blender stuck down his throat.
• [A man’s] hands are deep fried.
• The top of a drug dealer’s head is crushed with a set of weights.

Again, I don’t know what was in the boardroom air the day a cartoon based on this movie was cooked up but someone was clearly watching Captain Planet and said “we need another environmentally conscious series, but let’s not have him be an attractive, blue man… he should be an ugly, green monster who cooks people” (see earlier pizza oven, blender and deep fryer “murder gags” – there’s something up with this movie and food preparation).

There’s really not much more to say. Making a Troma film, any Troma film into a kids cartoon seems irresponsible if for no other reason than the risk of the kid going to the rental store and seeing a whole movie (wow!) on Toxie, and renting it to see that lovable scamp from the cartoon I… oh… that was me. And then I watched more Troma films. And I turned out fine. I may be rethinking the point of this list. Whatever… on to number one!

#1:

"Highlander: The Animated Series" (1994)

Ran for: 40 episodes
Source R-Rated Movie: "Highlander" (1986)

I know. The source movie here is not nearly as violent as others on this list but let me explain. I thought much longer about this topic than you might think is appropriate for content like this but I did. My reasoning here is about the plot… the driving narrative of the story chosen to continue from the source movie into the cartoon. You probably all know about the movie “Highlander.” It’s about immortals who gains another’s power by decapitating them, with the ultimate goal being the ambiguous “prize” when there’s only one left… becaaaaaause…

OK so that’s the plot of the movie. What about the plot of the cartoon? Taken directly from the “Plot” section of the Wikipedia page:

The story unfolds on post-apocalyptic Earth, after a meteorite collision nearly wipes out all human civilization after setting off nuclear weapons. Following this catastrophe, Connor MacLeod (the protagonist of the original film) and the otherImmortals forswear the Game of fighting each other until only one Immortal remains to win the Prize…

But one Immortal, Kortan, refuses to swear the oath, he still seeks the Prize and now wishes to dominate the world. Connor challenges Kortan to a duel and is defeated and killed, as any Immortal who breaks the oath is destined to die. However, with Connor’s death comes the prophecy of the rise of a new Immortal, unbound by the oath, who will defeat Kortan… [who] establishes an empire controlling most of the planet, which he rules from his fortress Mogonda.

700 years later, a Highland youth named Quentin is killed trying to defend his clan, the Dundee, from Kortan’s slavers. He is the prophesied Immortal and returns to life. His dying mother reveals his true identity to be Quentin MacLeod from clan MacLeod, “The Last of the MacLeods”.

…it wasn’t uncommon for minor characters to die, and while Quentin took other Immortals’ power and knowledge without also taking their lives, Kortan still did it the old way, by beheading them.

That. Is the plot. For a children’s cartoon show. Quick recap:

• Post-apocalyptic Earth following meteorite and nuclear annihilation (a bit overkill, don’t you think?)
• Bad guy takes over the world for 700 years by beheading his enemies, who won’t fight back because of an oath they took… to protect humanity
• Good guy finds out he’s the prophesied one by dying and reviving only to have his mother immediately die in his arms
• Beheadings are the driving force behind the antagonists’ power, and therefore the source of the main conflict of the show

Let’s go back through the others on this list and what their driving plot points were. We had…

#5 “Conan: The Adventurer” searched the land for a way to cure his family of a sickness and battled a cult of serpent men by banishing them to another dimension
#4 “Swamp Thing” is a man turned into a vegetable creature who protects the swamp land and other natural areas
#3 “RoboCop” is a Cyborg cop with cool gadgets who fights crime
#2 “Toxic Crusaders” are a group of mutant superheroes who fight crime and those who do harm to the environment

Nowhere in any of those does the plot demand a certain level of beheaditude in order to progress the narrative. And that is why “Highlander: The Animated Series” is the number one choice on RubberOnion’s Top 5 Cartoons Based on R-Rated Movies.

Don't forget to check out my new animation made with Rob Yulfo, "What Was Wrong with MAN OF STEEL?" based of a discussion on the podcast right here on Newgrounds!
 

What would YOUR top 5 cartoons based on R-Rated movies be?

TL;DR If you can't have the plot without referring to decapitation, you might not be making a kids' show.