I think if you wanted to adapt Animorphs into a tv show today, it should be animated. A decently animated show would probably be cheaper than photorealistic transformations, aliens and trained animals doing things animals don't do.

"They have KNIFE-TAILS?" I'm so glad that ended up being a talking point. I would love to see an Andalite tail-blade duel on screen with decent effects.

Rachel standing next to Jake as he makes the call to Tom is even more heartbreaking when you consider how Tom's and Rachel's stories end.

I will always recognise Shawn Ashmore as "Jake out of Animorphs" first and foremost, regardless of how many other things I see him in

I watched the show a fair bit growing up and while I never got SUPER into it, one thing I do vividly remember is watching the scene about ordering 'a cheeseburger without any cheese ' as an 8 year old kid and trying that out at Burger King, only to discover that A) it was not, in fact, a secret password that would lead me in the secret backroom where all the cool shit was happening, and B) Fast food hamburgers actually taste like garbage without cheese on them. In this way, Animorphs made me wiser. More world weary. Anyways thanks for having me on dude! Always happy to voice robots terrified of giving themselves eternal trauma and stuffy lit professors ✌️

Fun story: when I was a kid and I saw the Animorphs book covers, I didn't realize they were novels. I just assumed they were picture books about people turning into animals.

"These are my terrible skeleton children." - LordRavenscraft, First Pope of Animorphs

Well, the TV show had two scenes that in my eyes should've been in the books. 1: The Animorphs let Jake go, and trick him in his dying hours into exposing a secret entrance to the Yeerk Pool. That was a move I was REALLY impressed with, it can be hard to follow someone without alerting the person you're following to their tail, and also, that was an impressive display of cunning that was a genuine surprise in that episode. All in all the ending to Jake's infestation in the TV show is a treat! 2: Escargot, Jake eats it in front of Visser 3 and his brother, very visibly likes it, and the two of them can do absolutely nothing to even voice their offense...need I explain more?

As someone who was unreasonably charmed by the Animorphs TV show and also as a person who to this day will see Shawn Ashmore in a production and say "hey it's Jake from the Animorphs TV show!", this was a delightful video.

1. Pop Arena: "Cassie is a moron". Lord Ravenscraft: "Cassie was right all along." Yeah, I'm with you on this, since her biggest flaw was her naivete. And being naive is not the same thing as being... not smart. 2. The Capture 2-parter is a really good acting showcase for Shawn Ashmore, too, from the snail scene to him as Ax doing a Jake impersonation. Also the actor for Vissar-3 is SUCH a fun ham. 3. I call shenanigans on Rachel morphing a monkey in the last episode, since she always defaulted to the most violent & destructive animal possible in any given situation.

Please never stop making hour-long animorphs videos

Thank you for this journey. I think I sort of stumbled on the tv show and the books at the same time? I remember getting some Animorphs books from the library and watching some of the show but this was a fun time to revisit. I really like that guy who plays Ax! He was on Royal Pains!

Knew nothing of Animorphs prior to your content. Now I am enthralled.

I had weird relationship with the show. I was a huge fan of the books, but my family didn't have cable at the time. Meanwhile I had a friend who had no interest in reading, but they loved the show. I think it aired late enough in the evening that I wasn't allowed to stay over with them to watch it, but it created a cool bridge for us where even though we had different interests, we could still play Animorphs and talk about our favorite characters and plotlines. And since most of what they told me lined up with the books, my dumb kid brain imagined it as some high budget prestige sci-fi drama that was everything I wanted, but it was always just out of reach! One time I got super lucky and found The Capture on VHS at Blockbuster, and aside from wishing Ax wasn't human all the time, it came pretty close to living up to the hype. Then a couple years later I found a tape of the first three or four episodes, which... gave me a much clearer picture of what the show actually was, but it still made me want to see how they adapted my favorite scenes from the later books, since I didn't realize how early it had gotten cancelled. Finally, about a decade after that, I found the entire series on KZfaq and binged it. And yeah, I don't think I would ever recommend the show to another adult, but as an adult I was able to respect when they made clever budget decisions, roll with the camp when they didn't, and my memory of the books was hazy enough that most of the small changes went over my head. I just think it's neat that a bunch of arbitrary media formats that basically don't exist anymore made me care way more about a show than if I'd actually watched it. And that the two versions of Animorphs were close enough that, when you boiled it down to two kids talking about how much they love Rachel or Marco, the differences weren't significant.

I recently watched the whole first season with my 7 year old. He loved it in all it's low budget glory. Then we played a game of seeing how many Animorphs actors we could spot in Goosebumps episodes.

we need more reasons to pull out the "MAGIC ALIEN COMPUTER NIPPLES" graphic, because it is Very funny

If only we could've had an Animorphs animated series... that would've at least solved the budget problem (or just made it less of a problem)

I am a 34 year old woman who grew up during the heyday of Animorphs and never read it but these vids made me start the series out of sheer intense curiosity.

Oh god hearing that theme song again took me places.

Apropos of 'the critically underrated Paulo Costanzo': I just started watching The Expanse, which only added further evidence to my assessment that that dude is never less than awesome in anything he's in.

okay, i will admit, the snail-eating sequence is a work of art

Can I just say that Shaun Ashmore absolutely *killed it* as Ax in Jake morph. His impression of Pablo Costanzo's version of Ax is great.

"To be… or not to be. That is the question. These disks I hold… Are they a record of what will be, or only of what may? For if the future is indeed immutably fortold… then my demise is but moments from that confirmation. for I… I could not live if not the master of my fate. But… if the future can be changed… if these disks record merely one path of all the myriad ways the cosmos might conform… then the power is infinite, and yet still limited, for they can be used but once, and in that change be rendered fiction forevermore. I could destroy them! But… no. T’would be a coward’s answer. I will know the truth instead. Then, t'will be either them or me that face oblivion... Till then" - Dinobot

I honestly think that Animorphs should be adapted into an animated show aimed at older audiences, sorta like Amazon Prime's Invincible. Even though the books were for kids and the stars are kids, it's a little hard to make violence and gore fun for the whole family in a visual medium, not to mention that most of the people who grew up with Animorphs... are grown up now. (I mean, I assume. Maybe there's some immortal sixth graders running around somewhere. I'm not omniscient.) I'm inclined to doubt that Animorphs is still super popular with children these days. What do kids these days read? Percy Jackson? What hath Scholastic wrought? edit: also I just rung the notification bell, I think you certainly deserve it :3

There was actually a book where Ax made a lot of TV references and was obsessed with soaps and commercials - I believe it’s the one where they turn into cows.

this whole series of videos has made me realize that Animorphs would benefit from a good animation adaptation, which would allow it to do necessary corrections *and* be faithful to the book

Me, reading a review of the Animorphs tv series: "Creating a skeleton key by rubbing a card on Ax's nipples." Me: That's some impressive hyperbole. Lord Ravenscraft: Ax's magic computer Andalite nipples! Me: OMG... that nipple thing wasn't hyperbole?!?

I always kinda figured a Chee (like Erek) would be resilient and heal emotionally after their actions. Like how a beagle is the preferred dog for animal testing because of their incredible ability to forgive and trust their handlers, a Chee would forgive the people who asked them to commit the Act. They may have perfect memory, but they are also perfectly loving, and they aren't simple playback machines. They can think through their experiences and rationalize... I think Erek would be ok as long as he had a loving figure to guide him right away.

I've always thought it wasn't anyone's fault that this show was bad, it just wasn't possible to do right on a Nickelodeon budget with 1990s VFX technology. If it had a real budget, they could have done it well, or even if they were doing it now with a comparatively smaller budget. But Nickelodeon was just never going to do it right I think due to a lack of resources more than anything else.

Bless us O Lord, for these thy gifts we are about to receive. Thank you for sharing you art and your gift with us! You made me feel much better about things when I wasn't in a good place, that will always mean a lot to me. Keep doing good and be safe my dear Raven ally

your reaction to CYBERIA made me chuckle because there's a cyberia cafe in the town i went to college in lol

I started with the Andolite Chronicles. It had a little comic strip at the bottom of each page that showed the Millennium Falcon-esque ship (the ship had a name, but it escapes me) heading into a wormhole. I never read any of the books and watched some of the show.

Oh my GOD the physical effect that being reminded of those transformers had on me. Most things from my childhood I get reminded of just make me go "oh yeah!", but that memory was *buried*. I had the tiger Jake and the "Tri-Rex" (maybe more?) years before I so much as looked at the series, and they were pretty crappy toys that fell apart and got lost piece by piece, so by the time I picked up an Animorphs book I had mostly forgotten about them and completely forgotten that they were themselves Animorphs. I didn't even remember they were the same toy line as each other, christ, I didn't even know they were actual Transformers. I genuinely just now learned every single detail about them and it's like, deep in the recesses of my mind, my four year old self just got dropkicked by forbidden knowledge.

I've never been so emotionally invested in a dissection of a subject matter that debuted before I could obtain my driver's license. Keep up the good work

I have been WAITING for this. I've read all 64 Animorphs books, including the Alternamorphs, but have never seen any of the show' I can't wait to suffer through it, as I expect I will.

I’m really glad I randomly remembered Animorphs a few months back which brought me to this channel. What a rabbit hole I’ve entered

It’s not perfect, but you can’t tell me that the theme song for the show isn’t awesome.

I told my friend (who was WAY more into animorphs than me) that you did this video and I'm pretty sure he recoiled in physical pain. Good time.

I actually knew Jonathan Whittaker (the actor who played Jake's dad) when I was a kid, so when I heard he was going to be acting in the Animorphs TV show I was super excited! And then watched the first episode and hated how bad it looked and felt bad cuz it seemed like I was letting him down specifically for not liking it. Also yes, Beasties is objectively the correct Transformers show to enjoy.

Scholastic making a TV show to encourage people to go read the books reminds me of all the anime series that were only ordered for one season because they ONLY exist to encourage people to read the manga.

The Capture was always my favorite book as a kid because as a kid with serious mental health problems, the description of Jake being tied up on a chair inside his brain screaming impotently at his body to doing stuff was a perfect description of how I felt. It put words on awful feelings I couldn't describe.

I have been waiting for this. I honestly forgot the tv show even existed until it appeared on Netflix.

I love the fact that while animorphs is a main stay, you still do the others topics which I find super neat!

I feel vindicated for all the times I've had to defend enjoying that show as a kid.

God, these are amazing videos. Also, I think the scene where Jake calls Tom was actually better than the version in the book. The music, the extended dialogue, the inclusion of Rachel and the others, and finally the shot of Tom’s hand just made it hit so much harder

I remember being absolutely obsessed with animorphs as a kid. There was one time where i made a deal with mum that if I got a school assignment i was struggling with done by a certain day she'd let me watch the show on TV outside our normal allowed screentime. Then after I'd done rhe assignment it turned out the TV guide I'd been looking at was for the wrong week and the show wasn't on any more and I had a major meltdown because I'd been looking forward to it all week.

Credit where credit is due, those Controller Jake scenes in the show hurt in the best ways

Couple things! I like the show, because for me it's just a fun time, and I agree that people overstate the changes. Also! Tobias still being aware of the Yeerks in the show's pre-book Megamorphs 4 actually makes sense, because if you look at the first episode, Tobias went through the construction site without the others. So if just Jake and Co didn't go through, Tobias still would and so he'd still get powers

Holy smokes dude I'm really excited for your Beast Wars retrospective. I'm expecting a powerful examination of the themes in the episode "transmutate" which might have been the first TV episode that made me so emotional I cried.

yoo you made your own model for the crowd at the beginning? absolute madlad. big respect!

I recently discovered that one of my boyfriends siblings had no idea the book series existed and only knew Animorphs from the tv series. She was truly baffled when I told her I was listening to Animorphs podcasts near the beginning of the pandemic. Her siblings were also baffled, but it was because they had seen the book covers and were surprised that anything of merit was inside and had no idea there was a tv series.

As far as live action adaptations made by Nickelodeon go, we've definitely seen worse. ...But yeah, Animorphs is ALWAYS at the top of my list of, "Things that should be an Anime."

I was planning on commenting at the end, and again after a rewatch, but "you know how many people skipped the books when they saw the covers, people with no taste" that was me... I never much cared about animals so I just passed by them. I also want to say, the intro is golden, and I love a bunch of little moments you put in. Also, nice ad. I know they paid you so ill pay them, but meal replacement ramen sounds infinitely better then the rest of them, and I too chronically find myself unable to cook for myself so I end up eating a lot of junk... plus I eat the "good stuff" ramen for 2$ each, so... idk anyways, ill continue to watch the end now :) ty for the video, ive loved learning about the animorphs through your videos, and eventually once cobid *truly* settles down I will meet one of my friends who loved the books from childhood and he will lend me a selection of books, I dont think he has them all, but he has the first couple at least so I can get started. ty for the videos, hope you do well, and lots of love :) (as much love as an internet stranger can give without it being creepy, I just wish you well)

I remember checking out an Animorphs VHS at the local library (after me and my brother read basically every Animorphs book they had available) and being sorely disappointed by it. Now I have a better understanding of why. Thanks! 1:03:35: And reducing Ax to a punchline also undercuts any credit the show might get for treating Ax as a neurodivergent human character. If he could be solemn, knowledgeable, etc despite sometimes acting goofy, he would have seemed like a full character who incidentally has some quirks. But by reducing neurodivergent(ish) characters _to_ their quirks, you make them less lke people who should be respected and more like...well, punchlines. And a lot of the time, burdens on the "normal" people around them who have to put up with their shit, which is certainly what neurodivergence feels like sometimes but isn't exactly a wholesome message.

4:47 whenever I read or hear quotes like this I'm always reminded of this one essay titled "Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly"

I love your videos because you're not awkward in front of the camera. You make it sound like you're having a conversation and we're actually in the room just overhearing it. Thank you for these!

I always remember the oatmeal episode of this. For some strange reason this was the basis for a major ad for the show on YTV in Canada. Overly energetic announcer dude responded to zero-chill hold the cheese guy with "YES! HOLD EVERYTHING BUT THE OATMEAL?" I have no idea why this was done, but I swear I did not hallucinate it. Sometimes Canada's just weird.

I was 7 when the Animorphs show first came out. This was around when the TV-ratings system was becoming more established, so when I saw that first episode be rated TV-Y7, I had this funny sense of relief like "phew, I'm legally allowed to watch this!" And I feel like that's part of why I have such fond memories of this show. I'm sure it hasn't aged well, but I remember the human aspects of the story being treated really well. Jake and Tom's relation, Marco's awkward relation with this depressed dad... they all really hit. also ftr, I knew about the books before the show and even remember getting mad when classmates would only borrow the volumes from the library exclusively to play with the flipbooks in them. also also: You mentioned the show coming out around when the books were around volume 20 or so, and I feel like this definitely played a part in why so many of the middle volumes were "filler" stories. Must have been wild to see the source material spinning its wheels just so the adaptation wouldn't have to spin its wheels as much. Good video!

I HAVE THAT! I won a vizier 3 animorph at a School carnival as a kid and always wondered where this crazy fire monster came from!

Even if people want to argue over how good the show was, can we at least all agree the opening song for it was freaking awesome? It's a song I'll find my self humming even thou I haven't seen the show in over a decade. Same with the opening to So Weird.

I have needed a GIF of Ax dunking his burger in his drink for decades. Thanks for making it possible

I’ve watched like 10 seconds of this but I already want to say before you get into your own opinion that my friend and I actually enjoy the Animorphs TV show. The theme song is a banger, and we really love what they did with Visser One and the Yeerks adopting human activities to calm their hosts. (Unless I’m misremembering and that wasn’t in the show but I’m pretty sure it was.) It tries, you know? And I appreciate it.

This was so great, me and my partners have greatly enjoyed watching all of your deep dives into the animorph series. I literally cheered at your next video announcement

That ad break was just *chef´s kiss*

Rewatched first two parts just to get here, will probably watch again cause you did a great job. Thank you for this and I hope the algorithm blesses you for all the hard work and emotional exasperation

Gosh, I remember when I was a teenager and being EXTREMELY jealous that I couldn't watch the show as it only really came out in the US and nowhere else. I wanted to convince my parents to get the K7s on a budding ebay so dang bad. In the end I tried watching the show as an adult and....aaaaah... It was a complicated watch

The sheer nostalgia that hit me when you pulled out the red Visser Three Andalite > Hork-Bajir transforming action figure and asked if the audience knew what it was. I owned that exact figure. I played with it constantly. It eventually broke such that the only thing that remained was the lower/rear legs and the tail. Thanks for making these videos, and for such a wonderful trip down memory lane. 😂

"So, using the Blockbuster card Ax hacked with his nipple.." That's not something you hear everyday

I appreciate that you've made this series of videos. Thanks.

I recently discovered your channel and now I’m sad that I’m about to have nothing else to watch. I’ve been digging your Animorphs coverage!

oh my god this timing is impeccable! i just watched your animorphs videos yesterday and subscribed :D lucky me didn't have to wait at all

These videos are excellent. There is a lack of well made and sincerely passionate Animorphs content on the internet so I really appreciate you making them. Thank you.

I ran across your previous episodes like a week ago and seeing this on my feed so soon after just watching the others is delightful!

I am so happy I found your channel shortly after your Liars Dice video. Long form video essays are my absolute jam, and I have spent so many hours watching and re-watching your videos over the past year. Thanks for giving my brain “The Good Chemicals (TM)”.

followed recently after your first two animorphs videos and i am so stoked there’s already another

i love your work a great deal, and I love the passion that's clearly behind it

an audible screech was emitted and my sister now is shouting at me to shut up. no regrets.

This trilogy of retrospectives has been amazingly entertaining and well-written - not to mention hilarious! I loved the few scattered Animorphs books I read back in elementary school, but your retrospectives have really inspired me to read the entire series from the very beginning, and my GOD is it as amazing as you say! Thanks for making these!

I loved the show as a kid. I'm not gonna go back and ruin it for myself. This was a nice halfway. Thanks for remembering it so I didn't have to... Doug Walker doesn't deserve that phrase, there's so many other people that actually deserve it.

So just wanted to say that I never knew about Animorphs before coming across this channel yet I watched all your Animorphs videos and now I'm also curious to check the series out. Good work dude!

Always get excited when I see a new video from you. Good watch.

Amazing work! Your videos help us through the day with a fat dose of nostalgia, coated in a thick layer of amazing! Keep up the great work!

Ohhhh god, I had ALL the VHS tapes of this show (still do!) since I didn't have cable and had no other way to watch it, but I haven't watched them in decades. But just hearing that tiny riff of the opening de-aged me 21 years. Thank you for reminding me of my first all-comsuming obession.

Your content is always worth the wait. Well done mate.

I never read Animorphs and I don't know how I ended up at your channel but boy oh boy was I excited to see the continuation of this series pop up in my feed.

Great stuff! Very interesting look at how adapting something is a very intricate process with different factors affecting it.

Glad to see your alive, cant wait to see how this video goes

I really enjoyed having Eli's perspective on this! They had such fun reactions!! And Zachary was fun to see too! Also, I'll always click on a Lord Ravenscraft video!

I have very fond memories of Animorphs, the books and series. Love your video!

1:08:00 You are correct, sir. I'm 38, and I STILL name all of my internet routers "Dinobot".

These videos of yours are what got me into the franchise after missing out on it when I was a kid. Thank you so much for making these, I absolutely love the books so far!

Really enjoyed this nostalgia trip. Thanks for making!

"The best piece of Transformers media to ever grace the airwaves." You should say this loudly and often. :) This has been a really fascinating series of videos! Despite having been right around the target age when Animorphs came out, I never got into it, but now I at least understand why people remember the series so fondly!

At this point you're going to cover every single subject of my childhood nostalgia and I'm here for it. I actually read all the books but never watched the tv show so this was very informative for me. also btw the intro was great, I love it

The algorithm literally showed me your first two parts of the Animorphs videos just last night; didn't expect to spend my morning at 3am watching those... Time for another!

God bless you man. These videos have been amazing. Excellent job. I need more animorphs content in my life.

The young adult section of my local library is separated from the rest of the library, and is decorated in purple and green very similar to the Internet Cafe from this show. I swear that someone looked at an Animorphs screenshot and said yes, this is what i need for my local library

Great video as always. If I ever get around to founding an accredited University, I'll make sure to send you that Ph. D. in Animorphs, you've earned it.

Your videos have saved my work week. Subbed and ready for more!

So I retwatch the first two videos like. Once every few weeks, I think. I have ADHD and having something in the background helps me focus, and your voice is really perfect for it. Plus the jokes tend to land riiiiight when my attention is wandering and I can refocus. So I was SO EXCITED to see this update! Thank you for sticking with it, it's been a really fun watch/repeated listen. Can't wait for Beast Wars!