Lately it seems like it has been getting harder and harder for me to find something good to watch. This week I tried watching the new “Velma” show on HBO, figuring it could not possibly be as bad as they said it would be; Spoiler alert, it was so much worse that I made it all of five minutes and could not stand keeping it on. This was a huge disappointment for me because I have always loved “Scooby-Doo,” so I was hoping this would be a welcome refresh for the show. Then it hit me, why watch new shows hoping for them to be as good as the old ones when I can just watch the old shows, which I am nearly guaranteed to like because I already know I do? So, I started making my way through streaming services and found that a decent amount of the shows I used to watch were available on a service I already had or for free. 

The first nostalgic show for me, which I watched over the course a month before “Velma” even came out, was “Adventure Time.” If you are not familiar with the show, it aired on Cartoon Network back during what I consider to be the height of television. It follows Finn the human and Jake the dog in a strange, postapocalyptic world as they go on adventures. There are nine seasons, and it is nearly impossible to predict what is going to happen in an episode because of how weird and different they all are from each other. This show was always a welcome break from real life and was fun even today because the plot of it holds up and does not try to hold the viewers hand through every episode by dumbing down everything. 

Once you finish “Adventure Time,” I strongly recommend checking out another show that aired around the same time as it, the “Regular Show.” Despite having regular in the name, it was anything but. The show follows a group of park employees as they solve issues created by the two slackers of the group, Mordecai and Rigby. It was always sort of looked at as the slightly more adult accompaniment to “Adventure Time” because it had very similar vibes in the storytelling and animation style but tended to have more mature themes and subject matter. 

I did not only spend my time watching shows on Cartoon Network. I also liked watching shows because of my parents, with the big one always being “Transformers.” The original show was one of the best “Transformers” shows that has been created because it is exactly what you think it is going to be, a cheesy show about transforming robots that was only created to sell toys. It is still a great show to watch if you do not mind the writing from the 80’s. Even though this show came out long before my time on Earth, I found that it held up to what I thought it would be and is one of the better nostalgic shows that I have watched. It probably does help a little bit that I grew up playing with the line of toys, so the show hits even harder in nostalgia for me. 

The last show that I have been rewatching is one that everyone knows, “SpongeBob SquarePants.” While the show is still on today, I specifically started watching the older seasons that I grew up with, namely the first two. These episodes were the weirder of the bunch and had the most memorable moments that I still laugh at today watching the shows, just because of how dumb they are. 

Dylan Enerson is a Dakota Student General Reporter. He can be reached at [email protected].