If you’re familiar with the world famous Troma Studios, you may be aware of their Toxic Avenger series of B-movies that arrived in the mid-1980s. As were other notable Troma films, such as Class of Nuke ‘Em High and Chopper Chicks. in Zombietown, the Toxic Avenger series offered plenty of gore, racy scenes, and crude humor. You may be wondering how in the world this could be turned into a children’s cartoon series and with good reason!
In 1991, children’s cartoon shows began to change and new ideas surfaced in the world of entertainment. Shows like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Captain Planet brought a new message to young people: the importance of protecting our environment. With a bit of tweaking, Troma managed to turn the infamous anti-industrial hero of his into Toxie, a hideously mutated but lovable character who served as the star of Toxic Crusaders.
Of course, racing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles turned out to be nearly impossible and after a five-race trial, FOX decided not to run the entire series even though thirteen 30-minute episodes had already been created. Despite this rather gigantic setback, the creepily cute Toxie made a valiant foothold in stores around the world in the form of toys, trading cards, and a mountain of other merchandise that cartoon characters often seem to get their hands on.
However, Toxie did not face the evil polluters alone. Next to her was a cast of imaginative weirdos like: Yvonne, Toxie’s myopic blonde girlfriend; Blobbie, a fluffy pink pet; Mop, Toxie’s independent thinking cleaning tool; Junkyard, a human-dog hybrid of a drifter who hid from lightning in a kennel only to merge with the dog once lightning struck; Major Disaster, a soldier who fell into a radioactive swamp where he gained the ability to control plants; and NoZone, a pilot who flew through a hole in the ozone layer to crash into a silo of nuclear peppers that caused him to sneeze legendary.
Of course, no kids’ show could be complete without villains just as compelling as the heroes themselves. Toxic Crusaders didn’t skimp when it came to the bad guys. Few returned for more than one episode, but some of them included: Czar Zosta and Doctor Killemoff, two four-armed cockroach beings from a planet called Smogula; Bonehead, a street punk who intimidated Melvin Junko, the man who would become Toxie; and Mayor Grody, the corrupt leader of Toxie’s hometown of Tromaville. Of course, like other cartoons of the time, the series had its own expendable goons, the Radiation Rangers, who would arrive in droves and almost never hit their intended target.
As rich a series as any on television at the time, Toxic Crusaders proved fertile ground for marketing. In most cases, the same companies that held the rights to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles merchandise also held the rights to Toxic Crusaders. As a result, we saw an eight-issue Marvel comic, Topps trading cards, a card game, a board game, Halloween costumes, Colorforms, and of course, video games for the original Nintendo Entertainment System, Sega Genesis, and Game Boy. Playmates even offered a line of action figures featuring “radical” designs in bright neon colors on characters that retained the creepy charm of the cartoon show. These figures often came with glow-in-the-dark accessories and you might even get canisters of “Toxie’s Toxic Waste,” a goo suspiciously similar to Turtle’s “Retromutagen Ooze.”
Even these days, Toxic Crusaders still wows fans and in April 2008, Troma released a DVD of all 13 episodes, so if you missed the show, you still have a chance to watch it!
I hope you enjoyed this trip back to the ’90s and learned a bit about a great cartoon show that strove to bring a good message to kids filled with wacky fun. While the Toxic Crusaders may not have brought down the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle empire, they certainly offered a unique take on cartoons for “environmentally conscious” kids.