Street Sharks – The Complete Series (DVD)

006It just goes to show that just because something is cool on paper, it doesn’t mean it’ll be scooped up by children. By 1994, pretty much every studio were looking for their own “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” take off that could grant them instant success. Since the eighties and most of the nineties belonged ot the heroes in a halfshell, most of the animated studios looked for their own spin on the formula. There were at least dozen clones of the Ninja Turtles once the Ninja Turtles took off. One of them was “Street Sharks.”

Basically the toyline was introduced and then the television series which featured four anthropomorphic crime fighting aquatic man sized animals with attitudes and cool names. The Street Sharks were one of the most blatant of youth pandering with the concept basically trying to out extreme the Ninja Turtles. Wimpy slow turtles? Hah. How about carnivorous predators like Sharks? Turtles named after famous renaissance artists? Give me a break, how about four sharks with names like Ripster and Jab? And rather than living in the sewers and riding in trucks, the Street Sharks burrow in to the city streets and ride around on motorcycles?

And their signature food? Try hamburgers, hot dogs, and French fries. No wimpy pizza for these fearsome foursome. The “Street Sharks” were originally four human brothers whom were kidnapped by the evil Dr. Paradigm after attempting to recsue their father, and turned in to man sized sharks of four varieties. Dr. Paradigm is the villain mold of super villains, bald and donning an eye patch not to mention he sports a wicked super suit that allows him to fight the Street Sharks. “Street Sharks” for the most part is a bland amalgamation of various concepts that try to spark some sort of popularity (one shark rollerskates, another uses his footballs skills during fights).

It’s all put in to one product that is never quite as entertaining as it promises to be, but at least dons great potential time and time again. The street sharks look really cool half the time and the animation is considering the animators basically have to draw the individual sharks in various poses throughout every episode. Eventually “Street Sharks” combined with yet another attempt at Ninja Turtles gold entitled “The Dino Vengers.” They were, yes, four anthropomorphic dinosaur soldiers from outer space whom are stranded on Earth, and eventually team with the Street Sharks. Before cancellation, the show became “Dino Vengers Featuring Street Sharks” in order to promote another toy line named “Extreme Dinosaurs.”

The DVD comes with a bonus episode of “COPS” entitled “The Case of the Boy Who Cried Monster.”