This Cult ’90s Cartoon Had Episodes Roasting Batman, Hulk, Han Solo, and More, But No One Remembers It

Remember when cartoons could get away with making fun of just about everybody? Before every superhero had a cinematic universe to protect and every franchise came with a small army of lawyers, there was room for some truly ridiculous television. Imagine Batman getting replaced by a guy who looks like he wandered into the wrong costume department, or the Hulk having to share the spotlight with someone whose greatest superpower is sheer dumb luck. It’s the kind of nonsense that makes you wonder who thought it was a good idea.

Well, somebody did, and the result was one of those late-’90s cartoons that seems to have slipped through a crack in pop culture history. It took famous heroes, blockbuster movies, and beloved sci-fi adventures, then gleefully sent them through a comedy blender. The show wasn’t exactly subtle about its targets, either. Its episode titles practically dared you not to laugh. And if you remember watching it after school, congratulations: you may have stumbled across one of television’s most unique forgotten cartoons.

Walter Melon Roasted Batman, the Hulk, and Star Wars With Ridiculous Parodies

The cartoon was Walter Melon, an animated series that arrived in 1997 and later aired in the United States on Fox Family. Its premise was beautifully silly. Walter and his assistant, Bitterbug, ran a business as heroes for hire, stepping in whenever a famous fictional hero was missing, injured, or otherwise unavailable. Think of them as superhero substitutes, except you probably wouldn’t want them anywhere near an actual emergency. Across 52 episodes, the series took aim at an absurd range of pop culture icons, from Batman and Robin to the Hulk, Han Solo, Indiana Jones, and James Bond.

I’ll go into more detail about the cartoon’s origin further down, but you should know that Walter Melon is not purely an American cartoon. And its style makes that pretty clear. It was actually a co-production between American and European studios. That makes it hard to find today. Disney bought the original American studios, Fox Family Worldwide and Saban Entertainment, and Disney hasn’t released the show anywhere. But you can catch glimpses of it like this promo.

The jokes weren’t exactly hiding in the fine print. The Batman spoof became Splatman and Rubin, while the Hulk-inspired adventure was called The Incredible Bulk. Then there was Star Blecch, a jab at Star Trek, alongside The Melon Strikes Back, which played with the Star Wars universe. Those titles alone tell you what kind of show this was: affectionate, goofy, and perfectly happy to turn a pop culture legend into a walking punchline. Walter himself was hardly an intimidating replacement for these heroes. He’s a cheerful, dim-witted fellow whose unusual appearance somehow rarely bothers the people he’s impersonating. Imagine Gotham’s criminals preparing for the Dark Knight, only to discover that the guy in the cape might be better suited to delivering pizza. Honestly, the Joker would probably need a minute to process that one.

Why Walter Melon Became One of the Most Forgotten Cartoons of the ’90s

Part of the show’s appeal was just how much ground it covered. One minute, Walter could be stepping into a superhero adventure; the next, he was wandering into a parody of an action movie, a science-fiction classic, or a familiar fairy tale. The series didn’t restrict itself to comic-book characters, which made its world feel like one enormous pop culture playground. Windiana Bones and the Temp of Doom took a swing at Indiana Jones, while Moperminator sent up The Terminator. There were also spoofs of The X-Files, The Karate Kid, and Back to the Future. Each episode paired two shorter adventures, meaning there was always another recognizable target waiting around the corner. The series’ episode guide lays out the full parade of wonderfully silly titles.

The show’s unusual history probably didn’t help it stay in the public conversation. Walter Melon was loosely adapted from the French comic strip Achille Talon and was a European-American co-production involving Saban International Paris, France 2, and Scottish Television Enterprises, among others. It wasn’t quite the same sort of homegrown American cartoon that dominated many childhood memories, even though it found an audience through Fox Family and later Fox Kids. Its humor also depended on recognizing a lot of different films, television shows, and fictional heroes, making it a time capsule of the entertainment landscape that surrounded it. Today, the series feels like a relic from a period when children’s animation could throw everything into the same pot and see what happened. Maybe that’s why it deserves another look. Somewhere out there, Batman is still waiting for his replacement to clock in. Let’s just hope Walter remembered the cape.