This is for those of us lucky enough to grow up watching Nickelodeon, or in France. Back in the 80s, children's programming was top-notch with shows like David the Gnome, Belle & Sebastian, Adventures of the Little Koala, and Grimm's Fairy Tale Classics. But the one that really stuck by me all these years was this little known series, The Mysterious Cities of Gold, a French-Japanese collaboration about the legend of El Dorado, that aired just 39 episodes on Nickelodeon around 1989.
It all but sunk into my memory except for the image of towers of gold and a big golden condor, but I do remember that I loved it, from the characters to the plot to the way it captured my imagination. It was brainy, it was historical, and it was fantastic.
I sort of re-discovered it sometime in college and almost wept with joy when I found someone had uploaded the main theme onto an 80s nostalgia website. I went on a quest to find out more, but the DVD at the time was only available in France. People had created clandestine DVD-rips of the show and were selling them on eBay for like $15. I bought one. It was terrible quality, but I was willing to overlook it because, well, that's all there was.
Until now.
As of April 2009, this wonderful show has been released onto DVD in the United States! It's quite pricey (the deluxe edition going for $78 on Amazon, but only $48 on DeepDiscountDVD.com). But probably worth it, no, for 39 hours of viewing pleasure, and so much happiness?