BurnTheFlagg

17 December 2026 will mark the thirtieth anniversary of Teletoon — but not the one most of you are thinking. I’m talking about the original Teletoon.

17 December 1996 was the day Teletoon, or Télétoon (or TéléTOON), launched under the ownership of Télévision par satellite (TPS). Télétoon’ broadcast daily from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m; not unlike what Cartoon Network would eventually become with the expansion of Adult Swim in the 2000s. Télétoon’s main focus was classic French and European cartoons. Though aimed at 2 to 12 year olds, the channel also appealed to adults through reruns of cartoons with nostalgic appeal.

Télétoon would dip into original programming in 1997. Two notable co-productions aired on (the late) Family Channel in Canada: The Little Lulu Show and Franklin. I’d talk more about Télétoon’s programming as a whole, but there’s a decent retrospective video that does a better job. Meanwhile, 8 September 1997 would see the other Teletoon launched in Canada. Teletoon Canada Inc had zero relations to TPS’ Télétoon channel other than having the same name by some coincidence.

I have to give credit to Canada's Bell Media for committing to the "new" MuchMusic. We're coming up to the 5th anniversary of MuchMusic's "return" on 7 July 2021 via TikTok and other social media channels. I didn't think this would last 3 years; what with the actual cable TV channel still being a decrypted rerun farm. You'd think by now Bell would at least rebrand it as "CTV Pop Channel", or something.

Then again, this is the same Bell Media that thought replacing Discovery Channel Canada with "USA Network Canada" was a smart idea.

While "Much" celebrated its 40th anniversary in a dark cold abyss, MusiquePlus' 40th birthday won't be anywhere near as depressing. Current owners Remstar have been taking notes from what Bell Media has done with MuchMusic and decided to follow suite. MuchMusic's French-language counterpart was declared dead after Remstar Media Group flipped the channel into the female-targeting Elle Fictions on 26 August 2019.

Now, almost 6 years later, MusiquePlus is making its own comeback on social media.

It's clear Bell Media was on to something when they decided to reboot MuchMusic for the zoomers.

The number one reason why G4 TV's relaunch failed was the insistence of Comcast Spectacor on returning to cable TV, rather than stick to YouTube and Twitch. Why else do you think Machinima.com supplanted G4 as the de facto gaming entertainment network in the first place? Comcast should've tested the waters by launching a(nother) late-night program block on Syfy. Even that would've been a reach considering Syfy can't keep an original program on the air for more than 2-3 seasons; let alone stop themselves from airing generic action films and procedurals instead of actual sci-fi, horror, or fantasy.

Cut to Comet TV casually airing Stargate SG-1, Tales from the Darkside, Xena: Warrior Princess, and NWA Powerrr through both over-the-air broadcast television and the free livestream on their website.

MuchMusic and MusiquePlus cuts the middle man out: no paywalls, no geo-blocking, just content. Bell and Remstar were smart enough to realize that music television belongs to the streaming generation, and the former knew very well that MuchMusic - much like MTV - transcends traditional television. Nostalgia is powerful, and the best way to make use of brands with such an aura is to give back to the people who grew up on them without making them jump through hurdles.

...only to then discover the Firefox forks (Waterfox and LibreWolf) that might actually be better than the original web browser.

Especially if you're an AIphobic caveman.

Also, LadyBird might finally become a thing this year.

Speaking of Reddit, the Bluesky subreddit's response was as stupid as you thought it would be. From questioning the "popularity" of Twitter, to bitching about how Bluesky doesn't need millions of users.

By that logic, there's nothing wrong with Tumblr being an afterthought because what's left of its userbase (myself included) after the porn ban aren't bots or Nazis.

You either die as a crappy pirate site, or live long enough to become a shitty streaming service.

Yes, I know the initial broadcast of any given anime could be censored on Japanese television. Are you aware of the fucking date in this screenshot? Multiple mergers, acquisitions, and corporate reshufflings yet "Crunchymation" couldn't find time to make sure all of their content was uncensored before they charged customers for it?

THIS is (almost) the kind of bullshit that birthed the infamous One Piece gentleman's agreement after what 4Kids did to the anime. I can't believe I'm saying this, but fuck Crunchyroll.

This is why my "capitalist currency" is exclusive to Netflix Anime and Prime Video. Never mind that both services have far better animated originals and exclusives than the overrated, overhyped, cookie-cutter garbage that Crunchyroll is forced to work with every other season.

Meanwhile, depending on where you live, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure is not only streaming FOR FREE on Tubi; it's streaming UNCUT. As far as "simulcasts" (why are we still calling them that?) go, there's also BiliBili, Ani-One, Muse, and It's Anime by REMOW for more flexible options.

Only once you've exhausted the dozens of legal platforms for watching anime do you resort to piracy. Of course, If said anime was never released (uncut) outside Japan, common sense dictates that "the middle man" has lost all rights to complain about money they clearly don't want.

Otherwise: please support the official release.

Note the time stamp. The VOD for last night's Rizin Landmark cuts out the beginning of the broadcast.

Not kidding.

Rizin's English PPVs have gotten really sloppy in recent years. The broadcasts keep starting during the opening ceremony, the commentators keep talking over the Japanese announcers and even the video packages, and now they've recently started muting the ring walk music (AND Lenne Hardt).

Ouroboros.

Boomers recall it as the mark of a homunculus in Fullmetal Alchemist.

When you’ve been covering global broadcast industries as long as I have, this symbol becomes a perfect representation of how corporations blinded by greed have continually shot themselves in the foot chasing short-term gain at the expense of causing long-term harm to others. There’s no better example of this than the hopeless, misguided efforts of legacy media to compete with the Big Tech streaming companies.

I’ve already talked at length about how Paramount Skydance / Paramount Global / ViacomCBS / Viacom II (The “original” Viacom being the company formally known as CBS Corporation) and Warner Bros Discovery / AT&T’s WarnerMedia have tried to compete with Netflix. What they’ve done instead over the past six years was tarnish Hollywood, ruin American television, create an ocean of pink slips, and poetically, drive themselves into the ground. But because suits never learn, Paramount & WBD are reaching the finish line of a merger with each other. Not just another mega-merger that no one except the rich and stupid asked for, but a merger with the backing of the human garbage America re-elected as president, and the usual suspects of human rights violations in the Middle East — Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

If that doesn’t embody what a horrible country the United States of America is, nothing will. Fortunately, America’s other legacy media giants have given the rest the world a few reasons to at least tolerate them...

Fuck Bluesky

Fuck Threads

Fuck Instagram

Fuck Facebook

Fuck Meta

Fuck Reddit

Fuck YouTube

And Fuck "X"

Fuck every last one of these dogshit social media platforms. I'd sooner create a MySpace account then go back.

Another year, another ONE Championship drama

It's moments like this that make me wonder: what if Rizin bought ONE Championship?

Ever since ONE Friday Fights 147 & "Superfan Fights", the "World's Largest Martial Arts Organization" has been penny-pinching its fans with quantity over quality bullcrap. They've paywalled a portion of the free-to-air ONE Lumpinee / ONE Friday Fights events into something called The Inner Circle, featuring world title fights, which requires a streaming subscription of USD $9.99 per month. Meanwhile, we now know the new monthly ONE Samurai series in Japan will be PPV-exclusive; ONE Samurai 1 will cost $40 USD.

This is on top of the still ongoing ONE Fight Night / ONE on Prime Video (& Sky Sports) series and, presumably, quarterly numbered PPV events. In total, it will cost you $65 USD to watch all of ONE Championship this month. Imagine paying 65 bucks per month to watch a single combat sports promotion? At least UFC had the common courtesy to air its Fight Nights on regular TV considering how over-expensive their PPVs are.

Nowadays, RIZIN PPVs can be bought outside Japan either on their own, or with a monthly or annual subscription on Rizin.tv. It helps that RIZIN events were held sporadically; they will attempt to hold an event every month for the rest of 2026.

And, yes, The Inner Circle cards will naturally be held in the SAME ARENA as virtually every other ONE Championship event: Lumpinee Boxing Stadium in Bangkok, Thailand. ONE Championship, a billion dollar unicorn, USED to hold events across Asia before COVID. They haven't held an event in Singapore, Malaysia, or the Philippines since 2022; and there's been no activity in China since COVID killed the ONE Hero series.

After the Lumpinee partnership began in 2023, EVERY non-PPV event promoted by ONE has been held at Lumpinee. This month's ONE Samurai 1 in Japan will be among the few exceptions.

Contrast RIZIN events being held all across Japan.

By the way: it took around 9 years for RIZIN to hold its first international event, RIZIN LANDMARK 7 in Azerbaijan, on 4 November 2023. Their second and last event to date held outside Japan, RIZIN World Series in Korea, took place 2 years later.

ONE has only held 4 events outside Asia between 2023 and 2025; 2 events in Colorado, USA, 2 events in Qatar from the Lusail Sports Arena. It's more impressive than RIZIN, but pitiful not only compared to where the Professional Fighters League has been, but also considering the PFL has established regional branches in Africa and, previously, Europe and MENA.

And yes, this is the same PFL that was able to buy Bellator ONLY because Paramount is fucking dogshit.

RIZIN has been able to fly under the radar in-part due to its obscurity (i.e. ignorant MMA "fans" who only watch UFC). My article on ONE Championship doesn't do justice to the many scandals they've been involved in. To make a long story short: when it comes to celebrating "the values of integrity, humility, honor, respect, courage, discipline, and compassion”, RIZIN has a done a far better job projecting that image compared to ONE.

And yes, this is the same RIZIN Fighting Federation in-which an obnoxious American "gangster" is currently champion.

RIZN is almost everything ONE Championship should've been. If you go purely by optics, RIZIN is the biggest mixed martial arts promotion in Asia, whereas ONE has become a glorified kickboxing and muay thai league that also does MMA and, on occasion, submission grappling.

Not only has WWE has done to "Michin" almost exactly what AEW did to Red Velvet in-regards to Jade Cargill and her title run (Baddies, anyone?), not only does "The Other Jade"'s TNA Knockouts title reign (and her time in The Dollhouse before it) still remain the peak of her entire professional wrestling career, but Mia Yim's stock might have just fallen to greater lows than when she was part of Retribution during the pandemic.

And if the toxic internet wrestling community were the only people who thought B-Fab was nothing more than a background character, the live crowds are definitely wishing she was.

In the span of THREE WEEKS, WWE has managed to kill two mid-carders for the price of one weak world title feud. Just when you thought SmackDown's women's division couldn't get worse, they managed to 1up last year's WWE Women's Championship WrestleMania feud and create an even greater dumpster fire without the dirt sheet drama.

Colour me impressed.

SmackDown as a whole has become one giant cringe compilation, and they still have THREE MORE WEEKS to convince you to give a shit about ANYTHING happening on that brand's roster headed into WrestleMania. Meanwhile, NXT's Stand and Deliver airs next Saturday on YOUTUBE. Sure, spare the people watching the developmental brand (and TNA, by extension) 3 more weeks of trash TV.

This year's Road to WrestleMania hasn't been any better than last year's, but it's fair to say Team Blue has produced the weakest storylines thus far. At least with CM Punk and Roman Reigns you're getting two massive egos fighting for a world title, like a proper WrestleMania main event, and (potentially) another OG Bloodline reunion.

At least the latest Judgement Day drama presents the perfect opportunity for Finn Bálor to get a career reset, or Dominik Mysterio to get the WrestleMania moment his fans have been waiting for coming off his impressive run in AAA.

At least fans got to see Brock Lesnar getting manhanded by Oba Femi in what is already the best throwaway WrestleMania freak show angle Lesnar has been in ever. Who cares if Oba loses when he already looks amazing, and Lesnar is just a part-time cash-grab?

And I do I really need to convince you that Seth Rollins gunning for Paul Heyman is the best thing to happen to The Vision in months? The Vision went blind the moment they replaced Bron Breakker and Bronson Reed with Logan Paul and Austin Theory.

SmackDown alone has become the most unwatchable garbage in all of pro wrestling on American TV today, and considering the competition (including from WWE itself), that's saying a lot.

First off, I LOVE the fact that Major League Wrestling announced this MONTHS AGO back at MLW x Don Gato, yet NOBODY knew about this until MLW uploaded a YouTube video and made a social media post about it last week - even Wrestling Observer didn't know about this!

That's how irrelevant MLW is; not even their own fans watch their crap.

It's bad enough that MLW broadcasts STILL look like they're on a shoe-string budget (so much for that $20 million lawsuit), but going back to tape-delaying everything makes them no better than the NWA or any given indie wrestling promotion with a syndicated wrestling show. MLW's dumbass fans are utterly clueless to how much of an outdated relic MLW Fusion (and by extension, MLW Fusion: Alpha, MLW Azteca, and MLW Underground Wrestling) was compared to other weekly shows.

MLW Fusion doesn't air live every week, unlike AEW & WWE's crap. At its worst, from 2021 to 2023, the gap between TV tapings and air dates were so wide you could read months worth of spoilers. This made it all the more embarrassing when MLW would pretend that their weekly TV shows, taped specials, and YouTube & social media content were happening "the day of".

For example: On 4 March 2024, MLW uploaded a video of Satoshi Kojima getting attacked during a press event.

The fallout would play out at MLW's Once Upon a Time in New York TV special, which aired on 14 March. However, that TV special was actually taped at MLW Intimidation Games 2024, which aired LIVE on TrillerTV on 29 February. Not since the 2015 TNA Slammiversary debacle, where the preceding TV tapings spoiled the PPV, have I've seen such a fucking mess from a professional wrestling promotion; and you know something is fucked when I'm comparing a wrestling company in 2024 to TNA in 2015.

The weekly TV wrestling market is beyond over-crowded. Too many weekly shows exist, and few of them are worth a damn. If you're a pro wrestling company that isn't airing live in U.S primetime on a major platform, let alone weekend syndication or FAST; you have no business producing a weekly TV show. MLW's monthly model of airing live events and taped TV specials is exactly what they, and every other indie promotion in their position, should be doing. It's no different to how actual combat sports promotions, and even New Japan Pro Wrestling, distribute events.

MLW's retarded fandom only wants Fusion to come back so they have an excuse to not watch WWE, TNA, or AEW; no matter how much of an embarrassment MLW itself has become.

It's highly likely that MLW's YouTube channel will continue to be the de facto home of MLW Fusion. MLW CEO Court Bauer's infamous 2021 interview with POST Wrestling, where he was shitting on YouTube, continues to get better with age.

MLW's lone broadcast partner since their relaunch was Bein Sports USA; which is still among the lowest-distributed cable networks. Any one who does basic research will know that Bein Sports, for all their international reach, ONLY airs MLW in the US. Every other cable network (VICE, REELZ) or streamer (FITE / TrillerTV, Pro Wrestling TV, Premiere Streaming Network) scrapped MLW in less than a year.

It's not hard to see why.

The same day that I'm posting this, MLW's tentpole Battle Riot event (WWE's Royal Rumble with pinfalls and submissions) will be held tonight. However, on 26 January, MLW announced that Battle RIOT VIII won't be airing live. For the first time since (the dreadful year of) 2023, Battle Riot will be taped to air later on YouTube and Bein Sports. That's the literal equivalent to WWE taping the Royal Rumble. MLW wants to go back to weekly TV, yet they (presumably) need to tape several matches from one of their biggest shows of the year for MLW Fusion content.

Not being a product of Saudi Arabia's sportswashing is moot when the product itself is a fucking joke.

Freedom of speech means nothing anymore

Twitter has always been terrible, long before you-know-who supposedly made things worse. The reality is that Twitter, like every other English-speaking social media platform, is a cesspit. If I had a choice between interacting with the retards of the internet or the disgusting “mouth-breathers” in real life, I’d choose a more cathartic third-option and kill them all.

That’s why it infuriates me whenever my account gets suspended over what they think are “offensive” posts, when I’m really just using extreme language to tell someone to get off the internet. I’m not spreading hate towards minorities, spouting neo-Nazi ideologies, nor harassing anyone. Yet, for the comparatively small crime of occasionally telling someone or a specific group of people to kill themselves, my Twitter account has been suspended over and over again.

Meanwhile, like every other social media platform, Twitter has done a poor job of policing themselves. You will find no shortage of hashtags and threads dedicated to extremist views, bigotry, and the perpetuation of conspiracy theories. Such content has been allowed to prosper long before Twitter’s current owner made things worse by firing the people responsible for content moderation, among others.

In other words, instead of going after the people who are committing far worse offenses, Twitter has been targeting the likes of yours truly for significantly minor infractions. I can’t even appeal to Support because, as I’ve said, they don’t exist any more.

I know this, because I already tried…

This is the part where the unintelligent asks: “if Twitter is so terrible, why do you keep coming back?” Simple: because the alternatives suck by design, they will never surpass Twitter, and will most likely go the way of Mixer in 5 years time. If political content in-particular isn’t banned, it’s a safe bet to assume content moderation will be just as terrible as Twitter and Facebook.

Case-and-point: the overrated Fediverse fecal matter known as Bluesky

I haven’t even been on Bluesky for half a year before my account was suspended for “hateful” and “disruptive” content. I suspect I was too inconsiderate of my language when I was exposing Wikipedia for the frauds that they are, or when I was shining a light on the hypocrisy of the #BuyCanadian movement. When the bastards couldn’t check me, they had nothing left but petty insults; then they censored me, then they deplatformed me.

Bluesky is a glorified gated community; if you get “suspended”, you’re not coming back. For all their propaganda, Bluesky is no better, if not worse, than Twitter. I don't use the term "propaganda" as an insult; if you aren't an paranoid AIphobe dancing on the grave of a Trump-supporter while using Palestine and Ukraine as an excuse to spew racism, you won't last any longer than I did.

Techcrunch is one thing, but when even a shitty, American, political news network writer can sum up how much of an overrated piece of shit Bluesky is, that's a problem. Bluesky is a fucking joke, and the punchline is that social media is infested with hyper-sensitive bitches and political ass-kissers.

The nicest thing I can say about TNA on AMC (TNAMC, if you will) is that it further exposes the IWC as one of the biggest cesspools on the internet. How many years of Nostradamus bullcrap do these stupid fucking morons need to shit out before they realize that TNA was not, and is never, going to die?

Other than that, I will never forgive AMC for allowing this GARBAGE on their cable network. I come to AMC Networks for high-quality scripted programming, not low-brow pro wrestling TRASH. The only people who are happy about TNA Impact moving to AMC are broke, braindead retards who can't figure out how to use a streaming service to save their miserable lives.

At the very least, TNA Wrestling hasn't been as terrible as WWE this year (screwing over Jey Uso (AGAIN) just to give Goldberg a title shot at Gunther for the former's retirement, botching John Cena's LONG-OVERDUE heel turn, launching on ESPN to a storm of technical issues with an event hated by ESPN themselves, giving New Orleans the middle finger before announcing WrestleMania 43 in Saudi Arabia, etc.), but TNA has given me more reasons to stop watching their shit in the last 2 months alone (turning NXTNA / ‪@WWENXT‬  / the WWE NXT partnership into YET ANOTHER takeover angle, and having Mike Santana win his 1ST EVER World Championship, only for it to be stolen by Kaz; who is also now in his 1ST EVER World title reign) than otherwise.

With AEW STILL being overrated crap run by a total fucking clown, ROH STILL deserving a better owner, MLW deciding to go back to weekly television even though they're FUCKING AWFUL at it, the NWA still being carny crap, and even NJPW's Wrestle Kingdom 20 card ruined by having an overrated boring wrestler and a loud-mouth, anti-Gaijin POS fighting for (respectively) the World & Global Heavyweight titles in the co-main event; tell me why the fuck I should care about "professional" wrestling?

When so-called indie wrestling "mudshows" and all-female wresting promotions are 10X better, yet corporate wrestling gets all the attention and hype from one of the worst fandoms ever, that's how you know pro wrestling is still on-par with The Jerry Springer Show as the most bottom of the barrel, juvenile excuse for (sports) entertainment.

And THIS is what AMC Networks decided to waste their money on: "yet another zombie show".

Fuck these morons

Fuck AMC for jumping the shark

Fuck TNA

Fuck "pro" wrestling

and, as always,

Why do you have THREE WORLD TITLE FIGHTS on the PRELIMINARY CARD?

Glass half full: the prelims are free on YouTube, and given the hype for this event (it's Jake Paul vs Anthony Fucking Joshua), every boxing fan will be watching this portion of the show. If anything, because this is a Jake Paul boxing event, the free prelims might be better than the paywalled main card.

Speaking of the main card, there's actually one more world title fight...

Seriously, when was the last time you saw any promoter do this much for the women's side of boxing? Jake Paul may be an overrated boxer, but he's an underappreciated boxing promoter.

With all that said...

Two nobodies in the main card opener, plus a washed up Tyron Woodley (ex-UFC) boxing Anderson “The Spider” Silva (ex-UFC); the latter only starting his boxing career not even 5 years ago.

Good thing the main card is on Netflix, which everyone has a subscription to (or a shared account), because you'd rather watch the Good Times reboot instead. If this were any mid-tier streaming service (Peacock, Paramount+, ESPN, etc), it'd be a waste of money. Misfits Boxing on DAZN, PBC on Prime Video, and even PFL MMA cards on any network all sound more interesting. Pro wrestling events on TrillerTV are more hype worthy than this.

The #JakeJoshua main card is exactly the kind of uneven, overhyped, superficial trash that's killing boxing's relevancy and legitimacy as a professional sport. If anyone subscribed to Netflix at any point before the day of the event, it was most likely to watch the final season of Stranger Things.

The drunk haterade drinker would accuse Jake Paul of deliberately making the main card total fucking dogshit just so he's have an excuse for why AJ beating his ass was his lowest-rated boxing event of all time. Likely because they're drunk, they hate Jake Paul, and they don't have a clue what the fuck they're talking about. I digress.