1994 Ultra Beavis and Butthead Top Whatever

2022 saw the return of two classic characters in American television history. Thanks to technology, my reluctance to adapting and busy schedule, I haven't seen it. But now that it's 2023, I'm getting another chance!

New (to me) episodes of Beavis and Butthead will air on Comedy Central, after new episodes of South Park, starting Wednesday February 8, 2023.

And I'm pumped!

News broke a few years ago that Comedy Central was ordering new episodes of Beavis and Butthead, along with a new feature-length movie. Network executives were looking for a cartoon to air after South Park, that would keep an audience, leading into The Daily Show. As a cartoon, Beavis fits on Comedy Central so much better than MTV. Their former cable home only broadcasts shows about drunk pregnant teens from New Jersey these days.

(Ironically, far more disgusting subject matter than the Beavis and Butthead cartoon ever showed.)

News of new Beavis broke nearly three years ago, however, other than some rare and spotty reruns airing in the middle of the night, Comedy Central has been pretty Beavis free. The new movie and cartoon were produced, but they were sent to the Paramount Plus streaming service. So I never saw them.

Continuing the theme of me being a cranky old guy who doesn’t relate to today’s technology, I have a generally mild dislike for streaming. If something is available at will, any time I want it, there’s no sense of urgency to search it out. If I'm able to find it navigating Tascmoc's menus with a remote, I'll watch it. But now Tascmoc is denying access, until I bring the equipment in for free upgrades. Which means disconnecting everything the house... GOING SOMEWHERE... Then reconnecting it all back up and entering passwords via remote controls... 

I have to be in a REALLY tolerant mood to deal with all that...

For the record, I don’t have Paramount Plus. I have/had Netflix, but I never use it. I don’t dedicate much of my life to television programs and/or movies these days. I watch baseball, and a few network shows that I can record on the DVR and watch a week or so later. Or whenever I get around to it. Which for me, and the way my life is structured these days, means I mostly don’t bother with "appointment TV".

And I was a HUGE Beavis and Butthead fan, nearly 25 years ago.

This clear Beavis and Butthead card didn't come from the 1994 Ultra set, and has a copyright date of 1993. I don't know which set it came from. My friend Trav donated it to the Archives back in 1995, as he had an extra. It has stayed in a Semi-Rigid Nard Holder, on (or very close to) my desk, ever since.

But this story is about that actual 1994 Ultra Beavis and Butthead card set. 

Back in 1994, Fleer (The parent company that printed the Ultra line, which included cards for the MLB, NFL, NBA and NHL.) announced a set of cards based on the MTV series, featuring art taken from the original animation cells. Knowing the cards Fleer was making at the time, this would certainly be a quality release. 

1994 Ultra Rising Stars - Kirk Rueter

Some of their baseball cards of the day still hold up now. 

Many of which came from Shinders. Who sold not only a bunch of Fleer Ultra Baseball, but packs and boxes of 1994 Ultra Beavis & Butthead cards as well. They were released in April 1994. I picked up a few packs here and there, but shortsightedly never tried to compile a full 150 card set.

(Sealed Wax Box courtesy of the Googles, I do not own one.)

However, Trav did buy a sealed wax box of 1994 Ultra Beavis & Butthead cards, and came away with a complete set. But he bought his box several years later, off ebay, and didn't pay nearly what one cost in 1994, nor anywhere near what one costs today. While putting this story together, I researched the prices of a sealed wax box of 1994 Ultra Beavis & Butthead. Results ranged from $150 on the low end, all the way up to $279. 

Sure, I'd love to have one, but not at either of those prices. Besides, this is now a near 30 year old product. The odds of each pack NOT being a brick of inseparable UV coated cardboard are miniscule. So opening a box of these card today would be a big waste of time and an even bigger waste of money. Complete sets are far more reasonable, and something I may pull the trigger on in the future.

"That little girl farted..."

Point being, those promised new episodes of Beavis & Butthead are finally going to air on Comedy Central. And I've already set the DVR to record them. Since we’re no longer living in the days where I have to set a VCR.

Back in 2011, when the last Beavis & Butthead reboot took place on MTV, I saved them all to the DVR, and didn’t watch any of them until the newest run was over. Then I binged the whole new season, and felt let down when there was nothing else coming afterwards. At least I didn’t have to wait long for all of them to come out on DVD. Branded Volume 4, to sit alongside the previous 3 volumes of DVD’s under the Mike Judge Collection banner.

Which is all fascinating stuff, but the reason you’re all here is the count down of the...

Top 25 1994 Ultra Beavis & Butthead Cards, I Still Have!

#25 - Tanya The Gifted Teacher

Tanya The Gifted Teacher was only in one episode, as far as I can remember.

Not a very memorable character, but she gets a card. 

The card backs are where the real fun is. This example is just text from that episode, as recanted by “Beavis & Butthead”, that goes further than any jokes made on the show. Plus that font is Dom Casual, a favorite of Freelance Dan, back in the old school Wasted Quarter days! So there’s some major bonus points.

And no, there’s not nearly 9000 cards in this set (although, I wish there were!). The gimmick here is every card in the set has the number “69” in it. The first 100 cards have the 69 at the end, while cards 100-150 are preceded by 69. It’s a little confusing, and the joke falls flat rather quickly if you’re trying to sort them.

But I never had enough cards to actually sort into a set. 

At one time, I did have more than just these 25, however...

These 7 cards suffered water damage and were destroyed during a Colorado move, some 15 plus years ago.

Whatever...

#24 - Stewart's Mom

Stewart's Mom was another bit character, but she appeared in a few more episodes. 

"No way dude. You can watch the Olympics any time."

Yeah, the card backs are absolute gold. And some are pretty twisted, viewing through 2023 eyes.

#23 - Trailer Ladies

Some of the cards in the set are just new art, and not taken from any of the episodes. 

This one is all sorts of creepy.

Wasn’t expecting to see the phrase “beady-eyed foreigner” appearing on any card. 

But there you go!

Beavis & Butthead's singing on this is one of my favorite things they did over a music video.

As the show got more and more popular, MTV did exactly what you’d expect them to do. Market the shit out of it!

The Beavis & Butthead Experience CD was released in November 1993, and has since sold well over 2 million copies. I bought mine used, so that adds one to whatever that grand total is today. The Nirvana track (“I Hate Myself and Want To Die”) was a leftover from the In Utero recordings, and the reason I bought the disk. But to me, the real highlight is Anthrax’s cover of the Beastie Boys “Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun”. Mainly because of the bit with Beavis and Butthead getting on Anthrax’s tour bus and wacky antics follow. 

#22 - Go Petitioning

My favorite joke from this episode came when the petition was turned in. Beavis & Butthead obviously didn’t bother doing it, and forged signatures themselves. When Mr. Van Dreissen read “Rosie Palm and her Five Sisters”, he asked “Couldn’t you have gotten them to sign individually?”

Still gets a chuckle out of me.

Heheheheheh… Electrafry!

#21 - Thinking Doesn't Suck

Hmmm…

Pretty sure whomever was writing some these card backs were just phoning it in after a while…

This Book Sucks

But the writers did get their chance to shine with the series of Beavis & Butthead books that came out in the mid 1990’s. In addition to This Book Sucks, Ensucklopedia, Huh Huh for Hollywood, The Butt Files, Travel Log and Chicken Soup for the Butt, are all pretty funny.

And pretty expensive if you want any of these long out of print books today.

#20 - French Flies

"Large Fries, Pie, Large Coffee, Pronto!"

I don’t remember them deep frying a raccoon in this episode...

"How can they call it easy listening when it's really hard to listen to?"

Whatever...

#19 - Home Sweet Cave

Some more art that didn’t appear on TV.

Reading some of these card backs make me think there’s no way this would fly today. Then again, the show has been resurrected for today, but I’m thinking some of these jokes would be cut long before making TV. Or trading cards.

Or video games...

Yes, there was even a Beavis & Butthead game for the SupaNoFriendo (Genesis too). About 20 years ago, I borrowed it from my friend Bob, and didn't give it back. I've moved from Colorado to Minnesota, back to Colorado and back again to Minnesota during that time. Bob and his family moved from Colorado to Florida, so I should probably mail this back to him at some point. He did get his autographed Primus CD back in 2011!

As far as the game itself, I played it a few times and got nowhere in it. As I get older, I get worse at video games. Today I've all but dropped them as my free time dwindles. Video games play a very limited role in the wasting of time, which is reserved for writing and chipping away at the long time baseball card sorting project.

#18 - Lepercans

Art that wasn't part of a TV cartoon, but it should have been!

Super mega extra bonus points for all of the intentionally misspelled words in this set. A little touch that makes all the difference. Gives off the feel of actually listening to really stupid people talking. If everything was spelled correctly, you probably wouldn't notice, but the credibility would be shot.

Good example.

#17 - Shark

There's an unacknowledged subset of Beavis & Butthead tattoo ideas.

They fall kind of flat since there's even less context. Not even a gold foil title.

Absolutely redeems itself when you flip it over.

One of the best card backs in the set.

#16 - Lolita and Tanqueray

Great characters in small doses. The stereotypical slutty girls that show up every once in a while to taunt Beavis & Butthead, do little more than introduce themselves in a thick Texas accent. It's a memorable catchphrase in it's simplicity. And they always end up with Todd, because that's what makes sense!

"They're probably dead now..."

I love these cards!

About 15 years ago, the three volume, 9 disk Beavis & Butthead: Mike Judge Collection was released. Covering about 120 episodes, this was the biggest official release of cartoons to date. However, it was still about 80 episodes short of the complete run. 

And that's what I really wanted...

I'm pretty sure there's a few that came out on the Time Warner comps back in 1999-2000. I already had those. I also have this rarity...

The History of Beavis & Butthead DVD

MTV was putting this out in September 2002, until Mike Judge ordered it withdrawn. And it quickly was. Some copies got out, and are fairly valuable today. Quick search shows them selling at various online retailers, between $150-$350. Mine came via ebay, in 2009, for $85. Which I thought was steep, but I'm a completist dork. 

Mike Judge objected to the release because it contained a few early episodes that he felt were too poor quality. MTV agreed, the DVD's were pulled and several years later, we got the far superior Mike Judge Collection. Looking back at the very earliest shows from the Spring of 1993, the animation is almost hard to watch, yet kind of endearing in it's weirdness.

But this copy has some of those early and crude episodes, and I... Yeah.

Beyond that, there's another 80 or so that I remember from TV, and have poor quality VHS tapes of some of it. But nothing official and clean. They're just kind of erased from history, beyond written summaries. Which is a trend that will continue as entertainment is moved over to streaming platforms only.

I want physical copies of the stuff I like. If there's ever a chance that I want to go back to revisit something I feel important, I need a physical copy of it. Depending on whatever network or licensee holds the rights to your favorite shows, it could easily disappear from streaming or you tube, at the drop of a hat.

Growing up enjoying niche programming like Beavis & Butthead, I never imagined this stuff would eventually go away. Once TV was tired of dealing with it, it was finding permanent homes on DVD's. Now they are done and we just have to trust that it will be hosted online somewhere.

Whatever...

#15 - Young Gifted and Rude

That's more like it!

That was pretty much my excuse for not reading books too...

I've got no problem being gifted at excuses either.

When it comes to 1990's music, Beavis & Butthead talking over the song is how I want to remember most of it.

You can't get much more 1994 than this video!

Licensing the music to put all of the music videos on a DVD release would come at an astronomical cost. Not seeing the cartoons on DVD in the format I remember them from MTV back in the mid 1990's, feels like it's missing something. As the show went on, the videos became less about what they liked or hated about the song, but chance to go on some bizarre tangent for a minute and a half, that had nothing to do with the standard 12 minute episode. 

Beavis & Butthead was such a quick phenomenon that it didn't take Marvel Comics long, before getting Beavis & Butthead Issue #1 on newsstands, by March 1994. I didn't buy these when they came out, instead I picked up 6 of the first 7 issues off ebay in the late 1990's. They were pretty cheap because no one cared. After reading them, I didn't feel impulsed to find any others. (There are 28 in the series.)

#14 - Home Improvement

One of multiple episodes where they terrorized Tom Anderson's house. Until Mr. Anderson grew 25 years younger and got his own spinoff, called King of the Hill. That's not true, just seemed like both characters were based on the same guy at different ages. I'm sure it's a Texas stereotype very familiar to Mike Judge, I didn't like King of the Hill anywhere near as much. It was well done, and I'm sure it was accurate to the Texas culture he is familiar with, but it didn't resonate with me. 

I like the terrorize Mr. Anderson episode where they were digging out a swimming pool in his backyard, while he was looking for Spanish tile for his pool cabana, at the Home Labyrinth. 

Home Improvement was one of the DVD's I watched while writing this. When the scene of Beavis huffing paint thinner and painting the house came on. I had to do a little compare and contrast.

ENHANCE!

Yup, totally different Beavis than the one on the card. The roller is now covered in paint, which makes sense. I do think the background art of the house, yard and paint is the same. Looks re-colored, but the idea is the same. Since Beavis and Butthead were shown huffing said paint thinner in the cartoon, this had to be one of the earliest episodes to make the Mike Judge Collection.

Whatever...

#13 - I'm Like Beavis

So, as the first year of production developed, Beavis got a makeover!

1994 Ultra Beavis & Butthead is not the only Beavis & Butthead card set that Fleer produced in 1994.

There's also the stripped down Fleer set...

Which is the same exact set, only with a purple border and no gold foil stamping. 

The Fleer card backs also have the purple border and "69" in the card number, but an MTV logo in the corner...

Instead of the borderless look with a Fleer Ultra logo. 

Also, different cropping.

Had to love seeing Beavis & Butthead going after one of our most played videos from 201 Proof Television!

Speaking of 201 Proof Television, we even had (Name Redacted) Star do the Cornholio gimmick for the (Name Redacted) Star's Island sketch, on the August 18, 1994 episode.

Blurry and Oscar-worthy.

#12 - Meet God

One of the weaker episodes given the lofty premise, I always thought.

But that joke about The Cult is top notch!

Of course I can't talk about the original run of Beavis & Butthead, without covering the B.S. controversy of that day. I'll let my hometown newspaper, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, tell that story, as they did on  October 9, 1993:

I don't recall any particular segment where Beavis & Butthead are "setting things on fire", as the mom states. Certainly there were incidents on the show where they said the word "fire" in a favorable connotation. And the show did air clips of Beavis flicking a Bic-style lighter. But what the story fails to address is how the 5 year old became such a fan of a show that wasn't available in their home, since they DIDN'T HAVE CABLE TELEVISION!

Through all this utter nonsense, my favorite quote still comes from the MTV spokeswoman: 

"Responsibly programming MTV has always been and will continue to be our top priority."

Sure it is MTV, sure it is... 

A few weeks later, October 25, 1993, to be precise, USA Today weighed in with Tom Green's (No, not THAT Tom Green) editorial. Pretty much hits right to the core. Beavis & Butthead was a fad. And I missed those shameless bags of atrophy.

Come on man! Funk Dat!

Back in the fall of 2000, a friend of mine helped me hook FrankenMac up to my stereo, TV and VCR. Thanks to that awesome audio editing software, Sound Edit 16, I was now able to record audio from any of the media I had on hand, and burn it to CD's. For several years, I did a whole lot of this. First making audio recordings of almost all the 201 Proof Television VHS tapes, to preserve 1994 even more. One night a new project was unknowingly suggested...

An annoying woman I worked with snarkily asked me if I ever listened to any "normal" music. That weekend, I dug out the Beavis & Butthead VHS tapes I'd recorded in Basement World, and set out to create a series of audio CD's, full of the music videos Beavis & Butthead ripped on.

That following Monday night, I showed up to work with three CD's full of "normal" music. Perfectly acceptable radio friendly hits... All with Beavis & Butthead's commentary over them. She was not amused. However, my other coworkers were! Over the next few months, I added 6 more audio CD's of Beavis & Butthead goodness. All of which were big hits with the overnight shift in the office. 

She quit a few months later. While I'd love to take credit for that, it's likely not true. 

Unlike getting a guy to drop out of Overpriced Art School, by playing an The Commercial Album by The Residents. Then 3 years later, finding out that I was now working in the same department as that kid's mother. 

But that's an entirely different story!

Whatever...

#11 - Door to Door

During my near 3 year term of giving rides to pizza, I never encountered something like this when knocking on a strangers door. I saw occasional nudity, but no dominatrixes.

Quite often I would deliver to a house or apartment that "smelled funny". Usually it was a good kind of funny.

It was even gooder if they shared.

#10 - People Were Stupid in Olden Times

More non-show art.

That horse looks even more challenged than either Beavis or Butthead.

I doubt Gwar has been mentioned on any other Fleer Ultra card. 

Maybe a hockey card?

#9 - Men at Work

In 1992-1993, I worked at Hardees. Not all that different from Burger World either. One of my co-workers was definitely a real life Butthead. Boy did everyone hate that guy! We didn't have a resident Beavis though...

Can't say I didn't have these same thoughts when I was a 17 year old working the fast food grill. However, any ideas of wanting the customers to bring their own food to Hardees didn't cross my mind. By the way, Three's Company was a terrible TV show. IFC airs reruns every so often, and it does not age well...

Shortly after we got together, Laura bought me a Beavis & Butthead Work Sucks T-shirt. I don't wear stuff like this as I prefer plain solid color T-shirts, but I will display it! This shirt hung on the bedroom closet door of our Englewood apartment from 2012 to 2018.

#8 - Hellocinations

This picture is all sorts of awesome!

And that explanation makes perfect sense!

I'm a zombie, I'm a dead guy... And uh I'm a dead guy in the corner...

Back in 2001, I found someone online that was selling VHS tapes of the entire run of Beavis & Butthead episodes. It was fairly expensive, but Trav and I agreed to split the cost, and I'd make a copy for myself. I had a dual deck VCR at the time, and was able to easily make copies of tapes. 

Apparently Roy A. (or Ray A.?) was late in getting the Beavis & Butthead videotapes to me, I don't remember. As this accompanying note apologizes for being so late.

Whatever...

#7 - Sick

Yeah, this episode was pretty gross. Even worse than Beavis's thong... The dripping mucus is a bit much for me (especially as they were eating Cheetos), and I usually skipped the show in reruns. It was funny, just hard to look at.

Subscription cough medicine has never gave me a wicked buzz. 

#6 - Foreign Exchange

Conversely, this was one of my favorite episodes.

Hiro should have been a bigger presence in the series.  

Hopefully he's not teaching anyone how to do stuff in American...

Nobody needs that...

December 1996 saw Beavis & Butthead make their major motion picture debut. I saw it with my girlfriend at the time, much to her protest. It was showing at a small Littleton theater placed in the corner of a shopping center. That theater closed not too long after 1996, and became new retail that blended in with the rest around it. I thought I had taken a picture of it once, but I guess I didn't get one before moving out of Colorado.

Did Siskel & Ebert REALLY endorse this movie?

Wow, I guess they did! 

That theater had a decent promotion going on to promote the movie. All the way down to Beavis & Butthead themed popcorn bags. And unlike most of that theater's patrons, I kept my empty bag after eating the popcorn. Kinda doubt that many people did...

The Beavis side...

And the Butthead side.

There was a purpose to keeping these, beyond just keeping these. A few days after the movie, I made multiple Xerox copies of both the Beavis side and the Butthead side, brought them home and got out the scissors, tape and black pens...

Wasted Quarter issue #30 needed a front cover. And that front cover needed Beavis & Butthead! 

This would have been far easier to assemble in Photoshop, but I was still several months away from attending Overpriced Art School, and at least a year and several months away from FrankenMac, so all Wasted Quarter issues were put together with scissors, tape and black pens. 

Once I did get into Overpriced Art School, and got comfortable with FrankenMac, I learned that the classic Beavis & Butthead font was called "Cheap Motel." 

Now you know too!

#5 - Friday Night

Beavis & Butthead also hung out at a gas station, as if the characters needed more appeal to me.

Friday nights are no longer party nights... Stay up a little later, but I'm watching Bill Maher instead of roller wieners. Pushing 50, I'm just too tired after working all week to hang out at Happy Mart. (Or 99 Spillihp...) Which was called Kwik Mart on the show.

PARTY PEOPLE!!!

This would be a good video to learn to read with...

#4 - Life Sucks

Todd's new tattoo!

"The burning skull stands for the bones inside your head if they were on fire."

That's beautiful.

#3 - Badass Dudes

I don't even remember why they were fighting each other like this in the episode, but this has to be one of the greatest stills from the show.

Some science dude was supposed to have made those food pills years ago.

And my flying car. 

And my sassy robot maid.

I found this promotional picture on the Googles a few years ago. It's the same image I picked up, in poster form, back in 2009. For several years, it hung on the wall in the vague dining area of the apartment. After Laura moved in, the poster was moved to the bedroom. Some people have a picture of Jesus above their bed, we had Beavis and Butthead watching over us while we slept.

And we turned out okay?

#2 - This Rocks

The classic headbanging pose needs to be on a card.

Pretty good advice in dealing with asswipes that think you're worshipping Satan. 

Wonder if I was supposed to return the December 26, 1996, copy of Rolling Stone Magazine, to my ex. She was so irritated by having to sit through the movie, that she didn't likely want it back. Pamela Anderson awkwardly groping cartoons likely wasn't her thing either.

Plus there's a story on The Butthole Surfers! 

Couldn't have timed that better! 

Yeah... The guy with the best nads gets his armpit licked.

You know, this video always gave me a special feeling...

Whatever...

And the number one 1994 Ultra Beavis & Butthead card still in my collection would be...

#1 - Sperm Bank

Our heroes, walking off into the sunset, carrying stacks of porno magazines. 

I think it's okay to mix in a little information and education into our entertainment.

So that's it. The Top 25 1994 Ultra Beavis & Butthead cards still in my collection.

I wish I had more.

Now here's the good news!

As I was working on this story, I found out that the new movie and episodes are getting a combo DVD/BluRay release in mid-March 2023! 

Meaning that I will have a physical copy of the latest Beavis and Butthead cartoons. Pretty sure that I read there will be more episodes to come under the new Comedy Central deal. Hopefully they don't spend a year in streaming limbo first...

And why is it Season One?

After being minorly confused about that for a bit, the top of the box art reads: "Mike Judge's Beavis and Butthead."

Every other season was done under the MTV banner. 

HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEYYYYYY... I just thought of something else!

Four Baggers and Fore Closures saw it's 200,000th page view, on January 20, 2023. Doesn't seem like all that long ago, the 150,000th page hit took place. So thanks to all who've read my stupid crap!

Now that there's been over 230 stories posted here, there's a large bank of material to attract eyes.

And seeing which stories are currently getting the attention is endlessly fascinating to me. 

*******

On January 27, 2023, we lost Gracie to a quick moving cancer.

Laura snapped this photo of Gracie and I watching Beavis and Butthead cartoons, on October 28, 2013.

She was also a big Reno 911 fan.

Rest in peace Gracie, we love you and miss hearing you scream at your toys in the middle of the night.