As things become more uncertain in the world and values and morality go out the window it's not uncommon for people to retreat into the memories of a simpler, pleasant time. Even if that time just happens to be the 1990s. In case you didn't know, we are riding the wave of 90's nostalgia right now, and it's a great current to get swept up in. Why wouldn't you want to revisit the 90s? We had a saxophone playing president who had both the national debt and unemployment rate at an all time low. There was only really one sports team you needed to follow (Da Bulls) and music, on the whole, was infinitely more awesome than it is today with the rise of Grunge, East Coast/West Coast Rap, Pop Music, and the Macarena. Video games were in their creative heyday (as opposed to the Call of Duty/Madden rut they're in now). We had a plethora of awesome systems: NES, SNES, N64, Playstation, SEGA, and SEGA Dreamcast. The consoles went hand in hand with truly epic games: Golden Eye, Super Mario World, Super Metriod,
Mortal Kombat, Donkey Kong Country, Perfect Dark, and Sonic the Hedgehog 2. On top of all this, gas was cheaper, MTV still played music, kids played outside, people could say "not!" and "all that and a bag of chips" without seeming lame, going to the mall was the highlight of your week (especially if it had a video arcade), and you could spend all day looking at
Magic Eye or
Where's Waldo books without getting bored. It was altogether a more perfect and serene time. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RTicmeCeAU One of the best things about growing up in the 90s was all the great TV. Now I know you've probably read list after list of great 90s shows; everything from the
X-Files to
Kenan and Kel, but this is not what I am referring to. Yes the 90s had a plethora of great television shows, but the reason why they were so great was due to how the shows were arranged. TV in the 90s was not a scatter-shot cavalcade of shows from different genres and channels colliding and contrasting in some random order, but rather a carefully composed picture of order and style. Each and every show, for the most part, had a channel/lineup where it belonged and could call home; a sort of community where it found, among other things, a defining time slot and target viewers. These "communities" are what came to be known as television blocks. Just about every major network in the 90s had a television block that was their claim to fame. Televisions blocks were multiple, hour-long blocks of niche programming that aired at certain times and were geared towards certain demographics to maximize viewers. If you were around during the 90s, then you most certainly were a fan and avid watcher of at least one of the decade's signature television blocks, even if you can't remember them by name or channel. While the names and specifics of the blocks aren't terribly important, we still want to be as thorough as we can in our nostalgia. With that in mind, let's put a name to these storied old television blocks by highlighting the seven that made the 90s a truly golden era.