Cheez TV, Rage and The Simpsons Every Night: Australians Name Their Favourite TV Eras
On AFL grand final weekend, a simple question in an Australian nostalgia forum asked people to rank Seven, Nine, Ten, the ABC and SBS at their peaks. Hundreds of replies later, the answers read less like a ratings table and more like a shared diary of after-school cartoons, Sunday night movies and late-night SBS.
The post went up in r/AustralianNostalgia with a plain title: at their individual peaks, how do you rank the big five original free-to-air channels? Nobody agreed on the order. Almost everybody agreed on the shows.
What comes through is how much Australian television was a routine rather than a menu. People don’t remember choosing a channel so much as moving through a day that the networks had built for them, from breakfast cartoons to the moment Ten told the kids it was time for bed.
Ten owned the hours between school and bed
If the thread had a winner, it was Ten, and specifically Ten between about 1995 and 2008. One reply laid out the whole evening as a single run: “Ten in the early 2000’s – the Simpsons, into neighbours, into big brother, into The OC into Rove Live…. That was peak television”. Another put it more simply: “Ten had the Simpsons and cheez TV. Ten wins”.
Cheez TV came up again and again. The weekday morning cartoon block, hosted by Ryan Lappin and Jade Gatt, ran on Ten from July 1995 until 2005, when Toasted TV replaced it. The Simpsons at six o’clock was the other fixed point. “The best thing Channel 10 did was The Simpsons every night Monday-Friday!” one person wrote.
Not every memory was fond. A viewer who grew up in a Ten, ABC and SBS household remembered the frustration of the network’s scheduling: “Sometimes they would play the same Simpsons episode twice in one week.” Another summed up early 90s Ten, with Eyewitless News, E Street, Twin Peaks and Seinfeld, in one line: “They were tapped in to the zeitgeist, and likely many other drugs.”
The ABC was the after-school channel, and then Rage
For many, the ABC filled the gap between the school bell and dinner. Replies listed Rugrats, Rocko’s Modern Life, Daria, Arthur, Inspector Gadget and Astro Boy, alongside The Afternoon Show and Vidiot. “ABC could do no wrong,” one person wrote.
Older viewers remembered the ABC for its British imports. “ABC for all the British comedies, excellent kids shows, RAGE, Monkey, Young Ones” was one early reply. A Tasmanian who grew up with British parents listed Ab Fab, One Foot in the Grave, Keeping Up Appearances, Fawlty Towers and The Bill.
Rage is the rare answer that still counts in the present tense. The all-night music video show first went to air on 17 April 1987 and is still on ABC TV on Friday and Saturday nights. One reply to the whole question was simply “RAGE”.
SBS went from late-night reputation to the thread’s quiet favourite
SBS got the most jokes and, by the end, a surprising amount of respect. Much of the teasing was about its late-night films, which several commenters described in terms we won’t reprint. But the list of what people actually watched is long: Pizza, Paul Fenech’s comedy; Top Gear and MythBusters; South Park; Iron Chef; RocKwiz; The World Game on Sundays; and the anime that turned a generation of teenagers into fans.
Des Mangan, who hosted SBS’s Cult Movies on Saturday nights, got a devoted mention: “Des Mangan is a god among men.” Another viewer remembered Eat Carpet, the short film showcase SBS ran from 1989 to 2005, as “My first introduction to trippy arthouse claymation short films”.
Several people said SBS is better now than it has ever been. “Im 42 and its unbelievable really how respectable and good SBS turned out,” wrote one. Another pointed to its World Cup coverage and streaming app: “They were always a meme channel during the peak of FTA but the tables have turned dramatically.”
Nine had the cricket, and the family audience
Nine’s memories cluster around summer and Saturday night. “Nine, you can’t beat Richie Benaud and Tony Greig all summer long,” one reply said, and another simply missed the Wide World of Sports cricket theme. Hey Hey It’s Saturday, which ran on Nine from 1971 to 1999 with Daryl Somers as host, and Sale of the Century, from 1980 to 2001, were the other staples.
VoiceEditSuitePro audio tools built for working voice actors.Auto Clean UpACX Audiobook PrepAudition DirectorOne viewer described Nine in the 80s and 90s as the family default, with a nod to its long-time Sydney newsreader: “Nine seemed to be the main channel for the family. Brian Henderson told us so.” Nine also took the thread’s sharpest criticism for what it airs today, with one person calling it “the biggest downfall”.
Seven meant Agro, A*mazing and Saturday Disney
Seven’s nostalgia is almost entirely about kids’ television. Agro’s Cartoon Connection, the weekday morning show fronted by Jamie Dunn’s puppet, ran from 1990 to 1997. A*mazing, the maze game show hosted by James Sherry, ran from 1994 to 1998. Saturday Disney started in January 1990 and lasted more than 26 years.
One person reconstructed a whole 90s afternoon as a three-channel relay: Seven for A*mazing, the ABC until six, then Ten for The Simpsons. Grown-ups remembered Blue Heelers, All Saints and Home and Away, and one viewer credited Seven with the “Best selection of US TV”.
The rituals nobody gets back
Some of the warmest replies weren’t about a single show. They were about television as an event. “The Sunday night movie premier. 7, 9 and 10 all having movies on at 8:30pm,” one person wrote. Someone answered that the networks would promote those films all week: “It was like an event.”
Viewers who grew up with Ten’s Fat Cat remembered the costumed cat and presenter Jane Reilly signing off the children’s evening at 7.30pm: “That meant off to bed.” Others remembered the old dial, when SBS was channel 0 or 28 and the ABC was channel 2, and still think of them that way.
For a publication that covers the voice business, that detail is worth pausing on. Much of what people remember as the personality of a network was a voice: a puppet on Seven, a newsreader on Nine, a costumed cat saying goodnight on Ten, and the announcers who told you what was coming up after the break. Voice Over Herald looks at those station voices, and at the network logos that sat alongside them, in a companion piece.
What the thread is really mourning
The most thoughtful reply wasn’t nostalgic about any one channel. “Teams of writers, actors, actresses, set designers, editors, promoters, it was a big industry and it was our YouTube,” it said, before lamenting cuts to Australian children’s drama.
And one line captured where free-to-air sits in 2026 for a lot of people. Posted on the morning of the AFL grand final, which Seven broadcast on Saturday, it read: “Today is the only day of the year I watch any of them any more.”
The full thread is on r/AustralianNostalgia.
Sources: r/AustralianNostalgia thread “At their individual peaks, how do you rank the big 5 OG FTA channels?” (September 2026); Wikipedia entries for Cheez TV, Rage, Agro’s Cartoon Connection, A*mazing, Saturday Disney, Hey Hey It’s Saturday, Sale of the Century, Eat Carpet and Blue Heelers; ABC News, AFL grand final schedule, 24 September 2026. Reddit comments are quoted as written.
Lee este artículo en español: Cheez TV, Rage y Los Simpson cada noche: los australianos eligen su televisión favorita
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