Scorn hands down.

Pedal rigs are tons of fun, especially when you use them like a poor man's modular synth.
You can get some absolutely INSANE textures, throbs, and drones using nothing but pedal chains.

I can't recommend circuit bending effects pedals enough, as good bends give you so much more bang for your buck ...

Well basically, what they did to create the sound your talking about was to create a very rapid arpeggiator patch, where they would have the notes playing so fast it would sound like a drone, this was then recorded to analog tape (sequencers were rare at the time and expensive), the tape was then ...

In the 80's cartoon they'd make that crunchy yet liquidy sounding noise whenever they'd transform

Outside of the cartoon, I've heard that style of sound manipulation used in a few songs.

Just off the top of my head:
Spor - Haunt Me
Babylon System - Loaded

How the hell does one accomplish this ...