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Modern cartoons Yeah, I still watch cartoons sometimes. I find them oddly relaxing at best and only moderately annoying at worst. They can't really annoy me since I know they're meant for kids, usually small kids, and so we can't expect any sort of intelligence anymore. After all, we're lowering the expectations on kids almost daily in all fields. Its true, we used to expect kids to read subtitles, now we dubbed all shows, we used to expect them to read tough books in school, now Harry Potter is all that's needed. Lower expectations are everywhere and so it comes to no surprise that cartoons have gotten a lot stupider. But what does at times annoy me is the subject of these cartoons. In a world where kids grow dumber, cartoons are more and more depicting them as heroes, while the adults run around like drooling idiots.
Grossology This one for instance. Two kids, still in high school, work for some government branch to root out villains who usually have a disgusting plan. Their boss is a grey suited weasel of a man with an over inflated opinion of himself who usually calls the two kids when the city is about to be overrun, expecting them to come save him. Now, I know of no kids that age who could possibly maintain the concentration needed for any mission whatsoever. Most kids I know have the concentration spans of goldfish and are bored incredibly quickly if they're not kept occupied in various ways. I know this, because I teach history and geography to kids. (yeah yeah, cue the bad teacher jokes) So why did they start producing so many cartoons where the kids are the heroes? I clearly remember older cartoons starring adults as the heroes, as it should be. After all, adults are the ones who have the experience, the strength and the skill to accomplish missions. Most of them even have the concentration span needed! Plus they had certain distinct advantages:
MASK Its legal for them to drive cars for instance! The enemy was an actual military force led by an airforce general with an evil moustache and the hero was a blond haired Arian superman. In fact, some of the adults were so badass they flew helicopters and tanks and shot weapons at each other that didn't fire snot or rope or some sort of glue stuff. No, there was actual physical violence involved here and we loved it, didn't we? I sure as hell did. I think I understand the reasoning behind the cartoon makers these days. Kids apparently don't want to watch adults on TV anymore. They want to get the feeling that they don't need to grow up or do anything and still fantasize about being a hero. The subjects remain the same, they just got younger, easier to become, the goal has become easier to reach. In short, we're even making their fantasies easier for them. We're making them even more lazy. We're adding to the complete lack of interest they're displaying.
Aargh, it seems some of that youthly concentration problem is rubbing off on me. I can't come up with a good way to end this article so instead, I'm gonna leave you with the intro to the 80's cartoon MASK, one of the the best damn cartoons ever made. Working overtime, fighting crime!
MASK rules! Modern cartoons suck!
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