kids cartoons - part 3

One of the worst things that ever happened to children's television is when a law was passed requiring that broadcasters air a particular amount of "educational" programming for children, per day. Suddenly the broadcasters didn't want to take a chance that what they aired wouldn't count as educational and so the makers of children's television (Hanna-Barbera and Ruby/Spears were the two main producers) began to make cartoons that were heavily moralistic and didactic. But they weren't fun!

Certainly there was good reason for this law -- too many parents were letting television raise their children, therefore television was required to educate. But children need to laugh. They need to know that not everything in life has to be an educational experience.

Perhaps it was a good thing. Perhaps that by making television boring, kids watched less. I don't know if any studies have been done. But of course about this same time, the video game boom began, so kids were switching off the tv tube and switching on the Playstations and Game Boys.

Kids know. They know how to avoid the obvious educational programming. Take away their fun television, and they find another mindless outlet.

One of the first television cartoons to break away from the moralistic, educational cartoon-making was The Animaniacs. A wacky, silly, anything-goes series that made kids laugh but contained a LOT of humor that only the adults might catch. The series was produced by Steven Spielberg.

The Animaniacs worked because it drew from its cartoon roots. You can do ANYthing in a cartoon, and so you should. Drop 500 ton anvils on someones head, pull a mallet bigger than you from your coat pocket, hit someone so hard that they soar out in space. And the writing was intelligent. You had to know a little something about film and literature history to catch some of their best jokes -- yet while the little kids might not catch the West Side Story motiff, they will enjoy seeing pigeons puff themselves up and act "gang-like" to protect their territory. Drawing on popular culture was very popular in the heyday of the MGM cartoons, and so The Animaniacs brought that back in to play.

Almost certainly The Animaniacs never would have been done if it hadn't had Spielberg's name on it. For this I am grateful. I believe that is was a combination of this Spielberg production and the now plethora of channel choices that has brought a resurgence of quality kids cartoons. The Fairly Oddparents owes a great deal to The Animaniacs and classic cartoons: intelligent writing, an anything-goes attitude, and drawing on popular culture in some story-lines and character creation.

It is fortunate that we now have so many different channel choices. Because of stations like The Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon and The Disney Channel, we can have volumes of cartoon programming. And if only two hours have to be educational, the rest can be just plain fun.

It is good that the children who watched great cartoons in the 50's and 60's are now making their own cartoons. But will the kids from the 80's and 90's be doing a few years hence?