No matter what I say or what movies I show her, my mother believes that cartoons are for children. We’ve watched quite a few animated movies for adults – like Paprika and Perfect Blue (both of which she enjoyed) or I Married A Strange Person (which she didn’t) – but she still believes that cartoons are exclusively for children. If I suggest watching some excellent animated feature, it’s always the same response, “Why would I watch a cartoon? They’re for kids!”
Obviously, I disagree with her. Sure, some cartoons are aimed at children and only children, and many of those don’t warrant a discussion of their qualities except as tools of grooming children to be good corporate consumers from an early age (I’m looking at you, The Boss Baby). On the other hand, some animated family movies are built to be understood by adults and children (The Wind Rises) and then some adult movies deal with adult issues in frank terms (A Scanner Darkly).
Part of the cultural divide might actually be how the American view of animation matured during my adolescence. As a child, children’s programming was delegated to daytime television or cable networks. Even Nickelodeon switched to the oldies channel Nick at Nite at 8pm. Many channels had children’s cartoons from M-F from 3pm to 5pm (or 6pm) and on Saturday mornings from 6am – noon. But, the cartoons were for kids.
Prior to about 1988, adult American animated films were cult affairs with small and occasionally passionate audiences. The Beatles had Yellow Submarine, Ralph Bakshi had a handful of animated features ranging from his X-rated premiere Fritz the Cat to the tragically doomed The Lord of the Rings, and Heavy Metal was kept from home video after facing a litany of trademark fees for its soundtrack. Cartoons for adults were far from the mainstream.
In a way, the double hits of Akira and The Simpsons at the end of the 1980s paved the way for the American maturation towards animation. In 1988, Akira – a science fiction anime about government paranoia, psychics, and monsters – had a small limited theatrical release, but quickly found a wider audience through a litany of VHS releases and a Laserdisc from then-blossoming Criterion Collection. While Akira was making advances among the arthouse crowds, The Simpsons was normalizing the cartoon as an adult-oriented cartoon sitcom. Premiering during prime time on the Fox Network, The Simpsons used animation to push the visual language of the family sitcom while also telling adult jokes about infidelity and political campaigns.
Throughout the 1990s, animation pushed the maturity edges of the form. In 1990, Spike and Mike’s Festival of Animation grew large enough to spawn a Sick and Twisted companion festival, showcasing films from Mike Judge and Don Hertzfeld. On television, Nicktoons developed cartoons for tweens, primarily Ren & Stimpy, and Doug. Nick’s sister channel MTV pushed the limits of animation with Liquid Television and Aeon Flux, while they sold Beavis and Butt-head and Daria as more traditional animation acceptable for teenagers and adults. In film, Heavy Metal found a wider audience after it was remastered and legally licensed while Princess Mononoke built its audience as a Miramax release under Buena Vista. This all culminated at the end-of-the-decade adult cartoon South Park.
Over the course of these 12 years, mainstream American animation went from mostly children’s fare to having animation for a wide range of maturity levels. Growing up with the expanding role of animation in the American landscape probably colored my view that animation could be whatever the heck we make of it.
I’m a big fan of animation for being able to get at heightened emotions that live action could never get. In his youth, Bill Plympton was a master of the grotesque emotional reaction and the visual punnery. Don Hertzfeld’s films bend to form abstract emotional landscapes expanding beyond the limitations of live action reality. Ghost in the Shell used animation to smooth over storytelling gaps inherent in classic cyberpunk narratives about unrealities.
How did you grow up with animation? Did you grow up in a world where Adult Swim was already running full steam? Did you struggle to switch from live action to animation or from animation to live action? What are your favorite aspects of animation?
