Children's Cartoon Trends

Jacob LaPierre

Trends in Children's Humor

     We all remember Spongebob Squarepants.  A show that not only defined our generation, but continues to do so even now.  A few of us may remember Ren and Stimpy, a slap stick show about a dog and a cat. Today, we have AdventureTime.  This show takes place in the Land of Ooo where Finn the Human and Jake the Dog save the world from giant monsters.  How are these shows all related?  They all possess humor that resounds with almost all of their viewership.  However, they do this in different ways and through different types of humor.  

     Ren and Stimpy came out in the 1990s, during a time of trendy styles of animation and writing.  The creators of this show focused on the slapstick (physical comedy that is based off of absurd situations) aspect of humor.  This sprinkled with adult references and idiotic singing entertained children and adults(to some extent) alike.  The writing was terrible.  The jokes only were funny if they were coupled with an extravagant action by one of the characters.  This type of a show would not survive today because of changes in how people watch TV.

     The trend then shifted to shows like Spongebob.  These shows made use of the actual writing for the characters' dialogue.  Jokes were stand-alone funny and were only sometimes coupled with an action.  The writing catered to the adult audience as well as the children's audience.  Children loved the sounds of the characters' voices and the very distinct personalities of each.  Adults loved the references to real life situations and jokes that were over the heads of the children.  This mixture of clever writing and animation proved to be the golden standard for all children shows.

     Using that golden standard, AdventureTime makes use of clever writing and bright animation to convey humor to the audience.  The writing differs from that of Spongebob because the situations are more absurd, implying that AdventureTime does tend to rely on slapstick like that of Ren and Stimpy.  To balance this out, the writers use very intelligible dialogue to make simple jokes.  The smart language along with dark themes produces wildly entertaining television for children and adults alike.

     We can see that the trend has moved away from the extremes of the two main types of children's comedy.  The Slapstick that was in Ren and Stimpy is only a small part of AdventureTime's comedy.  The clever jokes in Spongebob find themselves in AdventureTime, but in a more intellectual form.  Since the pendulum of audience comedy expectations has swung from slapstick to writing, it now settles over a balance of the two which calls for shows such as AdventureTime.  

Group 2 Roman Davydov Blog Post

           Do you think violent television shows effect the viewers’ morals? Do some television shows portray antagonists as protagonists? Television show “Breaking Bad,” which was aired in 2008 until 2013. It was produced by Vince Gilligan and it is about Walter White, an elderly chemistry teacher in high school who learns of his terminal cancer and begins cooking methamphetamine to provide his family with enough money to live comfortably after he dies. In one of the episodes, Walter begins to question the morality of his actions. Walter White is viewed as a protagonist because even though he commits criminal actions, he does that to benefit his family. With that said, the popular culture was supportive of a criminal’s actions based on the “justifications” of it being with good intentions. The popular culture struggles with the morals of right and wrong.

            People get emotionally attached to the characters in the shows that they watch. David Pierson, author of Breaking Bad: Critical Essays on the Contexts, Politics, Style, and Reception of the Television Series stated “When viewing a drama, we come to like characters whose actions and motivations we judge as proper or morally correct while we dislike characters whose actions and motivations we judge as improper or morally incorrect… This intertwining of affective dispositions and moral judgments permits and governs our emotional involvement in the drama” (Pg 74). Meaning that the viewers’ appreciation of characters is linked to moral judgment. In Breaking Bad, Walter White gets justified for all of the criminal activities he has committed. Rationalizing his actions as being “the right thing to do,” “this couldn’t have been avoided,” “I’m doing this for my family.” People are attached to Walter White.

            According to London Evening Standard, Paul Cheston, a middle-aged woman tried to kill her mother by using the methods from Breaking Bad. In October of 2014 Paul acquired some poison from a drug dealer and tried to slip it into her mother’s coca cola. Her statement was “It was like I saw myself to be some kind of Mexican drug warlord. I would think it through as if I was the main character in Breaking Bad.” Paul Cheston associated herself with the main character so much that she pretended to be him. A much less extreme case would be Warren Buffet, an eighty two year old billionaire and a huge “Breaking Bad” fan. He said that he “would do business with Walter White.” That is because of his tactics and his business mindset. "He’s my guy if I ever have to go toe-to-toe with anyone."

Tony's Post

The picture below is of recent University of Connecticut graduate Shabazz Napier. Shabazz

played for the Uconn basketball team during his 4 year tenor. He also brought the school a

NCAA championship with his fantastic play in the finals game.

http://thinkprogress.org/sports/2014/04/07/3423798/uconn-star-college-athletes-have-

hungry-nights-that-we-dont-have-enough-money-to-get-food/

This topic reflects on my paper because it talks about how

Shabazz Napier was a star college athlete but did not always

have enough to eat. The cost of attendance to colleges is

often more than what student athletes get for their “full” ride

scholarships, leaving students without any money to buy

food. Leaving students without the financial means they need

to feed themselves seems cruel and is part of the reason why student athletes should get

compensated.

The NCAA makes billions of dollars from selling the rights to broadcast NCAA games. Per

year it equates to the NCAA bringing in north or 750 million dollars per year. All this revenue is

created from the college athletes playing in games. So without the college athletes, that the

NCAA is neglecting to pay, it is fair to assume that there would not be a 750 million dollar a year

contract for the NCAA. If the college athletes are the ones who are driving this massive revenue

stream, such as Shabazz Napier, then why are they not getting paid, or at least have enough to

eat? This article about Shabazz is not the first one that talks about college athletes having

“hungry nights” either. This is a reoccurring theme in college sports because the “full” ride does

not cover the full cost of attending a college. The picture below describes the massive contract

the NCAA has with Turner Broadcasting and CBS for the next 10 years. It aslo depicts the
average shortfall of scholarships which is $3,222. But what I find to be amazing is the ridiculous amount of money that college coaches are being paid compared to the total scholarship money coaches are getting huge checks. This topic is currently popular in the college sports world because of all of the recent news regarding the well-being of college athletes. There have also been many reports of college athletes taking money from boosters, which is not allowed per NCAA rules and results in the

schools facing budget restrictions from the NCAA for scholarships.

To back track to the article about Shabazz Napier from the beginning of this post, the

Uconn head basketball coach received a $66,000 bonus for getting the team into the Final Four

while Shabazz Napier couldn’t afford a bite to eat. The NCAA needs to change its rules about

players getting paid and players being able to be compensated for their likeness. I believe that

all D1 college athletes should get a true full scholarship so that there is no shortfall between

cost of tuition and scholarship award.