A Saturday Morning documentary

M

meganelise

New member
I was thinking about this last night and I thought it would be interesting if the idea actually came to fruition. Everybody's talking about how Saturday Mornings have declined due to pressure from the FCC,competition from cable networks and other factors. It'd be great if they could chronicle the history of Saturday Mornings highlighting its early days, the dominance of the ABC, NBC and CBS from decade to decade, shows that made up each decade and their influence, the emergence of the media watchdogs, FOX's entrance into the game, NBC's cancellation of their block and much more. Plus it could include interviews with former and current network programmers as well as people from some of the animation studios, past and present, who were there.

Pretty interesting concept.
 
If PBS, History channel or A&E aren't interested, how about posting it directly on Youtube, Dailymotion, Veoh or having some direct-to-video sale?
 
If he were to actually sale it, he'd need permission to mention all the shows and saturday morning blocks that were to appear in the documentary.
If you made for something to be viewed on Youtube and whatnot, you wouldn't have to.

As much as this is an interesting concept for a documentary, I'm worried it'll end up as a bunch of fans whining on how things aren't as as good as they used to be.
 
If this show at MoCCA (now long gone, unfortunately) could travel or turn into a book/TV documentary, it sounds like it would fit your bill perfectly. Unfortunately, I think a lot of the material in the show was lent from private collections, so I don't know whether turning it into a traveling show is feasible.

In the meantime, you'll have to satisfy yourself with the review of the show and the interview I did with Matt Murray about it. I'll bring up the idea of turning it into a book the next time I see him, though.

Getting rights for these things would be a bear, but I think most of the major media companies would play along. Doing it really comprehensively would be a pretty serious project all on its own, though.

-- Ed
 
I cant believe Saturday Mornings are coming to an end. 4Kids TV is just garbage, Disney on ABC is repeats from heck, CBS is aimed for little girls, NBC is all about education, and FOX....well we are seeing the future of CW. Saturday Mornings quality is not the only problem, the quality of TV in general has gone so low budged I don't even watch the local networks anymore. Reality TV has gone out of control and now Saturday Mornings are next to go. Its a dang shame, its a really dang shame.
 
You know I'd really love to see a Saturday Morning Documentary even though I know that the ending is going be really depressing, there is a way to save Saturday Mornings, not on the networks but the cable channels, I don't see why Disney Channel Toon Disney, Nickoldeon and Cartoon Network don't move the premires of their shows to Saturday Mornings instead of Monday or Friday nights.
 
I'm going to guess that it has to do with advertising rates and when people will be home watching TV and all that good stuff. Of course, I totally don't understand how a show aimed at younger audiences will get better ratings with evening viewings than SatAM, but I'm not a network exec and I'm sure they have some study telling them why. It might be something like a bid for more respectable parenting, since putting a premiere smack-dab in the time when a parent is watching TV means it's more likely to get the parents watching with the kids. Maybe.

In any event, it's worth pointing out that someone in the mid/late 90's doing a documentary on Saturday morning cartoons would have had a pretty depressing ending, too, but that changed by the early 2000's. Same thing would have been true of someone writing about Disney feature animation before the mid-80's and The Little Mermaid. Cartoons seem to go through boom and bust periods, and it's looking a little like a bust period now. I'm sure it'll swing back in the other direction sooner or later.

-- Ed
 
To sum it up, I really hope so, but I doubt it. This is an instant world, especially corperate. If something isn't an instant success, then it gets dropped imediately. No one is willing to ride a slump anymore, because these youngsters don't know what a slump is.

Problem is, they could go to a Boom period if someone was willing to try something. But trying costs money, and no one wants to invest in anything but a sure thing.

look at Seinfeld, one of the most popular sitcoms of our time. It had abysmal ratings the first 2 seasons, and was in danger of getting cancelled. Because they stuck through it, it became a huge success. if this happened today, it would have been dropped after 5 episodes, and replaced by something based on a commercial character or something, that would be even less successful.
 
Interesting idea, Zen Man. Have you tried contacting Jerry Beck over at Cartoon Brew about this idea? He's the biggest, most active cartoon buff I've seen and it's possible he may give you some pointers in doing this.
 
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