Blog Talkback: Toons of the 2000s: Top 5 Most Influential People in Animation

I wholeheartedly agree with the number one choice. John Lasseter saved 2D animation in Disney and has created nothing but excellent work throughout his entire career.
 
So the South Park guys and the Family guy guy gets recognized in the honorable mentions, but not The Simpsons guys? Oh but come on! Sure The Simpsons has sucked pretty hard this decade, but at least it's been the most popular adult cartoon...
 
The thing is, which guys do you nominate? Matt Groening, the creator of The Simpsons, hasn't done much work with the show in years (though I guess Futurama gives him some credit this decade), and nobody on the current crew is particularly notable.
 
What would your Top 5 have been?


They might partially be in the order they were discussed when they were noms for the list. Past that, no particular order.



Well, if, by your account, the show "sucked pretty hard this decade", then all they did is perform their basic function of being on the air. I don't think you'd give a person an honorable mention for remembering to breathe.
 
I think a lot of problems critics have about the list is that they're confusing popularity with influence. If this was a popularity contest, then Trey and Matt, Seth, Matt, Mike, and others would definitely be up there.

They made a truckload of money and pissed a lot of people off in the process, both in the content of their wares and those within the animation community. They're powerful, but does power begot influence?

Depends on how they wield their power.

Trey, Matt, and Seth entertain folks, but I don't think they're really influencing folks or changing the industry as a whole. They're making deals, yes, but influence? No. I mean, if you want to get into it, I think Aubrey Ankrum, Rhode Montijo, Kenn Navarro, and the Brothers Chaps are way more influential than Trey and Matt and Seth in one segment of the creative community. And if you know those names, then you know what I'm talking about. If you don't know those names, then some time in this decade, you have encountered their works (Ankrum, Montijo, and Navarro were the creators of Happy Tree Friends and the Brothers Chaps created Homestar Runner).

I love this list not just because I'm part of the rabroad crew, but because it's not filled with the usual suspects and is a very eclectic group of individuals that are rarely acknowledged in the media and by this community. I mean, personally speaking, I'm a fan of Fred Seibert, who helped mold the modern television animation landscape more than anyone realizes. But how many people knew who he was without resorting to Wikipedia for research and beyond Frederator?

It's not a popularity listing, it's a measure of influence, those that made an impact beyond personal gain or social commentary in the animation industry as a whole.
 
I like this list, really does highlight the people that innovated the industry. Jerry Beck spot is well deserving along with Lasseter, Seibert Bruce Timm and Moruyama.

Even all the honorable mentions are nice as well, espcially Trey & Matt, Seth MacFarlane, Bob Iger, Brad Bird, Hayao Miyazaki, and Gen Fukanaga.
 
Perhaps, but I also think that there's a difference between the TZ staff and the people who post in the forums. It's no secret that the majority of the people who post here are Cartoon Network/Anime fanboys. Meanwhile, the TZ staff has a wider range of interest. So, there's obviously gonna be some clashing.
 
Good to see Jerry Beck on there. He can't be thanked enough for his efforts in getting classic animation on DVD, and in great quality, too. Here's hoping the upcoming Bugs and Daffy DVD sets (coming in April) are successful so he can keep doing what he's doing.
 
I don't think they are confusing popularity with influence, for one Trey Parker & Matt Stone have had a huge influence on modern animation and probably an even greater influence on all the shows on Adult Swim.

South Park really showed that with extremely limited and cheap animation, you can still produce a very funny and well written cartoon. Almost every flash animated series on Adult Swim and almost every comedy series on Adult Swim came about because Comedy Central had massive success with South Park and still does to this day, wihle the series isn't animated with flash, I do think it paved the way for almost every flash series after it. You might hear that and think it's a stretch, but is anyone as shocked anymore to see a series with incredibly crude animation anymore? Not really, it's pretty commonplace now thanks to South Park.

Seth MacFarlane, whether you like it or not, has also had a pretty big influence on comedic animated series as of the past 5 years. Drawn Together, several Adult Swim series, and others have all been influenced by Family Guy's rapid joke-a-minute style.

And you can't really say the creators of Happy Tree Friends or Homestar Runner were industry changers, hell nobody even watches Happy Tree Friends or Homestar anymore.
 
Good to see Seth MacFarlane get at least an honorable mention. And of course it would simply be an incorrect list if have Bruce Timm weren't on it.
 
You can make the argument, and to qoute South Park, Simpsons did it. And 20 years ago. While nowhere near as cheap to make as SP, The Simpsons was never mistaken for high quality animation. It was a crudely drawn cartoon that rode on the strength of it's writing. Still does to this day as the animation still isn't good, just not crude. SP went further with that but I don't they started that.



If it's only Adult Swim shows I don't think that's really a big influence overall. He gets an honorable mention which is pretty good for a guy as polorizing as Seth.
 
Not to diminish the success of "South Park" (I consider myself a fan), but I don't think making it acceptable for cartoons to be crudely animated to be something one could be proud of. Wee! We lowered the standards of animation!

Nice to see Jerry Beck in the list. A heck of a nice guy if I can say so myself.
 
Yea that's something that I agree on too. South Park is really the only crudeley animated show I can bear to watch. A lot of other shows trying to emulate it I can't stand.
 
Call me crazy, but I really don't see much South Park-ness in the Adult Swim shows. I'll explain in a bit.

Not really. Vector-based animation really found its groove once the technology got to the point that it was accessible. Vector-based animation existed long before South Park adapted it, and it evolved largely because of other creators like Eddie Mort and Lili Chin, the Brothers Chaps, the Mondo Media guys, the JibJab guys, Matt Maiellaro, Chris Prynoski and Titmouse, Adam Reed and 70/30, Scott Fry and Radical Axis, and many others. Trey and Matt aren't leaders in that retrospect.

In regards to Adult Swim, the Adult Swim mentality existed long before Adult Swim and long before South Park. Remember, Williams Street was once Ghost Planet Industries, and they utilized the humor and sensibilities from Space Ghost Coast to Coast in all of the Williams Street-guided Adult Swim original series. SGC2C came first and is the foundation of all that is Adult Swim, and the fratboy sense of humor that evolved from the series influenced a generation of creators of web cartoons and later television shows and cartoons who watched them religiously.

One, who said I didn't like it? But Seth isn't all that original either. He was influenced by the works of Tex Avery, Hanna-Barbera, and Leon Schlesinger Studios, who did the joke-a-minute style first and better. Same deal with Drawn Together, which utilized a lot of the same comedy styles of those influences with a lot more crudeness catered to today's audiences.

I don't know. I mean, they were pioneers when it came to original web content as well as set a standard for vector-based animation as a dominant animation medium online, leading the way for folks like Fred Seibert to make a better model, which he did in Channel Frederator.
 
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