Reveiw american animaion by decade.

Say what!? No other decades cartoons have ben so grossly infused with moral tones than the 80's. Practiacly every episode of shows like He-man, Thundercats, Care Bears, The Smurfs and so on had atleast one preachy speach about something like the value of friendship, honesty, courage, true love, family, a free market, abstinence, nationalism ect (well, maybe those last three were'nt the most common themes, but you get the picture).

However, im not saying this is always a bad thing. In fact, the few times i actually do get some kind of enjoyment out of re-wisiting 80's toons nowadays are usually when those moral lessons are touching enough to tug a little at my heart strings. That dont happend often mind you, but every now and then. Like in a He-man episode i saw on YouTube not to long ago, were a kid idolizes his grandpa who fought in a war of sime kind, and the episode ends with the grandpa telling his grandson how some of his friends got killed in said war (because of a foolish mistake he himself made with a deadly weapon) and how war is actually a horrible thing and nothing to glorifie (*sob*).

Anyway, i think im starting to babble, so ill just stop writing now. :shrug:
 
how has nobody mentioned Superman from the 40s? that is phenomenal animation, especially for its time. it kicks the butt of most animation today even.
 
But not to the degree of the aforementioned Tom & Jerry show I mentioned. For one, surely you agree the last Super Friend shows are a step up from the first season.
 
The only toons I remeber from pre 70`s is H.B. toons. Looney toons, disney shorts/movies and tom&jerry.:sweat:

The 70s has to be the worst. If there was a good toon from the era I can`t remeber it.:confused:

The 80s rock. So what if most of the toons were not serious, Who cares? most of them could be seem as face value like TMNT. Then you had good ones like ducktales, The real ghost busters, Cops and the best of them all THE Transformers. Sure there were some bad ones but what decade don`t have any stinkers? My little ponies were gear toward girls. So it really no surprise that a guy didn`t like that show much.:D

The 90`s were the best. This when toon writers took a stand againts censorship and give us some toons that were dark,serious, whit high impact action whit people getting hit in the face alone whit a few mature jokes too. Females also got a piece of the action too. The decade is also know for having the best toon blocks on TV like the disney afternoon, Kids WB,Toonami and Fox Kids. The 90s rule.:cool:

Can`t say the same for 2000. There only a handfull of toons I enjoy from this decade. I would not say all the toons from 2000 were bad but nor were they good either. I saw some of toons from 2000 as being childish(sometime more) like toons from the 80s. Atleast the childish toons from the 80`s were funny while the toons from 2000 were not funny at all. On the other hand some toons try to be too mature and didn`t workout too well like spiderman 2003. 2000 also mark the end of 2 great toon blocks. Kids WB and Toonami. And whatever happend to toons having good music in the shows? Some of the music in toons today are so bad its enough to make me wanna hit the mute button. That enough proof for me to consider 2000 one of the worst decades for cartoons.:sad:
 
Call me nuts, but I have always been a big Scoody Doo fan, so I liked the 70's cartoons, at least some of the Hanna Barbara stuff. Outside of Scooby, Josie and The Pussycats, Hong Kong Phoey, the 70's didn't have anything else I liked.

I loved the 1940's for the early Warner Brothers cartoons, they were so much better than the later WB cartoons in the 50's and early 60's. Also you had the great Tom And Jerry cartoons.

I agree the 80's was very toy manufacture dominated era, and a Public service education dominated era. Also it was very age and gender divide decade in animation. The cartoons were just for kids of a certain age, or just for boys or girls, Trasnformer, He - Man, My Little Pony are examples. But it a couple of gems like Duck Tales.

If the 40's is the golden age, than the 90's is defentely the renaissance era or age. They went back to making cartoons that weren't driven to sell toys by make a quality show, and cartoons that boys and girls of all ages could enjoy. Shows that were very smart and made you think like Gargoyles. And the return of prime time cartoons like the Simpsons and South Park.
 
I hate to be technical here, but Spongebob and Ed, Edd n Eddy were both originally created in the late 90's (both shows first episodes aired in 1999, not 2000) so really they're 90's cartoons, not 2000's. There's a distinct reason for clarifying them from a different time but more on that later. First off, my thoughts on the various decades of animation.

1920's and 1930's: In truth not having seen too many cartoons from either era I really can't judge them fairly. They were the pinnacal start of animation though which before was just an impressive showing of just being able to get something actually animated that now actually had some thought and plot behind it. There were some breakthroughs on an indivual level but the overall consensus was just starting animation as something to actually get people watching and not just as an oddity.

1940's: The 29's and 30's did have they're cultural iconic characters, but the 40's really is where heavy promotion of them started existing outside of just the toons themselves. Aftearll it was in the early part of the decade America started getting into World War II, and cartoons were there to remind us who are enemies are, try and get us to buy bonds to support the war or even help give support to the troops in terms of just giving them something to enjoy during they're struggles. For the first animation was something more relative to the era in which people were living in. No one captalized more on this then MGA and what would eventually be Warner Brothers as Disney Cartoons, though still going strong started to loose they're relevancy as the only form of top animation around.

1950's: This was the era in which TV first started being introduced as a medium people could reguarly start buying into but animation didn't really start catching on until next decade. It did start reallly changing and finalizing they're look into something that's more recongnizable to what we would make today. The Looney Tunes offically claimed top of the chain here with Disney toons not only being fairly cliche but also not giving people the comedic zest the LT's did back in the day.

1960's: Though there were still some efforts made, this saw the era of general movie animation start to die. As in the end of theatrical shorts and the beginning of animation on TV. It was also the first time that we started bringing over Japan's animated shows as well as the first time animation started getting TV show Length as the Flintstones was able to leap Hanna Barbera to the top of the front for 60's animation in not just sitcoms but also recongnizable animal franchise characters like Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear and other fairly recongnizable faces to this day. None more recongnizable then Scooby Doo...

1970's: Which ultimatley impacted how TV animation would look in the 70's. While Theathrical shorts pretty much offically went away, Hanna Barbera offically took over the reign of most TV animation and most TV animation pretty much consisted of the same breed of Scooby Doo esque mystery shows starring a group of teenagers traveling around with a mascot character designed as the star and at the same time comedic relief. There were other attempts at changing the formula but most didn't really go too far. Which is what you can say abuot most animation from the 70's: It had about a season or two and was then cancelled due to not finding any popularity.

1980's: The failure of Warner Brothers saw Television execs try a new method of trying to appease animation to people. Gone were any attempt to try and reach out to any adult auidence. Now pretty much every show was aimed squarley at the kids auidence, promoting action and comedy based off other markets of pop culture. While animation has borrowed from other things since it's beginning, this is the decade where every popular toy line or comic book or person started getting they're own show in order to promote they're own franchise. This worked better then it did in the 70's, but also gave all toons a bland sense of samness. As others have said this is really where preachy and moral guidlines filled pretty much every cartoon and the only risks seemed to be in the occasional animated movie (which in the day didn't do too well but now are actually considered cult classics) and specials.

1990's: There were still some carryovers of the 1980's (including the idea of syndicated toons to have about a season appear over the course of a few months and unless the show did well to move onto to something else) but this is defintley where American Animation started taking more risks. With the Simpsons and then South Park animation finally not only started to be made toward more adult minds but also was allowed to not follow the restrictions of what people thought they could see in a cartoon. Action shows were allowed to actually get away with showing action and reach a depth and matruity that you wouldn't of seen in the last decade (thanks of course to Batman the Animated series). This was also the decade where 3D animation starting taking it's first steps and where Disney started reinventing themselves with classic full length movies. Of course there were still a lot of programs based on popular movies that faltered soon but hey that was probably one of the few low points of the 90's really.

2000's: This was when cartoons offically entered the digital age. Gone were the times where you tried animating on ink and cel. The only shows that even tried using those were the ones that had started in the 90's (like Spongebob and Ed Edd n Eddy) and they too eventually lost that more classic look. Now everything was pretty much done by computer. And computers themselves started actually producing webtoons that showed that anyone with enough talent could animate. This translated to TV with not only more well defined CGI shows but also the first use of flash cartoons. Theathrical animation saw Disney fail to stop producing 2D works and continued reliance on Pixar's spectular 3D animation which many other companies started aping. Though there were more attempts at diversing animation and ideas more then any other decade with loads of success and failutres on each end there is a few common problems the toons of this decade acquired. First off though standards became more lax on certain things then they had in any other year, they tightened up on other things to the point where few cartoons tried crossing the boundaries without actually become aimed at adults (unlike the 90's that actually bothered pushing more of the bounadries set for them). Furthermore there was this more cyncial feel to cartoons then there have been in any other decade of animation. This feel of harshness and sharpness where only certains shows allowed emotion to actually shine through which became more of the exception then the norm.

Animation nowadays is actually in pretty decent shape. There is variety and attempts at creating unique exciting shows but there are also flaws that probably won't be corrected until at least the next decade or never. It is interesting to look at how animation has evolved into what we have today and look at where it is going to go in the coming years.
 
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