Chatterbox - Western Animation

There used to be a term called Class Animation, to differentiate older cartoons from Limited Animation, the cheap kind often used for TV. Now it would have to be renamed something like Fluid Hand-Drawn Cel Animation. The classic toons that were made for the theaters usually had an appeal that the TV toons lacked, most noticeably in their movement.

I'm not sure how young I was when I first pointed out to a friend, while watching Tom & Jerry, that the mouse and the cat never spoke any dialogue but were very physically active, in contrast to all the talking toons that stood stiff and moved as little as possible. Tom & Jerry also had too much chasing and fighting and not enough story, whereas the toons that had all the story had hardly any action.

I outgrew most cartoons, but I never quite outgrew watching animation. Many new styles came and went, most of them limited animation. I had wished for cartoon animation for adult audiences, and eventually that came true in spades. I loved Heavy Metal, though I had to go with my parents to the theater. After I later got a photo ID, I went by myself to an art house that showed Fritz the Cat and Heavy Traffic. Those films were mind-blowing. They even had fluid animation and rotoscoping.

I love The Amazing World Of Gumball, South Park, My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic, Phineas And Ferb, Gravity Falls, and Adventure Time. I would give anything for MLP and Adventure Time to have a crossover. It wouldn't even have to be an episode, it could just be a comic book or something.

Say, is there any western animation show (shows, not animated films) that are capable of this level of animation or this?◊

edited 24th Oct '14 8:24:42 AM by dRoy

By that I assume you mean western animation studios?

I was surprised that Waltz with Bashir is actually partially traditional animated. From the look of the film I thought the entire thing is CGI animation.

Now see, Attack on Titan always just makes me think of Spider-Man.

Very few. However, if you want to get technical, anime (on average) has a higher frame delay between movements then western cartoons (there is more time where the characters are standing still with nothing but mouths moving). Also, sometimes the actual speed of animated frames per second is higher (or at least, consistently higher) in western cartoons.

In the 90s, such animated shows as Batman the Animated Series (particularly the episodes Two Face part 1 and Clayface part 2) overall has more animated characters, and more fluidity then many anime. However, if you were to compare Young Justice to an anime with higher quality animation (such as Attack on Titan or anything by Kyo Ani or P.A works), it would be a tough call.

In their more action oriented shows, however, Anime tends to do flashier things with their visuals then a lot of western shows (Comparing Fate Zero to the previously mentioned Young Justice would be a good example). So, while the animation in western quality shows is generally higher quality, the visual effects, character designs and backgrounds, are often more detailed.

I also have a feeling that if anime had the higher budget of a western animated shows, the quality would be as good (if not better) then they are.

Sure, to me the typical "anime look" looks like an attempt at making a feature film that then didn't "go all the way." It's a different way of approaching the limits of TV production, I guess.

Legend of Korra's animation is freaking glorious most of the time, even more than its predecessor. It definitely has its share of derp moments though.

Isn't LoK the most expensive hand drawn animation per episode in history?

I think that still goes to Invade Zim

I've been catching up on Black Dynamite and loving it. It's an excellent introduction to racial politics in the seventies, though I feel they whitewash Nixon somewhat. However I have to say the show has a big problem of Unfortunate Implications. In Honey Bee's name.

In many dialects of Scots, "honey" has the form ['hIni] and may be spelled "hinney". So her name amounts to "Being a hinny".

Did nobody tell [adult swim] how offensive this could be to black speakers of Scots!?

"In many dialects of Scots, "honey" has the form ['hIni] and may be spelled "hinney". So her name amounts to "Being a hinny". Did nobody tell [adult swim] how offensive this could be to black speakers of Scots!?"

Yep. Pretty sure nobody told them.

I remember reading some time ago that, believe it or not, Filmation's 80's He-Man cartoon was, at the time, the most expensively produced animated show on the air. Yes, that's Filmation of the constantly recycled animation. The costs were attributed to it being entirely domestically produced, by union animators.

I will say about anime that when it's on the ball it's frequently great. However, the cliche still stands of an anime fight scene consisting of eight minutes of trash-talking followed by 30 seconds of action followed by five minutes of the victor explaining exactly how he won. Though I may just be thinking of Bleach....

Well. This sucks.

edited 30th Dec '14 6:24:43 PM by TargetmasterJoe

The world is all the more poorer today for having lost such a terrific talent.

Even if she never did much due to her retirement, she was still a great voice actress, and she will be missed.

Is it wrong that the reason I didn't like Steven Universe is because the art and animation are kind of crap?

Well, there's nothing wrong with having your own opinion, but since it is the internet, you may want to be careful in case some devoted SU fans talk smack about you.

You are on TV Tropes though, so it's all good.

But seriously, the writing's good. CN should give it a budget increase like they did with Gumball.

Hi, I'm new to T Vtropes! I was wondering what the community here thinks of Rick and Morty and if anyone here's hyped about season 2 coming out this summer? Other Western animation shows I enjoy are: Adventure Time, Gravity Falls, Steven Universe, Bojack Horseman, and Legend of Korra.

A few years ago I really got into The Clone Wars, and darned it for pulling me into Western Animation! Liking the new Rebels show, Gravity Falls, and I may dabble a bit in shorts like Wander over Yonder!

So - I don't know where else to put this, but here you are. This is something from David Gemmill, an animator who works on Uncle Grandpa, talking about how he deals with people hating his work.

http://powerheat.tumblr.com/post/111708879362/well

I could easily have put this in that show's thread but it's a more generalized topic, about how cartoonists deal with people not liking their work. (Warning, some of the stuff he says may upset you...)

Thoughts?

A couple of things:

1. It is a sensible enough point that adults are essentially complaining about children's cartoons and that's a little bit silly, but there's not really anything else "age-appropriate" for adults that isn't seth macfarlane-esque comedies. telling them to go watch "age-appropriate" programming or to read literature (which he didn't, but you see this being said all the time) is also useless if they are specifically fans of animation.

2. he seems like a stereotypical opinionated "internet tough guy" who's rather full of himself (someone you'd meet on 4chan, in other words). You can see this by the way he resorts to ad hominem with the lowest blow possible when it comes to people who criticize his work (there's some degree of truth in his description of the demographic that criticizes shows like these but it comes across as malicious and undignified; if he has such a low opinion of them why would he care that they're criticizing his work in the first place?). It reflects very poorly on him. "people like my show so you can fuck off" is never a proper response to criticism. people liking your show doesn't mean it's good.

3. i haven't seen young justice but i don't need to know too much about it to know that he's vastly oversimplifying. claiming that he can write things with more depth is a bold claim and it often means that you're not as good as you think you are. most of my favorite creators who actually made something i would consider intelligent, nuanced, masterful and/or memorable were very humble, modest people who cared more about improving their own work than shit-talking other people.

to be succint, i don't necessarily disagree with his overall point but i don't care for his attitude especially considering the fact that he isn't working on anything that significant and thusly isn't entitled to be so cocky. i think it is much more productive as a creator to keep working on making better work and learning instead of trying to look like a cynical tough guy responding to people in a manner that is just going to make you look worse.

edited 21st Feb '15 11:15:16 PM by wehrmacht

To be fair, if someone went up to you and said "Hey, that show you work on sucks. Why'd they cancel that show I like? It was so much better..." you'd have the same reaction.

yeah to be fair i probably wouldn't have been as obnoxious as that one guy. i think there are better things to talk about with an industry professional than simply belittling his work.

So the post that Aldo930 linked seemed to have been removed and the guy posted a "deleting my tumblr" threat... Anyone have a link to the original post? He seems rather unstable from my 3 seconds of judgment but I'm intrigued about what he said to defend his work.

Here you are.

"Well

I work on a show that everyone hates except the 6-11 demographic that it does really well with. Which means that all the shit I read about it on tumblr and twitter is actually just a vocal minority who isn’t even in the intended demo because they must be 16-22 years of age. And even better. It’s always good news to hear that the show I work on does well internationally. Which means kids in the 6-11 love it all over the world. So maybe I might be making some kid in Europe or India etc smile and laugh. And that sure as hell is more important than some jaded 19 year old millennial stoner with social anxiety who hides behind a computer or mobile device all day and night and complains about how their life sucks because a corporate kids (kids! Kids!)network isn’t delivering the type of content they want to see.

Which reminds me of the time I bumped into this older dood in his late 30’s. We got to talking and he found out I worked on uncle grandpa. Then he told me he thought the show was lame. then he asked me why they had to cancel young justice. And I just told him ratings.

But more importantly in the back of my head I thought about how absurd it was that a grown adult male was watching shit made for 11 year olds. And that these fanboy motherfuckers need to grow the fuck up. As if young justice has more substance than a slice of pizza with shades. It’s all the same shit. Fucking teenagers dressing up in costumes taking the law into their own hands and fighting a one dimensional good vs. Bad fight.

Shit mang. I write shit in my eps with more depth and satire but people are too confused by slapstick and surrealism (because cartoons should be just like real life!!!) to pick up on it.

In summary. People are idiots."

Admittedly, the man can be over the top, but consider people have told him to his face the show he worked on sucked.