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Drawing Lots and Lots of Little Pictures- A Cartoon Thread
- Thread starter R.R. Bigman
- Start date
Purple
(She/Her)
There was a teaser for this a few months back, and I feel while it couldn't possibly be a vertical slice of the actual show they're working on, I'm pretty sure it told me everything I need to know.
Yeah I thought the teaser was just… a bad teaser…
Now I am less optimistic
Now I am less optimistic
Purple
(She/Her)
That was a good line yeah. That teaser though, woof. Why are you using your protagonist as the stand-in for the hypothetical anti-fans you want to make fun of? Why focus EXCLUSIVELY on this "bet you hate any sort of change" vibe hard enough it might as well just flash TRIGGERED? across the screen while actively trying to alienate the very sort of people who make "we are just too edgy for you" their whole personality?
Sprite
(He/Him/His)
The one review I read said that Velma is aggressively unlikable, so that teaser is probably accurate. It also said that Daphne is great and probably should have been the main character.
Also, besides being needlessly dark, those character choices feel… out of order. Shouldn’t Daphne be the reporter and Shaggy the drug dealer?
Also, besides being needlessly dark, those character choices feel… out of order. Shouldn’t Daphne be the reporter and Shaggy the drug dealer?
R.R. Bigman
Coolest Guy
Do the people making Velma even like Scooby Doo?
Purple
(She/Her)
I know I'm going to regret this, but, who liked what now?
Sprite
(He/Him/His)
Velma is honestly just kind of bland. Its idea of satire is to reproduce tropes and go “don’t you hate it when shows do this? This thing we’re doing? Right now?” It’s way too reliant on meta-humor. “Bland” and “Meta” describe a lot of Scooby media, but unfortunately this show also removes the good parts of Scooby Doo and replaces them with pure, unadulterated cringe.
It pats itself on the back so hard for having a female protagonist and racebent characters. Both of those things are good, but they’re not exactly groundbreaking anymore, and have even both happened in Scooby Doo before.
I mean, the show is trying, I guess? It wants to do a third wave feminism thing about how there’s no wrong way to be a woman, but it mostly comes off as writing itself a hall pass to creep on teenagers. Because these naked girls we drew are actually empowered, see? Now kiss! KISS!
It’s sort of falling between two stools, in that it wants to be a wacky no-holds-barred comedy but also expects you to care about the deplorable characters. They want Velma to be a flawed person that grows as the show goes on but they dialed her snark-o-meter waaaaay too high. She just hates everyone and everything but doesn’t have the quips to back it up.
I imagine the showrunners will blame this criticism on sexism, and yeah, sexism raises the bar unfairly, but folks have made cynical girls work before. Daria works because the character doesn’t actively hate anyone, she’s just disaffected and uses humor to cope with the purgatory of high school. Wednesday works because the character’s utter contempt sits on top of a broiling sea of emotion and vulnerability. She’s also offset by the inherent framing of being an Addams, and by pairing her with likable characters who see right through her and can handily defuse her (NOTE: I haven’t finished Wednesday, but I’ve liked what I’ve seen).
Velma has no one to pair off with, because everyone else is as annoying as she is. I don’t care what happens to any of these people, which would be fine in a screwball comedy but not a show that wants to have a plot and character arcs.
It’s a shame! I was fairly optimistic about this show and looking forward to it, but oh well. It will probably get more hate than it deserves given that HBO Max canceled almost everything else. I might just go dig into a different corner of Scooby’s 50 years of content.
It pats itself on the back so hard for having a female protagonist and racebent characters. Both of those things are good, but they’re not exactly groundbreaking anymore, and have even both happened in Scooby Doo before.
I mean, the show is trying, I guess? It wants to do a third wave feminism thing about how there’s no wrong way to be a woman, but it mostly comes off as writing itself a hall pass to creep on teenagers. Because these naked girls we drew are actually empowered, see? Now kiss! KISS!
It’s sort of falling between two stools, in that it wants to be a wacky no-holds-barred comedy but also expects you to care about the deplorable characters. They want Velma to be a flawed person that grows as the show goes on but they dialed her snark-o-meter waaaaay too high. She just hates everyone and everything but doesn’t have the quips to back it up.
I imagine the showrunners will blame this criticism on sexism, and yeah, sexism raises the bar unfairly, but folks have made cynical girls work before. Daria works because the character doesn’t actively hate anyone, she’s just disaffected and uses humor to cope with the purgatory of high school. Wednesday works because the character’s utter contempt sits on top of a broiling sea of emotion and vulnerability. She’s also offset by the inherent framing of being an Addams, and by pairing her with likable characters who see right through her and can handily defuse her (NOTE: I haven’t finished Wednesday, but I’ve liked what I’ve seen).
Velma has no one to pair off with, because everyone else is as annoying as she is. I don’t care what happens to any of these people, which would be fine in a screwball comedy but not a show that wants to have a plot and character arcs.
It’s a shame! I was fairly optimistic about this show and looking forward to it, but oh well. It will probably get more hate than it deserves given that HBO Max canceled almost everything else. I might just go dig into a different corner of Scooby’s 50 years of content.
Johnny Unusual
(He/Him)
I decided to look up when Simpsons was nominated for Emmy's and Adventure Time was nominated only once and Steven Universe never. The only angstrom of justice here is Over the Garden Wall won one year and it was up against some really strong competition. Even the Simpsons was really good that year.
Sprite
(He/Him/His)
Because I am Part of the Problem, my morbid curiosity got the better of me and I finished off Velma. Know what the worst part is? I liked the finale. The show spends all of two episodes actually focusing on the mystery and those are the best episodes by far. Turns out spooky hijinks and groovy mysteries are a potent combo, who knew?
Everything kind of slots into place. The characters work better, particularly in the scant few minutes we get with the full gang. The bargain basement satire is less grating when it's in the background instead of being the sole focus of the show. And the mystery itself, while not worth the season of build-up, does feel like a grisly twist on a typical Scooby mystery. It's a good mix of being straightforward and easy to figure out while also being ridiculous and convoluted.
I'm annoyed, because there's a shell of a decent show here, but it's so caught up in being Shitty Daria that it can't bother to do anything legitimately clever with the source material. All of the character development, satire, and mystery-solving could have been pared down into an enjoyable hour-long special or something. They should be solving mysteries every couple episodes or so, not featuring exactly one mystery that they ignore until the last possible moment.
Everything kind of slots into place. The characters work better, particularly in the scant few minutes we get with the full gang. The bargain basement satire is less grating when it's in the background instead of being the sole focus of the show. And the mystery itself, while not worth the season of build-up, does feel like a grisly twist on a typical Scooby mystery. It's a good mix of being straightforward and easy to figure out while also being ridiculous and convoluted.
I'm annoyed, because there's a shell of a decent show here, but it's so caught up in being Shitty Daria that it can't bother to do anything legitimately clever with the source material. All of the character development, satire, and mystery-solving could have been pared down into an enjoyable hour-long special or something. They should be solving mysteries every couple episodes or so, not featuring exactly one mystery that they ignore until the last possible moment.
The beloved Swedish cartoonist and animator Per Åhlin passed away yesterday. In Sweden he is well known among many generations for his various animations, often mixed with live action footage, or as small animated sequences in otherwise live action films. His most well known work is probably the animated Christmas short film "Sagan om Karl-Bertil Jonssons julafton" ("The Story of Karl-Bertil Jonsson's Christmas Eve"), written by the equally beloved comedian Tage Danielsson. In Sweden it's a Christmas classic that has been aired on television every Christmas Eve since 1975. Searching around, I managed to find an English-language version of it:
The English narration is missing some of the jokes from the Swedish original, and the fact that it's only one guy doing the voices for all the characters is a little disappointing for someone who is used to the version with different actors for the different roles, but the general plot and not-so-subtle message remains intact. Some small parts of the film have also been cut (most notably a very brief part with a bare-breasted woman), but you can still see Åhlin's distinctive art and humorous animation (not to mention hear the smooth jazz soundtrack by a group of famous Swedish jazz musicians).
As a bonus, here's one of my personal favorites among Åhlin's animations, the title sequence to the film "The Jönsson Gang and the Black Diamond":
The English narration is missing some of the jokes from the Swedish original, and the fact that it's only one guy doing the voices for all the characters is a little disappointing for someone who is used to the version with different actors for the different roles, but the general plot and not-so-subtle message remains intact. Some small parts of the film have also been cut (most notably a very brief part with a bare-breasted woman), but you can still see Åhlin's distinctive art and humorous animation (not to mention hear the smooth jazz soundtrack by a group of famous Swedish jazz musicians).
As a bonus, here's one of my personal favorites among Åhlin's animations, the title sequence to the film "The Jönsson Gang and the Black Diamond":
R.R. Bigman
Coolest Guy
Genndy Tartakovsky has a new cartoon called Unicorn: Warriors Eternal starting tonight at midnight on Adult Swim. Primal‘s extremely brutal downer of an ending still bothers me, but Genndy and his team make cartoons like no one else, and I’m always eager to see more.
Violentvixen
(She/Her)
Teaser for Nimona which looks like it comes out June 30th:
I'm a little concerned that the wizard isn't a part of the teaser at all, or maybe he's the rider at one point. His conflicts and perspective were what gave the story a lot of weight and made it so dang good.
I'm a little concerned that the wizard isn't a part of the teaser at all, or maybe he's the rider at one point. His conflicts and perspective were what gave the story a lot of weight and made it so dang good.
R.R. Bigman
Coolest Guy
Bob’s Burgers season finale was beautiful. Very heartfelt, and demonstrates how much this goofy show and it’s characters have actually grown over the years. There have been some best of series episodes this season, especially lately. Compared to the extra mean-spirited dreck The Simpsons had turned into by season 13, it’s heartening to see how much soul Bob’s Burgers still has this late in.
Tonight, on a very special Clone High premiere...
It's good, ya'all. It's really good.
Edited to Add: I had to look it up because I was like "who is that supposed to be"... and it turns out I have been mentally mispronouncing "Frida Kahlo" all my life. Or Clone High is doing it as a bit. I have no idea!
It's good, ya'all. It's really good.
Edited to Add: I had to look it up because I was like "who is that supposed to be"... and it turns out I have been mentally mispronouncing "Frida Kahlo" all my life. Or Clone High is doing it as a bit. I have no idea!
zonetrope
(he/him)
I feel like the movie breathed new energy into the show this season. I also like that the sinkhole is now in the credits, and you can see the repaired street in establishing shots of the restaurant.
jpfriction
(He, Him)
Scudworth sounds weird and they leaned a little heavy on the violence (which, to be fair, so did the original at times) but yeah, they didn’t fuck it up. Couldn’t be happier.
There was a lot of 21 Jump Street in the pilot; which is… very fitting.
I didn’t appreciate how much different Will Fortes voice is now compared to 20 years ago but he was also undefinably off.
Anyway; shows Good; Hooray!
I didn’t appreciate how much different Will Fortes voice is now compared to 20 years ago but he was also undefinably off.
Anyway; shows Good; Hooray!
jpfriction
(He, Him)
I enjoyed how my wife and I both, in unison went Who?! during the opening credits and Ohhhhhhh after the reveal of Topher Bus.
I absolutely love Topher Bus
FelixSH
(He/Him)
Really? I just watched this show, not a year ago for the first time, and was horribly sad that it was over. Seeing it be bad would break my heart!
I'll watch it anyway. What a neat coincidence. Also, I just can't imagine that they would get that weird early 00s MTV-humor right.
FelixSH
(He/Him)
Finally watched the first two episodes of S2 of Clone High. The first episode felt a bit off (no idea why, though), but the second one worked really well for me. They really did well there. I love that now, exactly when I finally watched that show, they produced a second season, so that I can basically watch it seamlessly. Love it.
Talkin' 'bout Clone High Season 2 again, light spoilers if you care about the general plot of a parody sitcom, but Joan is 100% the main character now, right? Like, she's the one with the friend circle, best friend, boyfriend, and all of the plots have featured her as the focal point, right? I am totally into this, as she has been my favorite character going back to the first season (well, technically second most favorite character. My #1 is that handsome athlete John Dark). Just random observation there.
Also, the show continues to be hilarious.
Also, the show continues to be hilarious.