The Decline in Quality of Today's Animation (Re: This Cartoon is SHIT)

[rj lake]

sym-bionic teen titans

[MobileMammal]

sym-bionic teen titans

Was that really worth a double-post?

And Sym-bionic Titan was the biggest disappointment ever. I remember waiting for it, a show made by my heroes, and when it finally came out, I got bored one episode in. No matter how many chances I gave it, I just never liked it.

[Grand Mal]

I know not everyone loves P&S, I'm not a gigantic fan of it either (I certainly like it, just not to an astounding degree.) However, there's little doubt that its existence is a positive one. In a medium where the biggest problem is too many people following the leader and not enough taking risks, an anime that's truly original is a rare sight.

As for American Dragon, I recall enjoying both it and Juniper Lee when I was younger. The difference was that I stopped watching Juniper Lee because they stopped making new episodes. I stopped watching Jake Long because it started to suck (even with its interesting romantic subplot and high quantities of Dante Basco.) No comments on Rule 34.

I remember realizing one day that American Dragon, Juniper Lee, Courage the Cowardly Dog, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer all had the same basic premise.

I had a similar experience with both Juniper Lee and Jake Long, but it's difficult getting over how similar the two where specifically.

Chinese-American teenagers maintain the balance between the real world and a supernatural world only they can see, their initials are JL, they have an annoying younger sibling of the opposite gender, a wise mentor grandparent of the same gender, and a frickin' talking grey bulldog. That's a little contrived to call it a coincidence.

Granted, I liked Jake, but I seem to remember his exploits were a little less self-aware and funny than Juniper's. I'll have to watch LATOJL again to refresh my memory, it being cancelled a while ago.

[*Sigh*]

Was that really worth a double-post?

And Sym-bionic Titan was the biggest disappointment ever. I remember waiting for it, a show made by my heroes, and when it finally came out, I got bored one episode in. No matter how many chances I gave it, I just never liked it.

That's kind of a shame, the gloriously dark tone and giant robot fights were beautiful to behold.

[Wesley Foxx]

Pearls of Lutra is one of my favorite books in the series, you go out and read it NAO. Rakkety Tamm was also excellent.

Honestly, ALL the books were at least GOOD. Except maybe Loamhedge. (I own all the books except Mariel and the last two in paper back form and constantly re-read through the series)

I still think either The Taggerung or Marlfox would translate best into a movie. Of the two, Marlfox is probably the more universally popular. And it even has a literal three act structure! :V

Yeah, I know I jumped to defend Courage but only because it has a high nostalgia factor for me, and the only shows of those you listed that I watched were Teen Titans and limited experience with Justice League and ATLA

[alexthewhite]

That's kind of a shame, the gloriously dark tone and giant robot fights were beautiful to behold.

Not to mention the ambitious world-building, excellent character designs, intriguing mysteries, top-notch characterization, refusal to adhere to genre cliches, competent villains, multi-faceted conflicts, focused and mature narrative, and that entire episode that was one long shout-out to Ender's Game.

The first episode was one of the worst ones, as it is with...like 85% of shows.

I am really, really glad it's reairing on Toonami at 2 AM EST. I highly recommend it if you didn't catch the initial run.

[MobileMammal]

Not to mention the ambitious world-building, excellent character designs, intriguing mysteries, top-notch characterization, refusal to adhere to genre cliches, competent villains, multi-faceted conflicts, focused and mature narrative, and that entire episode that was one long shout-out to Ender's Game.

The first episode was one of the worst ones, as it is with...like 85% of shows.

I am really, really glad it's reairing on Toonami at 2 AM EST. I highly recommend it if you didn't catch the initial run.

I said I gave it many chances. I didn't like it.

[rj lake]

Was that really worth a double-post?

i'm going to search my soul and figure that out.

[rj lake]

...



well, yes, yes it was!








anyway. sym-bionic was alright, but not nearly as good as samurai jack was. mostly the problem was that it, like invader zim before it, was cancelled just as it actually started showing some real promise.

and that is all to say about that.

megas xlr is a much better appropriation of the mecha show into western animation.

[williamcll]

Transformers animated ended too early.

[*Sigh*]

Transformers animated ended too early.

Indeed. Also Sari's character arc was incredibly rushed.

[Billiards Slick]

Transformers Animated was great and it getting cancelled was lame.

On that note, the latest Ben 10 series is actually pretty awesome. It's a franchise that's been in a downward spiral for years, but the latest series fixes that. It's essentially Ben 10 Animated; Same art director, same executive producer, most of the cast, etc. It emulates the tone pretty well and is actually funny.

[frostedWarlock]

From what I heard, the new main people (who also worked on Transformers Animated) weren't a fan of the newer Ben 10 serieses, so they decided to bring down the Magnus Hammer and retcon whatever they didn't like and replace it with respect to the original show.

Because honestly the Ben 10 sequels had no fucking idea what they were doing other than "We're a popular cash cow, right?"

[Billiards Slick]

Yeah, they did that in-show. In episode seven, the universe is destroyed. Ben brings it back, but with all the bullshit from the sequels erased from continuity.

Also, one of the new alien forms is a gorilla made of Lego whose power is being made out of fucking Lego.

So yeah, the new series is infinitely better than the travesties the past shows were. Which is a strange (but good) reversal of having modern cartoon things deteriorate over time.

[kaoticAntagonist]

Transformers Animated was great and it getting cancelled was lame.

On that note, the latest Ben 10 series is actually pretty awesome. It's a franchise that's been in a downward spiral for years, but the latest series fixes that. It's essentially Ben 10 Animated; Same art director, same executive producer, most of the cast, etc. It emulates the tone pretty well and is actually funny.

Really? I saw the first episode and definitely wasn't impressed, but if you recommend it ill give it another try.

I'm still kinda pissed off at Ben 10 not having a sequel called Hero Generation, which I think is the best tagline for a show like that. Also the fact that they never really did anything with that? Kinda glad they changed the name so the awesomeness wasnt tainted with reality.

[kaoticAntagonist]

Apparently young justice was just cancelled.

I...

I can't...

why the fuck would you do that? I can't...

edit: just realized that this means i won't get to see static and i am just...

so sad.

why?

[laserdogbad]

there making a 5th season of code lyoko
code lyoko: evolution
it looks like the makers of the sequel thought they were making tron as an animated series or something based on the preview videos

[cupcakeTrumpeteer]

Apparently young justice was just cancelled.

I...

I can't...

why the fuck would you do that? I can't...

edit: just realized that this means i won't get to see static and i am just...

so sad.

why?

Wut.

I don't even watch the show, and still... wut.

[frostedWarlock]

Wrong. Young Justice, Green Lantern, and DC Nation were all knocked back to January at the last second for no obvious reason. Not cancelled.

[kaoticAntagonist]

Wrong. Young Justice, Green Lantern, and DC Nation were all knocked back to January at the last second for no obvious reason. Not cancelled.

...

still pretty fucking shitty.

If you want to talk about decline talk about management decisions. Maybe they did have a reason but this is the second hiatus for YJ and DC nation since only 2 weeks ago.

The hell is up with that?

Though, yeah, I probably skimmed tumblr too much and got infected with their kneejerk reaction shit. sorry.

[*Sigh*]

This actually happens a lot on Cartoon Network, they take a perfectly good season and just kind of.... cut it in half and then put the other half in next year's slots.

[kaoticAntagonist]

This is more like cutting it into bite-sized chunks.

[*Sigh*]

No, what Nickelodeon did with the last season of Avatar was cutting it into bite-sized chunks. I distinctly remember being absolutely lived when I was trying to watch a new episode and instead of my beloved Avatar there was a Spongebob episode, and I proceed to look online and they pushed back the release date of a Single. Freaking. Episode. By. A. Whole. Month. FFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

[Billiards Slick]

Really? I saw the first episode and definitely wasn't impressed, but if you recommend it ill give it another try.

I'm still kinda pissed off at Ben 10 not having a sequel called Hero Generation, which I think is the best tagline for a show like that. Also the fact that they never really did anything with that? Kinda glad they changed the name so the awesomeness wasnt tainted with reality.

Well, like with TFA, a lot of the appeal of the show comes from how it adapts stuff from previous series, how it pays homage to past things and does practically everything better. Someone who is more into the franchise (which i am, the sequel series were unbearable but i watched them hoping for improvements. there were a couple of gems along the way) will probably appreciate how it works more.

A lot of the appeal is also artistic, at least for me. It's a very well animated, emotive cartoon, and it has a very interesting style. There's a lot of care given to minor and background characters, and there are a lot of neat cameos (There's an alien Sari in episode 4). Compared to the previous series where everything looked the same, that is a very welcome change.

Although in both of those aspects, the first episode is probably the weakest. The best episode so far are probably 2 and 5.

(Also, about the name: In the last episode of the second series, they joked about some other cartoon sequel they were watching which had Hero Generation as its tagline. The characters were slamming it for happening five years after, having a villain join the hero and basically being poorer quality than the original. At least they get points for being self-aware about their terribleness I guess?)

[CowboyBaccano]

there making a 5th season of code lyoko
code lyoko: evolution
it looks like the makers of the sequel thought they were making tron as an animated series or something based on the preview videos

Isn't it going to be a live action series?

Im not sure how to feel about this. On one hand I get the radness that is Odd Della Robbia. On the other hand I can't shake this feeling that it being live action and having the word evolution in the title are omens that it'll get butchered like Dragonball did.