Western TV Animation needs more genre/artstyle diversity

2D Animation sadly is hard and expensive and requires so much time to do "nicely". So of course Comedy shows would be what studios would turn to since they are simple to do.

That is why action animation and fluid animation are not something you see in Western shows because they are hard to do. Most Anime don't even do them right because of budget/time constraints (look at all the outsourcing done to Korea for Anime filler). All this is sadly why 2D animation is becoming a lost art, it involves a lot of time and expense for very little payoff. Again, it's why Comedy shows are popular in the west, they require not that much time/effort and thus can get a payoff with that little expense.

Until someone can invent a faster way to make 2D Detailed drawings animate well, you won't see much change.

It's not that they need to invent a faster way to make detailed drawings, it's that they need to be able to finance more animation, period. There need to be more animation studios, and more investors. There are not enough studios, and not enough jobs.

cosmicblizzard said:

Huh, for some reason I thought Anomalisa was French. You're totally right. I can nitpick and say I'd like something like that in non-stop motion, but that's more about it being attuned to my tastes rather than it not being an accomplishment that people should take inspiration from.

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The thing with animation is that creating a good, well-produced hand drawn animation takes time, a lot of time. The Red Turtle for instance took Michael Dudok de Wit ten years to make. Can you imagine a big American movie producer giving money to a director for 10 years to create a animation film? That shit would never, ever happen. Serious, adult animation is way too big of a risk for major Western studios because they will almost definitely lose money on that. Anomalisa was basically an indie film (produced by Starburns Industries, of Community and Rick & Morty fame). The only adult animation I can think of that was produced by a big Western studio are the Wes Anderson animation films.

CloudWolf said:

The thing with animation is that creating a good, well-produced hand drawn animation takes time, a lot of time. The Red Turtle for instance took Michael Dudok de Wit ten years to make. Can you imagine a big American movie producer giving money to a director for 10 years to create a animation film? That shit would never, ever happen. Serious, adult animation is way too big of a risk for major Western studios because they will almost definitely lose money on that. Anomalisa was basically an indie film (produced by Starburns Industries, of Community and Rick & Morty fame). The only adult animation I can think of that was produced by a big Western studio are the Wes Anderson animation films.

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Oh I know why it happens, but I'm still lamenting it all the same. Even if it is possible to nurture an environment where those kinds of works are desirable, the animation ghetto is well established at this point and no one wants to think THAT long term.

I see it similarly to the Comics Code Authority holding back variety in American comics since the 50s while the medium grew in other regions to the point of being THE mainstream medium in said regions where the level of variety is staggering and impossible for America to ever catch up.

MattWilsonCSS said:

But because there are SO MANY series, you do end up with 5-6 good series and a few more decent ones each season.

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Yeah people tend to overlook this when it comes to anime.

Smash-It Stan said:

Is there an equivalent to justice leage(unlimited), teen titans, or 90s spiderman for the superhero shows? Hell I'd even throw Kids next door in there, shit was basically child superheros making nukes out of bubble gum and having space bases. There was so much variety in cartoons back then I have trouble thinking about anything similar, such as EEnE or Courage.

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There's not much audience for those sorts of programs any longer.

Parents prefer to have younger kids watching educational or quasi-educational shows rather than violence. In the 80s, pre-schoolers were watching G.I. Joe and The Dukes of Hazard, as otherwise, PBS shows like Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers Neighborhood were the only child-friendly things on TV. That audience is gone now, since Barney and Teletubbies and Dora introduced a new wave of children's programming that actually was suitable for young children. There's plenty of western TV animation (with a variety of styles) that's only of value to kids now, and that's being ignored in this thread because adults aren't watching them. Put another way, the bifurcation of the market to Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood/Peppa Pig/Paw Patrol (for little kids) on one hand and Archer/Venture/Bojack (for teens and adults) has drained the marketshare and funding for the cartoons of the kind that Era seems to miss. Of course, the rising popularity of video/computer/smartphone games and YouTube also removes much of the audience.

Last Man is amazing. Nothing else looks like it, looks like a French comicbook come to life. It's also really good, high quality shit.

Channel5News said:

Rick and Morty is seriously impressive not just for the quality of the animation, but for introducing tons of new locations, character designs, and overall visual imagination with every episode. It's like an American Space Dandy.

Bojack Horseman, meanwhile, has maybe the best visual gags since classic Simpsons.

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Rick and Morty is trash at humans, they're the typical ugly & crudely drawn human characters of all primetime animated sitcoms.

Apple has acquired the distribution rights to Cartoon Saloon's (Song of the Sea, The Breadwinner) next film 'Wolfwalkers' for their upcoming streaming service.

https://www.cartoonbrew.com/feature...ts-to-cartoon-saloons-wolfwalkers-163868.html



It's great to see, frankly, anyone supporting traditional animation in this day and age - I just hope it still gets a blu ray release.

Ren and Stimpy changed everything.

For genre I kinda agree. We need more variety That having been said, the types of comedy are very different, and some have a very different tone and type of drama. Putting Rick and Morty and The Amazing World of gumball in the same genre, while technically true, isn't accurate to what those shows are. And niches are being filled again - Forever Train and The Dragon Prince are refilling niches left open for too long.

For art style? Hell no. Yeah there are some common elements, but art in animated shows are pushing boundaries now more than ever. We couldn't have gotten a beautiful silent episode of beauty and focused storytelling like Fish out of water back in the 2000's*. You don't get mixed media creativity like Gumball in the 2000's. Hell, we're getting closer and closer to having genuinely well animated 3D CG shows.

*except for samurai jack, but they were going for very different visual and tonal ground.