Friday, June 27, 2003
TNN ANIMATION REDUX: Now that I've finally seen the TNN animation block in full, I can truly say I'm underwhelmed. I went in expecting very little, and got even less in return.
The new "adult" Ren and Stimpy makes a great case that imposed limitations work for certain types of people sometimes. For all the farts and "nose goblins," Ren and Stimpy was pitched to a kid's network, and as a result, there was a line that you could be sure wasn't going to be crossed. John Krikfalusi worked within these restrictions (for awhile, anyway), worked on ways to dance around the restrictions, and the result was one of the classic cartoons of the 1990s. The problem--or one of them--was that John K. chafed under restrictions, and Nickelodeon wouldn't hang. Along with several missed deadlines, this led to an acrimonious parting of company.
Compare this to the state we're in now. When they brought back John K. and Spumco for the current round of Ren and Stimpy, TNN effectively signed a creative blank check. No restrictions. And that might've been where the problems began. In the course of a half hour, we had a uvula up the butt, our heroes kicking a man's (apparently anthropomorphic) testicle around, eating snot and vomit...and I think we already covered "I'm the catcher, you're the pitcher" elsewhere ad nauseum. In other words, when not explicitly told to, there's apparently no inclination in this crew to rope it in, allowing a longstanding anal and bodily fluid fixation to run wild. The result was a cartoon which was crass most of the time instead of funny.
I'm hoping that conditions improve in the remaining episodes, but whether I actually stick around for them or not is another matter.
Anyway, moving on...
Gary the Rat was cheap-looking for a reason, and I think there should be a moratorium on using Macromedia Flash for TV network projects. What looks slick and compelling on a web hookup looks downright chintzy when blown up to full-screen and broadcast as a major television debut. South Park's first season was Fantasia by comparison.
There were a few decent laughs, but the comedic area of lawyers with no scruples (even if one's a giant rat) has been stripmined for generations to the point where the comedy landscape looks like parts of West Virginia, where everything is covered in lawyer dust. That's the worst kind, trust me. We also have the nosy next-door neighbor and the exterminator who loves his job because he loves to kill, for those of you keeping up at home on your comedy cliche score cards.
That brings us to Stripperella, which (apart from the striptease in the opening credits) was apparently held back from some of the press previews. Technically, it's very well done (as far as television goes); the animation moved very well and the character designs were reasonably appealing. The problem is the art direction doesn't match the direction the writing crew chose to take. When you're doing Tex Avery-style sexy-girl takes (the bursting catheter bag, the frothy beer), they don't have the same effect if you're rendering people like real people, and that goes double for the looney dialogue. I couldn't shake the feeling that a lot of the material would've tracked better if they had taken a more cartoony approach. That would preclude the anatomically-correct moneymaker-shaking that's been the show's selling point since its initial announcement, so apparently that's right out.
I know, I know..."Eric, it's supposed to be about tits and ass," but let's get one thing straight, if I wanted to watch breasts for breasts sake, I could buy a Playboy, or a subscription to Cinemax. Making the "men's network" in the spirit of sniggering teenage boys does nothing for the case of mature animation in this country (or men, for that matter, a group that's gotten a bad rap in general). One of the reasons that anime is going over huge in this country is because of complex storytelling that sometimes rewards you for thinking, a type of storytelling that American cartoon mills have rarely tried because the either can't or won't do it. If TNN was a fanboy, it would firmly place itself in the tentacle rape camp.
The night closed out with a classic Ren and Stimpy show, so at least there was something here to which I can give an unqualified thumbs-up.
The new "adult" Ren and Stimpy makes a great case that imposed limitations work for certain types of people sometimes. For all the farts and "nose goblins," Ren and Stimpy was pitched to a kid's network, and as a result, there was a line that you could be sure wasn't going to be crossed. John Krikfalusi worked within these restrictions (for awhile, anyway), worked on ways to dance around the restrictions, and the result was one of the classic cartoons of the 1990s. The problem--or one of them--was that John K. chafed under restrictions, and Nickelodeon wouldn't hang. Along with several missed deadlines, this led to an acrimonious parting of company.
Compare this to the state we're in now. When they brought back John K. and Spumco for the current round of Ren and Stimpy, TNN effectively signed a creative blank check. No restrictions. And that might've been where the problems began. In the course of a half hour, we had a uvula up the butt, our heroes kicking a man's (apparently anthropomorphic) testicle around, eating snot and vomit...and I think we already covered "I'm the catcher, you're the pitcher" elsewhere ad nauseum. In other words, when not explicitly told to, there's apparently no inclination in this crew to rope it in, allowing a longstanding anal and bodily fluid fixation to run wild. The result was a cartoon which was crass most of the time instead of funny.
I'm hoping that conditions improve in the remaining episodes, but whether I actually stick around for them or not is another matter.
Anyway, moving on...
Gary the Rat was cheap-looking for a reason, and I think there should be a moratorium on using Macromedia Flash for TV network projects. What looks slick and compelling on a web hookup looks downright chintzy when blown up to full-screen and broadcast as a major television debut. South Park's first season was Fantasia by comparison.
There were a few decent laughs, but the comedic area of lawyers with no scruples (even if one's a giant rat) has been stripmined for generations to the point where the comedy landscape looks like parts of West Virginia, where everything is covered in lawyer dust. That's the worst kind, trust me. We also have the nosy next-door neighbor and the exterminator who loves his job because he loves to kill, for those of you keeping up at home on your comedy cliche score cards.
That brings us to Stripperella, which (apart from the striptease in the opening credits) was apparently held back from some of the press previews. Technically, it's very well done (as far as television goes); the animation moved very well and the character designs were reasonably appealing. The problem is the art direction doesn't match the direction the writing crew chose to take. When you're doing Tex Avery-style sexy-girl takes (the bursting catheter bag, the frothy beer), they don't have the same effect if you're rendering people like real people, and that goes double for the looney dialogue. I couldn't shake the feeling that a lot of the material would've tracked better if they had taken a more cartoony approach. That would preclude the anatomically-correct moneymaker-shaking that's been the show's selling point since its initial announcement, so apparently that's right out.
I know, I know..."Eric, it's supposed to be about tits and ass," but let's get one thing straight, if I wanted to watch breasts for breasts sake, I could buy a Playboy, or a subscription to Cinemax. Making the "men's network" in the spirit of sniggering teenage boys does nothing for the case of mature animation in this country (or men, for that matter, a group that's gotten a bad rap in general). One of the reasons that anime is going over huge in this country is because of complex storytelling that sometimes rewards you for thinking, a type of storytelling that American cartoon mills have rarely tried because the either can't or won't do it. If TNN was a fanboy, it would firmly place itself in the tentacle rape camp.
The night closed out with a classic Ren and Stimpy show, so at least there was something here to which I can give an unqualified thumbs-up.
|| Eric 5:45 AM#
