Tonight, Cartoon Network airs the half-hour season premiere
of Adventure Time. I love this show,
especially in light of the crazy bananas they pulled a few weeks ago in the
previous season’s finale. But I find myself wondering sometimes, how much do
kids enjoy it?
I know it is a success, but I do not know how those numbers
break down in terms of demographics—how much of its viewership is made up of
teenagers and adults? I know in the case of Spongebob
Squarepants, a significant chunk of viewers are adults—and not just parents
watching with their children. The same was the case with Avatar: The Last Airbender and its sequel series, The Legend of Korra.
In fact, a quick perusal of the internet will reveal legions
of children’s show fans who are able to vote. (Off the top of my head, TVTropes
and Tumblr are hubs of fandom activity.)
Why do we, the older audience, love these shows? In the case
of Adventure Time, I would argue the
very adult elements are one of the key attractions. This leaves me wondering
how much kids really get out of it. It is difficult for me to imagine anyone
under the age of 14 or 15 finding Regular
Show entertaining.
To an extent, I have to ignore a large component of most of
children’s entertainment to ask these questions: the sense of fun and wonder. To
watch Adventure Time is to be
transported to a world of bright pallets and problems that at their worst can
still often be dealt with by a little boy kicking and punching them. And this I
think is universally enjoyable to all ages.
I also think that I should consider the appeal of layered
entertainment. Pixar films and Harry
Potter have demonstrated that it is possible to tell a story that is
enjoyable on a base, surface level, while providing more thought-provoking
entertainment upon closer inspection.
So the answer is no, then? I mean, the wonderment and the
layers must invalidate my rhetorical, click-bait title, right? I do not know; I
still cannot imagine children finding the episode of Regular Show revolving around a VHS tape humorous. For one, they
might ask, what the hell is a VHS?
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| What do kids love more than hipster video store clerks? |
I do not know exactly what I am trying to say in this post.
Something about children’s entertainment no longer being entertaining for its
intended audience as it caters ever more to grown-ups. Not that that is a bad
thing.
Food for thought: Is what children find entertaining maturing earlier/at a more rapid pace? It seems to me that our society has become more open-minded, especially in terms of media, since we were kids. Between the parents who let their kids watch "South Park" and Adult Swim because "Oh they're just cartoons" and all of the 12 year olds on xbox live who've allegedly fucked our mothers, young entertainment could simply be evolving.
ReplyDeleteAnother possible perspective: Is it that different, or does it just seem to be since we're older and more capable of reflecting on it? Shows like "Rocko's Modern Life" and even "Rugrats" while maybe less explicit, definitely had humor geared towards adults in them, if at least to make it more bearable for the parents watching.
It's definitely possible that the perceived shift comes from me being older--I just hadn't considered it when writing the post. I never really watched Rocko, but I know that it had some adult elements in it.
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