TV is the New Reading

Saturday morning cartoons could use some work

It feels sometimes that I was a kid at exactly the right time to be a kid. There wasn’t much to do so there wasn’t that much trouble to get into. About my worst run-in with the law involved a speeding ticket and growing up, our television choices were often silly, but mostly inoffensive.

I can’t really remember too much about Saturday morning cartoons, but I remember waking up and watching them. We had Transformers and Scooby Doo and Smurfs and Thundercats. We had He-Man and She-Ra and the Superfriends, we had Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, and we had Looney Tunes, which I still think were some of the best cartoons there were.

During the election, I had a recurring image of Bugs Bunny running against Yosemite Sam in some sort of campaign. Bugs did his best Teddy Roosevelt impression, saying: “I speak softly, and I carry a big stick.” To which Sam replied: “Oh yeah? Well I speak LOUD! And I carry a BIGGER stick!” Then, smashing Bugs over the head, he growled “And I use it, too!” Bonk!

Then Sam was off in search of babies to kiss. “Bring on the babies! I love babies!” He kissed a number of babies until Bugs, dressed as a BIG baby, planted a BIG kiss on him and then burst into tears: “Wah! Wah! He bit my widdo nose! The bad man bit my widdo nose!” Sam then found himself surrounded on all sides by matronly types, whacking him on the head with umbrellas and purses.

It went on like this, and then we got a musical history lesson about the Constitution or math or some such with Schoolhouse Rock. These were consistently satisfying entries. The animation was cheesy as all get out but they were fun. Lolly Lolly Lolly sold adverbs, and Conjunction Junction connected up words, three was a magic number and Lovely Lady Liberty kept watch over the Great American Melting Pot.

I get a little nostalgic because the cartoons have gotten so much worse. You turn on any channel Saturday morning and you are as likely to find a Care Bear, a Winx fairy or some other badly animated, thoroughly corporate, endlessly marketed and vertically merchandised children’s show. Some of them are as clever as pocket lint and not quite as palatable.

I mean, I recognize I’m not the target audience, here, but I grew up at a time when shows could be enjoyed on more than one level. I recently looked up “The Rabbit of Seville” and “What’s Opera Doc?” on YouTube and they have aged perfectly. Honestly, I think you have to actually be high to enjoy Spongebob Squarepants, and you wouldn’t dare watch any of the other programs all the way through for fear of your brain leaking out of your skull.

While it’s commendable that broadcasters have limited the amount of violence children are exposed to, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to try limiting the amount of frothy pointlessness and commercial nonsense they’re exposed to as well. “Clever” should be rewarded somehow.

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