Animation History Question

[RogueMartian]

I have read several threads about animation being for kids and several responses to that saying that animation wasn't always a kids thing. Although the oldest cartoons I've seen, Popeye, Betty Boop, Mickey Mouse, and Old Bugs Bunny cartoons seem to point to cartoons having always been aimed for the younger crowd. What cartoons existed in the past that were aimed at adults and if cartoons were aimed at adults, why did this change?

[Howard]

As part of a movie theater program of shorts, newsreels and features, early cartoon shorts were aimed at a general audience, not just children or adults. On TV, cartoons were usually aimed at children, although when Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera discovered how many adults and teen-agers watched Huckleberry Hound, they decided to try to sell a prime-time series aimed at this audience, The Flintstones (1960), followed by Top Cat (1961?) and The Jetsons (1962) which weren't as popular. Theatrically, in the early 1970's Ralph Bakshi directed R. Crumb's "Fritz the Cat", possibly the first animated film aimed at an adult audience.

[Psycho Fox]

Originally posted by RogueMartian
I have read several threads about animation being for kids and several responses to that saying that animation wasn't always a kids thing. Although the oldest cartoons I've seen, Popeye, Betty Boop, Mickey Mouse, and Old Bugs Bunny cartoons seem to point to cartoons having always been aimed for the younger crowd. What cartoons existed in the past that were aimed at adults and if cartoons were aimed at adults, why did this change?

Well there is the War cartoons like the SNAFU ones that were aimed at soldiers in fact that is how the NFB animation deparment got started see Canada went into WWII before the US thus the military started it up for properganda purposes with the idea if you yell at someone enough anyone can learn how to animate and it kinda worked. IRs (International Rocketship) made Lupo the Butcher that definitely is not for kids and they made the film Pink Komkommer which was an experiment by being the first animated porn Then there is the movie Heavy Metal and two other R rated animated movies that I can't remeber right now. Then there is tons of non US animations that are not aimed at kids like Lotia Lotia from France. Well lets just say if I list every cartoon not aimed at kids in world then this would be a monster post.

[Joe Tully]

Theatrical cartoons in general were made so that they'd work for kids and adults. Some of Disney's stuff is clearly more kid-focused, but most of the Looney Tunes and also the earliest B&W Disney stuff was not just for kids. As for Betty Boop--have you seen some of the earlier stuff? At the end of Bimbo's Initiation, for example, Bimbo playfully pats Betty's bottom! There are other Boop cartoons that have to do with sex, directly or just as an incidental gag. In "Boop-Boop-A-Doop" her boss whispers into her ear lustfully and Betty asks him to not take her boop-boop-a-doop away. Watching the cartoon, it's pretty clear to an adult what she means by that!

As for why the change, Disney seems to have started the idea that cartoons were for kids. From there, it just got out of control.

[Jack]

Besides, half the stuff on TV today would have never been allowed back then, not even in live action movies. Also, if you look at a lot of Live action comedies and shorts, you'll see that humor is a lot like that seen in cartoons. Visual humor, slapstick, wordplay, etc. Tex Avery's Wolf and Red cartoons were kept off of TV for a long time because they were thought of as too adult (those are the ones where the wolf goes nuts over a dancer, hitting himself on the head, etc).

Cartoons were made to appeal to everyone, some were more appealing to kids, some were appealing to adults, but because they didn't have rating standards like we have today, they all had to appropriate for all audiences.


Jack