Wait... this is a kids movie right?

[starrypawz]

I'm surley not the only one whose had this happen but have you ever say rewatched an old kid's movie you used to watch quite innocently or old kids cartoons and had moments where you've gone 'I don't remember THAT being in there' or 'this is a kids program yet this is pretty heavy stuff'?

It's happened quite a bit when I've rewatched some of the older Disney animated movies and then spotted stuff that's quite disturbing. Two things I can remember are in Lady and the Tramp when you see the dog get dragged off in the pound scene, and the rather notorious part from Tarzan when you acutally see the body of Clayton swing, and I'd say a good chunk of 'Hunchback of Notre Dame' is quite dark.

And I've also noticed in a lot of the older Nicktoons series such as Hey Arnold! and As Told by Ginger seem to touch on some pretty 'adult' stuff and Hey Arnold! has quite a few moments that seem very dark for a kids cartoon.

This is not a bad thing though, especially when you compare stuff like that to a lot of the cartoons around now that seem to be either entirley made up of cutsey, cutsey, diabetic coma inducing sweetness or 'lol, farts and toilet jokes are the funniest thing ever!' I do remember toilet humor in 90's cartoons but a lot of it was more subtle.

It's quite remarkable, and a bit scary just how much the general tone of kids films have changed even in just a short time frame especially when some of the 'classic' Nicktoons finished as early as 2003. Just seems the older cartoons/films were totally different in terms of tone and were more menacing at points and a lot of the humour seemed a lot more subtle.

Maybe I'm just thinking too hard...

 

[HareBrain]

There wasn't a rash of lawsuits filed by parents of "distraught" children, by any chance?

On a serious note -- and as a piece of idle speculation -- I wonder if this is in some way a reaction to the recent perception that real-life for children has become much more dangerous, and that their entertainment should therefore be as free from threat as possible.

 

[Mele Kalikimaka]

Nostalgia Critic did a good montage of the top hidden jokes in Animaniacs.

"Yakko, can you conjugate?"
"Who, me? Why! I've never even kissed a girl!"
"No, it's simple, I'll show you."
[@ the audience] "Goodnight, everybody!"

 

[GrantG]

Something that disturbs me more than almost anything in any R-rated flick: Judge Doom giving the cartoon shoe "The Dip" in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? It had absolutely no affect on me as a child, but the last time I saw it, it got to me.

YouTube - ‪Judge Doom Dips a Shoe‬‎

One of the most gruesome deaths ever. Not because it was in itself gruesome, but because it was really out of place with the rest of the movie. It was like throwing in a head explosion in the middle of a Harry Potter movie.

 

[Steve Jordan]

But Roger Rabbit wasn't really supposed to be a kid's movie... it was an adult comedy/mystery in a world that had Toons in it.

 

[Precise Calibre]

Gonna quote "Adventure Time", a very recent cartoon.

"He said he's here to sack the nut castle!"

"What, who would want to sack MY nut castle on my second son's first birthday? Seize him!"


Also, yeah, stuff nowadays by the large has become a lot more tame. It used to be ok~ for characters to say "damn" and "hell" and other light profanity.

 

[Anne Lyle]

Not animation, but going back and watching the original Star Wars movie (now Episode IV), I'm always disturbed when Luke returns home to find the stormtroopers have slaughtered his family - and you see a blackened skeletal corpse outside the house, looking as if it was crawling from the smoking ruin when it was torched. It's only a brief shot but it's pretty gruesome!

 

[CyBeR]

Disney spoilers follow.

Have you listened to the song from The Hunchback of Notre Damme, that the priest sings?

YouTube - The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Hellfire)

Sooo...he's basically implying rape.
How does the character meet his end?

YouTube - The Hunchback of Notre Dame (The Final Confrontation)

Yes, well....

And the Disney examples keep on coming, since they were less than kind about how they ended their evil characters:

The Lion King - Scar is ripped to shreds by a pack of hyenas...auch!
The little mermaid - Ursula is basically run through with the stern (am I using this right?) of a ship, and then lightning strikes her...auch again.
The beauty and the beast - Gascone falls to his death on sharp spikes beneath the castle...auch once more.
Mulan - the main villain is basically blown up in a huge fireworks explosion...bits of him fall from the sky, though the camera does not show them.

And that's just Disney.
Has anyone here ever watched Invader Zim or The Grim adventures of Billy and Mandy?
I was watching one of these two at one point when my roommate walked into the room. He stopped and watched for a few minutes at the TV and then simply stared at me and asked "How did they ever get this past the censors?". And he was right, almost anything in those series is really really.....insane, and most of them beyond the grasp of children.

Going even further, I am Weasel and Cow & Chicken are two other shows that I believe were never intended for children at all. Nudity, implied sexuality and sexual tension, implied animal slaughter at some point and a horde of jokes that no child would ever grasp. Yeah, they're funny in the way talking animals usually are, but what's shown is critical towards society in quite many ways and again "Was this really a children's show?".

Going further back in time, there are two shows that stick out in my memory like a very sore thumb with a splinter in it: Rocko's Modern Life and The Ren & Stimpy Show, both lightyears ahead of their times (and ahead of my toleration for them). Disturbing...is the least I could say about them, and both of them were Saturday Morning cartoons.

I'll stop for now, I don't want to go into modern cartoons because I have serious beef with Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends and My gym partner's a monkey for undertones that are actually harmful to young minds, unlike the examples I've talked about above.
Yes, I actually appreciate all the things from the above shows. Cartoons should have a darker side, a more ungraspable one for young minds...it keeps them guessing and curious, which I believe is a great help for future development. Tame cartoons are actually pretty harmful in my opinion.

Oh, and a terrifying little example of Disney going out of their usual mindset, if you've yet to watch The black cauldron, I suggest you get to it soon. It's not to be missed.

 

[Steve Jordan]

I'll just add to your Disney list: The Incredibles, wherein Syndrome gets sucked into a jet engine by his cape (which means, he went in head-first).

 

[Precise Calibre]

The funny thing is, I personally believe all of these "disturbing things" are absolutely fine to be in these shows. The most intelligent children will get them and find humor in them, the adults who end up seeing them get something out of it too; meanwhile the rest of the children can have the "bad" stuff go right over their head and can still enjoy the more basic comedy involved.

Personally, I think the abandonment of such things nowadays is turning our next generations of children into soft-skinned little brats with a sense of entitlement because everything is made "perfect" for them. The Japanese still do it right...

 

[Steve Jordan]

I don't have a problem with them, either: These days, kids hear far worse on the daily news, and in conversations with their friends. We should worry about what's in a cartoon?

 

[CyBeR]

Personally, I think the abandonment of such things nowadays is turning our next generations of children into soft-skinned little brats with a sense of entitlement because everything is made "perfect" for them. The Japanese still do it right...

This is precisely why I have a very big problem with Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends and My Gym Partner's a Monkey.
Both shows include really damaged friendship relationships where the main character is basically subdued by a secondary one, which is very aggressive and possessive. What upsets me is that this secondary character is depicted as the one with the most success, always in the limelight and always getting away with murder basically.
Bloo, from the first show, is about as horrible a cartoon role model there can be, and all the other characters are almost powerless against him. Children will very rarely want to emulate the mild mannered Mack, when this piece of blue crap is shown to do whatever he pleases with no fear of repercussions.

Old shows, while they some strange messages at times, were always about how actions bring about reactions. Some dude pollutes the sea with chemicals, Captain Planet's gonna be there to whoop his sorry ass, and come out as the one YOU wished to be, or follow as a role model.
I've always found that a cartoon show can be depicting absolutely everything, even sexual stuff, as long as the characters are made to endure their own actions and have other character counter them.

 

[Steve Jordan]

I've always found that a cartoon show can be depicting absolutely everything, even sexual stuff, as long as the characters are made to endure their own actions and have other character counter them.

In other words: The good guy gets the girl, and the bad guys always get it in the end.

Except that's not how it happens in real life. You don't always get rewarded for doing the right thing... sometimes you even get punished for it. What's important is knowing right from wrong, and believe it or not, most cartoons do teach that to kids... even if they're not always great in giving us justifications for doing right or avoiding wrong.

I remember the old Charlie Chaplin movies and shorts: The Lovable Tramp character rarely came out on top at the end of the picture; but it was always clear from his attitude that "Tomorrow's another day," and everything he endured was at least worth the experience he had.

Kids' pictures should be the same, IMO... if they're going to teach us something about life, they should teach about real life, not politically-correct dream-life.

 

[CyBeR]

Swat Kats wasn't politically correct, Pirates of Dark Water wasn't, Captain Planet...I'll give ya this one, Tom & Jerry or The Looney Tunes weren't by far dream lives.
But they all had this bit where they thought children decency above all else. Bugs wasn't a fair player by no stretch of the imagination, but he was less devious and smarter than the other guy (Daffy usually)...Jerry as well.
Children's cartoons need to teach about being smart and facing up to mistakes. Not being a "playah" with everything to gain from being a general nuisance to everyone. Actions with reactions...if Tom betrayed Jerry on a deal, Tom would get it big time afterward. I don't see that with today's cartoons...they're either sickeningly good-natured (in the likes of Atomic Betty) or just plain old mean, like those shows.

 

[Steve Jordan]

I didn't mean to infer that all older cartoons were PC. Tom and Jerry and Looney Tunes were part of an era of cartoons that were built around raw slapstick humor, which is idealized in terms of not permanently hurting the recipient. And back then, kids generally knew the difference between real life and cartoons, so they enjoyed the slapstick without thinking they could inflict it upon others.

We also had Johnny Quest, which had people getting shot, blown up, attacked by monsters and crushed under falling objects. And those people didn't get up. But again, kids knew they were watching cartoons... no harm, no foul... and they knew the difference between themselves and their friends, and a cartoon.

The PC movement grew partly out of the desire to protect those vastly small number of kids who couldn't tell the difference, and hurt or killed themselves or their friends by confusing them with cartoons. Back in "the day," those kids would've been considered... well, let's say, losing them did the gene pool a favor...

But cartoons don't need to sugar-coat life... nor are they too violent for kids. Most kids know the difference.

 

[Precise Calibre]

It might be worth noting that as I grew up, my favorite movie was "Aliens", from the age of five... it still is. Not a cartoon, but it shows what some kids grew up loving.

I remember seeing the animated adaptation of "Watership Down" at an early age as well. If you want a cartoon to mind-freak a kid, that's one to go with.

Aliens (film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Watership Down (film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I remember so many things as I grew up, things of which nary a trace can be found nowadays.

"Inhumanoids" was spawned partially on the cold war mentality, but it also showed the downfalls of modern youth who are susceptible to peer pressure. It also had some really memorable villains, one of which was based off of "Dr." Mengele (Dr. Mangler).

"Captain Planet" not only handled ecological issues, it also dealt with racial and religious issues as well. In one episode, Captain Planet time traels to WWII Germany to stop a maniacal leader who was obviously Hitler from buying an atom bomb from the villains of the present. In another episode one of the supporting heroes is caught up in a fight between Protestants and Catholics in Ireland. Good luck seeing people touch on intolerance and why it's bad in the present day.

I think there's a group of parents out there who just want to coddle their children way too much. I know a couple whose children need speech therapy because the mom baby-talked to them til they were like six years old. We can't show children things having to do with religious, politcal, or even daily concerns because it might hurt their feelings or, heaven forbid, scare them! I was so mad in the G.I. Joe cartoon movie when Duke was killed that the line played out "He's gone... into a coma." Like they added the last bit cause death wasn't PC.

 

[CyBeR]

Speaking of children being scared, I can talk from my own experience that I had quite many nightmares and a long standing fear of the dark because of a few episodes of The real Adventures of Johnny Quest (added to watching Cujo, I believe it was, at the nice age of 4). I don't believe in cartoons needing to be graphic in any way (I wouldn't allow a child to watch Spawn for example, there are things in that series that need a bit of adult understanding...or at least teenage).
But I do believe talking about graphic content and how it may influence children is a discussion left for another topic. I don't think we could really just scratch the surface of the topic.