Have I Stopped Rolling with the Times?

Question: What has happened to the CARTOON?

You know, the Saturday morning, after school special, or even nightly cartoon. Sure, I'm one to wax nostalgic about the heartfelt loves of my youth, but am I off base to ask this question? (Hopefully, it's been asked before.)

When I was young I looked forward to Saturday mornings like no other, even in the summer time when we were out of school. We had The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour, Scooby Doo, Where Are You?, Challenge of the Superfriends (Superfriends), Speed Buggy, Speed Racer (the original of the Anime coming to America), Pink Panther, even the Smurfs, and a host of other shows to devour, not to mention Schoolhouse Rock (on which I posted a Top Ten list of the best SR song/videos here).

While I'll admit -- with Batman Beyond, Batman the animated series, The Batman, Justice League (Unlimited), Spider-Man, X-Men, and Teen Titans -- that the superhero genre of cartoons has drastically improved, what about all the others? I'd hazard a guess that most people, including most kids, aren't avid superhero fans. So where does that leave us?

Well, we have all the new wave Anime shows. Aside from the card playing games of Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh series, neither of which seem very good or long-lasting although that remains to be seen, I couldn't name one -- and I've wasted time watching a few. We've replaced the likes of Bugs and Scoob with Dexter's Laboratory, Loonatics (a bad Bugs Bunny and friends makeover), and Bratz (the animated series). Puuuuuh-lease! Totally Spies is mildly watchable, and I can get along with Dora the Explorer, which is now shown on Saturday morns, but I go thru the Saturday morning listings and the Saturday morning cartoon is dying a slow and painful death. Hardly anything watchable, let alone a show with "classic" potential.

Then, there's the whole Adult Swim late night cartoon biz and also South Park and the like, which I suppose ratings bear out that adults will watch these shows (hopefully, they're adults), but I don't find them amusing at all, and they're definitely not kid-friendly. I guess The Simpsons may go down as a classic, and to a lesser degree King of the Hill, but certainly as adult humor cartoons rather than family friendly classics such as The Flintstones.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe kids are loving 2 Stupid Dogs, Ed, Edd n Eddy, and The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, as these shows seem to be either the current or past fare of Cartoon Networks prime time shows. Perhaps, I'm mixing too many things: Cartoon Network, Saturday morning cartoons, and late night cartoons. I dunno. I sit with my kids some on Saturdays or at night when they want to see a cartoon, and I get depressed. Maybe I've just grown to be an old curmudgeon. But in my opinion, kids today would sure be better off with some good, old-fashioned Scooby Doo or, barring some of the classics of the past, maybe nothing at all.

Cartoons