I love my brother, Brian, very much but as kids we weren’t very close. With a five year age gap, my brother at ten didn’t know what to do with a tattle-tale, tag-along fiver year old little sister. I do have some really good memories with my brother as a kid though, just when no one was around. He read extensively to me from his Spawn comics and collection of Calvin and Hobbes, he knew how to make a fried egg sandwich almost as good as Dad’s, and he always made the coolest forts. I’ve had an inkling of a memory, but I couldn’t discern whether I was actually remembering or if I had imagined something. There was a ticklish recollection of Scooby-Doo and the rest of the gang teaming up with Batman and Robin; somehow Cher was there floating around too. I kept meaning to ask my brother, but I’d usually think of the thing at a really inconvenient time to call. Is there ever a convenient time to ask someone if you remember something or are just crazy?
A few weeks back my parents came up to visit and they brought my bike from storage and a couple of boxes of old VHS titles. My roommate and I didn’t really want cable; we have a T.V. and DVD player she scored for free in the font room and I have my little color TV VHS combo in my room. Buried under my favorite Disney titles, The Indian in the Cupboard, and Matilda, I discovered a battered copy of The New Scooby Doo Movies. Five minutes and a google later the case of my hazy memory was solved. The New Scooby-Doo Movies ran from 1972-1973 in two seasons comprising of a total of 24 episodes. Each week a special cartoon guest star would lend their personality and sleuthing skills to the mystery gang. Stars like Sonny and Cher, Phyllis Diller and Dan Knots lent their own voices to their ink counterparts; Batman and Robin made their appearance on September 16, 1972 in the second episode of the first season. I vaguely remember other episodes, like the one with the Boston Globe Trotters, but I think I remembered Batman and Robin more clearly because we obviously had the tape at home.
Why is any of this important? Well frankly its not; unless you’re me, Regardless, I also went and saw Wolverine: Origins with some friends over the weekend. I don’t remember my brother really being into X-men; he was more of a Thunder Cats kind of guy, and I knew little to nothing about the Wolverine comics put out by DC. I could however, compare the newer super hero to the thirty plus year old heroes my roommate and I watched later in the week. We cracked open a couple beers, curled up with the cats and laughed until my stomach seized up and my face was dripping.
Unfortunately, most of us have seen the highlights of the new Wolverine flick just by watching the preview, but Ryan Reynolds with a bald head, his mouth sewn shut, and a larger than average superhero stature shows up and shoots lasers out of his eyes, Wolverine’s blades slide out of his skin seamlessly; CGI brings creatures to life. Deaths are more brutal, colors are sharp and almost exaggerated; reality is exaggerated. Compare this to hokey music, simple backgrounds consisting mostly of flat color with one or two props thrown in. Even compared to the cartoons today, let alone a human acted role, makes the 1970’s version look like something my best friend’s three year old would make at day care.
The cartoons represent so much hard diligent work; grunt work. Computer enhancement is work as well; I took a web programming course last quarter and I have an unbelievable amount of respect for anyone who can get past JavaScript. But the work is different; heroes have become less about drawing and more about science and math. Entertainment as an industry is changing as well; people don’t want to work for their escapism anymore. Re-creating realism sells tickets; although I mean “realism” in the sense that people want the unreal and unattainable to look real. What I want to know is: where’s the fun in that? Did I enjoy the Wolverine flick? Yes, but mostly I enjoyed doing something with people I care about. I’d rather take a walk or read a book or watch The New Scooby-Doo Movies because they are hilarious. I miss when TV was just cool because of the novelty of it; I miss when the story was more important than the graphics and when I had to work a little bit to fill in the gaps. Designing g Women and Golden Girls for example crack me up and their sets were so simple. I know I’m mixing and matching my movies and television series and cartoons, but I feel like the change in the fundamentals of entertainment may be illustrated by examining them all.
A few weeks back my parents came up to visit and they brought my bike from storage and a couple of boxes of old VHS titles. My roommate and I didn’t really want cable; we have a T.V. and DVD player she scored for free in the font room and I have my little color TV VHS combo in my room. Buried under my favorite Disney titles, The Indian in the Cupboard, and Matilda, I discovered a battered copy of The New Scooby Doo Movies. Five minutes and a google later the case of my hazy memory was solved. The New Scooby-Doo Movies ran from 1972-1973 in two seasons comprising of a total of 24 episodes. Each week a special cartoon guest star would lend their personality and sleuthing skills to the mystery gang. Stars like Sonny and Cher, Phyllis Diller and Dan Knots lent their own voices to their ink counterparts; Batman and Robin made their appearance on September 16, 1972 in the second episode of the first season. I vaguely remember other episodes, like the one with the Boston Globe Trotters, but I think I remembered Batman and Robin more clearly because we obviously had the tape at home.
Why is any of this important? Well frankly its not; unless you’re me, Regardless, I also went and saw Wolverine: Origins with some friends over the weekend. I don’t remember my brother really being into X-men; he was more of a Thunder Cats kind of guy, and I knew little to nothing about the Wolverine comics put out by DC. I could however, compare the newer super hero to the thirty plus year old heroes my roommate and I watched later in the week. We cracked open a couple beers, curled up with the cats and laughed until my stomach seized up and my face was dripping.
Unfortunately, most of us have seen the highlights of the new Wolverine flick just by watching the preview, but Ryan Reynolds with a bald head, his mouth sewn shut, and a larger than average superhero stature shows up and shoots lasers out of his eyes, Wolverine’s blades slide out of his skin seamlessly; CGI brings creatures to life. Deaths are more brutal, colors are sharp and almost exaggerated; reality is exaggerated. Compare this to hokey music, simple backgrounds consisting mostly of flat color with one or two props thrown in. Even compared to the cartoons today, let alone a human acted role, makes the 1970’s version look like something my best friend’s three year old would make at day care.
The cartoons represent so much hard diligent work; grunt work. Computer enhancement is work as well; I took a web programming course last quarter and I have an unbelievable amount of respect for anyone who can get past JavaScript. But the work is different; heroes have become less about drawing and more about science and math. Entertainment as an industry is changing as well; people don’t want to work for their escapism anymore. Re-creating realism sells tickets; although I mean “realism” in the sense that people want the unreal and unattainable to look real. What I want to know is: where’s the fun in that? Did I enjoy the Wolverine flick? Yes, but mostly I enjoyed doing something with people I care about. I’d rather take a walk or read a book or watch The New Scooby-Doo Movies because they are hilarious. I miss when TV was just cool because of the novelty of it; I miss when the story was more important than the graphics and when I had to work a little bit to fill in the gaps. Designing g Women and Golden Girls for example crack me up and their sets were so simple. I know I’m mixing and matching my movies and television series and cartoons, but I feel like the change in the fundamentals of entertainment may be illustrated by examining them all.
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