Edge-Pushing Cartoons: Cartoons with No Bounds or Bars

Certain comedy cartoons which are not aimed at the little child target market have developed massive popularity over the last thirty years or so. These certain cases of cartoons achieving mass appeal has categorically been due to the program's satirical qualities and its ability to make fun of the real universe in its cartoon meta-universe.

The world of Omni-popular cartoons aimed at everyone except little babies is a small historical sample size to work with. We shall be looking into the four cartoons which have garnered mass appeal over the last few decades (shows which have generated huge audience, movie deals, etc.).

We shall give these shows a final tally and rating based on....um....I dunno.

You can rate stuff with numbers, obviously, but it's not an all encompassing variables rating system by any stretch. You can assign something a 5 or a 77 or even a 88.125 but what does that really tell anyone? It's just a dumb number.

You can use letters and assign something an A+ or a C- or a D, but again, they are just dumb old letters. Some people try and use "stars" like gold ones because they look cool, and some folks use "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" but that is only a two-variable system which leaves no room for any details. You either have a gold star or a upward thumb or you don't...pretty shoddy system.

I believe I shall use a geometric rating system. Yes, the shows shall be rated using standard geometric shapes. Each component of the cartoon show which improves it will be shown with a face/vertex/frequency/side. Whilst each bad component of the show shall materialize itself within the shape as well.

So, yeah. Our rating system for this review shall be geometric in nature. The final grade shall indeed be a shape.

The Simpsons

Everyone is familiar with this show, it does not matter whether you live in Kathmandu, Podunk or North Haverbrook. This is the first show which exploded into an all encompassing target market behemoth which rained down comedy on the masses. An instant success.

I was in the first grade (age 6.5) when the Simpsons came on the scene and its culture bomb invaded my elementary school in a decisive wave of popularity. Every kid had Bart Simpson shit...t-shirts, lunch boxes, stickers. Yo, one time I was standing in line in like grade 3 and this girl wanted to look at my Bart Simpson t-shirt where Bart is dressed as a Ninja Turtle (combined marketing appeal) and I couldn't turn to show her. I felt really sick that day and she was getting mad at me for not turning to show it to her....and then I puked. Everywhere. It was the only time I ever puked at school. I puked a lot though and the teacher gave me a blue rectangular container to puke in. It sucked and was embarrassing but when I think about it now...I laugh. I remember it pretty good for something that happened like 22 years ago.

Anyway, the Simpsons was very well written when it first came out. The creator Matt Groening was the mind behind Life in Hell and ran the Simpsons as a short on the Tracy Ullman show before hitting it big. The early shows were heart felt and down-to-earth and very likeable. They were the most loveable dysfunctional unit of humans on T.V. and they weren't even real people. Shows about how they got their dog or how Lisa coped with her obtuse opinions were very well received with audiences.

As tame as the 90s Simpsons is by today's standards....it was hated by parents/teachers/church/etc back in the day. Early Simpsons did indeed push the edge, it made fun of our society by exaggeratingly mirroring it in their yellow tinted universe. The good part about old Simpsons episodes can be summed up with one word...subtlety. The satire and rebellious nature wasn't as in your face as the shows that came after it but it was always there.

Take a look at the authority figures in the Simpsons for example. None of them are presented as being competent or regarded as upright citizens. The Mayor is a crook, the chief of police is a pig-faced moron, the owner of the nuclear power plant (the richest man in town) is down right evil and sadistic. There's nothing wholesome or heroic about these people....these aren't your Leave it to Beaver friendly people in your neighborhood types. Yet they are more realistic that's for sure. It was not common in programs watched by young people in this era to find authority figures being presented in this realistic fashion.

The Simpsons was the original Edge-Pusher and it broke ground subtly, left a huge mark, and was the trail blazer for future Edge-Pusher cartoons. Sadly, the Simpsons got really horrible at some point and never regained composure.

I've been trying to pinpoint where it officially jumped the shark, and I think I have the answer.

NO FONZE DON'T DO IT! THERE'S NO WAY BACK!

Where exacty did the Simpsons jump on water-skies and attempt to publish a show to the airwaves so unforgivably retarded that they crossed shark infested waters and had no way of ever getting back to where they once were?

For me personally, I remember when it happened, and I remember well. In Season 9 they ran a show so pointless and convoluted for no apparent reason other than that they had literally NO ideas left. The show in question is where Seymour Skinner reveals that he is not Seymour Skinner but is actually...Armin Tanzarian.

Never has a story line been so pointless, never has a cliff hanger been so stupid, never has an idea been so convoluted and inherently pointless as the Armin Tanzarian episode. I remember sitting there after the show was over and having an inner dialogue with my stupid ol' self that was like...

"Wait, that was really bad..."

"But, the Simpsons is cool...how can something cool be bad? It's a fallacy"

"No, but this was shit. This episode was total shit. Why did they go with this idea?"

"You're crazy. The Simpsons rules and it always will!"

"You're wrong self. The Simpsons sucks. It's terrible. It's the WORST EPISODE EVER"

"...but, if the Simpsons sucks, what else is cool that actually sucks?"

"I dunno bro...probably EVERYTHING EVER"

(Me, inner monologue, circa 1997)

The idea that "The Simpsons Sucks" smashed my rosy-colored view of the world and left me feeling very cynical. Next thing I know...everything sucked. Like, I watched an episode of Saturday Night Live (which the previous week was ok)...but after Armin Tanzarian water-skied over a sea of venomous sharks...SNL started to look like total shit too. I couldn't even watch it, I wanted to jump into the screen and tell Kris Kattan to stop making a mockery of comedy and find something better to do. I haven't watched either of these shows in 15 years.

So to whoever wrote that episode of the Simpsons back in 1997 (Ken Keeler), way to go man. Thanks for ruining the Simpsons dude.

Rating: Thanks to nine good seasons (1989-1997) The Simpsons has some good depth to its shape. Nine sturdy lines, nine healthy and witty vertexes. Yet thanks to 16 horrible seasons to its name the shape is represented differently. It's nine-sided nonogonic nucleus of sturdy good qualities is overshadowed by an entwining 16-sided uncomfortably cumbersome hexakaidecagon. The final tally of the result of its rating is:

Nonogonal Nucleiic Hexakaidecagon

As you can see the nine-sided nucleus is well connected and sturdy...yet the additional 16 sides of the polygon are cumbersome and unnecessary. The only logical geometric rating to give The Simpsons is the Nonogonal Nucleiic Hexakaidecagon, obviously and undoubtedly. 

If making some cartoons is like building a house...then who would want to build a house shaped like a Nonogonal Nucleiic Hexakaidecagon? Probably Ken Keeler.

Beavis and Butthead

 
Okey-doke, so naturally moving along chronologically in our compendium of cartoons we arrive at the hit 1993 cartoon show...Beavis and Butthead.

I've written before about my enjoyment derived from watching this program so the rating may be a tad biased but it's just a stupid blog about my opinions so that's all you're gonna get. You're gonna get heavily biased views. Thank you very much.

This show had a million times more controversy than the Simpsons ever generated. From Senators denouncing it on the house floor, to Carl Sagan denouncing it in Demon Haunted World. This show got up everybody's trouser legs and just like the Simpsons it took a great deal of subtle (well not so subtle) satire up there with it.

 Now who is dis here Beevo and Buffcoats what-have-ya?

Previous entries on Beavis and Butthead: 

1. Beavis and Butthead are Back

2. Dear Carl Sagan Who art in Somewheres...

Rating: Beavis and Butthead had 1+6+1 seasons. Yet the first season was of notoriously poor quality and offered no subtly (straight out shock 'til you drop style). So in essence it is 6 core seasons + 1 notoriously bad one (1993) + 1 late-addition REALLY GOOD add-on (2011). It is in essence a hexagonal base structure yet it's core has so much depth that the lines are not flat. In fact it is a six faced structure...a cube to be more precise. 

The first season acts as a rough nucleus of non-concentric circle wavelengths radiating at the core of the six-faced core-cube. The first season acting as the most offensive season thus a radio-wave catalyst and driving force...yet still very unrefined. The 8th and final season in 2011 acts as a second wavelength of concentric circles which merges with the non-concentric circle wavelengths to create Pi (π)  and smooth out the core into a smooth sphere. Yes, Beavis and Butthead's most accurate rating variable in regards to this review is the Sphere-Nucleus Cube.

 Sphere-Nucleus Cube

South Park 

Our next sequential entry is the take-no-prisoners tour-de-force known as "South Park." Its first episode aired in 1997 and I remember it well. 

A station in my region bought the original 6 shows in 1997 and aired one...then waited for the complaints and ensuing damage-control needed before airing any others. Meanwhilst, in 1997 the internet was going strong and I had already figured out how to stream videos and watch whatever the fuck I wanted.

So, lo and behold...all the kids at my high school were talking about how funny that ONE episode of South Park was and I dropped a bombshell when I stated that I had already seen six shows. Naturally no one believed me so I took the time to storyboard out the shows at lunch period and said to the naysayers...

"Ye who doubt that I have seen 6 episodes of South Park lest only watch when the other 5 finally air and ye shall see that all my divine prophecies ring true. For in the next installment, Kathie Lee Gifford is parodied and Cartman gets very very fat!" 

Obviously when the station in question did finally air the second episode my prediction rang true and all the two or maybe three people I told it to thought I was pretty friggin' cool and everything.

As far as controversy goes...honestly it didn't get as much as Beavis and Butthead because Mike Judge had kinda plowed a good deal of chillness (in regards to cartoons) into society by this juncture. 

Though South Park had to always do more and more and more to push the bar so low that not even fucking James Cameron could fish it out of the abyss. Yet through all the bar lowering the show stills has an acerbic deadly wit behind it. It's shock and awe, all the time, but when you burrow underneath the surface there's a lot of really intelligent stuff going on with this show.

Even after SEVENTEEN FUCKING YEARS the new season is looking strong. The tour-de-force has never lost its drive and there's even still potential in this show. Unlike the Simpsons which jumped the shark and died soon after...South Park has managed to find a way to be shark proof.

  As Shark Proof as The Batman

Maybe it was in Season 2 where they depicted Fonzie jumping over a shark...and then the shark caught and devoured Fonzie that broke the curse for them. Maybe they've been shark proof and free and at ease since 1998. Either way, alls I knows is, South Park is still good after 17 years.

Rating: It's a clean 17-sided Heptadecagon, no doubt about it. Each point of the Heptadecagon intersects geodesically with each other point at roughly 60 degree angles. Yes, South Park is undoubtedly a 60-degree intersecting well-made Heptadecagon. 

 60-Degree Intersecting Heptadecagon

Yes, yes it is. Oh and, since South Park has had 17 good seasons and The Simpsons has only had 9...

17 - 9 = 8

South Park is 8 units better than The Simpson mathematically. South Park is thus quantifiably Octahedronically better than The Simpsons.

Family Guy

It's becoming hip to rag on poor old Family Guy, but I want the record to show that I've never really been huge on this show and I'm not one of these band-wagonning anti-Family Guy genres of people. I believe Family Guy jumped the shark and began being pretty crappy at this juncture...

Yeah, Okay, he hurt his knee. What a cute joke. Okay, okay...good for fucking him. These types of jokes are the core of the show which is shrouded in an impenetrable wall of stolen bits. That basically is what Family Guy is. It was bad from the first season, right from the get-go, and will always be bad. There's no blips in the wavelength of shit...just shit...forever and ever.

Its geodesic shape is that of actual inertia. A straight line of never-ending/never-altering crap.

"Inertia is the resistance of any physical object to any change in its motion (including a change in direction). In other words, it is the tendency of objects to keep moving in a straight line at constant linear velocity, or to keep still." (wiki) 

Family Guy is a straight unchangeable line. What's more is they gave this show TWO clones of itself...American Dad and Cleveland. Meaning this straight line has two identical clones of it in its universe.

Rating: What do three straight identical measuring and angled lines give us?

Equilateral Triangle

Family Guy (and Family Guy ' and Family Guy '') are an equilateral triangle....of crap. Okay, it's not that bad, it can be funny sometimes but I think this rating variable really fits snug-like-a-glove in this case.

Conclusion

We have successfully concluded our geometric ranking of Edge/Boundary Pushing Cartoon shows and I believe it went well. Maybe I should go back to rating things with numbers or letters though.

I wanted to include good shows like Futurama and Ren and Stimpy (I think Ren and Stimpy has a big place in history honestly)...but these two are not omni-popular like the Big 4 Edge-Pushers are. Only 4 cartoons have had massive appeal.

Thank you and good night.

Promotion for Web-a-Sodes

Watch He's Talking Dead Eh, a great show about the last dudes left on earth who gotta find beer, chicks, and food and all the while fend off terrible urban zombies, rural zombies, zombie bees, and zombie ants.

 Sodes (1 and a 2)

Greg and D have mixed feelings about being the last two knobs on earth, and decide to go find some food and shit. They hope they are not attacked by terrible zombies or ants.
 

Greg and D decide to return to the city but run into a major pity when they are attacked by a surviving commando who is involved in military arts once again. Will they be able to cope?

Gregis and D-Head?

Similarity

An odd similarity exists between the pilot episode of He's Talking Dead Eh which aired November 9, 2011 and an episode of Beavis and Butthead which aired on December 1, 2011 (approx. one month later).

The premise, story, and dialogue between the characters is very similar. Especially in one particular scene. A cheesy wind sound is playing in the background while the respective heroes assess their respective situations...

In He's Talking Dead Eh (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxKOo98O8_k), watch from around 1:15 to 1:50.

In Beavis and Butthead (http://www.mtv.ca/tvshows/beavis-and-butthead/video_content.jhtml?id=1675253), watch from around 2:29 to 3:03.

He's Talking Dead Eh didn't steal this bit. It aired almost one month prior to this episode of Beavis and Butthead, any similarity is just a coincidence.

"Influences"

To be fair, the show is inspired by the following:

1. Bob and Doug McKenzie (particularly the opening scene of "Strange Mawfucking Brew" where Bob is the last man on earth)

2.Bruce Campbell (his heroics in the face of evil deadites)

3. The Three Stooges expressions and slapshtick

4. Beavis and Butthead (the intelligence level of our intrepid protagonists).

We have our "influences" but we did not steal the above bit, and the dates are the proof.

(writings on this blog about Beavis and Butthead: Here, and here too)

Beavis and Butthead are Back

In the old days, Beavis and Butthead never won, they never scored, and they never succeeded at life. In the new episodes coming out, I'm sure they won't score, they won't win, and will surely not succeed.

They're dumb, violent, mean, vulgar, horrible, little teenagers. You're never sure to laugh at them, hate them, pity them, or root for them. I think as a viewer everyone kind of takes a stand as they observe data, we want to see the hero win and the villain lose. Are they heroes? Anti-Heroes? Villains? You're never really sure. Are you supposed to cheer them on or learn a lesson from their idiotic ways? What's their deal?

Some think Beavis and Butthead was supposed to be a wake up call for society to start worrying about today's youth or to warn us about devo-lution (explored later in Judge's "Idiocracy" work). These are components, but I don't think this is the main idea behind it. I think they were meant to be rooted for like any other protagonist in any other work of literature.

The hardest protagonists to root for are the ones who never win. Ask a Chicago Cubs fan if that statement is true, they haven't won since 1908 and aren't looking like they will in the future. Beavis and Butthead will never age, never score, never win, and never succeed. They are forever trapped in the purgatory of failure and hardship. In essence they represent suffering in its purest form.

Look closely at the characters. They have no parents, they slave away at school all day and then slave away at minimum wage labor at Burger World (the fast food chain in their world) on their weekends, they are angry and depressed, they take their anger out on each other through violence. They live a life of suffering...and will never as long they exist in their story ever free themselves from their hardships.

Ouch, I think I hurt myself.

Each episode featured them losing, failing, getting beat up, beating each other up, being scolded at school, getting arrested, getting stuck in something, getting terribly bloody and injured. Life beats them down into the ground each and every time. Except for one...one episode in the entire run of the original series was totally different than the rest. It was their only victory, and it wasn't much but it was still a victory.

A GREAT DAY

A Great Day is a break from the motif of failure, hardship, and injury. They wake up and feel good, Butthead says "I think it's because I finally got some sleep" and Beavis says "Ah boy...I feel pretty good right about now." They start out happy, and everything just goes right for them. Their victories are not grand at all, they see some cool things and because of their good mood they have a positive outlook on life and for that brief moment in time...the nachos taste better, the sight of two dogs banging makes them laugh more heartily, looking up at the sky and going "ah boy...I feel good today" makes them feel a-o-kay.

This was our heroes victory. One day in their miserable, impovrished, beat-down lives where they were happy. This episode feels odd and out of place, but I understand it now, that it's those little silly things in life, those little passing moments in time when things make you smile and you don't know or can't explain why. You got some sleep the night before and had pleasent dreams and you just feel pretty good right about then. You get a couple of breaks that day, you know, the laws of random chance just fall in your favor. You see someone else get injured instead of you (schadenfreude) and are glad you're not getting hurt for once...you know...stuff like that. You learn to appreciate those little things.

These guys didn't need much to be happy, they could laugh at literally anything. They laughed through all the tough times. They just wanted to be free from school, free from menial labor...they wanted to be free so they could rummage through trash cans and find porno magazines. They wanted to explore the world, do America, and find cool places and see cool things like cars crashing, dogs banging, stuff they never saw before.

"Someday I'd like to be like that, you know, a kid finds a dead bird...you give him 20 bucks for it."

"Beavis...life just keeps getting better."

They're thinking about the future and they're place in it and how great it's gonna be. This episode was so different than the others. These kids are ok, they're good kids, they had it rough and act out but they just want the same thing anyone wants...just to be free and to be happy. They just want a couple of great days. That's all.

Dear Carl Sagan who art in somewheres...

Dear Mr. Sagan,

In your book Demon Haunted World on page number 26, you cite the popularity of Beavis and Butthead as a sign of the decline of intelligence in civilization. I feel that this point is mistaken.

The creator of Beavis and Butthead, Mr. Mike Judge, was a man of scientific intellect. He worked as an engineer previous to creating cartoons for the masses. Judge's "Beavis and Butthead" is in much the same vein as your book Demon Haunted World.

Your book is in essence a social critique of the decline of intelligence of our times, and more so a request for people to practice skepticism and foremost critical thinking. Similarly, "Beavis and Butthead" is also a social critique on the decline of national intelligence. As for promoting critical thinking? Beavis and Butthead's harsh critique of the music industry's chaff garbage forced upon the youth of the era gave the teens who watched it at that time an inherent Bullshit Detector. Anything that was fake or pretentious was automatically tossed aside and labeled as "sucks" on the program and similarly the teens of the era took a critical way of thinking to the entertainment media they observed.

Wherever you are in the universe, whether you are star stuff or whatever...please don't hate on Beavis and Butthead bro.

(Sources: Sagan, C. Demon Haunted World, p.26)