are we in a dark age of family animation?

[harry580]

don't get me wrong, im not in the levels of tswade2, there are some family animation films coming out like trolls 3, wish & mitigation but I have a feeling we in a dark age of family animation right now, I mean, blue sky studios, tangent studios & that lego ninjago animation studio (not wildbrain, but the one studio in denmark) closed down, Cartoon Network purging shows & not to mention the rise of adult animation & the fact adult swim already takeover half of cartoon network's daily schedule & the fact that there are some animated films that flopping, so, that begs the question, are we in a dark age of family animation?

look, I know im freaking out and I almost feel like I should never made this thread to begin with but I want to hear some thoughts

 

[Goldstar!]

I have to say, I don't see the closing of Blue Sky Studios as a sign that we're entering a dark age. I mean, Blue Sky was never a giant in the industry to be begin with. Not to mention this change wasn't even recent. It happened 2 years ago, and it's not like Blue Sky had a bunch of commercial hits under its belt.

Dreamworks and Illumination seem to doing OK, as far as I can tell. The Super Mario Bros Movie made over a billion at the box office, so I'm not worried about Illumination. Puss in Boots: The Last Wish and The Bad Guys performed well for Dreamworks also. Sure, Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken tanked at the box office (fish pun intended), but the studio barely promoted it, and every studio drops a bomb once in a while.

Sony Pictures Animation is doing good with the Sipderverse movies. They also produced the animated series Young Love for Max, which I enjoyed more than I thought I would.

As I see it, Disney's main problem is that the studio needs to get out of its comfort zone and experiment with some new and different types of storytelling and art styles instead of relying so much on the tried-and-true fairy tale/princess movie archetype. Pixar likewise needs to try some new and original types of storytelling and stop relying on sequels.

Warner Bros. just plain needs to get its act together. At least we still have The Day the Earth Blew Up and Bye-Bye, Bunny to look forward to. Those projects managed to escape the ax from David Zaslav.

 

[harry580]

I have to say, I don't see the closing of Blue Sky Studios as a sign that we're entering a dark age. I mean, Blue Sky was never a giant in the industry to be begin with. Not to mention this change wasn't even recent. It happened 2 years ago, and it's not like Blue Sky had a bunch of commercial hits under its belt.

Dreamworks and Illumination seem to doing OK, as far as I can tell. Sure, Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken tanked at the box office, but the studio barely promoted it and every studio drops a bomb once in a while.

As I see it, Disney's main problem is that the studio needs to get out of its comfort zone and experiment with some new and different types of storytelling and art styles instead of relying so much on the tried-and-true fairy tale/princess movie archetype. Pixar likewise needs to try some new and original types of storytelling and stop relying on sequels.

Warner Bros. just plain needs to get its act together. At least we still have The Day the Earth Blew Up and Bye-Bye, Bunny to look forward to. Those projects managed to escape the ax from David Zaslav.

I mean, if disney wanted to make sequels of something instead of Pixar, why not do sequels to ice age & rio and maybe go back to the disneytoon studios route but better

 

[Goldstar!]

I mean, if disney wanted to make sequels of something instead of Pixar, why not do sequels to ice age & rio and maybe go back to the disneytoon studios route but better

Personally, I'd rather see Disney explore new territory than just pump out more unnecessary sequels, but that's me.

 

[harry580]

Personally, I'd rather see Disney explore new territory than just pump out more unnecessary sequels, but that's me.

so, basically just let ice age & rio end up like rugrats was in the early to mid 2000s while disney used the money to do new territory stuff, oh wait, im going off topic, anyways back on topic, I blame covid for why disney didn't have a animated film that is a big box office hit (well, raya & Encanto of course but they need something bigger)

 

[Goldstar!]

so, basically just let ice age & rio end up like rugrats was in the early to mid 2000s while disney used the money to do new territory stuff, oh wait, im going off topic, anyways back on topic, I blame covid for why disney didn't have a animated film that is a big box office hit (well, raya & Encanto of course but they need something bigger)

Encanto did quite well for Disney. If anything, Disney could stand to make something else like that (and no, I don't mean that they should just make Encanto 2, which they'll probably end up doing regardless).

 

[Silverstar]

"I want more Ice Age and Rio stuff" does not equate to "Family animation is in a dark age". I mean, I've always felt The Funny Company should have been a bigger commercial hit than it was, but I'm not sitting here claiming that TV animation is in the sewer solely because it wasn't.

 

[Golden Geek]

Encanto was a hit and Elemental did surprisingly well on streaming and overseas after the doom-and-gloom forecast it got from people who make dramatic YouTube videos about Disney's downfall.

Family animation is fine.

 

[harry580]

"I want more Ice Age and Rio stuff" does not equate to "Family animation is in a dark age".

I didn't mean that I just saying this is something disney has to do while they In this dark age, I mean direct to video was something that help disney out during a dark age they facing back in the early to mid 2000s

 

[JoeMabbon]

I feel like television is weaker than film right now and even there it feels more like a low ebb than a full on Dark Age.

 

[The Overlord]

I have to say, I don't see the closing of Blue Sky Studios as a sign that we're entering a dark age. I mean, Blue Sky was never a giant in the industry to be begin with. Not to mention this change wasn't even recent. It happened 2 years ago, and it's not like Blue Sky had a bunch of commercial hits under its belt.

Dreamworks and Illumination seem to doing OK, as far as I can tell. The Super Mario Bros Movie made over a billion at the box office, so I'm not worried about Illumination. Puss in Boots: The Last Wish and The Bad Guys performed well also. Sure, Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken tanked at the box office, but the studio barely promoted it, and every studio drops a bomb once in a while.

Sony Pictures Animation is doing good with the Sipderverse movies. They also produced the animated series Young Love for Max, which is decent.

As I see it, Disney's main problem is that the studio needs to get out of its comfort zone and experiment with some new and different types of storytelling and art styles instead of relying so much on the tried-and-true fairy tale/princess movie archetype. Pixar likewise needs to try some new and original types of storytelling and stop relying on sequels.

Warner Bros. just plain needs to get its act together. At least we still have The Day the Earth Blew Up and Bye-Bye, Bunny to look forward to. Those projects managed to escape the ax from David Zaslav.

I feel like the situation with films is fine, sure the last few Disney movies didn't so great, but there are still plenty of kids films in theatres.

I think it's TV shows that this middle ground is disappearing. Cartoon Network is giving up more Time to Adult Swim, Amazon Prime doesn't try to make animated shows for kids, Netflix's attempts at kids animation shows seem half hearted.

There are still some shows like Dragon Prince and the Ghost and Molly McGee, but those are the exception, not the rule. Everything else seems aimed at adults or pre schoolers.

 

[Ace]

Disney probably isn't going to do as well has they have a few years ago where they made making a billion dollars look easy. The hype of Star Wars Marvel movies all the planets just seemed to align at the right time for them where they had all the franchises that were the most relevant at the time and the brand had never been more relevant.

The hype seemed like it was something that wasn't going to last and now things are just back to normal for them and they're currently witnessing the withdrawal symptoms.

I think family entertainment as a whole is down because Gen Alpha is very hard to reach. Gaming is more popular and so is YouTube. The reason why things like Mario and Spiderman are doing well is because they are franchises kids can actually recognize. Finding things younger generations recognize is getting harder now that streaming split the audience many different ways.

 

[5YearsOnEastCoast]

For animated movies, not really. Yeah some of them flopped at box office (like Wish), but they are doing alright at least.

Animated series on the other hand...jeez. There haven't been a lot of successful animated shows outside of preschool targeted ones. The more successful cartoons currently are the ones that have been on for ages like SpongeBob and Teen Titans Go. And even if there are ones that are doing well... they would get canned soon because they aren't doing insanely well or some really odd reason.

 

[Goldstar!]

For animated movies, not really. Yeah some of them flopped at box office (like Wish), but they are doing alright at least.

Animated series on the other hand...jeez. There haven't been a lot of successful animated shows outside of preschool targeted ones. The more successful cartoons currently are the ones that have been on for ages like SpongeBob and Teen Titans Go. And even if there are ones that are doing well... they would get canned soon because they aren't doing insanely well or some really odd reason.

It goes back to what Ace said in the post above yours. Kid's TV shows aren't doing great right now because by-and-large, kids aren't watching a lot of TV. There are too many distractions. These days, video games, social media and sites like YouTube have replaced TV as kids' number 1 distraction, so many networks don't think it's worth it to try to cater to an audience that by-and-large isn't there.

 

[ThePharaohZ]

think family entertainment as a whole is down because Gen Alpha is very hard to reach. Gaming is more popular and so is YouTube. The reason why things like Mario and Spiderman are doing well is because they are franchises kids can actually recognize. Finding things younger generations recognize is getting harder now that streaming split the audience many different ways.

It's kind of ironic that companies continue to have this stigma of animation being for kids and yet kids today are becoming harder to reach, meanwhile adults have been continuously calling companies out for such an ignorant and out-of-touch belief.

 

[JMTV]

I'm not gonna pretend everything was all sunshine and lollipops in Hollywood right now, because I know it's not, but even I'd admit that kids TV animation weren't as hot as it used to be 20+ years ago.

Despite its flubs, animated films are gonna be fine since they pretty successful. Cable TV on the other hand, is a whole different story like others has said, besides preschool shows, kids these days has so many options to consume content than watching TV. Linear TV went down the toilet thanks to streaming and the internet, and the executives felt there's no point of greenlighting shows if the kids are not watching them. Sure, they're some kids shows that are popular on cable TV right now, but those are very rare and few and far between.

Of course, that doesn't excuse the executives' dumb-ass decisions though, because animation deserves to be treated much more respect as a art form than as disposable content that the shareholders don't wanna put up with, but that's the unfortunate reality. Hell, why are we living in a world that recognizable IPs are more profitable than original ideas? You get the point.

Honestly, the only way to get out of this "family animation dark age" is to have executives took chances on original projects and handled it with proper care, and the projects themselves that are actually good.

That's my two cents.

 

[Elijah Abrams]

I'm not gonna pretend everything was all sunshine and lollipops in Hollywood right now, because I know it's not, but even I'd admit that kids TV animation weren't as hot as it used to be 20+ years ago.

Despite its flubs, animated films are gonna be fine since they pretty successful. Cable TV on the other hand, is a whole different story like others has said, besides preschool shows, kids these days has so many options to consume content than watching TV. Linear TV went down the toilet thanks to streaming and the internet, and the executives felt there's no point of greenlighting shows if the kids are not watching them. Sure, they're some kids shows that are popular on cable TV right now, but those are very rare and few and far between.

Of course, that doesn't excuse the executives' dumb-ass decisions though, because animation deserves to be treated much more respect as a art form than as disposable content that the shareholders don't wanna put up with, but that's the unfortunate reality. Hell, why are we living in a world that recognizable IPs are more profitable than original ideas? You get the point.

Honestly, the only way to get out of this "family animation dark age" is to have executives took chances on original projects and handled it with proper care, and the projects themselves that are actually good.

That's my two cents.

Linear TV will survive since it is available on vMVPD providers like YouTube TV and Hulu+Live TV, Spectrum has shifted from offering cable boxes to new customers with Xumo boxes that have the Spectrum TV app, and, in the future, FAST services like Pluto TV and Tubi will have the regular feeds of channels like Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, Disney Channel, etc. available instead of FAST-exclusive versions. Heck, Paramount+, in the future, will most likely make the regular linear feed of Nickelodeon available on said streaming service.