AnimatedFan01
Active Member
I made a thread similar to this a couple years back (it feels good to be back on Toonzonr after the 7-month long outage) about cartoons you regret ignoring as a kid so I guess I've sort of already asked this, but this is for cartoons of any time period, whether you were a kid or an adult, so cartoons of either the past or today.
Amphibia is definitely the first that comes immediately to mind. I'd heard about the show from the beginning but didn't even care to check it out until February of this year (around the same time of the site outage), primarily due to the Calamity Trio igniting my interest as I do love friendship cartoons, as I was initially under the impression of it focusing solely on a girl in a frog world with no human contact whatsoever, and that's one of the reasons why I refused to check it out originally. Let me just say that sleeping on it throughout its run was definitely the biggest mistake in my life. This quickly became my new favorite cartoon due to its beautiful animation and art style, perfect balance between episodic and serialized, talented (and recognizable) voice cast, likeable and unique characters, adventurous plots, and amazing production music. Not only do I consider it the best Disney cartoon but the best cartoon of all time.
The main reason I didn't think to watch it while it was airing was because I was under the misconception of it being a generic serialized and arc-heavy cartoon with no episodic quirk or fun whatsoever. In fact, this was my attitude toward most 2010s cartoons and why I refused to check them out. Pretty much ever since Adventure Time premiered, I was under the pretense that every cartoon produced onward was going to be lore-oriented, action-heavy, dark, angsty, and story-heavy (e.g. Steven Universe, The Legend of Korra, Infinity Train, Gravity Falls, Star vs. the Forces of Evil), or too overly random, dumbed down, gross, overly reliant on crude humor or character abuse, trippy, and have moronic protagonists (e.g. Regular Show, Gumball, Teen Titans Go, Uncle Grandpa, Sanjay and Craig, Breadwinners, Pig Goat Banana Cricket), with the standard "boring" and "pandering" slice of life (e.g. The Loud House, Clarence, Craig of the Creek, We Bare Bears, Summer Camp Island, Harvey Beaks) being the "in between".
That's what made me yearn for the days of simple episodic fun and quirky cartoons like Ed, Edd n Eddy, Foster's, Billy and Mandy, Jimmy Neutron, Fairly OddParents (pre-Poof), Phineas and Ferb, etc. I blame internet critics like Benthelooney and especially Mr. Enter for instilling this mindset into me since they're notorious for having a nostalgia bias and blindly judging cartoons or giving very vague reviews on them. This caused me to adopt those beliefs and attitudes without me having thought of them before and caused me to equate "modern" with "bad". While it wasn't as bad for me to be dismissive of every modern cartoon, as there were some I liked and watched like Rick and Morty, most of them were adult cartoons and very few modern kid cartoons I actually watched.
I still haven't forgiven myself for April of last year back when I was in a hotel room and ignored Amphibia while flipping through channels since it was still airing even if very close to its finale, and it's always such a shame when I get into cartoons only just after they've ended. The very least I can do is hope for a revival of some sort if not a new cartoon from the same creator with a similar premise and animation style.
The only modern kid cartoons I remember actually taking my time to sit down and watch so as to give them a chance were We Bare Bears and Craig of the Creek (both of which I downloaded the whole first seasons to because I wanted to check them out), and while I did find both to be decent if not okay at best, I didn't like the overuse of social media/smartphones in WBB since I watch cartoons to escape these things not see more of it. That's another thing that turned me off about modern cartoons and still kind of does is the generation pandering.
Anyway, I am sure there's more examples than Amphibia that I regret sleeping on but none that come immediately to mind. Owl House is probably the second one since I only checked it out just when it was nearing its end, but only saw the first few episodes and am still a long way from the finale. I wish I'd gotten into The Ghost and Molly McGee when it first premiered as I'd only checked it out in January this year when season 1 had wrapped up, but at least I watched it when it was still airing unlike Amphibia.
If there's anything I've learned from this experience it's to never judge a book by its cover and don't let internet critics or general consensus influence yours. And on the bright side cartoons seem to be becoming fairly more episodic and lighthearted with Molly, Kiff, Hailey's on It, and Hamster & Gretel. I haven't really kept up to date with CN or Nick so I'm not sure about their newer originals.
Amphibia is definitely the first that comes immediately to mind. I'd heard about the show from the beginning but didn't even care to check it out until February of this year (around the same time of the site outage), primarily due to the Calamity Trio igniting my interest as I do love friendship cartoons, as I was initially under the impression of it focusing solely on a girl in a frog world with no human contact whatsoever, and that's one of the reasons why I refused to check it out originally. Let me just say that sleeping on it throughout its run was definitely the biggest mistake in my life. This quickly became my new favorite cartoon due to its beautiful animation and art style, perfect balance between episodic and serialized, talented (and recognizable) voice cast, likeable and unique characters, adventurous plots, and amazing production music. Not only do I consider it the best Disney cartoon but the best cartoon of all time.
The main reason I didn't think to watch it while it was airing was because I was under the misconception of it being a generic serialized and arc-heavy cartoon with no episodic quirk or fun whatsoever. In fact, this was my attitude toward most 2010s cartoons and why I refused to check them out. Pretty much ever since Adventure Time premiered, I was under the pretense that every cartoon produced onward was going to be lore-oriented, action-heavy, dark, angsty, and story-heavy (e.g. Steven Universe, The Legend of Korra, Infinity Train, Gravity Falls, Star vs. the Forces of Evil), or too overly random, dumbed down, gross, overly reliant on crude humor or character abuse, trippy, and have moronic protagonists (e.g. Regular Show, Gumball, Teen Titans Go, Uncle Grandpa, Sanjay and Craig, Breadwinners, Pig Goat Banana Cricket), with the standard "boring" and "pandering" slice of life (e.g. The Loud House, Clarence, Craig of the Creek, We Bare Bears, Summer Camp Island, Harvey Beaks) being the "in between".
That's what made me yearn for the days of simple episodic fun and quirky cartoons like Ed, Edd n Eddy, Foster's, Billy and Mandy, Jimmy Neutron, Fairly OddParents (pre-Poof), Phineas and Ferb, etc. I blame internet critics like Benthelooney and especially Mr. Enter for instilling this mindset into me since they're notorious for having a nostalgia bias and blindly judging cartoons or giving very vague reviews on them. This caused me to adopt those beliefs and attitudes without me having thought of them before and caused me to equate "modern" with "bad". While it wasn't as bad for me to be dismissive of every modern cartoon, as there were some I liked and watched like Rick and Morty, most of them were adult cartoons and very few modern kid cartoons I actually watched.
I still haven't forgiven myself for April of last year back when I was in a hotel room and ignored Amphibia while flipping through channels since it was still airing even if very close to its finale, and it's always such a shame when I get into cartoons only just after they've ended. The very least I can do is hope for a revival of some sort if not a new cartoon from the same creator with a similar premise and animation style.
The only modern kid cartoons I remember actually taking my time to sit down and watch so as to give them a chance were We Bare Bears and Craig of the Creek (both of which I downloaded the whole first seasons to because I wanted to check them out), and while I did find both to be decent if not okay at best, I didn't like the overuse of social media/smartphones in WBB since I watch cartoons to escape these things not see more of it. That's another thing that turned me off about modern cartoons and still kind of does is the generation pandering.
Anyway, I am sure there's more examples than Amphibia that I regret sleeping on but none that come immediately to mind. Owl House is probably the second one since I only checked it out just when it was nearing its end, but only saw the first few episodes and am still a long way from the finale. I wish I'd gotten into The Ghost and Molly McGee when it first premiered as I'd only checked it out in January this year when season 1 had wrapped up, but at least I watched it when it was still airing unlike Amphibia.
If there's anything I've learned from this experience it's to never judge a book by its cover and don't let internet critics or general consensus influence yours. And on the bright side cartoons seem to be becoming fairly more episodic and lighthearted with Molly, Kiff, Hailey's on It, and Hamster & Gretel. I haven't really kept up to date with CN or Nick so I'm not sure about their newer originals.
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