Xie xie ni, but what exactly are the people of Beijing and Shanghai fighting about? © Warner Bros. All rights reserved.

The best, and perhaps the only way to enjoy Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids is to purchase the original animated series that has recently (coincidentally?) been released on DVD. There it remains a product of its times, flawed but honest in its blemishes and noble in its homely intentions. One of the first (and least offensive) pro-social cartoons, Fat Albert possessed a generous belief in its mission to make society a nicer place while providing funny entertainment to kids. As is Cosby’s way, it did not talk down or condescend to its audience. The junkyard songs that reinforced the moral were often forgettable and sometimes embarrassing, but when the body of work (or even several episodes in succession) is seen, the overall impression is that of an earnest, caring cartoon that was still entertaining enough to merit a wide audience. It is in every way superior to the LAAF.

I fully agree with the recent assessment by Scott Shaw! Animation director Bert Klein, character designer Jaimie Lopez and other creative stars such as Tony De Rosa and Eric Goldberg more than held up the short animated segment of the film, but for all their admitted talent they are as hamstrung as Cosby in resurrecting the original. Approximating it yes, but that is all a LAAF can, or will, ever do. In the meantime, I expect the attempts shall go on.

Maybe some producer trying to remember a childhood before power lunches, lowballing, cocaine paranoia and divorce will attempt a LAAF of Wacky Races. Perhaps some aspiring young person destined for that Life In The Fast Lane will roll the dice on a Danny Phantom LAAF years from now. Indeed, there are no shortages of horses that will kick one in the head for the mere price of a multimillion-dollar budget. NOTE: As this piece went to bed, I noticed that Fat Albert miraculously broke even. It finished, in fact, about $9 million better than the incredibly bad LAAF The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas. This, I suppose, is cause for wild celebrations at Fox.

IN OTHER NEWS: Let’s end on a lighter note. Old Doc Toon recently came across a newspaper article detailing a cultural battle in China. It appears that Beijing prefers standard Mandarin as the only acceptable dialect for television broadcasting. China, however, is rich with a multiplicity of regional dialects, and it is rather difficult to get 1.3 billion people on the same page. Speakers of the Shainghainese (and other dialects) beg to differ, and the issue of China having a dominant dialect came to a head over, of all things, episodes of Tom and Jerry. The Shanghai People’s Comedy Troupe does Tom and Jerry in their preferred dialect, and this often changes the meaning of the dialogue for those who speak Mandarin. Thus, Cat and Mouse (as the series is prosaically known in China) is at the center of a controversy.

The only puzzling part of this is that I seemed to recall Tom and Jerry as a virtually silent cartoon set to Scott Bradley’s inventive scores. Even the crummy Gene Deitch and misguided Chuck Jones versions were mostly silent, though there were a couple that broke convention. What was being translated into Shanghainese, the sound effects? Does a lamp breaking over Tom’s noggin sound more or less agonizing in Mandarin? I later learned that the Shanghai People’s Comedy Troupe was actually dubbing these toons on the fly.

Cool! I, for one would give 8,300,000 yuan (about a million bucks) if the People”s Republic of China would close the loop and export the dubbed cartoons right back here. I am willing to bet they’re a scream. Hey, funny animation and great cartoons constitute a universal language. Let the good citizens of China go on enjoying Cat and Mouse in whatever dialect(s) it is finally dubbed into. Shanghai People’s Comedy Troupe, you truly rock. Do it your way.

Martin “Dr. Toon” Goodman is a longtime student and fan of animation. He lives in Anderson, Indiana.