ANIMATION WORLD MAGAZINE - ISSUE 5.11 - FEBRUARY 2001

My Generation?

by Martin "Dr. Toon" Goodman

"Don't want to end up a cartoon in a cartoon graveyard..."
- Paul Simon © 1986 BMI Music

The first true star to emerge from Hanna-Barbera Productions was Huckleberry Hound, who began in 1958 sponsored by Kellogg's cereals and syndicated by Screen Gems. In 1960, the blue hound went on to win the first Emmy Award ever given to an animated program. TM & © 2001 Cartoon Network. An AOL Time Warner Company. All Rights Reserved.

Memories from a sixth-grade history class: I recall seeing pictures of pale, pitted figurines that resembled malformed gingerbread men iced with dirt. My textbook informed me that these objects were "fertility statues," created to ensure fecund livestock and bountiful crops. At least that was the prevailing theory; they might have actually been the Sumerian equivalent of fuzzy dice, pet rocks or action figures. After some 5,000 years, who really knew? This conjecture led to the only interesting homework assignment I ever had in elementary school: "If archaeologists were to dig up our classroom 5,000 years from now, what assumptions might they make about the artifacts they find?" That was a challenging question in 1965, but answering it in 2001 is simple: They wouldn't need to make any assumptions at all.

Assuming no nuclear conflagrations, environmental disasters, world-cleansing global pandemics or invasions by the Drej, the record of the past should be easy to read. Current technology has been able to preserve civilization through the use of increasingly sophisticated devices, and at least the past fifty years of cultural history are available to all mankind on CD-ROM, DVD and other formats. Frequently this historical record reappears in digitally remastered form, looking and sounding better than ever. This is no sci-fi fancy: source material will be preserved in ways yet unforeseen and it is conceivable that audiences a thousand years from now will be able to view an original episode of Rocky and His Friends with full understanding of the cultural context. Sure, the show may seem a bit weird and unworldly but hardly indecipherable, since it will never have disappeared. These audiences will contain historians and academics, but also fans who will recognize many of the show's nuances.

Celebrating the cartoon stars of the Hanna-Barbera library, the 24-hour classic cartoon network arranges its weekly schedule into four different programming categories designated by character, half-hour series, year (television season) and action-adventure genre. TM & © 2001 Cartoon Network. An AOL Time Warner Company. All Rights Reserved.

Old Is New: Boomerang
Which brings us to April 1, 2000 and the premiere of Turner Broadcasting System's newest offering, Boomerang. A companion channel to the highly successful Cartoon Network, Boomerang differed from its "sister" by offering vintage cartoons. The title suggested the "baby boom" generation born between 1946 and 1964 who were ostensibly the original audience for these cartoons, and the fact that the cartoons had returned to their cultural owners and caretakers. Boomerang first cut a deal with EchoStar satellite service and then hit it big with DirecTV soon thereafter. In an interview with ign (March 27, 2000), Cartoon Network president Betty Cohen noted that while, "Cartoon Network's phenomenal audience growth with older kids and younger adults is increasingly driven by our aggressive ramp-up of original programming and contemporary acquisitions...our research and consumer feedback tells us we still have enormous opportunity to serve baby boomer parents with more of the classic favorites they grew up with. Boomerang will give them the chance to share those favorites with their kids."

Inside his laboratory, Dexter believes that every day is a great day for science, but not for sister Dee Dee. TM & © 2001 Cartoon Network. An AOL Time Warner Company. All Rights Reserved.

Noble sentiments indeed. Economical ones as well. Research and consumer feedback have neither ensured success nor averted disaster in the world of TV programming, and the Cartoon Network execs are likely aware of that fact. Boomerang may, in fact, have a secondary and even tertiary purpose. Cartoon Network has two important goals that mitigate against older toons dominating its programming. CN must ensure a steady dose of progressive and original programming. They must also develop the intensive marketing that is inseparable from toons that slip their restrictive time blocks and enter the mainstream's profitable secondary markets. To these ends, Cartoon Network has dedicated its prime viewing hours to original programming. Their phenomenally lucrative Friday evening block (7:30pm-11pm) was a key factor in gaining the economic leverage needed for program expansion. CN is one of (ad-supported) cable TV's highest rated networks, and advertising revenue exploded 40% over 1998-99 levels, partly due to this block's popularity with viewers.

 
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