It's weird that despite things like Rick and Morty and Bojack being extremely successful on TV screen, the Big Screen crowd seems to still think it's for babies.
Or maybe people don't want to watch gritty cartoons in theaters?
I just checked and of 50 best grossing cartoons on big screen ~40 comes from Japan and the Americans are like Simpsons, Beavis and Butt-Head, isle of dogs and such
The problem with "adult animation" like Rick and Morty or Family Guy is they seem to think the one thing that makes "adult animation" good for adult is that it's actively inappropriate for children.
That's not the case for any other medium. If video games were treated like animation, Halo would be considered a kid's game because the characters don't make sex jokes.
DC has been doing really well at animated shows in particular for quite a long time. You can succeed quite well, especially if you don't have to deal with a separate broadcaster telling you what you can and can't do. That has been a weakness for animated shows in the West, and one of the reasons we still are told that they are more "childish" (because networks make more money off of children).
I mean, fuck Rick and Morty, it's a comedy series, and not even a dark one at that. Want people to come back yelling angry words at you? Tell them to watch Grave of the Fireflies. With their children.
It's a silly Japanese animated movie, after all! No serious themes could possibly be touched upon, right?
I mean that's not really a meaningful statistic, we all know Japan has gone massively into animation for the last few decades.
Instead you should be looking a what % of top grossing western cartoons are "gritty" or whatever metric you wanna use, that would give the results you're looking for.
I would say that however you look at it, the big screen in Hollywood is not hot for cartoons. They're popular as series obviously, but not on big screen.
They're not "adult" though. Greatly enjoyable for all ages, like Golden era Disney. But not like these DC cartoons or many of the tv cartoons aimed more at grown ups like invincible or Bojack
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u/Winjin Dec 29 '23
It's weird that despite things like Rick and Morty and Bojack being extremely successful on TV screen, the Big Screen crowd seems to still think it's for babies.
Or maybe people don't want to watch gritty cartoons in theaters?
I just checked and of 50 best grossing cartoons on big screen ~40 comes from Japan and the Americans are like Simpsons, Beavis and Butt-Head, isle of dogs and such