Okay, this is going to be a short summary of my thoughts on a certain topic. Recently the Genndy Tartakovsky adult animated feature film "Fixed" was released and prior to that it had a large group of detractors. People were calling this movie "Sick", comparing Genndy to John K, and all around making a lot of claims about this movie and how depraved and degenerate this movie was.
Full disclosure I have not seen Fixed as of yet, I have been really slacking in my job this year, but regardless, this is not a post about the quality of the movie, rather about how I think a movie like this is important. What is the one thing I always say about animation in stories like this, "There is a stigma towards animation", I say that because animation is constantly being pigeon-holed as "Children's entertainment", and this doesn't just mean viewers dismiss it as "Low art", it also means that companies disregard it because "It's just for kids, nobody cares". If AMC treated Breaking Bad as badly as Nickelodeon treated... literally any of their cartoons, but for example sake let's say Legend of Korra, chances are they would not have gotten away with it.
Of course the question is, "How do we destigmatize animation?" and the answer to that is really simple, but also really complicated. For the most part, animation fans are doing alright, supporting "K-Pop Demon Hunters" and "The Day The Earth Blew Up" is absolutely how we should do it. However, let's not (For want of a better word) kid ourselves, these are movies meant for kids, maybe older kids, maybe young teens, but still meant for younger audiences. Animation is never going to leave the stigma behind if the only things coming out in animation are predominately meant for kids and young teens. We need more adult animation, and I mean beyond X Rated pornography, and South Park and Family Guy clones, or even online content. We need proper mainstream adult animated properties, especially feature films.
This is not to say that adult animated features are exceedingly rare in this modern day, we see things like "Cheech & Chong's Animated Movie" or "Anomolisa", but are those "Mainstream" or are they more of a "If you know your stuff" kind of movies? Genndy Tartakovsky is a mainstream name in animation, even if you don't know the name, you know Samurai Jack, you know his work on Dexter's Lab, you know Hotel Transylvania, he's not a name like Richard Williams or Rob Renzetti, he is probably up there with Walt Disney and Stephen Hillenburg. Him making an adult animated feature, one that reportedly is not tame at all, is actually very good to help destigmatize animation. Even if the movie isn't good (Though I've heard good things about it), it does say to other animators that they don't have to be stuck in these holes they are put it, they can experiment, leave their comfort zone, and get notoriety for it.
I actually think it's kind of refreshing to see Genndy Tartakovsky go in this direction, and I do think that "Fixed" is a good thing on the art side of animation. Of course, on the business side, "Fixed" is probably going to be a nightmare, with studios green lighting more animated features that have adult content, but miss the point of what made them liked in the first place. We can, and should, celebrate the artistic achievement while dreading and criticizing the corporate directions that will come of things.
Anyway, those were my thoughts on the matter, again, whether the movie is good or not, and again I've heard good things, I do think that "Fixed" is important to animation as a whole, and also trailers suck, but that's a topic for another time.
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