Here are a few Cartoons which I think work within the realms of imagery that we should be working within.
- Dark and innocent characters within Cartoons
- Ren and Stimpy
This rather dark Cartoon was once a main feature on Cartoon Network. Somehow it's sinister undertone was overlooked and it was classed as a daytime children's TV show. I find it amusing but it is full of disturbing undertones and imagery. The character design in this is simplistic and over exaggerated. Their colour schemes are more evil, primal and use the less is more approach in appearance. You could easily make these characters become evil sidekicks in another show and they would still fit their purpose. They are funny, yet dark and your not able to take them too seriously. That is how the characters seemingly get away with also being loveable amongst their many controversial doings.
2. Sleeping Beauty
Although full of heroism and fairies, I find the imagery used within Sleeping Beauty to be classically dark. The theme is of a pretty blackened nature too, a young girl cursed to die on her 16th birthday by the evil Witch Maleficant. It sticks close to anatomical likeness to the real world, however uses fine lines and shapes to emphasis the character and their personality. The more a character is a sidekick to another character the more indirect to realism they are, or the more a character is of a supernatural background the more they have exaggerated features.
3. Salad fingers
This Cartoon is the optimum of installing unstable emotional responses into the audience by delivering an unorthodox approach to the characters depiction. He is almost like a stranded survivor on a lost world, reminiscing of a life he has long been separated from and as a result has twisted personal and social skills. The introverted nature of this show can make the audience feel very uncomfortable and it opens up humour or darkness by making the familiar become uncanny and threatening.
4. THE BFG
Although this film is about a big friendly giant, the actual storyline and vast majority of the scenes are set in somewhat dark, intimidating environments. The fact we come to terms with a young girl being taken away from her bed at night is strong enough to be disturbing in itself, however then we come to find the captor is a Giant from another realm that travels to Earth every night to deliver dreams to people. Although you feel safe with the Giant it's humble character covers up well for a scary undertone that is socially and morally questionable. We see other Giants in this film, all of which are evil, scary and intimidating especially considering this is a Children's film. Each of these Giants have over exaggerated features to make them stand out and perform their character's identity to the best that it can. It uses many dull colours for the darker characters and questionably dark scenes. The human characters are a step away from being realistic, still keeping to the slightly strange world of fantasy and keeping it's innocence noticeable. There are also elements to suggest a very dream like state of depiction throughout the movie, which leaves you in a sense of awe and fulfilled attention.
- Cartoon styles within the 1950's
During the 1950's and 60's it was rare a Cartoon would be based on a female character, or include one for that matter. The approach to visual depiction was usually more aimed towards realism with a slight attention aimed away from a perfect image to being more about the shapes built to represent a character to its best while still at its most simplistic.
- Top Cat
- Snagglepuss
- Huckleberry Hound
- Fred Flintstone
- Tom and Jerry
Chris
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