Current Events > why is western animation so often deliberately ugly? why so visually repulsive?

(+) Yeah! (+)

why so visually repulsive? why have we let this permeate our culture?

from Spongebob to Family Guy, Rick and Morty to Big Mouth, Steven Universe to Simpsons to Rugratsa dozen styles, all seemingly consciously hideous. Why?

https://twitter.com/tracewoodgrains/status/1776661464763273380

how can someone say this without mentioning south park

Not sure. I guess it's just an artistic decision. While all pretty ugly, they're at least distinct art styles which give the show some level of character.

Unlike every anime character looking the same.

It looks more visually distinct than anime characters that are all eyes.

Okay, yeah, Rugrats had a weird artstyle, I'll agree with that one. But wtf at calling some of those other shows ugly.

Klasky Csupo had a specific style.

I don't care if it makes me sound like a weeb, but I agree, >.< . Western animation styles are usually hideous.

Easier to draw than something pretty and proportional.

Because brain rot has set in and "good looking art" has been replaced with "I want to have sex with it." Hence why even in Japanese stuffs stuff like Ping Pong the Animation had the usual suspects whining about how ugly it was while on the flip side it was lauded for its amazing art direction and animation.

It's all about "peepee not hard" whining.

We still haven't gotten over that Gross Out Is Funny To Kids thinking that popped up in the 90s.

It wasn't. It isn't. But they still do it anyway.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foOqrX9GHyc

Because not every show is or is trying to be the one show that you have decided is the golden standard of what good looks like.

Choco posted...

how can someone say this without mentioning south park

South Park is mentioned, the Tweeter is a former Mormon (it is relevant to his tastes)

Garabandal posted...

Why?

The short answer is because they cherry picked the worst examples possible.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/0/00276724.jpg
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/d/dfc83c19.jpg
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/0/0173f55a.jpg

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/9/9fba47c4.jpg

Ikr

Why can't the west aspire to the aesthetic excellence that we see in Japanese works like Crayon Shin-Chan and Grappler Baki?

Dathrowed1 posted...

South Park is mentioned, the Tweeter is a former Mormon (it is relevant to his tastes)

Excuse me, he is ETHNICALLY MORMON.
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/c/ca4db765.jpg

Blue checkmark logic

Also, those are comedy cartoons, I think the art style choice is deliberate.

Because in the 90s we decided butts farts burps and barfs were the way

HannibalBarca3 posted...

Also, those are comedy cartoons, I think the art style choice is deliberate.

Yeah this too. Let's look at some comedy anime.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/6/6022cb57.jpg
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/2/2f2a8b97.jpg

Tyranthraxus posted...

Yeah this too. Let's look at some comedy anime.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/6/6022cb57.jpg
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/2/2f2a8b97.jpg

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/1/1f90d2f3.png

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/c/c968d53b.jpg

If it doesn't make dicks hard and pussy wet it's ugly and therefore SHIT! live only for the horny! Nothing else matters but sexual desires and masturbation!

Green Eggs and Ham is more beautiful than all anime combined.

Actually, I do have an adjacent question to the general premise of this topic: are we talking western animation specifically drawn in the west, like actual American Animators, or western shows that are outsourced to Korean studios/elsewhere like a bunch of shows from our youth? Because the 90s golden age of tv cartoons was great but I don't know if they were drawn in-house. Like I know btas was outsourced to Korean animators. Same with avatar. Tiny toons I don't know. Ducktales and Disney's other 80s-90s classic cartoons of our childhood I'm not sure.

And I kind of do agree that I loathe the 2000s/post 2000s animation style and animation itself, I think they call it callarts? Compare that with the other goofy but still great style of our cartoons like the tick or even ninja turtles

Revisited posted...

Actually, I do have an adjacent question to the general premise of this topic: are we talking western animation specifically drawn in the west, like actual American Animators, or western shows that are outsourced to Korean studios/elsewhere like a bunch of shows from our youth? Because the 90s golden age of tv cartoons was great but I don't know if they were drawn in-house. Like I know btas was outsourced to Korean animators. Same with avatar. Tiny toons I don't know. Ducktales and Disney's other 80s-90s classic cartoons of our childhood I'm not sure.

And I kind of do agree that I loathe the 2000s/post 2000s animation style and animation itself, I think they call it callarts? Compare that with the other goofy but still great style of our cartoons like the tick or even ninja turtles

Worth noting that he also considers Scooby Doo to be ugly because Scooby makes weird faces sometimes.

https://twitter.com/VitoComedy/status/1776764206223945737?t=-fn9copS56giDgu7IEYNvA&s=19

Sephiroth_C_Ryu posted...

We still haven't gotten over that Gross Out Is Funny To Kids thinking that popped up in the 90s.

It wasn't. It isn't. But they still do it anyway.

Yeah, I remember a cartoon called Grossology that was about a brother and sister duo that helped protect the city from gross crimes. Like a villain that spreads puss filled boils to people or one that tries to give everyone athletes foot. It was such a weird show lol.

https://youtu.be/ghhUKeVy1-8?si=uQvTdR1g9uPvz049

El_Marsh posted...

Ikr

Why can't the west aspire to the aesthetic excellence that we see in Japanese works like Crayon Shin-Chan and Grappler Baki?

True, there's plenty of anime with weird art styles too.

Even when things are outsourced they aren't usually completely outsourced. Bruce Timm is still responsible for the bulk of BTAS even if key arts and story boards were done in Seoul.

Tyranthraxus posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/0/00276724.jpg

Lol this is a bittersweet example because that studio specifically failed because the animation was so beautiful, and there was no market for it . Maybe the audience does prefer gross out/caricature art style only.

Revisited posted...

Lol this is a bittersweet example because that studio specifically failed because the animation was so beautiful, and there was no market for it . Maybe the audience does prefer gross out/caricature art style only.

That's not a problem exclusive to the West though.
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/0/02aaa70c.jpg

Studio got bought out by SEGA mid development because this anime was a massive money hole despite it being one of the most beautiful looking things ever and then it got cancelled basically just before the final fight.

Fans have been begging to revive this series but it's never gonna happen.

this is why i just watch real movies

Eh, we always had a good mix between art styles imo.

Megas XLR, secret saturdays (at least I think that is what this show was called. Its been years), ben 10, generator rex, various marvel cartoons (I thought that short-lived wolverine and the x-men one also looked pretty nice), venture bros, thundercats 2011 (artstyle looked way better than the original series. Yeah, I said it) especially the boondocks. The currently airing invincible, etc.

Tyranthraxus posted...

That's not a problem exclusive to the West though.
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/0/02aaa70c.jpg

Studio got bought out by SEGA mid development because this anime was a massive money hole despite it being one of the most beautiful looking things ever and then it got cancelled basically just before the final fight.

Fans have been begging to revive this series but it's never gonna happen.

What anime is this? I feel like I should know it but I dont.

PraetorXyn posted...

What anime is this? I feel like I should know it but I dont.

Saint Seiya.

PraetorXyn posted...

What anime is this? I feel like I should know it but I dont.

Saint Seiya the Lost canvas. Fantastic anime but you'll have to finish it in the Manga.

As opposed to anime? The simple answer is the lack of an ingrained western equivalent to kawaii/moe culture. I'd say there is a burgeoning western equivalent of this think Powerpuff Girls, Steven Universe and the new She-Ra but it only started to get off the ground in the last decade or two with shows like those, while with anime it was more or less there from the start.

Before then, that niche was essentially dominated by Disney at least as far as American media goes, and while early anime was deliberately imitative of their style, the animation popularized by Warner Bros., Nickelodeon, DreamWorks etc. along with pretty much the entire adult animation industry in the west arose at least in part as a counterculture to it. Which leads us to another simple answer to this question: us Americans never quite got over the "cutesy = girly/kiddy = bad" stigma which reflects in a lot of our media (and a lot of our responses to Japanese and certain other foreign media).

If it's considered ugly, I'm thankful for that as Western animations has more uniqueness to them in their designs. I'll take Simpsons, Doug, or Rugrats designs over everything looking like an anime.

I do think theres a weird amount of western animation thats deliberately ugly to be fair, but that doesnt mean it all is.

The examples used in the tweet arent even good examples. None of those are what id call ugly.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

By "girly/kiddy" I meant "girly and/or kiddy" but I see how the slash created ambiguity, heh. Though both readings do apply.

I thought this was gonna be about Big Mouth or something.

lilORANG posted...

Not sure. I guess it's just an artistic decision. While all pretty ugly, they're at least distinct art styles which give the show some level of character.

Unlike every anime character looking the same.

This; also, it's a lot quicker and easier to produce the more cartoony look. The show isn't likely to be much funnier just because the art is more realistic. Heck, some of the funniest shows I've watched have absolutely terrible art (The Life And Times Of Tim, and the later seasons of Kevin Spencer, come to mind).

tremain07 posted...

If it doesn't make dicks hard and pussy wet it's ugly and therefore SHIT! live only for the horny! Nothing else matters but sexual desires and masturbation!

What can I say? Sex sells.

I'll take it over 10,000 animes that all look like the same thing. At least with Western animation you can tell at a glance what show a screenshot is from.

I like my stuff stylish.

TMOG posted...

I'll take it over 10,000 animes that all look like the same thing. At least with Western animation you can tell at a glance what show a screenshot is from.

This is just the reverse of the generalization of western animation that the original tweet does. Not all western animation is ugly. Not all anime looks the same.

People should just stop making these sweeping generalizations about such broad forms of media.

Many cartoons start off as someone's doodles, someone else happens to like their doodles and they make a cartoon based of those doodles. Even if those doodles are almost as old as its creator