Politically incorrect cartoon characters
Animation is a very visual medium. With animated shorts usually coming in under seven minutes in length, you need to be able to get the audience up to speed rather quickly. If you play upon stereotypes, this is one way to get the audience to understand a character or situation quickly. This frees up some of your seven minutes for more gags or plot points, since you didn’t have to do quite as much building of the character. The audience just kind of gets it, based on what you do with the character. For instance, a larger character might be assumed to be slow. An oafish character may be assumed stupid. It’s when you start to bring in ethnic, religious, or physical handicaps into animation that you begin to tread on thin ice.
Speedy Gonzales was a very popular character for Warner Brothers for many years. You don’t see very much of him anymore though.
Mr Magoo was another character who built upon a politically incorrect trait for stories and plot points. If you aren’t familiar with the character, basically, the man is blind. He stumbles through life, mistaking one thing for another, due to his eyesight.
I’m wondering if characters such as these are possible in today’s hyper PC environment? I think they may be, but it depends upon your audience and how much faith the money people have in you. Have a look at one of the most popular, yet unPC (by most standards), characters in animation today.
Thoughts?
-Floyd Bishop
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On August 27th, 2007 at 12:00 am
What about Xiaolin Showdown? One of the main characters is an Asian stereotyoe, with yellow skin and everything.
On August 27th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Good one. I had forgotten about that show. You’ve also got the Texas/Southerner stereotype on that show with the character Clay.
On August 27th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Xiaolin Showdown (and Omi, the character in question) was created and produced by Christy Hui, who is Chinese.
On August 27th, 2007 at 12:00 am
That’s an interesting point, Chris. A few posts ago, I showcased a piece called “Read a Book”. The creator is black, and has received criticism from Jesse Jackson and the Rainbow Coalition. Granted, it’s a different type of project, but it would seem that having the creator be the minority depicted in the cartoon is not always a free pass.
On August 27th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Unfortunately, the fascism of political correctness has practically wiped out humor in this country.
I’m not really counting shows like SOUTH PARK or FAMILY GUY because they’re considered ‘adult’ shows and when they’re un-PC it’s extremely overt.
George Carlin once said “Either EVERYTHING can be funny or NOTHING can be”… he then went on to do several jokes about rape.
On August 28th, 2007 at 12:00 am
I also find this to be a very interesting topic, because it really has brought down the ability of cartoons to play around with certain characters. It’s disappointing, yes, but the world’s no longer ready for political incorrectness in children’s shows, I guess.
On August 28th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Really, what’s the point? Do we have to be un-PC in order to be funny? There’s SO MUCH potential out there to make funny stories and situations without having to pull out the political incorrect card. Really, it’s a crutch. The same when it comes to overt violence in student work. My feeling is this: been there, done that. It’s so easy to fall into that pigeonhole. Do something interesting and not typical.
On August 29th, 2007 at 12:00 am
The point of the initial post was that with PC at an all time high, maybe characters are being pegged as PC when they really aren’t? Also, when you design a character, you often use physical traits to help describe what type of personality the character might have. Is the character a hero, a villain, a comedic side kick, etc? Without some sort of judgment based on appearance, the visual part of an animated character’s design doesn’t work. I guess the question is: In a very strict, politically correct society, does character design suffer?
On August 29th, 2007 at 12:00 am
A good character design is good character design, whether or not ethnic traits come into play or not. When I design a character I don’t think about these things. I just work on an overall appearance that is appealling to me.
On August 29th, 2007 at 12:00 am
In the real world, stereotypes are not a good thing usually, yet in animation, we use stereotypes all the time to help set up the characters as something the audience knows a bit about. Some may not see Elmer Fudd as a politically incorrect character, yet his speech may offend some. At what point does a cartoon character become offensive on that level? Does it have to do with the size of the group you are “offending”?
On August 29th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Speedy Gonzales continues to be one of the most popular characters in Mexico and Latin America. The Cumbia Allstars just wrote a song about him and the video features alot of original animation of him. Whoever says yea or nay when it comes to political correctness certainly doesn’t know what is offensive and what isn’t since Speedy’s fans are Mexicans themselves.