Break a Leg

Editor's note: Sorry, Drew! I completely forgot to publish this yesterday...

Here we go!

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Debates rage constantly on the effects of violence on children's perception and behavior, especially violence from television, movies, and video games.

Just the other day I acquired a DVD of classic Bugs Bunny cartoons, and wanted to start introducing my son to some real cartoons, the kind I used to watch when I grew up. I mentioned that to my wife and she demurred, saying "It's so violent; Caillou isn't violent at all." Caillou is a Canadian import, need I say more?

I realized with shock how absolutely right she was: cartoons today are terrible. I started watching my Bugs Bunny DVD alone (picture me on the couch in the dark, huddled up to the laptop chuckling madly), and wondered how I could improve today's children's programming.

Let's take a few examples:

Caillou: about a little bald boy with a strange name that is just trying to cope as a four-year-old in a grown-up world.

Typical problem: Gilbert, his cat, has stepped on the Sunday funnies and torn the paper, making it difficult for Caillou to look at the pictures.

Caillou's solution: his father helps him tape it up, making it "good as new". Yay!

Bugs Bunny's solution: whack the cat with the rolled-up paper, causing his head to flatten into the floor and his tail and hind legs to shoot bolt upright. Bugs then mutters some pithy political quote apropos of the 1950s and digs a hole through the kitchen floor.

Bob the Builder: about a general contractor named Bob who has a fleet of talking, yet seemingly incompetent, construction vehicles. The vehicles also have genders, though what implies I'm not too sure.

Typical problem: Spud, the local scarecrow, is giving all of the decorative food from the snowmen in the local snowman competition to some seemingly hungry rabbits, rendering the snowmen big featureless piles of snow.

Bob's Solution: explain to Spud why what he did was wrong, and drive around with him to fix the snowmen. Mind you, Spud is a scarecrow, and as such has no brain, making it likely he will repeat the entire sequence of events within seconds.

Elmer Fudd's solution: blow Spud's head off.

Thomas and Friends: a delightful adaptation of the Rev. W. Awdry's series of children's books about a cheeky little engine and its companions. Notable for trains that are completely self-aware, can talk, think, reason, and drive themselves, yet need an engineer in the cab all the time anyway. Sir Topham Hat is a self-righteous asshole.

Typical problem: Thomas is trying to avoid Diesel, 'Arry, and Bert because Diesel said that Thomas is the "stinkiest engine" on Sodor. Or something. This causes Thomas to not pay attention and crash into another train, spilling all of the "stinky cheese" and requiring him to go back to the dairy for another batch.

Thomas's solution: he gets the second batch of stinky cheese and a firm talking-to by Sir Topham Hat, who never seems to learn that his engines have the emotional mentality of a fourth-grader.

Daffy Duck's solution: Paint a fake tunnel on a stone wall and drive through as if it were real, leaving Diesel and his cohorts to crash into the wall. Because after all it is just a painted-on tunnel, right?

Yeah, cartoons in my day had some real kick, didn't they? I watch kids programming today and just shake my head sadly. Don't even get me started with The Wiggles.