THE FUTURE OF ADULT ANIMATION

Adult animation is expanding by the day as streaming services try to compete with one another in a never ending battle - and most of it has left cartoon fans cynical, feeling as if the medium is doomed to be sitcoms with ugly art styles. However, is this a fair assessment of adult animation as a whole? Is it on a downward spiral, or is there a light at the end of the tunnel that people are missing?

Sure, we have dumpster fires such as The Prince, Chicago Party Aunt and (in my opinion) Big Mouth, but we also have amazing projects such as Invincible, Helluva Boss, Close Enough, The Midnight Gospel, Inside Job, Clone High 2.0, Marvel's What-If, Star Wars Visions and so much more!

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Roundtable Hosts and Crew:

@AwestruckVox
@ItsRetroNemo
@TomEpQm
@joshuacriger

CREDITS

Hosted by: Kevin Williams
Edited by: Kevin Williams

Graphics by CabooseJr

Artwork by Kaitrin Snodgrass, Nikki Thompson & Kitsune Zakuro!

This video, including all pictures and clips used is a critique and is covered under "fair use" under section 107 of the US Copyright Act 1976. If you would like to see the shows and episodes in full. Purchase them online or the DVD sets by their respective owners.

[RoundtableVids]

How do you feel about adult animation's future?

[PK-Radio]

Its like they intentionally try to make characters look hideous

[austinmorrison]

It just grinds my gears whenever someone thinks adult animation just needs to be a family guy clone.

[WeegeeSlayer]

I can't stand most adult cartoons nowadays, because their underlying message is always "life is shit and then you die"

[xblade]

I have high hopes for adult animations. Especially shows like primal, invincible, helluva boss, Harley Quinn, heck even season 3 and 4 season of young justice.

[interestpeakk]

First thing I noticed is in the thumbnail, , how Blitzo stands out from every other character. I really love helluva boss, it's original and thought out and there's genuine love and care put into it.

[andriakimble]

I am so hyped for a full Hazbin Hotel And Helluva Boss is awesome too.

[wisdomcube.]

*I honestly missed the Era of the early 2000's where adult animation was the king of various networks. Early Family Guy (Seasons 1-3) is a good example of this. Bojack Horseman also works because they knew to devote to the comedy to one episode and the emotional drama in the next.*

[juromori]

The Midnight Gospel is one of the best things that happened in adult animation

[Smokeymoss]

Comedy has such a chokehold on adult animation, which makes networks scared to go farther with it. I honestly believe if networks would allow adult animation to push into other genres that it will absolutely thrive and I can’t wait for that moment.

[theartisthasarrived]

Don't worry, Hazbin Hotel will usher a new era of adult animation where not all adult animation looks like Family Guy.

[Elvusmiw]

Well alot of adult animation takes the lazy route, a boring cliche sitcom with cartoony moments with ugly animation, or just be ugly and so raunchy its unwatchable, cough mr pickles. Duncanville and big city greens despite taking the lazy route, they're not boring or bad, I'm surprised with duncanville

[BluffsCastle]

I’m sick of the modern adult animation style, aka the Family Burgers and Morty Style used for Fox cartoons as well as Hoops, Central Park (even though it’s a good show) and Solar Opposites. Some other mediocre looking modern adult cartoons are 10 Year Old Tom, Chicago Party Aunt, and The Harper House. We need more of Primal, Final Space, The Midnight Gospel, Harley Quinn, Ballmastrz 9009, Invincible, Tuca and Bertie, and Close Enough and less of generic, ugly looking shows.

[LCWatchdog]

And that’s why everyone’s switching to anime cause the US can’t do adult animation. For some reason the industry thinks that the only adult animation that can work is comedies with no story and then they flop.

[MiraculousViolet]

Adult animation is such an interesting concept of media.Since it’s for adults it basically has no limits to what they can put in they can put violence, swears, mature themes, etc.This is one think bad adult animation series don’t get though, they can’t just expect these things to be enough in there show to please people they need to have a good story actually to engage people into there show.

[UNKNOWN-pryn]

When it comes to action adult animations, they could make more adaptations of comic book series like invincible same way how Japan does manga adaptations into anime and there is a wide variety of comics that could be adapted into an animated series

[gibbathanmadness]

Helluva Boss is already smashing it, and going by just that, Hazbin Hotel is gonna be absolutely GORGEOUS

[triadwarfare]

I always wondered about Viziepop's business model... while their shows are high quality, I beg to wonder, how are they getting enough money to hire animators and if they're given a decent salary?

[DeathandGrim]

I am so thankful for projects like Primal, Love Death and Robots, Bojack, Inside Job, Invincible, Disenchantment, Hazbin Hotel, Helluva Boss, castlevania and so many other adult series that have been pushing Adult animation past juvenile overly indulgent cynicism fests.

Love Death and Robots laid the groundwork other studios should study and follow. Sometimes we're following a futuristic utopia with murder cleaning robots, sometimes we're desperately lost in a cornfield with monsters and no escape in sight, sometimes we're killing children to maintain a bleak world order, sometimes we study a massive human corpse on a beach as humanity interacts with a massive visage of itself. While all of these are shorts and don't always hit, the creator freedom and diverse animation on display is always refreshing and interesting. It's an anthology of what adult animation should be: unconcerned with having to make sex jokes and crass vulgar humor to proudly display "WE'RE NOT A KIDS SHOW, " but instead constantly prodding questions and intrigues adults really do think about while providing visual splendor to compliment it.

I hope this trend continues as we mature our own thoughts on animation. Adult animation is in its infancy and hasn't been pushed to the limits it could be. Imagine a movie like Soul that didn't have to blunt the imagery and simplify the subtext while retaining its experimental animation and existential concepts; I'd pay for that multiple times over. Hopefully in 5-10 years we can get that.

[YungBuckTheLabrat]

My favourite adult animation atm is hellva Boss, am literally watching this after watching part one of season 1's finale