So anyone that knows me knows I’m a huge fan of cartoons.
My current favorite would have to be Martha Speaks. Because I gotta say, the writers make me laugh out loud on occasion. Which doesn’t happen often—animated or live action. Plus the theme song is super catchy. Just sayin’.
But the award for worst cartoon on my list has to go to Curious George. I actually don’t watch it because it must be geared toward super young kids (and those are tough to watch even for me). But every time I do watch it, I get super annoyed.
One, the story itself is outdated. Stealing a monkey from its African habitat so it can live with you in a large city is like the epitome of Colonialistic excess. It offends my liberal sensibilities. Two, with all the incredibly destructive and thoughtless things that George does to the Man in the Yellow Hat’s apartment, I would have taken that meddling monkey ass out with a twelve-gauge years ago.
But what floored me today was watching one of those “real kids” segments that always airs between the two stories.
If there’s one thing all PBS cartoons tend to do, it’s promote and encourage good choices—eating healthy, conserving resources, not polluting… all things that are great for kids to learn. But this episode had four kids out in their driveway seeing how water flows by hooking up random pipes to a garden hose and then turning it on and just watching the water flow. Down the driveway. To nowhere.
Not only is there like no rhyme or reason as to what you’re supposed to learn from this (because watching how water flows is not exactly scientific discovery), but talk about a serious waste of water. I kept waiting for them to say something about a least collecting the water so they could water the garden. Or wash a car. Something. Anything.
Nothing. Just a complete waste of perfectly usable water.
Terrible.