Of course, I could tell you what I was into at the various stages of my childhood. I was a hardcore He-Man/She-Ra fan at the age of six, eventually grew into worshiping Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, before becoming a pure Batman fan (the Burton/Schumacher movies, Batman: the Animated Series, the 1960s Batman show, comics, etc). Other than the comic book superheroes that I adored, most of the entertainment I consumed was made for me, originated in my lifetime, and technically original in the sense that it wasn't a rehash of something that was successful a decade or three prior. He-Man was created in 1986 and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was created as a comic book in 1984 and then adapted into a cartoon in 1987. Indiana Jones was created whole in 1981, and Back to the Future was an original screenplay written from scratch in 1985. Yes, some of these properties had homages to the genre fare of old, but by-and-large, the stuff I consumed was created at the time I first consumed it. I took ownership of it knowing that it was created originally for my generation. But then I wasn't growing up in a generation of adults unwilling to let go of their childhood playthings.
Other than a few offhand references to the 1950s Adventures of Superman show, I couldn't tell you what movies, television shows, and books my dad was into as a kid. Yes, I know he grew up loving baseball, but I couldn't tell you his favorite movie or his favorite book as a kid. I know only about his music tastes from paying attention to the various mixed tapes he listened to as I was growing up (lots of Elton John), but I don't know what he liked when he was a kid or even a college student. Same with my mother. I know she likes the band 3 Dog Night, but other than that, I have no idea what entertained my mother in her initial 1/3 of life. Aside from exposing me to Star Wars and Indiana Jones right as the films were being released, my parents made no effort to steer me towards the entertainment they grew up with. I got to discover my own entertainment options. I listened to Michael Jackson because he was popular when I was growing up, not because he was popular in the 1970s. I listened to Bon Jovi because they released "Slippery When Wet" in 1986. I watched He-Man: Masters of the Universe because it premiered right as I was old enough to really get into action cartoons. To my parents' credit, I was allowed to discover MacGyver, The Simpsons, and Family Feud more-or-less on my own.
My dad did not spend his evenings debating with my mother when I would be 'ready' to watch The Adventures of Superman. Of course, my dad didn't have DVD and Netflix Instant. Our generation is arguably the first generation of parents who have access to nearly any show, book, CD, or movie ever released either instantly or within 48 hours. As a result, we CAN expose our kids to the 1980s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon or The Joshua Tree pretty much on a dime. But to what extent should we be doing that? By force-feeding our children the stories and myths that were ours, are we denying them the opportunity to discover their own icons? And with an entertainment industry (especially in television and movies) obsessed with recycling the past, will our children even have their own entertainment franchises? If we bring our children up in an entertainment culture where the biggest movies are live-action versions of OUR favorite cartoons and all of the cartoons and youth-targeted genre fare are reimaginings of yesterday's cartoons and properties, will today's kids be forced to merely appropriate our culture as their own?
Who will be the heroes and villains that my daughter and son grow up with? Will they get icons of their own, or will they be stuck merely watching/reading reboots and re-imaginings of the same stuff you and I loved? Dora the Explorer is eleven years old. Harry Potter, arguably the last original generational literary icon, debuted in 1997. The kids of today, at least in the realm of heroic fiction, are not being given their own heroes and villains on screens large and small. They are instead being served a mishmash of 1980s nostalgia (Transformers, Tron, Thundercats, etc) and continual rehashes of the same various comic book superheroes (Spider-Man, Batman, X-Men, etc) that I grew up and my parents grew up with. When was the last original American action cartoon that struck a chord? Gargoyles was fifteen years ago, and has there been anything else of its caliber to spring from an original mind since then (UPDATE - Avatar: The Last Airbender certainly applies)? Once my daughter and my son outgrow the Nick Jr. entertainment empire, will there be anything left for them to embrace other the remakes and rehashes of the characters I once loved? And considering how important it is for a child to be able to claim stories for themselves, is that really an entertainment strategy that we should be encouraging?
Scott Mendelson
