WHAT 1979 THOUGHT 2009 WOULD BE LIKE

Austin "Oppo" Papageorge wrote to ask me what I thought 2009 would be like when I was breathing the air and walking the halls of 1979.  Wow! An interesting question! Most of my predictions from that year had to do with animation and cartooning because '79 was the year I got my first animation job.  Only about half my predictions came true, but maybe that's a higher average than some can claim.

BTW, the pictures I'm using to illustrate this are all from 1979...well, 1977 in the case of the "Saturday Night Fever" poster, but let's not quibble. None of them have to do with animation, but I thought they might make it easier for the reader to imagine himself back in the day, strutting down the street like Superfly, and and nurturing his mullet. 

Actually I remember the predictions that failed more than I remember the ones that succeeded. I had no idea that anime would become as popular in this country as it did. I thought it would never appeal to more than a niche market. The early anime shows like Astro Boy were shot on 6's and it would have been inconceivable to me that something that jerky would sell. 

Not only that but a lot of anime had to do with earnest and idealistic heroes, something that seemed out of sync with the anti-heroes and decadent irony that abounded in 1979. I'm earnest myself, and had no trouble relating to idealistic heroes, but I doubted whether the rest of America could be persuaded to feel the same way.  I was wrong.  Apparently there were a lot more earnest people than I thought, and anime swept the country.  I learned two big lessons from that: 1) trust that people like and will always like stories and adventure, and 2) verve and imagination trump slick production values. 

 


Musically what was going on that year was Punk, Disco and break dancing. Break dancing wasn't associated with racial politics, crime and drugs the way hip hop was later on. In 1979 it was fun and exciting and everybody wondered what would become of it.  I predicted that black animators would bring a fresh, funny rap  sensibility to animation, but it never happened.  Most black animators I know prefer classical Disney, Marvel or Hanna Barbera.  

Video tape recorders (above) began to appear around this 1979. They were expensive but everybody in the animation industry was chomping at the bit to get one. There wasn't much over-the-counter animation, we just taped cartoons off  TV and endlessly still-framed them.

I thought that video tape recorders would usher in a new golden age of full animation. It was hard to work on the limited TV stuff after seeing in detail what full animation was capable of, and I thought everybody else felt the same way. What I didn't count on was that a lot of young animators grew up with Hanna Barbera, and didn't mind limited animation at all, VHS not withstanding.  

I remember that most people in the industry weren't too bothered when ink and paint began to go overseas in this period. The feeling was that boring non-creative jobs were unsavable. Lots of older animators told me that we need never fear that the Asians would take away our creative jobs because they grew up in authoritarian societies where creativity was discouraged. They assured me that the outsourcing would stop with ink and paint. I accurately predicted that the outsourcing would go way beyond ink and paint, and I felt terrible for the painters.

 In 1979 and the early 80s absolutely nobody I talked to foresaw the computer revolution that would usher in 3D animation and threaten the very existence of cartooning. Back then it was believed that computers would actually make the 2D industry healthier by lowering the outrageous cost of coloring the drawings. Some artists imagined that the American ink and painters would get their jobs back when it became cheaper to do coloring here on computers, rather than overseas, with manual labor.  It never occurred to anyone that people overseas could buy computers too. 

I also predicted wrongly that funny, cartoony animation would drive out the superhero stuff. It did for a while but anime gave superheroes new life, and retro design with a graphic emphasis drove out a lot of the looser, cartoony look. I thought late 70s cartoons like Get a Job, The Big Snit, and The Cat Came Back would usher in a new look but that revolution fizzled out for some reason that I still don't understand. 

I was completely blindsided by the near collapse of funny cartooning starting in the 90s. In retrospect it's not hard to figure what caused it: young artists felt they were more likely to get a job with computing skills than with drawing skills, so cartoon drawing withered on the vine for a while. I say "for a while" because it's made, and is still making, a comeback. Study cartooning...if you're good, you definitely will be able to make a living from it! Thank God for John Kricfalusi, Ralph Bakshi, Gary Larsson and others who kept the torch burning during the lean years! 

As an afterthought, I'll mention that art as a whole was beginning to suffer by 1979. Actually the rot had set in earlier but by 1979 the secret was out and there was no denying that something was wrong. It just wasn't fun to go to a museum anymore.

In '79 super-realism was still in the air. That's not a photograph of a car above, that's an oil painting. 

Nice old buildings were routinely replaced by blank concrete slabs (above) and parking lots.

Galleries went in for cold, geometrical stuff. The art magazines and art schools were full of it.


Every museum had exhibitions of dirt and broken glass.

These abominations are still with us, but there's a feeling in the air that all this clutter is somehow out of step with the times. That's a good sign, a very good sign. My prediction for animation and cartooning in the next ten years: the big corporations will support safe and slick films, which will cause them to atrophy. It's beginning to look more and more like the future of really fun animation and cartooning lies with the independents. Gear up for it, sharpen your skills, and don't let anybody talk you out of ideas that are good and really mean something to you. The next ten years are going to be very interesting!  

A MEAL WITH MY KID

I hate to put up family travel pictures. I mean, who's interested in that apart from me and a couple dozen friends and relatives? Even so, I thought I'd make an exception here and tell you about a trip I made to visit my grown-up son in the future. That's right....the future!

It all started when I received a kind of funky greetings card (above) postmarked March, 2039. It was from my kid, then fully grown up and living in the same city thirty years from now. He said he'd be happy to treat me to dinner. Wow! Imagine that! A dinner with my kid thirty years in the future! Of course I accepted!

Getting there was easy. The card said I had only to stare at something white for a few minutes and a time warp would take care of the rest. I did, and it worked!

Following the instructions on the card, I took a paper helium plane (above) to my kid's house, which was in a small town North of LA.

We landed at Vagina International Airport (above).

His house was nearby so I decided to walk there. The scenery was beautiful.

I had no trouble finding the house but it took me forever to figure out where the door was.

I found my kid reading in the living room, behind his buttocks sculptures. Amazingly, he looked only slightly older than the last time I saw him, back in 2009.

It was great to see him! We talked and talked and talked, and finally sat down to a light lunch. That was my chair above!

To my surprise the bowls were just for decoration. The meal was the flower...I guess everybody in the future's a vegetarian! I said I wasn't hungry.

After lunch we left for the city. Above is a picture of my kid's butler, who helped us into the car. The poor guy was the victim of flawed genetic engineering.

In the city we decided to take in a movie (above) that everyone was talking about. It was the story of a poor circle that longed to be a square, but kept falling into something that looked like egg yolk. I didn't understand it but my son and the rest of the audience were moved to tears and bought souvenirs in the lobby. 

After the show we went to a swank vegetarian restaurant (above).

My son said the restaurant (above) was rather small by the standards of his time, but he thought an intimate setting was best. I kept hitting the people behind me with my elbow.

Finally dinner was served, and the proud waiters and cooks all gathered around to see what somebody from the past would think of their cooking.  That's it above. I couldn't figure out how it worked, so I had to make an excuse about not feeling well enough to eat. 

My kid called a cab...that's it above. Boy, the future does wonders with plastic!

Back home I ran for the nearest hamburger stand. The future's great but don't expect to be able to eat the food!

IF ARTISTS DESIGNED CITIES

I'm not a fan of the mega city concept, where one architect designs the look of an entire city. That unified look is great for sci-fi movies (above), but most of us want the city we're actually going to live in to have more diversity. I like cities where each division has its own flavor, each section has its own story to tell.



Architects aren't sympathetic to any of this. They believe in the one-size-fits-all philosophy where the solution to every problem is simplistic, bold shapes.  I hate stuff like that.

Architects are clueless about what people really want.

A lot of what they're building today (above) will be the crime-ridden, concrete slums of tomorrow.

There's plenty of examples of good, vintage architecture out there, but you can't get architects to pay attention to it. Maybe it's time to give artists a turn at bat.  They can't do worse than what's around now. 

These days artists are steeped in graphic novels which are always depicting the dark side of things.  If artists designed a city they'd probably go for something funereal, like Gotham City in the "Batman" movie.

Such a city is bound to attract a criminal element.  Rather than leave their housing to chance, artists should build it (above) for them. Maybe something by H. R. Giger. 

Maybe thugs would feel at home in this environment, and not be tempted to venture out looking for victims.

Giger fantasizes about making murals out of human remains. (above). criminals should love that.

If the city is going to have a modern design, let's try something really drastic (above). Imagine going down that staircase on the upper left.  The steep angle would take your breath away, and descending would be difficult and dangerous...but it sure would be fun! 

Maybe a city of raised platforms half a mile in the air would make for a stimulating walk.

Maybe we need to flood the streets the way Venice is flooded. Wouldn't it be fun to take a boat to work?

Here's (above) a little Lego city that Norman Mailer built years ago, and which still stands somewhere. Each Lego block represents an apartment. Mailer said philosophers would live on the top, call girls would live in the white blocks, and corporate executives in the black ones.

Here's an idea (above) for giving Manhattan a kind of colorful, kid's playroom look.

Here's (above) a goth city where half the population is Christian and requires a lot of churches, and the other half are irreverent satanists who delight in building churches upside-down.

A city which is divided like that will naturally be pretty tense. To distract the population from their differences I suggest a diversion, perhaps a race of genetically modified giants who will walk around and randomly intimidate people.  

If the giants get out of hand, the city's water monsters will be unleashed. Water monsters eat giants. 

Here's (above) a possible layout for a New York City.  The buildings would be crammed together...really packed. Every window would be butted up to some window in the next building. if you want to live here you better be the kind of person who gets along with your neighbors. 

MY PREDICTIONS FOR THE FUTURE

In the future humanoid robots will be common. No need to worry; they will always be identifiable by their poor choice in clothes.


Chairs will be so comfortable that nobody will ever want to leave them. The chairs will sprout wheels or wings as the situation calls for, and will be able to take us anywhere we want to go.


Ultimately the chairs will become more intelligent than we are, and get rid of us. Their proximity to us will have heightened their sophistication relative to other machines, and if machines ever go to war with each other, my bet is the chairs will win. Chairs will be the real inheritors of the Earth. Perhaps some chairs, nostalgic for the old days, will carry floppy dead humans in their seats.


Of course animals will become smarter.


The future will be obsessed with putting glass domes on everything. Cities, beds, parakeets...everything will have a dome or a space helmet.


A few mavericks will drive cars without domes where people can actually talk to each other, but these people will be justly shunned by their peers.


A few brave souls may actually leave their chairs and walk around their living rooms. When it's necessary to travel, the whole living room will pick itself up and scurry around town.


Humans will become perfect physical specimens. They will be tiny though, in order to conserve energy.


Of course the future will be environmentally responsible. The shocking waste involved in each individual having his own soda straw will be eliminated. Community straws will proliferate.

 .......

Incidentally, the type size on the comments page got smaller all by itself, with no help from me. Anybody know how to fix that?