Anyone concerned about the lack of Teen-oriented cartoons?

[themistermanguy]

With the exception of Daria, some internet series, and a few anime, teenagers are often a really underserved market in animation. Teen dramas and sitcoms are everywhere on TV, but hardly anyone has the balls to make a cartoon sincerely aimed at teens. It's a shame too, because if all the manga drawing and stick figure doodles in high school will tell you, it's that teenagers love cartoons just as much as young children and adults do. I think TV executives still think that teenagers just aren't interested in cartoons and animation, or think they're too old for that. That's not true as SpongeBob, Adventure Time, Regular Show, My Little Pony: FiM, Family Guy, American Dad, South Park, Avatar, Ninja Turtles, and most Adult Swim content all have a huge following amoung teenagers. I'm a teenager, and I'm a huge fan of Cartoons and animation. If people can make plenty of cartoons aimed at adults, then they should be able to do the same with adolescents.

 

[Ratty]

"a few anime"? By teenagers I assume you mean high school age,[footnote]As opposed to 17, 18 and 19 year olds who might be in college.[/footnote] and one of the reasons I don't watch much anime is because so much of it is aimed at that demographic. I couldn't care less about high school drama no matter what medium it's presented in. But if that's what you want you should dig a little deeper because there's a ton there.

Other than that well, teenagers generally want to be older because high school sucks, and you're beginning to have the responsibilities of adulthood at that age without the sense of freedom you get in your college years.[footnote]Which you then lose when you graduate from college and start sliding down what Tom Lehrer called "the razor blade of life".[/footnote] So cartoon shows aimed at 20 and 30 somethings (like several of the shows you listed as being in your favorites) should appeal to a lot of teens as well.

 

[Zontar]

I don't think there's a lack of teen-oriented cartoons. On the contrary, I see an abundance of them compared to when I was a high school teen. Well, except for anime, that's had an abundance of them since the 90s.

 

[themistermanguy]

I don't think there's a lack of teen-oriented cartoons. On the contrary, I see an abundance of them compared to when I was a high school teen. Well, except for anime, that's had an abundance of them since the 90s.

Can you tell me any recent cartoons aimed at teenagers?

 

[themistermanguy]

"a few anime"? By teenagers I assume you mean high school age

I mean youth between the ages of 12 and 18. There are just as many teenage animation fans as there are young children and adult, yet adolecents always get the short end of the stick when it comes to cartoons.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Anime is pretty much nothing but cartoons for teenagers. You could even argue that most cartoons are designed with teenagers in mind, but because cartoons are always viewed as "children's shows", then any teen-oriented show will ultimately be viewed as a children's show, regardless of who it actually targets.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I don't know how thin the line is between shonen and seinen but most anime stars teens and is for teens.

 

[VanQ]

Because teeneagers are at the stage in life where it's healthy to want to feel grown up. Where it's healthy to try to distance themselves from childish pursuits and attempt to mature themselves. Unfortunately, many teenagers go on to being adults but never quite actually understand what actual maturity is.

A rough idea of the kind of response you can expect from people at different stages of life about cartoons.

Children: "Cartoons! Yayyy!"
Teenagers: "Cartoons? No way, they're for kids and fags."
Immature Adults: "Cartoons? No way, they're for kids and fags."
Adults: "Cartoons? Fuck yeah, fun things are fun."

 

[themistermanguy]

Because teeneagers are at the stage in life where it's healthy to want to feel grown up. Where it's healthy to try to distance themselves from childish pursuits and attempt to mature themselves. Unfortunately, many teenagers go on to being adults but never quite actually understand what actual maturity is.

A rough idea of the kind of response you can expect from people at different stages of life about cartoons.

Children: "Cartoons! Yayyy!"
Teenagers: "Cartoons? No way, they're for kids and fags."
Immature Adults: "Cartoons? No way, they're for kids and fags."
Adults: "Cartoons? Fuck yeah, fun things are fun."

I don't think this is an acurate sterotype of high school teens as many of my friends in High School enjoy and watch cartoons. If you mean middle school adolecents, then I think I would agree since kids in middle school are just starting to go through puberty and thus, become a lot more image consious than when they get older.

 

[BreakfastMan]

Wait, how is Family Guy, Regular Show, Adventure Time, Avatar, or Gravity Falls not sincerely aimed at teens? Those all seem like fairly teen-focused shows to me. Same with stuff like Ben-10, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, and most of the stuff on Adult Swim. :\

 

[Radeonx]

The vast majority of anime is targeted towards the teenage demographic, so no, I'm not concerned.

The most popular anime that have had the biggest success in the west are also specifically targeted towards teens (DBZ, Naruto, Bleach, One Piece), so I don't really see the concern.

 

[FPLOON]

Do you remember a show called Out There that came out "last year"?
...
Exactly!

OT: Besides anime taking care of that department (rather if most people agree with that or not), it seems to be better if you try to either focus on the kids (and how far can you push that particular envelope), for the "whole" family (where you can see which parts were aimed at which person in the family), or for adults (where you can basically say "screw the rules of etiquette content" and shit like that). I see it as more of a marketing decision, since you would rather play it "safe" and market to audiences still engaged in animation than to "risk it all" on an audience that would rather get their [teen] fix watching an anime involving teens people beating the shit out of something/going to school or something like that...

But, whatever... I'm starting to rarely notice lines like that, in terms of show demographics, and mostly noticing the mindset behind certain executive decisions, in terms of what they're willing to show and not show on their respective channel... (Seriously, I sometimes have to shake my head and/or facepalm at some of their overall decision-making... *sighs*)

 

[Saetha]

Wait, how is Family Guy, Regular Show, Adventure Time, Avatar, or Gravity Falls not sincerely aimed at teens? Those all seem like fairly teen-focused shows to me. Same with stuff like Ben-10, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, and most of the stuff on Adult Swim. :\

Yeah, gotta agree with this. I feel like Adventure Time and Regular Show especially are more "For teens and college kids" than they are for actual kids. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure that Regular Show was always supposed to be teens/young adult targeted. I mean, the creator's in his twenties himself, and it's hard to imagine little kids grasping that show's humor, setting, and characters - they won't know what it's like, to be a school drop-out stuck in a dead-end job and just coasting through life. Legend of Korra is pretty much a teen drama slapped over a fantasy setting. It's my understanding that Young Justice was like this, too. And Teen Titans, obviously. Besides, even though shows may have been originally aimed at kids, doesn't mean that they don't have something that can appeal to all ages. Stephen Universe is a good example of this (Hey, I watch it, and I'm on the tail-end of the teenage demographic.)

Frankly, I think there's more teenage-targeted cartoons now then there's even been. Anime proved teens watch this stuff, and now more and more cartoons are accepting that too. They may be like Adventure Time, working under a veneer of "child-friendly." Or they may be like Regular Show and Legend of Korra, just completely abandoning any notion that they're serving kids. But now's a great time to be a cartoon-loving teenager.

 

[viscomica]

So what counts as a cartoon aimed at teens? Like Daria hits the same audience as Family Guy, not just teens. So if it's a cartoon made hoping to appeal to teens, most qualify. If it requires a teen main character then a lot apply (And I would argue South Park counts even though they aren't teens, as they are written wise beyond their years).

You mentioned Daria and to me that's the top notch example of a cartoon seemingly aimed at teenagers but that everyone can appreciate. So yes, I agree with you. That being said, Daria is from the 90s as is Beavis and Butthead and so on. I can't understand why there aren't cartoons like that anymore aimed to teenagers (and young adults as well) that even full blown adults would watch / understand.

 

[Ragsnstitches]

I'm confused. All those shows you mentioned are aimed at teenagers (south park and family guy are geared more for late teens and adults, though early teens can also watch them even though most of the content will fly over them). What exactly do you mean by "Teen orientated". Seriously, I'm 25 and I still watch some (if not most) of those cartoons.

Here are a few shows I watched when I was in my Teens that I would consider "teen orientated" (in no particular order):
Ben 10
The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy
Fairy God Parents
Avatar The Last Airbender
Teen Titans
TMNT
X-Men Evolution
Batman Beyond
The Batman
...

That's all I can think of right now but I know there are many more. These are shows that were released when I was a teenager, so I'm not counting shows of today (post 2009) and shows of my pre-teens (which would be pre-2000. It's also not a list based on quality, just what I remember right now.

The viewership of these shows were primarily teens. But "Teens" is a VERY broad demographic. These are the formative years of young personalities and they are very fickle for the most part. There is no clear demographic to work with. So most shows aimed at Teens are broad appeal shows that can bring in other audiences. You can still have niche appeal, but exclusively tailored for teens is not an easy thing to make.

So again, I'm confused about what you are concerned over. Most afternoon shows are made with Teenage Demographics in mind.

 

[Jason Rayes]

Hmmm, as far as cartoons that appeal to teenagers go, I think were are in a veritable golden age for that kind of thing. When I was growing up cartoons were kids only, not really due to social convention or anything, It was a quality issue, basically they were so simplistic and predictable that only a child could sit down and enjoy them. Now a lot of shows, even those designed for kids, are well enough produced and written that pretty much anyone can watch and be entertained. As for stuff squarely aimed at a teen audience, as lots of people above have pointed out you are almost spoiled for choice. From the sounds of it its simply that none of them appeal to your taste, In fact I'm not really even sure what your definition of "for teens" is if none of the plethora of options available to you fit the bill.

 

[Vault101]

As I am no longer a teenager....nope

That said the west could do with more shows like avatar

 

[Nathaniel Grey]

To put it simply it's teenagers fault that there is currently a lackluster of cartoons aimed at themselves. Why you ask? Because they don't watch them. 1-2 years back we had a multitude of cartoons aimed at teenagers and young adults alike. Let's see if you remember any of them:

Motorcity
Tron:Uprising
Symbionic Titan
ThunderCats
Young Justice
Green Lantern TAS
Beware the Batman

What I found was that younger kids were not interested in these types of cartoons and older kids (the target audience) simply did not watch them. Shows like Adventure Time, Regular Show, and My little Pony, hit that perfect sweet spot of being goofy enough for young kids and young adults alike. They have marketable toys and merchandise that everyone buys. Henceforth the shows continue on. Teenagers are simply not as much of a reliable source as younger kids are when it comes to cartoons.