The Simpsons reconceived

ID:32912
 
Jul 23 2007, 7:12 am
Sharp wants us to Simpsonize ourselves:

http://members.byond.com/Sharp?command=view_post&post=32908

But I ask you, my friends, is it not better to de-Simpsonize the Simpsons?

(click for full size)



Courtesy of snEEkie Villain on the BioShock forums.
Jul 23 2007, 10:46 am
Don't forget about de-Futurama-ing Futurama.

http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/46124117/
Jul 23 2007, 10:52 am
Ha! Very nice!

[Edit: So that's the original source of the Simpsons pic too. I'll have to look around that site some more!]
Jul 23 2007, 2:23 pm
They got Homer's hair colour wrong... he was a brunet. =)
Jul 23 2007, 2:29 pm
Nope, clearly not better. The de-Simpsonized Simpsons are quite definitely anime (or, since it's not animated, manga), and are therefore crap. Let's see some de-Simpsonized Simpsons with a drawing style that doesn't suck, though, and I'll likely concede the point.

As it stands, the Simpsons drawing style is far superior to anime because 1) no one's eyes take up 50% of their head, 2) no one has that no-nose look, and 3) they use more than 2 FPS.
Jul 23 2007, 2:41 pm
Manga styles aren't so bad- look at Symphony of the Night, one of the better Castlevania games.

And the Simpsons drawing is hardly quality (and this is coming from a big Simpsons fan who doesn't particularly like most anime). It gets the job done, and is rather endearing, but no way matches the artistic talent of something like Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust or Ah My Goddess (though the latter was rather insipid, to say the least). The strength of the Simpsons is in the writing!
Jul 24 2007, 1:49 am
Oh, please. Just because you may not like some anime (DBZ, Naruto, whatever) on the basis of its content or lack thereof, that doesn't mean that the drawing style is crap. That's the lamest attack on anime I've ever heard.
Jul 24 2007, 10:06 am
Jmurph wrote:
The strength of the Simpsons is in the writing!

Sadly, it atrophied after 2001. =P


Lummox JR wrote:
The de-Simpsonized Simpsons are quite definitely anime (or, since it's not animated, manga), and are therefore crap.

I dunno. The only person with anime-like features is Bart. The rest look like a sort of crossover between American-style and Japanese-style.
Jul 26 2007, 11:35 am
Au contraire, Crispy, I hate anime far more for its drawing style than for its content. I find it annoying on a very visceral level.
Jul 26 2007, 2:15 pm
Lummox JR wrote:
As it stands, the Simpsons drawing style is far superior to anime because 1) no one's eyes take up 50% of their head,

Only because their overbites are so huge. They're eyes are gigantic even by anime standards, it's just offset by the fact that the rest of their faces are warped. Although it's worth mentioning that huge eyes aren't actually that common in anime. They're generally used as an expression rather than a permanent facial feature.

I love the Simpsons but in terms of animation quality and style they suck hard (even compared to the cartoons around the time the show was created).
It's very clear that they evolved from basic scribbles (and they didn't evolve far). Anyone who can hold a pencil can draw a Simpsons character. They're pretty much just lumps of circles. Even the creators admit that.
I don't have an issue with the animation style used in the Simpsons, they do what they do and it works, but it really deserves no real praise.
Jul 26 2007, 2:35 pm
The Simpsons has a minimalist style which is hard to define. I would say The Simpsons has some of the best animation quality on television, myself. A look through Teletoon (Canada's equivalent to Cartoon Network), for instance, reveals to me most of the shows have poorer animation quality than The Simpsons. Objects are inconsistently sized, appear slightly different from scene to scene, are miscoloured on occasion, etc. The Simpsons has none of these issues.
Jul 26 2007, 5:40 pm
Really it's ludicrous to claim the Simpsons are a somehow inferior style because of certain traits, because those traits are deliberately cartoonish. Anime on the other hand shoots for realism and ends up with faces that all look the freaking same.
Jul 26 2007, 10:23 pm
Lummox JR wrote:
Anime on the other hand shoots for realism

Um. No it bloody well doesn't. If it did, it wouldn't have all the stylistic quirks that you're complaining about ("eyes half the size of the head" and all that).

The anime style may be "more realistic" than the Simpsons, but that's moot because just about everything is more realistic than the Simpsons. You might as well claim that Toy Story's animation style sucks because it's more realistic than the Simpsons. Or that Wallace and Gromit sucks because Aardman Animations' claymation style is more realistic than the Simpsons.

You're judging the Simpsons on the basis of "it's okay because it's a cartoon" (which is fair enough), and anime on the basis of "it's not okay because it's not realistic enough". Nice double standard there.

The extremes of "real" and "as cartoonish as possible" are not the only artistically valid positions on the spectrum.


I hate anime far more for its drawing style than for its content. I find it annoying on a very visceral level.

I don't think there's any suitable response to this other than to scratch one's head, shrug, and walk away...

For the record, I think the art style of the Simpsons is great. The animation is of high-quality and does the job well, as well as having its own unique identity.
Jul 26 2007, 10:42 pm
Lummox is right. Manga and japanese animation is fugly. Some animes are decent but I just can't seem to get past the ugly ugly drawing style.
Jul 26 2007, 10:55 pm
You people have weird aesthetic tastes. Though I still think you're biased for other reasons besides appearance.
Jul 27 2007, 11:06 am
Hrm, if you don't like Japanese animation, do you also dislike the style of things like Robotech/Voltron, Speed Racer, Thundercats and the like which were produced by Japanese animation mills? Do you also dislike the Disney cartoons which inspired the style? Just something to consider.

I have a similar irrational hatred for most modern abstraction, interpretative, and "conceptual" art that bleeds over into cubism and impressionism for starting the whole mess. But I do recognize the odd exception here and there.