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The "Art" of Seth McFarlane |
Just recently Seth McFarlane (creator of Family Guy and American Dad) has launched a new series of animated shorts on his website called Seth McFarlane’s Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy. This video titled Super Mario Rescues the Princess is the fourth in the weekly series of unrelated skits and represents all that is wrong with Seth’s style. So prompted by this uninspired animation, I decided to dissect this video and Seth’s work to find out just what exactly is wrong with Seth McFarlane.
I must admit, I used to enjoy watching Family Guy. Though I’m unsure whether the series got worse over the years or whether I just became more cynical. Now when watching any of Seth’s work all I can see is the lazy animation, cheap pop culture references and formulaic writing. This really isn’t about personal taste in humour, but the fact that Seth’s work is always suffering from the same exact problems.
Hit the jump to read on.
My first point is that Seth is a talentless writer who relies on pop culture references. The content of the Super Mario cartoon isn’t any more inspired than his usual work as he “insightfully” points out that Mario never gets anywhere with Princess Peach. This is a comedy goldmine that totally hasn’t been done to death and is definitely worth stretching out for two minutes. Seth proves once again that he is only capable of writing comedy in one style – and that’s to bludgeon the same joke to death in an awkward back and forth conversation, as if elaborating on a tired joke will make it funnier.
It is the
exact
same
format
over
and
over.
Also exactly the same is the character designs, with Mario looking like a cross between Brian and Peter, while Princess Peach looks like Lois in a pink dress. Apparently Seth never learned to draw from any other perspective than a three quarter front on. This insistence on keeping all characters at this angle creates an offputting effect when you have characters conversing – which is the majority of Seth’s work; endless, mind numbing conversations. Having two characters side by side on a slight angle talking to one another creates this bizarre effect as though they’re staring just past one another - there’s absolutely no sense that these characters are truly engaged in conversation. It doesn’t help that you hardly ever see a non-talking character animated or that these conversations are carried entirely by the moving of the lips. Look at the diagram below and try to recall the last time you comfortably chatted with someone standing in these positions.
Furthermore, look at the way the eyelids are drawn. They’re just about always perfectly straight, when they should be slightly curved as they supposedly sit on a spherical eyeball. Conclusion: Seth cannot draw. He doesn’t seem to have any grasp of perspective or anatomy – and he certainly doesn’t have a clue about animation.
The animation of Family Guy, American Dad and Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy consists almost entirely of character’s mouths moving, with the occasional rigid pose-to-pose animation. This movement is banal and devoid of any true expression, with the same exact timing on every movement. Watching Super Mario Rescues the Princess with the sound-down would convey little more than a general sense of displeasure in the characters. Look at how Bowser re-enters the frame at the end of the video. The sound of Bowser’s landing and the great bulk of his character should indicate that his leap on screen would require a great effort and his landing would be heavy, taking him a moment to absorb the weight once he lands. Instead, he pretty much falls on screen as though he was a sandbag dumped on the ground. I can only imagine how mind-numbingly dull it would be to work as an animator for Seth McFarlane, who continues to stifle any sort of imaginative character design or fluid, expressive movement.
But to visualise my point, here is the video edited so that all but the moving parts of the cartoon are blacked out.
This isn’t economic animation; it’s just lazy and boring. The Chapman Brothers (creators of the Homestar Runner cartoons) manage to make animations in Flash with an extremely economic style, but still manage to convey a wonderful sense of character that adds to the comedy. Check it.
Another one of the many problems with the animation is that that the character designs restrict just what can be done with them. There’s no malleability or ability to articulate in any detailed way. Seth’s characters just shift their eyelids, flap their lips and occasionally wave their arms. Take a look at these last few panels of a page from webcomic Peter & Company by Jon Ponkivar. His curvy lineart and simple character designs means he can be incredibly expressive with his characters. Can you imagine Peter Griffin articulating so expressively?
However, the animation does reflect the limited range of vocal talent Seth has as a voice actor. Seth plays a number of characters in Family Guy including Peter, Brian, Quagmire and Stewie. This is much to the detriment of the show as the man has only a handful of voices in his repertoire. For Mario he does Brian’s voice with a hint of Stewie whilst putting on a cheap Italian accent and doing the usual delivery he does for Peter. He’s not Mel Blanc. He’s not Billy West. He just doesn’t have the vocal range to do a cast of characters.
Also to the detriment of Seth’s work is his overuse of bland wide shots of the characters talking. While I understand that both Family Guy and American Dad are going for a sitcom style presentation and that the Mario “satire” is by necessity side-on (though those characters remain slightly turned), I still cannot fathom why Seth refuses to let the ‘camera’ come into play in his storytelling. Though by storytelling I mean his compilations of pop culture references with a minimum amount of segue in the form of a thin plot. Though I suppose it would mean that Family Guy or American Dad would require a single storyboard for most of their scenes and minimises the amount of backgrounds needed to be drawn. Still, Seth is robbing himself of a valuable creative tool. Meanwhile just look at how gleefully an animated series like Invader Zim plays with the ‘camera’ and perspective.
Lastly, Seth is a sell-out who opens this video with an ad for Burger King. Apparently making this crap takes so much money it needs sponsors. In the end, all of Seth’s cartoons are the just ego-indulging work of a man who can’t write comedy, who can’t draw or animate and who can’t act. Whilst working on this article I had an epiphany: I have no idea why Seth McFarlane makes cartoons. He has no apparently love for visuals at all. His character designs, shots, backgrounds, animation are all bland to the extreme. It’s as if he just doesn’t care.
Seth, if you’re reading this why not do a live action TV show? Or better still, why not work in radio plays? You seem to enjoy writing and voice acting – you’d probably find yourself much more at home in a sound-only medium. Just please stop being a black hole of creativity.
Now after that rant, I suggest you all go watch the gorgeously imaginative and downright enjoyable Adventure Time.
Via Cartoon Brew.
Also, those who are particulary interested may want to check out the interesting array of discussions happening on Cartoon Brew. Thanks for the linkage, Amid.
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