[LilacElf]

An article from FoxNews says that the tradition of kids sitting down on the couch on Saturday morning and watching cartoons may soon be gone forever.:(

(Article at this address: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,49394,00.html)


I find this a shame as so many good cartoons have come and gone, and very few are now available to the public either on VHS or DVD.

[Evil Agent]

I personally think the tradition is already dead. It's nowhere NEAR as good as when I was a kid, in the 80s. I'd watch the BEST cartoons of all time, every Saturday! I really feel sorry that the kids today missed out on that.

[ArthurFrayn]

Why bother? Between the Cartoon Network, Nicktoons and FoxKids/WB, kids have hot and cold running cartoons 24-7. It says that in the article as well.

[saintjon]

It bums me out, make no mistake. It definitely seems like what is offered these days is pretty weak though.

[Wulfa_Jones]

In the UK we still have Saturday morning kids TV shows, but they tend to be more about music and general entertainment than cartoons.

They did show the lastest Batman cartoons recently but that was about it...

[Hobbit]

... but a lot of that is being moved to the BBC digital channels now, Wulfa, where there is at least 12 hours a day TV. And then there's Cartoon Network, Jetix....

So yes, the idea of everyone sitting down and watching something at the same time has pretty much gone, and perhaps if you believe the UK national press is another sign of children losing their childhood early.

Alternatively it is the BBC (and others) catching up with how things have been elsewhere for years.

Recently UK national pop programmes went the same way when the BBC flagship, Top of the Pops, after 40-odd years was cancelled due to poor ratings. The argument was that it couldn't keep up with what MTV was offering, 24 hours a day, specialist programming.

Hobbit

[ArthurFrayn]

Look, there are cartoons that all the kids watch whenever they're on -Pokemon,Digimon,Dragon Ball Z,SpongeBob, ...

[musick]

Pretty sure we still have them here, though i dont do weekend mornings well.

[FicusFan]

To me the tradition died a long time ago. Yes there are cable channels were you can watch cartoons, but the tradition belongs to the networks. And whether network or cable the cartoons today are lousy.

For me it died when you could no longer see Loony Tunes (not a big fan of Tiny Loony Tunes). I watched those as a kid and as an adult. Now you have to buy them on DVD, cause I don't think they are even on cable (don't know about the movie channels you have to pay extra for).

Very sad loss (LT).

[sic's mom]

To me it is so sad there are no good cartoons, or many at all for that matter, on Saturdays anymore.
My husband recently got Sat and Sun off and thought, Well I'll get up and watch cartoons with the kids. There was nothing on! Unless you want to count Cartoon Network and Disney Toon.
But for me it is sad. We looked forward all week to Saturday. Just to be able to loaf around for a few hours, eat our cereal in front of the TV and watch some really good cartoons. Ones like Scooby Doo, Superfriends, the Looney Toons and Johnny Quest were some of my favorites. Now all kids have to do is turn on the TV and there they are. To me it would be like having Christmas all the time. The Saturday morning ritual was important to my generation and I am glad we had it. I think in some ways it taught us to be happy to have what we did and appreciate it. Kids don't seem to have to wait for anything anymore and therefore in my opinion it probably isn't as special to them. (And the shows aren't nearly as good anymore:))
t