Not a good list, but as a book...

Earlier this week -- after saying that I had no new book to review this week -- I went and checked out A Celebration of Animation: The Top 100 Greatest Cartoon Characters in Television History. I love cartoons, so I expected to love this book.

However, the writers of this book quickly throw television under the bus by including classic characters from cartoons originally made for movie theaters and then later shown on TV, as well as superheroes transposed from comic books. How can other company's possibly compare to Disney's oeuvre (Supposedly very well, according to this deeply flawed ranking system)? How do you separate the cartoon superheroes from the bodies of comic book work that give them so much depth and history?

It turns out, these authors have a much different take on cartoons than I do. Instead of seeing cartoons as a positive method of storytelling, these authors delight in the subversive, giving accolades to characters who defy, rather than represent, positive values.

Their #1 character is somehow Bugs Bunny, the anarchist. Their argument that Bugs is always provoked and hence can't be a bully would not have fooled me as a young boy anymore than it does today; Bugs is too super-powerful to ever be in real danger, so the lengths he goes to  humiliate others are never justified by his thirst for revenge. I would have put Bugs somewhere down around #33.

Their #2 and #3 characters are Homer Simpson and Spongebob Squarepants! How awful, that they value so highly characters who glorify ignorance and have now taught generations of kids that they will do better in life if they just stay dumb and uneducated. Homer is the better of the two, since at least we are encouraged sometimes to laugh at him instead of with him. I have loved The Simpsons, as a whole, so I would be okay with Homer staying up high around #11, while it would be generous to let Spongebob even have the #100 slot. Somehow, Dexter -- Dexter, of Dexter's Lab -- one of the most brilliantly conceived cartoons of all time, is only #64??

Just pulling from this book's top 64, my top 10 would look more like this:
1. Batman
2. Spider-Man
3. Donald Duck
4. Scooby Doo
5. Charlie Brown
6. Dexter and Deedee

7. Mickey Mouse
8. Bullwinkle
9. Daffy Duck
10. Johnny Quest

So it's not a good list (as I said in the subject line,), but as a book....What this book does so well, by failing so badly, is it sparks debate and discussion. I could probably do an entire library program around re-ranking the best cartoons!