I was dismayed to see that HBO is launching an animated program about a guy going to work on Mars — disturbingly close to the theme of the comic strip I’ve been working on.
But the trailer makes it look like yet another modern animation that’s 100% snark, like it hates its characters and hates its subject.
At first I felt like, “Oh well, there’s my thing gazumped,” but when I sit with it… My thing is full of flawed people (my ideal would be something like Commedia dell’Arte, or Twelfth Night, which is pretty much straight-up Commedia), but hopefully still has a heart.
As a kid, I loved space anything, so imagining that setting revives my feelings of hope, wonder, and play.
It’s the same with Apple TV’s “Hello Tomorrow”: I should be its prime audience member, but it’s so cyncial that I stopped watching it. Again, it seemed to have nothing but disdain for its characters and their world.
Hell, if you don’t like this, why should I?
Somewhere along the way we mistook “nasty” for “funny”.