The golden age of cartoons?

Justin Peters makes a strong case in the Washington Monthly that we are currently experiencing a golden age of animation, beginning with Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim:

The Adult Swim entourage is only the latest in a series of consistently witty and original cartoons that have emerged on television in recent years–from “The Simpsons” to “South Park” to “King of the Hill.” And this is on top of the plethora of fine feature-length animated films that have graced movie theaters such as Monsters Inc., and the Shrek series. Indeed, if novels, pop music, and live action movies have been going through a bit of a fallow period, we are arguably living in a golden age of cartoons, one that rivals in creativity and appeal to the era of “Looney Tunes” and “Betty Boop” over half a century ago.

Read the whole thing — indeed, my only criticism of the article is that it failed to mention the renaissance in high-quality superhero cartoons — X-Men, Batman, Superman, Justice League, and the awesome Batman Beyond. However, Peters does give appropriate props to Harvey Birdman, Attorney At Law, a surreal 15 minutes of genre-busting. My personal favorite — and the only successful Sopranos parody I’ve seen — is when Harvey defends suspected mobster Fred Flinstone. Best line — “You’re dead to me, Barney!! [Actually, the best line is “Ewwww, Gleep juice!’–ed. Well, yes, but understanding why that line is funny requires a knowledge of bad Saturday morning cartoons that the sophisticated readers of danieldrezner.com should never admit to possessing.]