posted
I'm inclined to agree. It's not a certainty or anything, but I think if we live in a world that'd see Calvin bumper stickers on all sorts of things in spite of the creator's efforts not to merchandise, it's not an unfair assumption to make that had he been less zealous on the subject, we would've had a lot more-and I think given the odds we wouldn't have gotten, say, Pixar level of merch and media.
quote: Still, I have little sympathy for the point of view that marketing to children is wrong. Marketing bad or unhealthy things to children is wrong. On the other hand, the marketing of awesome stuff like He-Man, GI Joe and Transformers is a large part of what made my childhood so much fun.
I would speculate that his point isn't so much that these things are bad, just that they're not really very good. For example, Calvin spends basically zero time playing with toys aside from Hobbes, water balloons, and water pistols. I think his view is that consumerism is generally not such a great thing, even when it's not actively negative.
And I say this as someone who also had a helluva lot of fun with Transformers and GI Joes as a kid: I don't think they were actually much of what made my childhood fun-I think that's what was marketed to me, and thus that's what I picked, because I was a kid. And because I was a kid, I had fun with it. I would've (and did, sometimes) have fun with big cardboard boxes, as did Calvin. I'm totally guessing here, but I think that might be one of Watterson's points.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Whatever your feelings on it, Watterson 's view was that most advertising aimed at children is designed to manipulate them into exploiting the buying power of their parents. He was not wrong in that assessment. He didn't feel it was morally conscionable to participate in such a market willingly, and for profit. I rather admire him for it.
I totally admire him for it, and I agree with him.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
More on Watterson's point of view on the subject:
quote:Nick Samoyedny • Tarrytown, NY Q: What led you to resist merchandising Calvin and Hobbes? A: For starters, I clearly miscalculated how popular it would be to show Calvin urinating on a Ford logo. . . . Actually, I wasn't against all merchandising when I started the strip, but each product I considered seemed to violate the spirit of the strip, contradict its message, and take me away from the work I loved. If my syndicate had let it go at that, the decision would have taken maybe 30 seconds of my life.
quote:With the strip's popularity exploding, Universal Press Syndicate was eager to produce and sell "Calvin and Hobbes" merchandise. Watterson refused. Merchandising, he said, "would turn my characters into television hucksters and T-shirt sloganeers and deprive me of characters that actually expressed my own thoughts." That's why there are no official "Calvin and Hobbes" toys or t-shirts, though unauthorized reproductions of the characters still abound.
posted
Unauthorized? But I thought if it hadn't been stopped by someone, that was an indicator of legality.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: And I say this as someone who also had a helluva lot of fun with Transformers and GI Joes as a kid: I don't think they were actually much of what made my childhood fun-I think that's what was marketed to me, and thus that's what I picked, because I was a kid. And because I was a kid, I had fun with it. I would've (and did, sometimes) have fun with big cardboard boxes, as did Calvin. I'm totally guessing here, but I think that might be one of Watterson's points.
I definitely had some fun with boxes, although a lot of that was imitating Calvin. But I think my love of the backstory of Transformers, especially, is a large part of the reason why I'm a sci fi fan today.
So I guess we had quite different experiences, in that sense.
I also think that the shared cultural background we (our generation) have as a result of these marketing ploys has been a valuable thing for our generation in many ways. There's a whole universe of jokes, nostalgic references, etc available to us as a result of being immersed in these detailed fictional worlds from such a young age.
I don't think the effect on our lives has been at all negative. Quite the opposite.
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posted
I definitely played with things like GI Joes, and Transformers quite readily, I also was surprised to find that Calvin and Hobbes did not offer anything like that. But after reading Watterson's reasoning I found that even as a child, it made sense, and I was none the worse for wear for not having that merchandise, I even agreed that there being that lack made the comic special.
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posted
I don't really think comparisons to merchandise is wholly appropriate. This is pretty clearly tribute work done on a website that, as near as I can tell, doesn't charge money, or host advertising. That makes a pretty big difference to me.
I think manji had it right. This is fan fiction. I'm not aware of Watterson's stance on that, thought I'd be interested to know.
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The way they appear to have ended it, I still (guess) think Watterson would disapprove, but that's just a guess and I'm personally less inclined to be suspicious.
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quote:It’s been a crazy week, thanks to everyone who commented on the Calvin & Hobbes strip, it was really cool to hear what you guys had to say, and the vast majority of you seemed to like it!
Sorry if it disappoints you guys, but there’s not gonna be any more Hobbes & Bacon… not for a while, anyway – our comic is more of a skit show, we do a gag, sometimes two, and then we move on, just like Family Guy or Robot Chicken, if we kept going, then it would be a strip about Calvin & Hobbes, and that’s just not what we do.
We tried to stay true to what Calvin & Hobbes meant to us, and what the style and atmosphere was, and I hope that we were able to capture what people loved about the strip – which is impossible, we’re not Watterson, we’re the Heyermans – there’s no way we can totally capture his style, no matter how much we tried.
But the most important thing, what we really wanted people to do was to go back and read Calvin & Hobbes, or support Watterson by getting the books if you don’t have them.
We don’t make any money on the strip, so hopefully you take all your desire to read more Calvin & Hobbes and support one of the most amazing artists of our time.
Some of us were lucky enough to be around when it was happening, to read Calvin & Hobbes in the paper, and if you’re like us, it guided and shaped who you are, and drove you to be different and be creative.
It’s no exaggeration to say that Pants are Overrated would be a completely different thing if Bill Watterson hadn’t created his masterpieces every day when we were kids.
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I definitely played with things like GI Joes, and Transformers quite readily, I also was surprised to find that Calvin and Hobbes did not offer anything like that. But after reading Watterson's reasoning I found that even as a child, it made sense, and I was none the worse for wear for not having that merchandise, I even agreed that there being that lack made the comic special.
Yeah, I guess it's better that C&H wasn't heavily marketed. My main problem is with the idea that marketing to kids is some sort of great harm, rather than something that's actually brought a lot of kids a lot of joy.
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quote:Yeah, I guess it's better that C&H wasn't heavily marketed. My main problem is with the idea that marketing to kids is some sort of great harm, rather than something that's actually brought a lot of kids a lot of joy.
I was pretty careful not to say that, Destineer.
But to go into greater detail...I don't actually think toy marketing is what's brought a lot of kids a lot of joy. My personal belief is that childhood is the majority of what brought a lot of kids a lot of joy-once upon a time, people might've said they got a lot of joy playing tiddliwinks, and now that's a sarcastic term for boring activity.
I don't think it's bad, necessarily, to market to children. But I guess I don't see the virtue you see in it, or at least the virtue I seem to be reading you're suggesting can exist.
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I definitely played with things like GI Joes, and Transformers quite readily, I also was surprised to find that Calvin and Hobbes did not offer anything like that. But after reading Watterson's reasoning I found that even as a child, it made sense, and I was none the worse for wear for not having that merchandise, I even agreed that there being that lack made the comic special.
Yeah, I guess it's better that C&H wasn't heavily marketed. My main problem is with the idea that marketing to kids is some sort of great harm, rather than something that's actually brought a lot of kids a lot of joy.
You need to accept that this is not a contradiction in terms. Child and youth-targeted adds are almost inarguably a major contributing factor to a variety of current social problems, among them obesity, diabetes, behavioral problems relating to consumerism and fashion. Childhood toys and activities are very nice. Some of them are advertised. Very little of the advertising adds to the niceness of these things, and quite a lot of the advertising fuels some fairly serious problems.
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posted
I'm not sure exactly to what extent I agree with him, but I'm sympathetic with Watterson's views on the matter, and I respect him for sticking to his guns.
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posted
I was not trying to make a broader commentary on marketing for kids in general. Shows like GI Joe and Transformers were made purely to support an already existing toy line. As some pointed out, and I can confirm reading it, Watterson was not opposed to all forms of marketing. He was sympathetic to an animated show, and I can imagine that little tear out calendars like The Far Side had wouldn't provoke his ire. But he wasn't given control over the marketing, and that ultimately was what clinched it. If you don't have creative control over your creation, it's not really saying what you want it to say anymore, or more accurately, it now says things you don't necessarily wish for it to say. If Universal Press Syndicate couldn't find a way reach some sort of reasonable compromise with Watterson, that's unfortunate for those who wanted to buy C&H merchandise. But it was good for many of us to see Watterson take his stand, explain it from his POV, and then refuse to sacrifice his principles, even in the face of incredible amounts of money.
I've got more than enough role models for how to make money with an idea.
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I definitely played with things like GI Joes, and Transformers quite readily, I also was surprised to find that Calvin and Hobbes did not offer anything like that. But after reading Watterson's reasoning I found that even as a child, it made sense, and I was none the worse for wear for not having that merchandise, I even agreed that there being that lack made the comic special.
Yeah, I guess it's better that C&H wasn't heavily marketed. My main problem is with the idea that marketing to kids is some sort of great harm, rather than something that's actually brought a lot of kids a lot of joy.
You need to accept that this is not a contradiction in terms. Child and youth-targeted adds are almost inarguably a major contributing factor to a variety of current social problems, among them obesity, diabetes, behavioral problems relating to consumerism and fashion. Childhood toys and activities are very nice. Some of them are advertised. Very little of the advertising adds to the niceness of these things, and quite a lot of the advertising fuels some fairly serious problems.
Yeah, fair enough. And I guess Watterson's position isn't as far from mine as I originally thought.
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I was not trying to make a broader commentary on marketing for kids in general. Shows like GI Joe and Transformers were made purely to support an already existing toy line. As some pointed out, and I can confirm reading it, Watterson was not opposed to all forms of marketing. He was sympathetic to an animated show, and I can imagine that little tear out calendars like The Far Side had wouldn't provoke his ire. But he wasn't given control over the marketing, and that ultimately was what clinched it. If you don't have creative control over your creation, it's not really saying what you want it to say anymore, or more accurately, it now says things you don't necessarily wish for it to say. If Universal Press Syndicate couldn't find a way reach some sort of reasonable compromise with Watterson, that's unfortunate for those who wanted to buy C&H merchandise. But it was good for many of us to see Watterson take his stand, explain it from his POV, and then refuse to sacrifice his principles, even in the face of incredible amounts of money.
I've got more than enough role models for how to make money with an idea.
Yep. This is the crux of the issue. Watterson was OK with certain types of merchandising, but not all. In his mind, there was a clear delineation between something like a book collection or calendar and a series of Calvin and Hobbes Collectable Playsets. The former doesn't do anything more than present the strip as-drawn in a novel context. The latter implicitly supports a form of consumerism that Watterson greatly disliked (and frequently criticized in the strip itself). I think Watterson felt that it would have been morally inconsistent for him to write strips making fun of American consumerist culture while profiting from the same. The fact that traditional merchandising agreements between syndicate and artist prevent the artist from selecting which forms of merchandise his or her work becomes was utterly unacceptable to Watterson. He would rather have no merchandise at all than allow his work to be used in a manner he found abhorrent.
I have to say, Watterson's stance on merchandising always impressed me, even as a toy-loving, animated series-watching, video game-playing, scifi-fanatic eight year old kid. It was the first introduction I had to a creator of art that I liked making a grander point than "bad guys are bad" or "explosions are cool," and it's something that has stuck with me since.
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posted
I owned the complete set of the heavy metal Voltron action figures. Each one weighed like 2 pounds. I wish they made heavy duty toys like that these days. Sure they were made in China and had a ton of lead in them, but damn were they fun.
Not only that, but those heavy action figures were a perfect bludgeoning tool. I think my younger sister still has a scar. Posts: 1937 | Registered: Nov 2006
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