Top 10 Things from the 20th Century that Majorly Jumped the Shark During the 21st Century
Nickelodeon is an American basic cable and satellite television network launched on December 1, 1977, and is owned by Viacom through Viacom Media Networks and based in New York City. Granted, the 1990s Nick lineup wasn't really THAT great overall, but for cartoons alone, it gave us Ren & Stimpy (horribly written show, yes, but unbelievably brilliantly animated), Rocko's Modern Life (easily one of the top ten, if not top five, best all-ages satire shows ever. I really don't care what anyone else says), Hey Arnold (deeply relatable), Rugrats (also pretty deeply relatable), The Angry Beavers (one of the most underrated slapstick shows EVER), and Doug (the show that started it all).
And that's not even mentioning all of the live-action shows, most of which were also pretty terrible in the 2000s, believe me.
Now, moving on to the 2000s, we have Spongebob (great show but nowhere even near the writing level of Rocko or the artistic level of Ren & Stimpy), Jimmy Neutron (sorry to break it to you guys, but I probably wouldn't have developed my brain fetish in the first place if not for this ugly CGI dung-heap and Spongebob), Fanboy & Chum-Chum (needs no explanation), and Planet Sheen (also needs no explanation).
I mean, yeah, sure, we still had the occasional diamonds in the rough like Invader Zim (EASILY the channel's darkest and most sardonic show to date, and I say that even after watching the Fan Club episode of Ren & Stimpy), Avatar (literally anime by any other name), and Harvey Beaks (if only for its adorably innocent promotion and encouragement of autism awareness), but overall, it just isn't enough to compensate.
I normally don't like to beat dead horses here, but Michael Bay is a film director who (at least as far as these films are concerned) genuinely sucks with his stupidly oversized interpretation of Devastator's "ball bearings."
Pretty much all of the good stuff became relegated specifically to the extended universe surrounding the films, besides Episode III. Even then, it was still a pretty hugely "middle-of-the-road" type of good.
Cartoon Network is an American basic cable and satellite television channel that is owned by the Turner Broadcasting System division of Time Warner. Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon switched places with the advent of The Loud House and Teen Titans Go, respectively.
Luckily, they seem to at least be somewhat recovering from it. Teen Titans Go, being as dreadfully abysmal as it is, notwithstanding.
The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening that originally started on April 19, 1987 as shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show. It got its own series on December 17, 1989 and is still running as of 2023, making it the longest running animated sitcom. It is about a man named Homer... read more Yes, honestly, even more so than Futurama. Technically, Futurama was from 1999, so making it count for this list is stretching quite a bit.
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney, is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California.
Well, the games are starting to recover from it, at least.
It slowly went downhill during the 2000s and was decent up until 2009, where another decline began.
Toad, known in Japan as Kinopio, is a major character in the Mario Bros. franchise. He assists Princess Peach in the Mushroom Kingdom and will do whatever it takes to help her. He first appeared in the classic game, Super Mario Bros. after being kidnapped by Bowser and his minions. Since then he has... read moreThe Newcomers
Rocko's Modern Life is an American animated television series created by Joe Murray for Nickelodeon. The series centers on the surreal life of an anthropomorphic Australian-immigrant wallaby named Rocko as well as his friends: the gluttonous steer Heffer, the neurotic turtle Filburt, and Rocko's faithful... read more
The whole timeline of this series is in chronic disarray.
The fanbase is at war.
Sega Games Co., Ltd., originally short for Service Games and officially styled as SEGA, is a Japanese multinational video game developer and publisher headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, with multiple offices around the world.
Metallica is an American Heavy/Thrash Metal band formed in 1981. The original lineup was James Hetfield (Vocalist and Rhythm guitarist), Dave Mustaine (Lead Guitar), Lars Ulrich (Drums), Ron McGovney (Bassist). The group came into mainstream from their Self-Titled album and the hit single "Enter Sandman"... read more
I don't know. Something about Parappa 2 was just completely lacking the very distinctively one-of-a-kind "labor of love" charm of its predecessors, even if it WAS technically a much better game with music that was instrumentally composed in vastly more complex ways. The amount of features the game had when compared to previous sequel UmJammer Lammy (which was on PS1 as opposed to PS2, for Christ's sake) was also quite pathetic.
And after that game completely flopped, the series got merchandised and "kiddie-fied" literally to death and was never properly heard from ever since. Sad, I know.
Radiohead are an English rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke (lead vocals, guitar, piano, keyboards), Jonny Greenwood (lead guitar, keyboards, other instruments), Colin Greenwoood (bass guitar), Phil Selway (drums), and Ed O'Brien (guitar). Please tell me this is a popular opinion. No offense to the band, it just quite frankly strayed a bit too far from what traditional music is supposed to be for my liking.
SpongeBob SquarePants is an American animated television series created by marine biologist and animator the late Stephen Hillenburg for Nickelodeon. It is currently the most popular animated television show on Nickelodeon and is world-renowned by children and adults alike due to its humor, high-quality... read moreJust another show about random Americans dressing up in costumes and beating up monsters. For the kids.
Pokémon, abbreviated from the Japanese title of Pocket Monsters and currently advertised in English as Pokémon: The Series, is a Japanese anime television series, which has been adapted for the international television markets. It was first broadcast in Japan on April 1, 1997, in the United States... read more Sword and Shield were what killed most of my love for Pokemon.
Reality TV and bad use of politics. Enough said.
Until its revival (the releases of N. Sane Trilogy, CTR: Nitro-Fueled, and It's About Time), at least.