Overanalyze This

You know it seems today that all you see is violence in movies and sex on TV.
But where are those good old fashioned values on which we used to rely.
Lucky there's a family guy.
Lucky there's a man who positively can do all the things that make us laugh and cry.

 But seriously, my name is Brandy Wilson.

 For my Studies in Pop Culture class I was tasked with creating a blog about some aspect of pop culture. I love television and knew early on my blog would cover some aspect of television. I wracked my brain and considered everything from a blog devoted totally to Glee (my favorite show) to one about reality TV.

 Then it came to me. I want to write a pop culture blog about a genre that itself comments and makes fun of pop culture. An animated series seemed perfect. Initially, I wanted to devote this blog only to Seth McFarlane's animated series trilogy Family Guy, American Dad, and the Cleveland Show. But the more I thought about it I wanted to include shows like The Boondocks and South Park which also regularly served as vehicles for social commentary and critique. I decided to expand my idea to include primetime animated series.

 Over the course of the semester I will analyze and dissect (they're cartoons so it won't hurt) elements of this genre. I'd like to explore why this has remained popular over the years. Through the course of this exploration I'm certain we'll see how these shows are able to get away with a lot of things live action shows with people can not get away with. Despite the obvious aesthetic difference, I expect we're going to find a lot of the same themes we see in regular television series: families, friends, trying to fit in, overcoming adversity, etc.

 I look forward to getting graded for watching cartoons. Academia is fantastic.