The constant clamouring hunger for new content without any of the risks of original IP continues with the news that the Flintstones is getting a gritty, adult reboot dealing with contemporary issues of the modern family. Which… hey, isn’t that basically the idea behind Roseanne?
And on the face of it that’s a weird decision, starting with that what demographic of viewer still remembers, much less feels a great fondness for, the golden age of cheap Hanna-Barbera cell animation?
What’s more, for several generations of American youth the Flintstones aren’t a familiar cartoon family lovin’, laughin’ and learnin’ together, and which The Simpsons ripped off blind.
They’re a brand of baby vitamins. And here in Australia they’re not even that.
It’s a similar issue with the beloved Warner Brothers animated characters, in that it seems like something that 40-something studio execs would get excited about rather than contemporary audiences.
It’s great that Don Cheadle’s come on board the inexplicable decision to make another Space Jam movie, and LeBron James makes sense as the new Michael Jordan, but does anyone under thirty still feel any particular identification with Bugs Bunny or Daffy Duck, much less Foghorn Leghorn or Yosemite Sam?
And let’s not even open the can of worms that is Pepe Le Pew in the post #metoo era.
But back to the Flintstones: on the plus side, it’s being done by Elizabeth Banks’ production company and her forthcoming Charlies Angels reboot looks pretty amazing, so that is reason to be cautiously optimistic.
Also, the recent Flintstones comics have been unexpectedly edgy and entertaining, so… maybe this is a story that needs telling, and can only be told with wildly anachronistic hominids co-existing with dinosaurs?