Adventure Time. Set in the magical land of Ou, and its many kingdoms, home to candy people, animals and cast of weird characters (Personal favorite, Gunther the penguin). The popularity of Adventure Time, as one may point out is the thrust for adventure. The stars of the show, Finn the human and Jake the dog are two best buds who gone all sorts of adventures that one may call strange and out of the ordinary. They fight monsters, overcome fears, save princesses and most importantly, have a hate against all-sorts of evil. Adventure Time is very popular with kids; however, adults also demonstrate the love for Adventure Time. The hidden core appeal of Adventure Time is nostalgia, a feeling of wanting to go to a better time in the past.
Nostalgia is something that we all have experienced. The feeling of wanting to go back in time to a better place is believed to be the reason behind Adventure Time’s success. As an Adventure Timer, this topic automatically appealed to me when I saw it on the PBS Idea Channel on YouTube. “”It because at the same time audience are experiencing nostalgia, so to are the characters in Adventure Time.” It is nostalgia within nostalgia or “Nostalgiaception”. Just as the characters in Adventure Time, I too, seek to go back in time when life was much simpler. Nostalgia is also a persuasive technique many commercials and ads company make to cause people to buy their product. For example, New York Times recently published an article, “In Super Bowl Commercials, the Nostalgia Bowl” which is about how the recent Superbowl used nostalgia to attract costumers. However, nostalgia in Adventure Time brings out confronting emotions, happy and sad, or otherwise known as ambivalence. For example, when I think about my past friends and homes, I am happy that I was able to cherish those memories, however, sad at the same time, because I know I can not go back into that time. Thus causing a wide range of emotions. Adventure Time has the ability to hack into the nine year old in me with “exciting sites, magical objects, and impossibly terrifying things.”. However, young people do not only experience these emotions. Adventure has become a hit with adults all over the world because of the ability the show has to bring them back to their childhood. Adventure Time is about “Rescuing princess, fight giants monsters, protecting the innocent and have a strong dislike of evil dudes,” and brings people back to a much simpler time in their lives.
Adventure Time’s subtext calls upon another comic, Calvin and Hobbes. Through friendship and adventures, the characters in both Adventure Time and Calvin and the Hobbes deny what has/had happened in the surrounding word. In Adventure Time case, it is about forgetting that Finn is the only human left on the plant and that the world almost came to an end in the Great Mushroom War. In Calvin and the Hobbes, the characters crack jokes even at a time when nothing could possibly be funny anymore.
By watching Adventure Time, you participate in the show. The show is as important as the people who watch it. As an adventure time fan, I still believe that television stills has the ability to persuade audiences even though, it has been around since the 20th century. Television is a type of mass media that I believe will never go away even has years pass by. Adventure time has been a hit for Cartoon Network and there will be more adventures to come.
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