But if you are going to analyze it, The Jetsons seems to me to reflect the essentially optimistic outlook of the period. Life is good and getting better.

1.) It came years after TV audiences had watched the similar story lines peddled via the Flintstones. The novelty had worn off. Both HB series featured a family, one in the past, and one in the future – a lot of the humor was based on interpretations of how a typical family in the past, or the future, could live like a white nuclear family in the 1960s. After a few years of watching the Flintstones copy the Honeymooners with this kind of added twist on daily life, the Jetsons were too darn similar in HB stylings.

2.) There was a real future to explore. It is one thing to make fun of a prehistoric past no one has any value on, and another to make fun of our goals towards space exploration, and future society. With real astronauts and rockets, poking fun with cheap-looking animation just wasn’t where a viewer’s imagination lay. The Jetsons cheapened what was believed to be a very real possibility.

This is why Star Trek worked – it took itself serious. Viewers wanted to believe in what we were doing as noble and exciting, as well as expensive and dangerous. The Jetsons’ milieu was too Fisher Price and Playschool.

The 1980s fashion stylings were retro 1960s. The Jetsons’ cartoon interpretation on the future fit that the fashion of that age.

3.) HB was not brilliant. It’s series were silly knock offs of real television show characters. It’s animation was cheap. The success of the Flintstones as a prime time series was not seen before with previous HB television projects, or since. Anything the Jetsons put out in it’s single season was accidental happenstance based on HB tried and true formulas and flat-out copying other shows and movies. Hanna-Barbera is not an orginator of what it lifted from other entertainment genres of the time.

I agree with others that the case for color as a reason for its short life might make sense if those of us who were watching when it first ran ever got to see anything in color, but the vast majority of us saw tv only in black and white anyway, so it being produced in color would’ve been pretty irrelevant. To be honest, I had no idea until I read this post that it was even in color.

Perhaps its futuristic bent had more to do with its short life? Its one-year gig was almost repeated by Star Trek (which in the 60s, along with Lost in Space, managed to squeak out 3 years) and was repeated by the only other futuristic cartoon that I recall, Jonny Quest.

I’d also suggest calling it the “single most important piece of 20th century futurism” might be overstating the case a bit. The Jetsons (or even Star Trek) wouldn’t have existed without Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, or Forbidden Planet. Definitely the Jetsons have importance, but the “single most important” piece of futurism of the whole 20th century? Maybe just in Saturday morning cartoons, which certainly would be impact enough!

Great article, looking forward to more.

I think you’re making too much of the color vs black and white aspect. In 1963, for most fo us, everything was in B&W, even movies. We didn’t even notice it unless we saw a color set in a store. We mentally added color without thinking as we watched. I recall seeing many advertisments for a mouthwash that wasn’t sold in my area. I never thought much about it, until I finally saw it in a store, and IT WAS THE WRONG COLOR! That is, the color I has assumed, or imagined, for whatever reason was not it’s actual color.

Another aspect is the Flintstones. That show was a runaway and surprise hit. Imagine adults watching a primetime cartoon show I think just a year earlier (I may be wrong). The Jetsons was put on TV as a “me too” or copycat show to catch that wave, and advertsing $’s! But George wasn’t as interesting as Fred. He was kind of wimpy, there was no male buddy (Barney). Fred Flintstone was so like the live action sitcom characters, you could almost forget he was a cartoon. The stone age world of the Flintstones was exactly like ours, with a comic twist.

The Jetsons did not resonate the same way, unless you were a sci fi fan, or a future fan. The Jetsons went off, and was revived much like the original Star Trek. The Flintstones took our world and changed it just enough for safe satire. The Jetsons took us to another world, one not everyone could relate to. In 1963, satire beat futurism. The same fate befell Star Trek six years later. In the 1980′s the world caught up with both series.

Live Long and Prosper George!

dg

Looking forward to the rest of the series!