Why Disney Channel Feels Dead At This Point?

Why Does Disney Channel Feels Dead At This Point? By Felix Saenz

 I wrote a journal about why Disney XD needs to die and I decided why not do the same for Disney Channel? The channel doesn’t seem to be as dead as Disney XD, but compared to Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network (when they eventually rebrand later this year), it’s looking to be one of the next kids channels to shut down, even if it won’t happen for a long time. But with a streaming service under its belt, it makes you wonder if watching Disney shows on linear tv is worth these days. I won’t be as critical as I was towards DXD but it’s still going harsh since I was never big on Disney to begin with.

First of all, I think Disney Channel has no purpose as a network anymore because most of the exciting stuff are now on Disney+. The linear network these days has nothing to offer outside of new episodes. There’s a person who runs the Disney Schedules account and you’ll notice how dead their channel are, especially Junior. https://twitter.com/DisneySchedules?s=20 All they do is constantly air the same shows over and over again. I’m pretty sure the target demographics will get sick of seeing nothing but Jessie, BUNK’d, Big City Greens, Puppy Dog Pals, Bluey, and TOTS fast and beg for the network to air other shows (but they can’t because those shows get all the ratings). I talked about how uneven the animation and live action ratio is and while 2018 show promise (with animation returning to Disney Channel full time), it’s too late to go exactly the same it was many years ago when they were perfectly balanced especially with its own streaming service being prominent. If you’re not preschool, BCG and Miraculous Ladybug (somehow that show is getting more screentime than the other Disney cartoons currently running), then animation is useless on Disney Channel. Even Disney and PIXAR movies have stopped airing on this channel for the most part. They are now mostly on Freeform if you can watch on live tv. They have aired a few times in the past year but only for certain events. As for DCOMs reruns, they have ran out of stuff to air. It’s mostly Descendants and Zombies reruns with the occasional standalone movies (that aren’t musicals). Basically there’s no variety anymore. I mean it’s sad since it used to take an advantage from Nick and CN: not having an adult themed block. But even their overnight schedule is a waste. It used to be a 6 hour block for ended shows (never mind the fact that their currently most played show is a show that already ended back in 2015), but now currently running shows get to play during those hours as well. Where’s Disney Replay when you need it? It’s getting so sad that freaking Disney Junior has lost better ratings than the main channel. And yet their scheduling aren’t any better (it’s been crap for years now even though the first few years were diverse). I think it’s time for Disney to shut down their channel in the States, if the time ever comes. Granted it used to be a premium channel so I don’t know how it’s ratings were like during its first 15 years of existence. But if they don’t do anything to impress the viewers the next few years, it’s time to say bye bye bye. Oh and another thing, the promos these days are atrocious. If you thought Nickelodeon being hip and cool was bad, then Disney is even worse at it and that may be the main reason why I’m slowly growing out of it. I’ve given up on the channel a couple times and this will be my next time if they don’t shape up. So long, Disney Channel. You were fun during my childhood but now it’s time to let it go. At least I’ll still have Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network on my side to watch for kids cable networks (and Disney+ for all the stuff related to Disney but that’s streaming). Keep in mind while I’m still looking forward to some of their shows, I’m better off watching them on Disney+ instead so I can have a better binge watching experience. I tried to not make this an essay because I didn’t have three reasons why. It was mostly about the streaming wars being a huge factor of declining interest in Disney networks.

Why TV Animation Is Better Position Now?

Why Is TV Animation in a Better Position Than They Were 12 Years Ago?

Hello this is Felix Saenz, writing a series of journals that will make people argue with me over my differing opinions. For this journal, I have decided to write about the state of television animation and how much it have came from their dork age in the late 2000s. And even though streaming is taking over, western animation is going strong more than ever. And here’s why...

First of all, better access. This can applies to tv in general but cartoons have a much better access to watch outside of cable, even if it’s piracy. Around 2010 is when cable being available in households started to decline and Netflix subscribers start to rise. During this time, Viacom had a deal with Netflix to stream their shows. This lasted until May 2013 where they suddenly got removed. Around the same time, Turner struck a deal with Netflix to stream their content. The biggest problem with this was that Netflix only streamed one season at a time, which means you had to wait a few months to see the other seasons. Unsurprisingly this didn’t last long as Viacom’s contract with Netflix and by 2015, they were gone. Both Viacom and Turner content went to Hulu for several years until they migrated to their own streaming services. And look where we are now. Thanks to streaming services, we now have a much better access to short lived and older shows. 

Second reason (and this is relevant to the journal), animation have seen a strong reassurance since 2010 started. If you people are feeling for nostalgic for the late 2000s, I urge you get to fuck out of this journal. I don’t have the nicest things to say about tv networks around this time period (especially aimed at kids). There’s a reason why I don’t look fondly back at Cartoon Network and Disney Channel during those years. Not so much with Nickelodeon but even they started to have their own problems like dedicating so much screentime to SpongeBob and by the time Cyma Zarghami became the president, Nick started favoring live action shows more than cartoons that wasn’t popular. The Noods era was beginning for CN in July 14, 2008 and you’d expect a fresh new outlook for CN’s future. Wrong! At the time, some greedy executive named Stuart Snyder thought it was a good idea to do live action on a network that have the word cartoon in its name. It was a rough time for us Animation fans. If you go up and ask any Cartoon Network fan, the general census that 2009 was THE WORST YEAR of all time. There were no new original cartoons from their own studios and all they did was shove CN Real down our throats. The only good thing to come out of was the schedule and to give this era credit is something I don’t want to do, because they did had more shows airing at the time as opposed to just Gumball and Teen Titans GO dominating the schedule (even with better content). By the time Snyder left, we never heard of those shows again. However, he did gave us CHECK IT era, where the network suddenly made its comeback by being Cartoon Network and not the Reality TV Network. There were shows like Adventure Time, Regular Show, Sym-Bionic Titan, Gumball, Steven Universe, etc. Yep, it was clear that CN was back to its old roots. Though its a matter of time before the schedule was no longer important to the live feed and became limited to just a few shows because binge watching is the hip thing to do. Now let’s discuss the Disney Channel debacle. This is purely my opinion (and other cartoon fans), but I also feel like Disney Channel itself (not the movie studios, the live action remakes won’t be a main thing until the mid 2010s) was starting to drift away from animation and instead show more content that was aimed at tween girls. Stuff like High School Musical and Hannah Montana weren’t exactly what tween boys who are animation fans want to watch Disney Channel. I did the same thing and didn’t watched much of the network until Phineas and Ferb and Fish Hooks were prominently airing. They’re in a better position now with extra animated shows on their channel (especially since Disney XD is about to be irrelevant) but only if they can let BUNK’d end so that Jessie can stop rerunning more than the other shows that are still airing new episodes. Nick on the other hand, had one of the most notorious and stricter business practices ever. Any new cartoon would dead if they didn’t stand up to SpongeBob’s ratings. It was a Cyma thing and it got worse over time. With Brian Robbins at the helm, this had only happened to Rise of the TMNT only because it was made from the previous management. But rest assured you, Nick is going to get better with this. They’ll have Netflix and Paramount+ to work with so we don’t have to deal with shows being dumped to Nicktoons and Teennick for low ratings. 

And last but not least, the quality of animated shows themselves. Many people will claim that television animation peaked in the 80s, 90s, or 2000s, but I digress. It doesn’t matter when animation was at its high point, there’s no end point when cartoons stopped being good. The 2010s and so far the 2020s prove that tv animation is still going strong. Don’t listen to what anime profile pictures on Twitter have to say, they are not going woke. They are jealous that western animation is taking more risks than their fanservice driven shows ever have. Some of the examples are representation of various culture like ethnicity, sexual orientation, etc. They also have expanded beyond comedy, and there’s various of cartoons with story arcs (even if they are going overboard in recent years), as well as sci-fi, slice of life (which was very popular in the 90s) and more. Now it doesn’t mean I’m dissing anime or the classic cartoons, but animation is evolving, and I mean that in a very good way. I thought most cartoons during the late 2000s were hit or miss. There were more misses because there weren’t that many memorable cartoons unless you look for a few quality ones like Phineas and Ferb and Chowder. All I’m saying, if it wasn’t for those shows and Flapjack and Adventure Time, we wouldn’t be in the position we are right now. And while there are quite a bit of revivals and spin-offs for some companies especially Nick, I really hope they don’t overshadow the promising original ideas from animators. What matters is that TV Animation is still in good hands. Nothing will ever go the way of 2009 ever again...let’s continue supporting new cartoons, regardless if their quality. Even if streaming takes over, there will still be quality cartoons on cable, it’s just the risky stuff have to be on streaming for having story arcs.