It may not be the best example, but the idea behind Velma is actually a pretty good one. Taking a beloved piece of childhood nostalgia and updating it to cater towards a more grown-up audience can result in some brilliant shows. Velma didn’t exactly win anyone over, but it wasn’t the first of its kind. Cartoons like Samurai Jack gave a 10-episode final season that targeted a more grown-up audience with a more mature story.
Banking on nostalgia will almost always bring success to the creators, so it’s very likely that we’ll be seeing more shows from our childhood get given the Velma treatment. With that said, we’ve compiled a list of 10 cartoons that we think would be great to see revamped for a more adult audience.
Johnny Bravo
The macho, Elvis-esque, self-proclaimed womanizer is a perfect choice for a more adult-themed adaptation. The show already toed the line with its adult comedy, often hinting at but never explicitly referencing sexual content, but bringing the show back and updating the humor would allow the writers to go all-out. Making Johnny even more crude than the PG cartoon could bring a whole new level of humor to the show. It would be perfect for the kind of humor that didn’t quite sit right in Velma and fans would expect from the narcissistic protagonist.
The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy
Let’s face it, this show was already too gruesome and dark for kids. With horrific spider-demons, gross-out body horror and jokes that probably should have never been allowed in a show for kids, the material’s already there, bring the show back and don’t hold anything back, the result will either be glorious or the worst thing ever created. Either way, it will be talked about for a long time afterwards.
There’s even more potential if we were to use the same tactic as Velma and focus on a single character. Every fan of The Grim Adventures would love to see a solo series for Mandy. After all, everyone loves a quick-witted, edgy female lead with a sharp tongue. For proof, just look at Netflix’s Wednesday adaptation. It would be great to see something along those lines for Mandy, and would still be fresh and exciting for fans of the original show. Such an update would be a sure-fire success.
Ed, Edd n Eddy
There’s been interest in a reboot of the classic 2000s show for a long time. It would be great to see the characters slightly older (but probably not any wiser). It’s been almost 15 years since the last episode and plenty has changed in that time. To see the Ed’s interact with the modern world would be as entertaining now as it was in the 2000s.
The show’s creator, Danny Antonucci, has stated that he would likely never return to Ed, Edd n Eddy as he would rather work on more adult-oriented animation, such as his infamous short Lupo the Butcher, a cartoon that follows a foul-mouthed, impatient butcher who’s better at chopping his own fingers than he is at chopping meat. There’s a lot of gore and a lot of swearing and it’s all presented in a slapstick comedic fashion. It would be great to see Antonucci take the same approach to the beloved kids cartoon as an adult revamp. That way, he can still bring his own brand of adult humor whilst giving fans a long-awaited reboot of Ed, Edd n Eddy. That’s what you’d call a win-win.
Rugrats
We all watched Rugrats as kids; the show has been heralded as one of the best kids cartoons of the nineties. There was a follow-up show All Grown Up! that centered Tommy and the other kids as young teens. It would make sense to give us another follow-up series that focuses on the lives of the characters as adults. It would be a great nostalgic throwback and could deal with more adult issues that wouldn’t have been touched on in the first two shows like working and paying bills… actually, that sounds a little bit depressing. But we’re sure there are some talented writers that could make a great show centering on Tommy Pickles and co. as they navigate the adult world.
Phineas and Ferb
A more adult revamp of this show could fill the Rick and Morty-shaped hole in the world. Turning the childhood wonder of invention and imagination into a crazy sci-fi comedy would allow the writers to do some real damage out there.
While that does sound like a winning formula for a show, we think there’d be great potential for a spy thriller/comedy series focusing on Perry the Platypus and Dr. Doofenschmirtz. It doesn’t even necessarily need to be aimed at adults, we know that the adults would watch a show about Perry regardless. He already has a theme song, all that’s needed is some writers and animators to give us what we want. Perhaps it could take inspiration from shows like Archer, perhaps not. We don’t care, just make it happen.
The Powerpuff Girls
Although the CW Network were rumored to be working on a live-action adaptation of the super-powered trio, we haven’t heard anything on that in a long while. The show was supposed to focus on the girls when they were older, maybe that idea could be taken and adapted into a more grown-up cartoon for the fans of the original show.
With the rise of the MCU and DCU it would be great to see a take on superheroes that doesn’t come from these massive studios. There’s already an extensive rogues gallery that we’d love to see in an updated form. Somebody at Cartoon Network make this happen!
Fairly Odd Parents
The show only finished six years ago, but many stopped watching long before that. Unfortunately, the appeal of Fairly Odd Parents waned as time went on and the jokes got stale and the storylines got repetitive and boring. The format of this cartoon definitely needs to be re-imagined. Why not try something completely new? A follow-up that shows a grown-up Timmy Turner could be the key to restoring the show to its former glory. The kids who grew up with the show would love to see the characters again, but the humor and storylines would need some tweaking to appeal to a more grown-up audience.
A story focusing on an older Timmy Turner would be interesting, and yes, we know, it’s been done already, but the movie with Drake Bell was a mistake and we wish we could unsee it. Another roadblock to a reboot following adult Timmy Turner is that he’s canonically a 60 year old man in a 10 year old’s body. Yeah… later seasons of the show get very complicated and weird. Might just be best to wipe the slate clean and start with a fresh character for this one.
Danny Phantom
The plot of this show is already genius and it already has a devoted following. The concept of the ghost zone and the other ideas the show presents are ripe for plundering and developing into a more mature adaptation that could bring different elements the original show never touched on. For example, the show could work great as a supernatural thriller/horror with a different ghostly threat every episode, à la Scooby Doo.
It would be great to see the source material adapted into a somewhat darker and more serious take that maybe leans into a horror direction, plus, the show only ran for three years, so it would be great to see it get another chance with a fresh perspective for the adult fans.
Kim Possible
A crime-fighting heroine who has to juggle her life as a spy with high school drama? This sounds like a Netflix executive’s dream. Kim Possible has all the things we love to watch; action, comedy and drama. The format of the show would make it perfect to adapt into something very similar to Velma, without hopefully being as much of a disappointment as that show was. Whilst Kim is the perfect protagonist for a reboot of this sort, we wouldn’t say no a Dr. Drakken and Shego spin off, or even a show that centers around Rufus.
Courage the Cowardly Dog
Like The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, Courage the Cowardly Dog would be a great series if it were brought back as an outright horror. Think of something along the lines of Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey. Maybe we could have a reboot centring around Courage protecting the farm and Eustace and Muriel from some kind of Lovecraftian horror like the Spirit of the Harvest Moon. That thing was terrifying enough in the original cartoon.
We all know that the show is already arguably too scary for children with many who grew up watching the show still scarred to this day by some of the character designs and plots from the old cartoon (Again, just look at the Spirit of the Harvest Moon). Just imagine how much more nightmare fuel could be injected into the show if children weren’t its target audience.
Nostalgia with a twist
There’s plenty of great cartoons out there that we’d love to revisit as adults. Giving someone the opportunity to provide a different perspective on a beloved IP can create some of the best pieces of fiction. New ideas are born from taking something old and updating it, a lot of these cartoons even started out with the intention of being for adults before their creators changed their minds.
There’s a growing trend on most streaming platforms of taking an established childhood cartoon and adapting the material to make it more appropriate for adults. It’s likely we’ll be seeing a lot more shows in the same vein as Velma or Wednesday in the coming years. It works because most of the children who grew up with these characters are adults themselves now, seeing characters from our childhood grow up with us is something that will never get old.