What Is CalArts Style and Why All the Fuss About It?

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In case you haven’t noticed, a lot of cartoons coming out these days have started to look very similar. It seems to have started with the release of Pendleton Ward’s Adventure Time back in 2010. Since then, more and more cartoons have started using a similar style of thin-lined animation.

Don’t believe me? Go watch a clip from Disney Channel’s Gravity Falls. Now go check out Cartoon Network’s Steven Universe. Now go watch the recent reboot of the classic cartoon ThunderCats called ThunderCats Roar. You can’t tell me that these cartoons don’t all share the same simplistic, whimsical, and rounded-off animation style.

Whether or not it gets under your skin that all these cartoons are utilizing a similar animation style is a different question entirely. Cartoon enthusiasts have been taking to the internet to criticize these animators for using what they’re calling the “CalArts style.”

If you’re wondering what the hell that means, it’s a reference to the California Institute of the Arts in Santa Clarita, a prestigious art school many of the great animators of the past few decades have attended. Animation purists online have been bashing CalArts graduates for propagating this style and diverging from the more complicated animation styles of the 1980s and 1990s in shows like the original ThunderCats or Captain Planet and the Planeteers. 

I think it’s pretty clear that, yes, there are many cartoons these days that look very similar in their animation styles. However, is it fair to accost these animators for going with the flavor of the day? Is the California Institute of the Arts really to blame for the homogenization of cartoon styles? Let’s take a look at what the haters are saying and what the animators are saying to see if we can make some sense out of this whole “CalArts style” ruckus.

What Is CalArts Style?

There’s really no strict definition for what the CalArts style is. It honestly depends on who you ask. In general, though, it’s been used by critics in a derogatory sense to criticize animators for a lack of creativity and a generally lazy approach to animation. It typically involves thin-lined drawings, characters with rounded faces and noodle-like arms and legs, and generic colors and shapes. The characters also typically feature large heads, small bodies, and ovular eyes. 

So, it’s pretty easy to see how you could group shows like Steven Universe, Gravity Falls, ThunderCats Roar, Star vs. the Forces of Evil, Regular Show, Adventure Time, and The Amazing World of Gumball under the “CalArts style”.

But what about Rick and Morty and Star Trek: Lower Decks, which both share some characteristics with the previously mentioned cartoons but also differ in many ways? Are they CalArts style? What about Dexter’s Laboratory, which has almost all of the characteristics of a “CalArts style” cartoon but was made far before this whole craze started? You see, there’s no hard-and-fast definition to what “CalArts style” means. 

The Origins of the Term

The term was first coined by John Kricfalusi, the creator of The Ren & Stimpy Show who was brought up on charges of underage sexual abuse in 2018. So, right off the bat, it’s probably better not to blindly trust that guy’s judgment. 

Apparently, Kricfalusi had been using the term since the 1990s, but in a blog post he wrote in 2010, he stated, “They kept doing the same things over and over again — and that’s what all the animators copy today — the decadent stuff, rather than the skills. Unfortunately, the people who grow up inspired by copies of copies of ‘60s Disney animation learn to accept these few superficial stylistic things and don’t realize they are doing it. They unconsciously absorb it and regurgitate it in their films until the next generation comes along.”

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So, Kricfalusi and later adopters of the term have essentially been making the argument that there is a sort of pipeline between the California Institute of the Arts and the Walt Disney Company. As a result, many of these CalArts animators are copying the styles of their predecessors and getting lazy (allegedly because they know that they’ll get a job with the Walt Disney Company regardless of the quality of their work just by virtue of being a CalArts grad). 

In summary, this is the theory of people who use “CalArts style” as a derogatory term. CalArts grads don’t have to be original or skilled to get a job with a major animation studio because they have an employment pipeline and connections in the industry, which is why so many shows utilize this “lazy” and “unoriginal” animation style. 

Is CalArts Really to Blame?

There is, in fact, a clear connection between CalArts and the Walt Disney Company. Walt Disney co-founded the school in 1961 and many CalArts graduates have gone on to have successful careers with the Walt Disney Company since then. However, does that really mean that there’s favoritism going on? Is it that surprising that graduates from the California Institute of the Arts, which has been referred to as the “Harvard Business School of animation,” are going to work for one of the largest animation studios in the world? 

There’s also the fact that many of the animators that are being charged with propagating the CalArts style did not actually attend CalArts. Kyle Carrozza created Mighty Magiswords, which fits into the “CalArts style” category as well as any cartoon out there, and he attended the Art Institute of Philadelphia.

John McIntyre, the head of animation for the Ben 10 reboot that could definitely be put under the CalArts style umbrella, attended the New York University Tisch School of the Arts. 

Alright, there are quite a few CalArts grads involved in making shows that some would classify as the CalArts style. However, there are also plenty of CalArts grads that are animating in very different and original styles as well. If you want to see some work that was produced by their 2021 class, check out the 2021 CalArts Character Animation Student Films on Vimeo.

Why Is the CalArts Style So Popular?

It’s important to remember that having a lot of cartoons on the air at the same time utilizing a similar animation style is not a new phenomenon. There were many cartoons throughout the 1990s that used nearly the exact same animation style. He-Man and the Masters of the Universe and ThunderCats were extremely similar in their styles, for instance. 

One of the other complaints about the “CalArts style” is its simplicity. However, using a simpler style of animation allows animators to produce content more quickly, and thus produce more content overall. Yes, this mostly comes down to money because the more content you’re able to produce, the more you can potentially make. But it also means that we cartoon fanatics have more cartoons to watch and more episodes of those cartoons coming out in rapid succession. 

Another reason that the CalArts style has become so popular is quite simply that it works. Adventure Time was a massive success. It was popular among young children, young adults, and even full-grown adults, and its ratings were through the roof. So it’s only natural that other animators would try to replicate that formula, as they do in every industry. It doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the California Institute of the Arts, it’s just business.