A preview of the revival of the early 2000s Cartoon Network show, "The Powerpuff Girls," was just revealed.The reboot, which was initially announced in 2014, features new voice actors and is animated differently than the original cartoon. The new series is rumored to air in April or over the summer this year.
The preview features the three girls at a carnival where a new unnamed villain threatens to destroy everything. He challenges anyone who is "man enough" to stop him. However, none of the other carnival-goers want to be bothered. Buttercup takes it upon herself to confront the lumberjack-looking bad guy who calls her "princess". This enrages her and Buttercup processes to throw the villain across town who even says she "throws like a girl" as he flies away.
As a fan of the original series, I was certainly looking forward to this, albeit with a little skepticism. When the Powerpuff Girls aired the special, "Dance Pantsed", with a wannabe anime-esque animation, I was worried that this was what the reboot would look like. Then when I found out original voice actors including Tara Strong (Bubbles) was not going to be in the new cast I was disheartened. Especially when you consider what Strong did and continues to do voice work for shows like The Rugrats, both Teen Titans, The Fairly OddParents and more.
However, I think I don't think I like this use of obvious feminism for the sake of feminism. The preview above shows a stereotypical display of sexism when the villain says that he's looking for someone who is man enough. While the original series did tackle some of these kinds of issues, I feel like the original ones dealt with topics in a less obvious way. Such as when all of the villains had come together to defeat the episode "Members Only" it was shown that Professor Utonium did all of the domestic work which I'm sure many kids still indirectly grow up with the idea that these are a part of a woman's job. It went even farther than that by saying that a woman can do a man's job when it was said that Bubbles mows the lawn. Although, seeing that I'm older now, I may just have a different perspective on things that I didn't have before.
This also leads me to question whether other newer social issues will show up in future episodes like LGBT+ rights and issues with police brutality. I believe that these issues can be presented in a way children can understand if handled correctly but I just don't think the show will be that deep.
