MonkeyBallistic wrote:I just don’t understand why, these days, anything written for children has to have children as its main characters. When I was a kids all of my favourite things (Doctor Who, Star Wars, Space 1999, Star Trek) were about grownups.
They weren't written for kids, they were written for kids, they were written to appeal to a wide audience. You look at old school horror and sci-fi and it looks campy as hell but at the time they could be very advanced and deal with real world concerns like the danger of nuclear war. Star Trek dealt with a lot of social issues, Star Wars was a spectical like Avatar was a few years ago, and even a show like Lost in Space was a favorite of my Grandfather who was a WWII combat vet. They're all a call back to pulp novels and radio shows which were made to appeal to the masses.
Why make stories about kid heroes? Because it's proven to market well towards younger audiences. There is a reason why super heroes got teen sidekicks, it sold really well and spread to very popular heroes like Spider-Man and the XMen.
SW had a Jedi Academy series for kids about the Solo kids and others being trained by Luke in the
EU. Harry Potter was definitely a kids series. While adults can and do enjoy these things, they are definitely marketed to children.
I am concerned that the presentation of violence and prejudice in
40k isn't the best without some education in the realities of things like war and oppression. I mean a cartoon like Exo Squad did an excellent job of telling an actual war story despite mostly being a vehicle to push toys.
40k is coming from the opposite direction which is harder dial back down without going with going "it's a different setting where a Commisar won't execute all three kids out of hand".
