This is what Maya was made for! Arnold’s attic apartment was every kid’s ideal bedroom, complete with all-glass ceilings, rooftop access, charmingly retro carpeting, and, who can forget, a remote-controlled flip-out couch. Friends were always hanging about, hatching secret plans, hosting sleep-overs, or just playing checkers. It was all very endearing, a decidedly adolescent vision of living in New York, where you always had time for adventures in the seemingly infinite and differentiated, Jane Jacobs-like “joyous urban jumble.” (Which begs the question, did Hey Arnold! inspire an entire generation of gentrification? Hmm…) The room itself was best rendered bathed in the pink hues of sunset, before transforming into an aquarium-like receptacle at nightfall–an effect heightened by the fact that Arnold’s dream state seemed triggered by the bedroom’s surreal interiors. This was the heyday of day-time television animation, and, sociological stereotypes aside, it was a sharp and funny (subliminal references to Freud and other cultural figures abound) account of childhood.

by Samuel Medina

posted in Uncategorized

tagged animation, cartoons, Hey Arnold!, maya, nickelodeon

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