It feels a bit weird to call Hey Arnold! or Dexter’s Lab classic, but lets face it, as ’90s kids slowly grow up, these shows from Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon age as well. Here’s Isaiah K. Stephens, who picked a handful of cartoons from the ’90s, and remade their characters as realistic-looking adults.
Some of the results look really cool. Bonus points if you can identify everyone in the Hey Arnold! picture.
All Grown Up! by Isaiah K. Stephens [Tumblr]
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22 responses to “Classic Cartoon Characters, As Grown-Ups”
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Why are they mostly hipsters?
And the art direction doesn’t remotely match the styles. Where’s the Football head for Arnold?
yeah, the artist tried to make em so unique that they all ended up looking the same and very hipster.
They don’t know that they are hipsters
so they were hipster before they knew they were hipsters?
dayumn, that’s some complex level of hipception right there.
Ummm, well if you read the beginning description, it says realistic looking.
just looks like a bunch of teenage hipsters with the shows logo in the background… i looked straight at Hey Arnold and was like.. No football head.
It didn’t even occur to me until I got to Chuckie and then the South Park boys. They’re not even realistic hipsters, they’re caricatures of hipsters with every possible jarring stereotype jumbled together.
R34?
I only know South Park and Rugrats. I feel so old and irrelevant.
Er, in fact, SP is one of the newest franchises in this group. It may be the case that you are too young.
No, it’s because I was a teenager when the other cartoons were aired, and I began to watch SP as an adult. I only know Rugrats because my cousins watched it religiously.
I like how all the guys have the same body. Chucky is totally the gymrat type, yeah.
The only one that really feels like it matches any of the original characters style and attitude at all is the south park one.
Because it’s a carbon copy of the live-action version of them in that zip-lining episode with all the diahrhea
I honestly think a lot of people get hipster confused with generally decent/good fashion. When a larger majority of these drawings are wearing chinos, khakis and jeans with a shirt and t-shirt, none of which reference a 90’s or 80’s band I fail to see the hipster.
My version of a hipster is someone who is wearing brand new faded clothing(why!?) which may or may no be ripped and will probably with referencing some obscure pop-culture icon from days past. Also they will be wearing 2nd clothes, not because it is all that they can afford but because they think it is cool to imitate being on a lower income level. That, is a douchebag hipster.
Currently mainstream fashion is on a trend where it’s imitating aspects of hipster style. That’s where the confusion comes in.
This is what the watered down mainstream version of douchey hipsterism looks like:
poor bohemians –> Hipster douche imitation –> mall kid version.
I totally agree with: “they think it is cool to imitate being on a lower income level.”
I’m looking through to see which designs can even begin to constitute hipster fashion. Whether that’s the first wave of hipster that is now mainstream, the second wave of hipster that is now mainstream, or the new wave of hipster that isn’t mainstream yet. The only thing that comes close is Chuckie’s shorts and I don’t think that was the intention.
It’s just like back a ~decade where anyone with black or dark brown hair was considered emo.
They’re good drawings, even though the style of the character interpretation seems to be from the Justin Bieber school of “cool”.
South Park are the best The artist retained the original character in that pic more, the rest the cartoon characters are just subtle influences over the artist’s standard style of figure, they’re not interpretations.
Dexter’s Lab did their own interpretations of what grown up versions would look like, it was more interesting.
Heh, I lol’ed hard at the rugrats — namely because I used to play Utopia (swirve.com, anyone?) with the voice actor who did Dil Pickles (lame pun).
I never believed it until she referenced our Kingdom on her website. Good ol’ days.
So many of these I don’t know. Dammit I’m not old! *sob*
Does Tommy Pickles still carry a spare screwdriver in his pants?
I’d only heard of South Park and the Power Puff Girls. Who are all the rest of these people?
It seems pretty random anyway, just make a good looking, generic, late-teen early twenties character and give them the same coloured hair as the other character.
Nice art – though where’s the love for Doug? You can’t talk 90s toons without Doug. And what the hell was “Rocket Power”?
I’m also kinda disturbed by how … attractive … Spinelli from Recess looks. Didn’t see that coming.
These are Hott!!! Of course people would hate on the artist. He/she did an amazing job. Who gives a fuck if it’s hipster. If they made them all black, I’m sure you’d be upset about that too. How about we make them all circus freaks? Or would you rather see them all as half donkey half alien? …..it’s a realistic perspective of old school cartoons.