Drawing blood

摘要

'Xi yangyang' is probably not the sort of cultural work Mao Zedong had in mind when he said that art should serve the revolution. But China's revolution now is of an entirely different sort. After earning multiple awards and huge audiences, 'Xi Yangyang' ('Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf') is being forced to change its winning formula, which has included copious amounts of callous cartoon violence. The bloody mayhem has taken many forms. Since the launch of the animated children's television show in 2005, there have been thousands of portrayals of a wolf being struck with a frying pan-usually by his wife. One episode showed a goat impaled on a spear and struggling to survive. Hundreds of others have shown a goat being boiled alive.