Fraggle Rock Retrospective (Part Two): And the Rock Goes On and On

If you missed part one, click here before the guilt overtakes your whole life.

The early reviews of Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock are in and it sounds like the critics are embracing the show. I'm particularly impressed with the way the reviewers are able to separate their childhood nostalgia from viewing the new show on its own merits; I myself have not had the chance to try it on and I expect I'll be going through a bit of a transitional period, but I have to say I'm enthusiastic.

If the show proves to be successful I think we can all expect a wave of negativity from the voices who can't, or won't, separate that nostalgia (I observe this all the time on the Scooby-Doo threads). I GET the emotional attachment, the original show was a kind of lightning in a bottle on par with Batman: The Animated Series. But let's also be fair, not all the original episodes were home runs. For every boat ride about white birds and death there was some jazz about the Gorgs' soufflé that just feels like hole filler.

So as a contribution to the cause I've selected thirty of the ninety-six episodes as my personal Fraggle pond for you to dip your toes into. "THIRTY?" you say, "That's a lot! That's three times the usual top ten list!" I KNOW that boulder-brain, I'm being nice. What I've done is taken each of the main Fraggles and the selected the five best episodes that showcase them, demonstrate character growth, or are just kind of awesome in some way; you can pick your favorite. And I've also included a selection of episodes that don't really settle on which Fraggle is the protagonist but are too good to ignore.

So grab your postcards and hold onto your radish bars because it's about to get a little bit silly in here.

Gobo's Decisive Top Five:

I've often wondered if statistically Gobo is the Fraggle least likely to be a kid's favorite. As the 'leader' his personality has fewer of the fun quirks the supporting cast gets and he tends to start out with an advantage as the voice of reason. But serving as the audience's surrogate, you're pretty much guaranteed to find Gobo at the center of any story that advances the overall mythology of the Rock. His weaknesses are usually his strengths not kept in check; confidence becomes arrogance, determination becomes stubbornness. And a lot of times his mistakes are the ones that have the most impact on others.

5. The Honk of Honks (season 5, episode 12)

I hate to direct you to the penultimate episode of the series right through the gate but this is one of the rare times a story can feel epic with almost nothing at stake. Gobo is tasked by Cantus to sound the titular Honk of Honks so the Fraggles can sing the Song of Songs; it's kind of a thing. Gobo has an often tenuous relationship with authority figures; in fact the Trash Heap is the only one who maintains his respect from the start of the series to the end. And while Cantus can give Gobo a loving dressing down, the answer always feels well-earned in the end.

4. The Day the Music Died (season 2, episode 18)

While a few miscommunications nearly bring on the end of the Fraggles' civilization, it's clear nobody is actually at fault. Sometimes shit happens because you don't have all the information you need; in this case, how much the Fraggles' survival depends on music. Gobo's fighting spirit is the savior here as he refuses to give up, even as the darkness is killing him (excuse me, putting him to sleep forever, much better). His last ditch effort isn't even intended as a long shot, it's just him deciding how he's going to go out. Perhaps dumb luck, or maybe he just knows even when he doesn't know he knows.

3. Gobo's Discovery (season 1, episode 21)

I wouldn't say self-doubt is a heavy topic, but it's definitely a complicated one, and pretty abstract for a debut seasons that's given us easily-resolvable conflicts about finding Boober's hat and going back to eating Doozer constructions. It's sad to see Gobo having an existential crisis, but it's even worse when you realize Fraggle Rock is the least qualified place to handle one. Fraggles know who and what they are, even a misfit like Boober has a grip on his identity. Nobody is going to be able to help him through it. In fact the only other character who goes through something similar in the series is Cotterpin Doozer, and we're a few seasons away from that support group.

2. Uncle Matt Comes Home (season 2, episode 5)

Throughout season one Gobo clearly had a trajectory of aging, going from about a ten year version of himself to a fifteen. With his Uncle Matt (literally the only parental figure for any of the Fraggles) exiting his life in this younger mindset, Gobo retains the idea of who his uncle is through the whole season. But with Matt's temporary return, both uncle and nephew realize that neither one is quite who they're expecting. Gobo has grown, and Matt isn't used to a teenager. Inevitably there's a blow up, even if neither one is clear on why.

1. The Bells of Fraggle Rock (season 3, episode 1)

This is the best Gobo (and Cantus) episode, and one of the most innovative 'Christmas' stories. At the core of it is an original solstice myth that every non-Gobo Fraggle accepts as face value; even Wembley doesn't budge on his belief in it. But Gobo can't accept a story without proof, and sets out to find the Great Bell at the worst possible time. Now with a short run time of 25 minutes the episode simply can't cover everything it wants to, but the believer/non-believer debate and the notion of spiritual betrayal are alluded to, hopefully enough to inspire real-world discussions. And there's nothing more chilling (get it?) than the moment Cantus finally drops the mystical shtick and challenges Gobo with logic.

Mokey's Five Inner Voices:

There's an episode I haven't selected for this list where Cantus and the minstrels offer Mokey a spot in their band. And as much as she wants to go with them and collect songs, her friends in the Great Hall mean too much to her. That spot, with one foot in a team mom role and one foot in the unknown, sums up Mokey. She's slightly older, wiser, and more intuitive than the others, and under most circumstances her life would be fairly drama-free. But she has friends with strong personalities. Like any empath, she tends to absorb the emotions around her, and when those eyelids roll back you know something's about to erupt.

5. Mokey's Funeral (season 1, episode 22)

One of the ongoing conflicts regarding Mokey is the fact that, like so many nurturers, she's treated as if she's incompetent when it comes to handling challenges of the physical world. She's a maternal figure to be protected, not allowed to get her hands dirty; all the more curious as she's the one who spends the most time around the Gorgs. It hurts when her ideas are pre-dismissed as impractical, and it's devastating when her poetry (read: soul) is mocked as irrelevant. For all their song bursts, Fraggles have a mean side, but it's a gentle heart like Mokey who's most likely to learn and use an unFraggle phrase like "F**k you" if she gets pushed far enough.

4. The Incredible Shrinking Mokey (season 3, episode 20)

Fraggles are innocently insensitive, which is harmful enough but usually resolvable without too many tears. So it takes an outside character (one shot Begoony) to tackle the family-friendly concept of an abusive relationship. Many times in the series an abstract idea is presented as concretely as possible; in this case Begoony's constant demands of Mokey literally begin shrinking her until she's just his plaything. Her way out is obviously much smoother than in real life incidents of abuse, but the point her is to start showing kids the warning signs. Suffice to say, if you start seeing yourself reflected in Begoony it's on you to get off that path.

3. The Preachification of Convincing John (season 1, episode 6)

Convincing John makes three appearances through the show's run and all three of them have made my list. It's not that I have a particular affection for the character, but from a story point of view he's very good at escalation. Funny thing, even in his debut appearance he doesn't have his own opinion, he's just doing what Mokey's asked him to do. The real conflict comes from Mokey's belief that eating Doozer towers is wrong, and she forces her belief on everyone else in a manner that raises some real questions about political power in the Rock. Fortunately Mokey also the type who's willing to admit when she's wrong.

2. The Secret Society of Poobahs (season 3, episode 10)

Family entertainment produces a whole lot of content that's classified as humorous, but very little of it is actually funny. This episode is really funny. The short version, Mokey's getting punked. Not maliciously so, the substantial network of pranksters isn't trying to make her look stupid; it's more like they're making themselves look stupid for the sole purpose of getting a laugh out of her. But Mokey's stuck so deeply in her own head that she can't see the humor. Hell, even at the end she only kind of gets it on her own, but she gets there nonetheless. Of special note, this episode is Convincing John's third and final appearance, and it's fun  to see who he is without his 'Convincing' adjective at work. So...John Fraggle I guess.

1. The New Trash Heap in Town (season 1, episode 24)

Kudos to Fraggle Rock writing team for their selection of difficult topics, but sometimes I can't really tell if the end result works or not. The season one finale is a fairly light presentation of a highly nuanced issue, and I keep wembling between whether they should have gone darker or if the horror is best left in the subtext for the adults to discover. At any rate, this gets worse the more you think about it. The Fraggles are having the same collective nightmares and the Trash Heap's wisdom is temporarily cut off. So scared community needing relief. They turn to Mokey, but not just to hear her insights but to actually think for them. In other words the happy go-lucky Fraggle create and fall victim to their own cult. And it's a telling peek into Mokey's psyche how unappreciated, and possibly unloved she ordinarily feels that the sudden adulation takes hold of her immediately. All I can say is thank God she's willing to listen to reason over her own praise.

Wembley's Five Best Or Maybe Not:

From a writing perspective, Wembley is the go-to character whenever a situation needs someone to randomly walk in and ask for clarification on what's going on; i.e. the Doctor Who companion. As the proverbial 'child' character, Wembley's overarching arc most closely resembles what Fraggle Rock's creative team wants the audience to take from the show. Phase one: identifying the innocence in life and doing one's best to preserve it. Phase two: recognizing that sometimes innocence can't be protected and learning to adapt. Phase three: developing a wisdom to notice when the world would be better for actively creating a change.

5. We Love You, Wembley (season 1, episode 13)

It's telling how the Wembley-centric episodes seem to contain the highest concentration of one shot characters. Lou Fraggle, who nobody manages to bump into before or after this one encounter (raising some questions about the Rock's population) is his first. It's a real pity she doesn't stick around because her street-smart 'I-don't-have-time-for-this-shit' attitude is rather intriguing for a Fraggle to have. And maybe there's a variant world out there where Lou Fraggle is the star of her own series. But as is, she effectively plants a seed in Wembley's sycophancy (it will grow later) to ask the question "If I don't want this, why am I agreeing to it?".

4. Wembley and the Mean Genie (season 3, episode 9)

You've never heard the saying 'a heart of gold attracts moths' before because I just made it up, but it certainly applies here. Wembley was destined to meet a real bully at some point and I can't help but wonder how it might have played out if Wembley didn't have discovered power over the genie. But the important thing is that Wembley does manage to hold on to the aforementioned innocence (in this case seeing the best in people) all the way through, and the fact that he never presses his advantage probably makes him better than me.

3. The Secret of Convincing John (season 2, episode 14)

I'd love to watch this episode in a graduate school class for therapists. Wembley's defining trait of indecisiveness is played as a mental health issue with potential consequences; he almost gets Gobo killed because he can't decide where to tie off a security rope. Enter Convincing John with his bag of mind-control tricks to reprogram Wembley's brain. It goes poorly. Not only is it uncomfortable seeing Wembley decisive to the point of arrogance, but we get a peek at a deep rooted self-loathing that we never knew was there. And when you factor in that Convincing John has the same affliction, one wonders what kind of master manipulator Wembley could actually turn into.

2. The Gorg Who Would Be King (season 5, episode 11)

Junior Gorg's character development over five seasons reaches its conclusion when a mishap shrinks him to Fraggle size and he sees the world through their eyes. Wembley is the one who takes him under his wing, and in the process defuses a near-mobbing of Fraggles who seem ready to dole out some karmic punishment. That's how far Wembley's come by now, he knows what's right and he's willing to stand alone for it if he has to. "We're all connected" has been the theme of the show, but Wembley being the one to teach it to a Gorg is a resolution I don't think any of us were expecting.

1. Gone But Not Forgotten  (season 5, episode 7)

Oh man. Arguably the best episode of the whole series, this is dealing with Mr. Hooper's death if we actually watched it on screen. Wembley makes a friend with a very short lifespan. And watches him die. That's pretty much the plot, of course the thing that makes it work is how much time they devote to processing the emotions that follow. Sometimes you just have to hurt it out and Wembley accepts that he's been changed forever by the experience. Death just is. And it sucks that that's all the resolution we get, but anything more than that is a lie. Just because.

Bonus- Five Shared protagonist Episodes:

The Challenge (season 1, episode 14)

It's advertised as a Red episode but it's just as much a journey for Gobo. While the hierarchy doesn't exactly resolve and there will be several points where we revisit this power struggle, Red makes her demand for respect pretty clear. It's subtle, but there's a turning point moment where Gobo asks her for permission to borrow one of her earlier ideas. As in life, you're not always aware of what you're learning.

Marooned (season 1, episode 17)

I think it was a misstep for later seasons to neglect the bond Red and Boober developed throughout season one. They don't realize it but they're actually very similar in a lot of ways; headstrong, highly opinionated, really brave in their respective elements and really afraid outside of them. Dave Goelz and Karen Prell's performances in this episode might be the unbeatable Oscar clip in all of Muppet history; they allegedly had half the crew in tears during the filming.

Fraggle Wars (season 2, episode 17)

Perhaps more of a Tri-Force episode featuring the Red/Mokey coin and one shot character Beige. The Bert Fraggles (see my previous post) are proudly unfun, and possibly the group Boober actually belongs with. The Ernies nearly come to violence with them over (to Red's understandable horror) not liking the same jokes. Sometimes conflict is inevitable, but it's crucial to remember what you're fighting for instead of just honing in on who you're against. When Red and Beige both realize that they want what's best for Mokey a peaceful solution presents itself.

Scared Silly (season 3, episode 13)

Okay let me get this out of the way; Boober is my favorite character, but he's really being a dick here. As cathartic as it is finally seeing him on the dominant side of scaring people, his treatment of Wembley in this episode is unforgivable. What was going to be the endgame? Give Wembley a nervous breakdown? Dude, not cool. Funny as hell, yes, but you were over the line and you knew it.

Wonder Mountain  (season 4, episode 11)

The Fraggles do Looney Tunes. Street smart Red feels she needs to protect book smart Mokey from the street, and while her intentions are good they're inadvertently insulting. As such, Red winds up in whatever trouble she's trying to overprotect Mokey from and has to be bailed out. It's a natural conflict of interests, Mokey wants to have an adventure and Red wants to keep her safe. I can't really tell if a lesson is learned or not, but it's a great journey. Um, one question, didn't they technically leave the avalanche monster to die?

Boober's Five Greatest Worries:

So as much of a Fraggle Rock connoisseur as I am, you might think when I first heard about the series I was planted right in front of the HBO logo on day one. Well boy are you dumb. In 1983 I was ten (and eleven respectively) and starting to age out of children's entertainment, which is what the show looked like. I'd catch an episode here and there whenever we'd misplace the remote, but for a while I wasn't connecting with it. But then something about that grouchy misfit character with no visible eyes caught my attention. As an unwilling pre-teen with no resources for depression, the spark of representation suddenly crackled. Dave Goelz, the one (and currently only) mastermind behind Gonzo was about to throw me a life preserver in my sea of adolescence. Dude, PLEASE write an autobiography before we lose you.

5. Boober's Quiet Day (season 2, episode 23)

I wasn't a huge fan of the whole Sidebottom subplot, but it did give us this great screwball comedy episode about one little lie that snowballs into a whole charlatan performance. Sidebottom is Boober's fun side which he actively suppresses. If that doesn't make any damn sense, congratulations, you probably don't live with depression. But like anything ambiguous that you try to keep control of, it gets away from you in an instant. Boober wants a quiet day, but his fun side can't accept the boring act of asking for one, so he tells a lie. And then another. And again. And spoilers, he doesn't get his quiet day.

4. Boober and the Glob (season 3, episode 3)

I imagine Boober was a hard character to come up with stories for as his ultimate goal was to be left alone. But here again is a setup where too much fun was about to push him out of his comfort zone, in  this case Joke Day. He tries to escape but trips over Cotterpin Doozer (a character you'd expect him to get along with) and then witnesses the arrival of a Glob that eats Doozers. The other Fraggles don't see it as something to worry about, but Boober worries about everything. And when he watches Cotterpin get swallowed, a seed of heroism begins to sprout in him.

3. I Don't Care (season 1, episode 15)

The promo to this episode was what got me hooked on the show. Boober is afraid of everything in Fraggle Rock, and between the Glob and the Terrible Tunnel it's hard not to see his point. But he finds a placebo to give him courage in the form of a lucky blanket that only seems to attract misery to him. As he gets angrier his friends only bounce between confused and insensitive towards his feelings. It's worth noting that the conflict gets violent before it gets resolved, which was the one line even the Fraggle Wars episode didn't cross.

2. Boober Rock (season 2, episode 2)

Well he finally does it. Boober pulls up stakes and moves away from the noise where he thinks he'll be happier. The experienced introvert can recognize why Boober moving away isn't ultimately going to work out for him; he needs other Fraggles. He may not be able to stand them on the surface, but Boober has always done the cooking and the laundry because he honestly wants to. But that's not an interesting story so let's go with Plan B; it's dangerous to go alone. The same killer plants that almost do Red and Lanford in in season three make their debut here, this time with an amnesia spray. Boober Rock isn't quite the horror tale that The Terrible Tunnel is, but you've got to give it credit; this is the only episode that smothers it's own song.

1. The Doomsday Soup (season 2, episode 19)

We don't tend to think of Boober as a fighter but when he has to throw down he can even make Gobo's jaw drop. Boober knows he's the black sheep, and a lot of his stories are about him trying to change something (himself or his situation) to alleviate that discomfort. In The Doomsday Soup, he starts with a reluctant acceptance that he's always going to be the odd one. A series of chemistry malfunctions creates a soup capable of turning Fraggles invisible, which the others treat as a blessing while Boober worries about the potential consequences. But for once he gets rewarded for staying true to his unpopular opinions when he witnesses the soup cause a rock quake. He's not believed, but safety is more important to him than approval; hence when he throws down against Junior Gorg and orders him out of the way. In that moment, Boober proves he's the Fraggle you don't want to screw with.

The Five Rules of Red's Club:

If there's one character who could survive in a solo spinoff from the series it's Red. The Fraggle Rock creative team was incredible, but I can't help feeling like Red kind of created herself in the same way that really dominant personalities like Bugs Bunny revealed themselves to the animators. Red is a very complex character, being both the star athlete and her own cheerleader, and yet without coming across as narcissistic. We're all driven by two conflicting needs, to be included and to be exceptional. Red probably comes the closest to finding the balance between the two. She knows her worth, even if she sometimes misjudges what she can do with it. I think we all need a Red in our life and wish we could be a bit more like her.

5. Red Handed and the Invisible Thief (season 3, episode 2)

Rule one: if you're going to fail, fail spectacularly. Red's self-confidence is more likely to get her in trouble than anything else as she demonstrates when she becomes convinced that her best friend is stealing her radish bars (yuck, by the way). Through a very thorough investigation Red figures out in the most embarrassing way that she's been eating them herself in her sleep. But watching her have to pull her foot out of her mouth and apologize to Mokey is an inspiration. Red's not afraid of being wrong, and that self-confidence extends to her ability to admit it.

4. Inspector Red (season 5, episode 10)

Rule two: 'I can do it' is your mantra, whether you can or not. Another crime takes place in the Rock and Red jumps at the chance to solve it. Alas, patience isn't her strong suit, and every time she gets a lead she misinterprets it as a solution. The mistakes she makes get progressively more humiliating for her, but they never deter her from the follow through. In the end she gets a flash of out-of-the-box thinking to save her own ass and pulls off a victory. Oh one more thing, can we take the Fraggles' "the punishment for false accusation is worse than the punishment for stealing" and apply it to the real world?

3. The Garden Plot (season 1, episode 20)

Rule three: you're stronger than you think you are. I believe Red's animosity towards Uncle Matt has to do with a resentment of how fearless he is. Fearless isn't the same as courageous (the former is closer to oblivious) but when you're focused on results the difference isn't evident. But because of Uncle Matt Gobo regularly goes one room into Outer Space, which automatically grants him a one-up on her. Red's need to prove herself isn't always the healthiest motivator, but MAN when it's time to act she's a force to be reckoned with. Not only does she save Fraggle Rock from an explosion, she takes down Junior Gorg by herself.

2. Playing Till it Hurts (season 3, episode 17)

Rule four: everyone has limits. Red hears her hero Rock Hockey Hannah is visiting from...um...Who-Knows-Where to watch her play (seriously, where do these one shot characters go?). The peek into Red's psyche is a nightmare sequence where we see her teaching herself the terrible advice we teach all of our athletes about pushing through the pain. 'I can do it' is a valuable mentality to get you started, but it's crucial to accept that sometimes you just can't. "I can't" is probably the hardest thing Red has ever had to say, and it's touching to see the moment get a stamp of approval from her hero.

1. Red's Club (season 2, episode 13)

Rule five: always ask yourself why you're doing what you're doing. Relationships are complicated, and even though Red got out of Gobo's shadow multiple times already, his 'voice of the group' still carries too much weight for her. The thing is, if their power dynamic were reversed it would be very effective (although we wouldn't get as many stories out of it). Red is a born leader who benefits from being challenged by a larger picture guy like Gobo; it's understandable why she resents his presumed position of doling out permissions. This whole episode is heartbreaking because we can see she doesn't really know what she wants, and she keeps driving wedges between her and people who care about her trying to figure it out. But it culminates in her most bad-ass moment of the series when she offers her service to Pa Gorg and them gives a 'screw this, I'm out of here' rescue to her friends. You go girl!

The Trash Heap has spoken. Nyeeeeah!

Fraggle Rock Retrospective (Part One): 'Cause We Belong to the Song

Fraggle Rock has nearly slipped into the ether as 'that thing my parents keep mentioning to their friends'. Surely everyone knows the theme song, as it modernized the irresistable hand-clap before Friends got there. But not everyone is familiar with the series that followed it.

The Jim Henson Company is on the brink of an attempt to change that with the release of Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock in less than a week; and if this weren't the creative bachelorminds behind The Happytime Murders I might actually be openly optimistic, but let me honor Mokey's wishes and focus on the positive. Here's what you need to know:

Debuting in 1983, Fraggle Rock was the family show that was meant to end war. Do I mean that literally? No, unles it does, then yes.

Jim Henson was coming off the success of The Muppet Show and found himself in a position to do practically any project he wanted. His creative inner circle (save Frank Oz, who'd been following his own path towards film directing) was at the height of their synergy. They were tasked with a simple question: what if a television show could end war?

Now this is where the division between the artist and the entrepreneur shows itself. I think everyone who's not a truly awful human being recognizes two things here: 1. A world without war would be a good thing. 2. It isn't possible. The entrepreneur values the tangible and says "It can't be done, let's focus on what can." The artist says "It can't be done, but the conversation is still worth having, and exploring, and if we come out on the other side with a more empathetic understanding of each other then it's worth doing."

It's worth doing.

Things tend to happen in threes. For Jim Henson and the Muppets, that Tri-force was Sesame Street, The Muppet Show, and Fraggle Rock. Sesame Street is a permanent staple of educational television. The Muppets are a franchise (currently under Disney's infallible leadership). But the Fraggles haven't been in the public eye much. They were Gen X's thing, and kind of the Millennials depending on where and when you were. But aside from that, the little furry guys have all but become relics of a more innocent time. Maybe that will change in a week, maybe it won't, but while the zeitgeist sorts that out it's worth taking a few moments (or hours of blog writing) to look back on the things we love and celebrate why.

Today I'm going to do a completely biased top ten list; probably starting a war with other Fraggle Rock enthusiasts who feel differently.

Top Ten Fraggle Songs

Now there's no way in hell I'm going to be able to organize these in terms of best of the best. The music of Fraggle Rock (almost entirely composed by Philip Balsam and Dennis Lee) is as much a character as any of its lead performers, and my soul already hurts for the omission of some genuine favorites (not limited to: Go With the Flow, Sail Away, Muck and Goo, Remembering Song, I Sniff the Rose, There's a Promise, Do You Want it?, Pass it On, and The Rock Goes On). But I have to draw a line somewhere between blogpost and fully comprehensive watch guide; so I'm limiting it to ten.

I don't know what to say about the fact that six(ish) of them are from season one. I don't think the quality of the songs ever waned. It may have had to do with the way the episodes were written early on, perhaps more conscious of how the songs would fit into advancing the narrative. I don't know. But here are my top ten selections in the approximate order you'd encounter them if you went straight through the series.

1. Thimble Beetle Song

First off, I can't stress how important the character of Red is, not just to the series but to our culture. In 1983 geneder norms were blatantly divided. Competitiveness and athletics were purely for the boys; I don't even think the word 'tomboy' had made it into the colloquial vocabulary. Red broke the mold.

Curiously her wonderful performer Karen Prell was a self-proclaimed Mokey in real life, and wasn't pleased with being cast as this character she didn't immediately understand. But episode 7 "I Want to be You" where Red tries to force herself into Mokey's image gave Prell the handle on who Red was by expunging who she wasn't. And nowhere was this more delightfully on display than in the exquisite tongue twister of "Thimble Beetle Song". As a public service, here's the line where Red fails spectacularly.

See the little simple, silly, dimpled, pimpled daughters as they flirt with dirty otters while they flit 'n flatten spatulas and smack-a-whiz and rat-a-tat and flatten maddened hatters on a skitzy kitten stone.

2. The Ballad of Sir Blunderbrain

Oh man. In the first seven episodes it's established that the Fraggles sing and play and work a job thirty minutes a week, and the threats to their existence all come from external worlds. And by now you're thinking you want to pull up stakes and move in with them. And then this shit happens.

"The Terrible Tunnel" (episode 8) is a horror story. Not a Muppets Alice Cooper Halloween celebration, but a very real nightmare of a tunnel in Fraggle Rock that swallows Fraggles, that Uncle Matt seemed to have accidentally avoided, and that still exists wherever it is.

The Ballad of Sir Blunderbrain, as sung by the supporting character only know as the Storyteller, is the tale of a brave-naive Fraggle who meets a truly godawful fate. And from the moment the song's opening guitar chords start, you know this episode isn't dicking around with you anymore. Oh, by the way, it gets even worse when Wembley almost immediately after gets lured to the tunnel himself. Did I mention it's still out there?

3. Doc's Instrumental

I don't know what percentage of Fraggle Rock's creative drive was meticulously planned out versus grown organically, but there's a natural age progression of the POV characters through Jim Henson's big three. Sesame Street is the kids who are built for pretend. The Muppet Show is the range of career adulthood, incorporating grown-ups who went into an artistic field. Fraggle Rock gives us one on screen adult character and he's an elderly man.

Now I can only speak on the American/Canadian version of Doc but it cannot be overstated how brilliant Gerry Parks was in the role. He was and adult with adult issues; he paid bills, he was grumpy, he'd had a fairly normal life and career, and yet he'd held onto traces of the childlike wonder that most adults sacrifice. And as an inventor of relatively useless things he continued doing what made him happy.

His best invention was his version of a calliope which incorporated about two dozen party favors; something Spike Jones or Dr. Seuss would have snatched up on sight. Even if the patent office didn't recognize the thing's potential, Gobo did. And coming from a creature who practically lives off music, you don't get much higher an approval than that.

4. Dixie Wailin'

Episode 14's "The Challenge" starts with the power struggle that we knew had been coming. Gobo's position as 'leader' of this five player band of Fraggles is called into question when a decision of his proves inconsiderate to Red's feelings. Now from start to finish, this whole story arc is a perfect example of how to not patronize your audience. Nothing is spelled out. The script doesn't establish who's right or wrong and it doesn't resolve anything. We don't know if the Fraggles went on their picnic or if Red made her swim meet. They never make it to the Trash Heap to settle the argument. And in the end, no life's lesson is put on display.

But something feels different.

I would argue it's the fact that we've just been through the funeral dirge capable of raising the dead. If for some reason you haven't seen this episode, I'm not going to put that statement into context. I'm just going to say that the aforementioned argument escalates into a performance of the funeral dirge capable of raising the dead, and for one brief season one moment Junior Gorg and the Fraggles are dancing together.

5. Let Me Be Your Song

According to IMDB Jim Henson actually performed in about a third of the series, but we only really notice when that unmistakable Rowlf voice takes center stage. We got the hyper version a dozen episodes earlier with his evangelical salesman Convincing John. But it's the arrival of wandering minstrel Cantus that lets you know something important is about to happen.

Cantus, like Jim and most artists, is driven by something even he doesn't fully understand. This song, with its hypnotic pipe and deceptively simple lyrics, sums up in three minutes what that calling (at its best) feels like. Whether or not Cantus was in fact the embodiment of Jim, the character did seem to represent the way several people on Jim's inner circle viewed him. We all need a Cantus, and when we can't have one, we make one.

6. Ragtime Queen

It's established pretty early on that death is going to play a factor in our journey with the Fraggles. We're on episode 22 "Mokey's Funeral" now. We've already seen several dangers surrounding the Great Hall and been through a very real brush with death ("Marooned" ep. 17) but this episode deals with the concept of sacrifice.

Oddly enough, the audience is let in on the punch line from the beginning; Mokey's not dead and she's not going to be dead. But the characters don't know that, and their reactions to the illusion genuinely hurt. Gobo, who always believes he knows what to do, can't do anything but stare at the dummy. Red (my GOD Karen Prell's acting) goes through all five stages of grief in mere minutes; the moment she demands Mokey still be alive because "She's my best friend!" has made me tear up since I started this blog. Even Junior Gorg expresses a self-loathing at the possibility that he's killed a Fraggle; a peak into his character we hadn't seen before.

But it's Ragtime Queen that really sets the tone of how brutal the feelings in this episode are going to be. First Mokey does indeed fantasize about sacrificing herself to the Gorg's trap for the good of the Fraggles, but then comes up with the idea of sewing together a decoy (made in her image). Cool. Except Mokey is an artist, and she takes the time to sing to her creation about how real she is. How real is she? How much of a soul can a stuffed bit of cloth with a face have (I want to remind you we're watching a Muppet production)? We don't know, we aren't told if dummy Mokey has the feelings her creator claims she does. All we know is there's a slight toe-in-the-pool-of-insanity chance that this episode is exactly as sad as it feels.

7. If It Happened to You

Jumping ahead to episode 41, "Fraggle Wars". The show was designed to end war; it was inevitable that it would actually do it in universe. Red and Mokey stumble across a never before and never again mentioned band of Fraggles who prefer order to chaos; let's call them the Bert Fraggles to the Ernies we've been spending our time with. Mokey, with her Ernie curiosity and trust, reveals herself with no exit plan and gets locked in a cage. Red catches sight of the situation and shags it back to the Great Hall for help.

A lot goes on in this episode, not the least of which is we get to see Red assume the leadership position in Gobo's absence she's always wanted. But the first problem is that even though her fellow Ernies horrified by the thought of Mokey's capture, they still won't focus. So she pulls out the big gun, the song. But like any weapon it goes from motivating to harmful at the turn of a verse when the World's Oldest Fraggle takes Red's honest fear and turns it into hatred. Age doesn't always equal wisdom.

8. Shine On, Shine On Me

The very next episode is called "The Day the Music Died", so you just know it's going to reveal something big. In this case, Gobo has been tasked with writing the Glory Song, which is the anthem of his generation. If you don't know, that's exactly the kind of pressure that makes writing a generational anthem damn near impossible, made all the more difficult by the fact that the Fraggles around him won't shut up with every other song they know.

A misunderstood request leads the whole rock to stop singing at all. Moods start to drop because Fraggles live off this stuff. But then the actual light in the rock begins fading. We discover it has been the product of a fairy-like collective known as Ditsies who literally live off of music. With the light gone, Fraggles can no longer stay awake, making the situation even more serious than we were expecting.

This episode may have been meant as an allegory for depression; although having personally dealt with Dysthymia for about 45 years I can tell you it doesn't quite work as one, but I do see the parallels. The thing I really hone in on is at the end of the episode, Gobo is essentially about to die, and he decides to go out with a song. The song itself, which is implied to be his Glory Song, is not glorious. It's from a place of despair, wishing it could be more powerful than it is. Ironically it IS powerful enough to save the Fraggles and the Ditsies, but on it's own it's simple. It wishes it was more than it is. It's the most un-anthemed anthem of a generation. And as a member of Gen X, this f**king thing might actually have summed us up. 

9. The Friendship Song/The Wind and the Pond and the Moon and Me

I know it's kind of a cheat to cram two of them together, but bite me- (sorry; Gen X, remember?) -but allow me to explain. Season one's "Marooned" is one of the heaviest episodes. A rock slide traps Red and Boober together, and the threat of death is very real for them. Boober (who's my favorite character and I've said jack sprat about him) has spent his whole life worrying about death but is strangely at peace when it's right in front of him. But for Red, this is apparently the first time she's been confronted with it.

The Friendship Song is a good song, but I didn't give it its own spot on this list because it's not actually important to the episode, serving only as a pause in a mostly bummer story arc. But the song serves as an unintended mirror to episode 59 "The Beanbarrow, the Burden, and the Bright Bouquet" (or 4B for my own stability).

4B has a similar setup as "Marooned", Red gets stuck in a situation with a character she can barely stand, in this case Mokey's pet plant Lanford, a Night-Blooming Yellow-Leaved Deathwort. A wrong turn during the Beanbarrow Race leaves the two of them in a dead-end surrounded by highly mobile killer plants. This is the second time Red has faced her impending death and she does so with three seasons of experience. It's less tragic with more humor and stronger rays of hope, especially once it's revealed is about to bloom the very flowers that repel the killer plants. But he can't quite do it, and for some damn reason he needs Red to rock him while singing a lullaby. Don't ask questions.

Red sings the mouthful of a title The Wind and the pond and the Moon and Me. This is where the episode gets dark. The lyrics are the kind of thing you'd sing to a child about a happier place than where they are, perhaps because they've had nightmares. But the implication of the line "I know, I've been there" really sounds like Red is referring to the cave-in where she and Boober almost died. During the song her voice starts to crack as if she's realizing their last hope might not work, and not helping is the fact that the plants trying to kill them are mere inches away (one of the more horrifying images in the whole of the series). This moment carries a similar weight of the scene in Titanic when the mother tucks her children in bed knowing they're all going to drown.

10. All Around the World

Again speaking only to the North American version, this song appeared in instrumental form as the backdrop for the Traveling Matt segments starting in season three. In the UK, the song appeared as a 45 RPM single with lyrics sung by Matt, Gobo, Wembley, Red and a female chorus.

Since it's opening episode Traveling Matt is presented as having a wanderlust, and even when he finally returns to the rock for good he still seems like he has one eye on the next untraveled tunnel. The beauty of All Around the World is the implication that he does in fact get homesick in a way that he never expresses outwardly.

But the song is more than that. The lyrics "It's hard to believe as I look around...a culture like ours is nowhere to be found..." aren't just about a silly Fraggle confused by the world of humans. It's the fact that the creators of Fraggle Rock really poured their souls into intertwined ecology of the place, and the world of harmony that the show spends 96 episodes earning is still a distant dream to the world of reality. It's a sad truth as much as it's a celebration of the Fraggles. Why can't we learn to understand each other the way the Doozers and the colossus Gorgs can? Why can't we all get along and recognize that we laugh at the same jokes and dance to the same music?

I don't know. I just know that in two days the Fraggles are back. Maybe they'll remind us of what magic feels like. Maybe they won't, but they'll inspire a new generation to pick up the old DVD's. In any case, welcome back.

Let the Fraggles play.

2021 Movie Wrap-Up

Another year, another blog post. At this rate I'll hit hit 300 post celebration when I'm 82.

So the cinema did not, as people predicted, die during the ongoing pandemic. And it looks like we even got to see a few at their intended release date. Yay. Well let's dive in, shall we? We shall.

Mortal Kombat

It's funny to me that out of all the movies that could have gotten me back into the theater after the whole world turned toxic, it was this one. I don't care about the franchise in any of its forms, but I found myself strangely invested in the story here. I've always liked James Wan as a director, and he clearly knows what people want to see from an MK film. Not only does he follow through, he infuses the whole ridiculous concept with (dare I say?) dignity. Wan, you've got serious game. I'll be watching your career intently. Just please, for the love of God tell me keeping Amber Heard in the Aquaman sequel was beyond your control.

A Quiet Place Part II

I do enjoy horror films based around a kind of quirk, in this case keep quiet or die. But I find too many of them feel like a Tales From the Crypt episode with padding, and I get bored with padding. Quiet Place One had about 55 minutes of good stuff and 35 of padding. Part Two had kind of the reverse issue. Taken together and generously trimmed would have made for a truly memorable film. One film. As is? Well, whatever.

Cruella

I was going to skip this one, as Disney's live remakes are beginning to feel like this generation's direct to video sequels. But then people wouldn't shut up about it, and I was getting the movie withdrawal itch. Damn, it was good! I've always liked Emma Stone but this role made me realize how much I've underestimated her as an actress. Her Cruella is unapologetically in the grey area between anti-hero and anti-villain, and she refuses to be contained. She is electrifying. But the true star, and I have the guidance and passion of my wife to thank for being able to notice, is (currently) two time Oscar winning costume designer Jenny Beavan. I'm as non-fluent with fashion as I am with sports, but for two hours and fourteen minutes I totally got it.

Black Widow

To get this out of the way, as long as Scarlett Johansson keeps blindly lapdogging Woody Allen I'm not going to pay for movie tickets to see anything with her as the lead. On Disney Plus, it took me several tries to get through it because I just kept losing interest. As its own action movie I'd say it was good enough, perhaps a step above the Fast and Furious series (which is praise, but not much). As an MCU film it was nothing special. This movie needed to happen before Infinity War to mean anything, and it didn't.

Space Jam: A New Legacy

I covered this one in more detail already but the gist is Don Cheadle was the MVP in a movie with freaking Looney Tunes in it, so something fundamentally went wrong. At the time the biggest problem was the movie was an undisguised commercial for HBO Max. Several months have passed, and HBO Max is having much bigger problems. Warner Brothers is their primary contributor and they haven't had a hit this year. But I'm sure they'll learn from their mistakes and put together a really solid DCEU in just a couple of more reboots. Space Jam 2 exists. And for whatever it's worth, the original really wasn't that good either.

Escape Room: Tournament of Champions

I've got good news and bad news, and both of them are that this sequel is more of the same thing. I liked the first one a lot, but I didn't like the ending because it felt like the filmmakers wrote themselves into an uninteresting corner. They get out of it by putting off that uninteresting corner until the end of this movie (again). I like the creative deadly rooms, and the new characters are as likable as the victims of the first movie. But where the franchise is trying to be Saw with less gore, more color, and a bit of hope, it's falling into Paranormal Activity syndrome where we've kind of figured out the rhythm already.

Free Guy

And just when I'd forgotten what not being a bitter, jaded Gen X-er felt like it's Ryan Reynolds to my rescue. Reynolds is a fellow Gen X-er, and he's mastered the schtick of trying really fucking hard to uphold the values Mr. Rogers instilled in him. An NPC in an MMORPG becomes self-aware (the direction we're going IRL BTW) and reminds real people what humanity actually is. Free Guy may not be the most original concept, but it does feel like a flower has bloomed in the wasteland hellscape we've been living in since fascism reared its ugly orange head six miserable years ago. Thank you Ryan, beauty CAN come out of ashes.

He's All That

It's listed on Wikipedia as a 2021 film so I'm going to talk about it. A gender-swapped remake of 1913's Pygmalion, or 1999's She's All That (for anyone under 108) it's as respectable a remake as it deserves to be. You've seen this move before even if you haven't; and if you haven't, go watch Not Another Teen Movie right this second! So not much to talk about except for wondering why cast Addison Rae? I get that Netflix is dabbling in the idea of social media stars transitioning into SAG roles, and I'm not opposed to it (Adam Conover is doing quite well) but nothing about Rae's performance reads as someone who nailed the audition. Anyway...

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

Or SCATLOTTR for short. I really enjoyed this movie when I saw it. But that was a few months ago. Curiously, I haven't thought about it since. I mean, I'll give Marvel credit for actively pursuing diversity, if a bit slower than needed, but I really didn't connect with this one. I liked things about it; the romance-less male/female friendship, the complex villain, the...um...other stuff that happened. But I'm probably going to leave this one out of my week-long MCU marathon in 2028.

The Eyes of Tammy Faye

This was another movie I didn't think I would get into and wound up being blown away by it. Knock-it-out-of-the-park performances from Jessica Chastain, Andrew Garfield, and Vincent D'Onofrio elevate what would probably have been an average television movie into a really engaging journey through the mind(s) of the superficially devout. Televangelism has always been a racket, but the film carefully lays its groundwork of how religion produces people who truly think they're doing the right thing. The movie doesn't judge the Bakker's, it just presents them. In the end the lesson is that passion will always get you going somewhere, and Tammy Faye had plenty of that. But without the wisdom to know where and why you're going, you're destined to end up in the wrong place.

No Time to Die

There was actually plenty of time to die. In fact, in the extended sequence of the heroes discussing going to the villain's base, why they're going to his base, followed by the scene of them GOING to the base, approximately fifteen hundred people in the world died. Here's the thing about the Daniel Craig era of James Bond films: NONE of them have kept me engaged through the third act. Craig is a great actor and I love what he's done with the character, but the films have forgotten that James Bond is fun. Timothy Dalton's Bond was as gritty as Craig's, but his (sadly mere) two films never left out that hint of silliness that made it all work. Not only does No Time to Die take itself too seriously, it has the Craig era's third act pace- For. The. Whole. Movie. The only time the film comes alive is the one scene that Ana de Armas is in. If the Broccoli estate has any interest in gender-swapping their franchise, spin off with her. This one sadly wasn't worth the wait.

Eternals

Ten years ago (wow.) my wife and I saw Drive, and The Smurfs in very close proximity to each other. Drive was a technically flawless film that left us feeling nothing. The Smurfs was ridiculous, but we came out of the theater talking about it, laughing, and generally feeling good about having shelled out the twenty bucks in tickets. I bring this up because I feel Eternals was a less-good movie than SCATLOTTR, but it left a much stronger impression on me. It raised questions about immortality, responsibility, immediate good versus grand scope good, and so on, and it wasn't afraid to not have the answers. Sadly it had some great ideas that didn't go anywhere, like the sentient deviant's point of view; but it HAD ideas. For me, a flawed movie that makes you feel something is better than a flawless one that leaves you indifferent. Oh, and for the record, Angelina Jolie made me tear up three times.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife

It's nearly impossible to evaluate this movie on its own merits but I'm going to try. It was good, heartwarming, and imbalanced. The good: Mckenna Grace is a hell of an actress, the nostalgia works, and without getting heavy-handed the film celebrates neurodiversity. The heartwarming: there's a sense of closure to Egon Spengler's arc, as well as the wedge between Harold Ramis and Bill Murray that kept Ghostbusters 3 from ever happening. The imbalanced: Paul Rudd's talent is underused, Carrie Coon's talent is SORELY underused, J. K. Simmons is (for the first time in his career) needless, and the pacing is exactly what you get with Jason Reitman directing. If this franchise continues (and it will) it needs a balance between this movie and the 2016 reboot; substance and energy. There.

West Side Story

In his prime, Steven Spielberg had this magic touch of making you feel like he was sitting next to you in the theater. It's been such a damn while, but I finally felt that again. Just look at the way the musical is framed from its opening shot to every lavish dance number. Perhaps people felt that this was your grandparent's musical, and it kind of is but it's also kind of not. The tribalism and racism committed to the stage in 1957 has sadly not gone anywhere, and one could argue West Side Story has an even more timeless quality than that Shakespeare play about the dead couple (sorry: spoilers). Unfortunately the poignant qualities of the film, and the electric performances of so many of its new cast members (and cinema royalty Rita Moreno) get overshadowed by the lead actor's sexual assault allegation with a then-seventeen year old girl. On the one hand, it's encouraging that we're past the point where an audience will let a studio do damage control by sweeping such a story under the rug (which is what they tried to do), but on the other we're not past the point where studios try. Lessons are slow to learn.

Spider-Man: No Way Home

As of this writing, No Way Home is still number one at the box office, and deservedly so. It's not often a single film can provide closure to THREE different cinematic story arcs and still fit in as a prequel to a different character's sequel. I hesitate to say this about a film producer (as Hollywood produces some real monsters) but Kevin Feige just might be a genius. How this damn MCU juggernaut is still holding together at all after 27 films is a (no pun intended, no, seriously) marvel in and of itself. Most of what I could say about No Way Home has already been covered by everyone everywhere, but I want to point out three things. One, I didn't realize just how good we had it in the early 2000s with Willem Dafoe and Alfred Molina's performances, but watching them together for the first time was jaw dropping. Two, the line (you know the one) has gone so far into the field of cliché I didn't think it was possible to deliver it as anything but a joke. DAMN Marisa Tomei, I'm still feeling it. And three, the big one. The whole of Marvel's Phase Four has been about healing; coincidentally timed considering the state of the world. But as anyone who's been on multiple medications can tell you, healing is an ugly process. It's not the life's lesson at the end of a Full House episode; it's a blow-up, a freak-out, and a humiliatingly bloody ugly public cry. A character like Spider-Man is notorious for hurting, for having a life that sucks, and for snatching a loss from every victory. When the film unites the three Peter Parkers, it could easily have gone for a couple of exchanged one-liners and segued into the climax. It doesn't. For once, slowing the pace in the third act works, letting all the Parkers just talk to each other. A shared pain, some encouragement, and a lot of mutual understanding. Spider-Man and his rogue's gallery has always been about tragedy, but maybe just this once it's also about recovery.

2022, it's your turn.

Live (barely) From New York, It's-a Me!

If you've never been to New York (like me, as of a week ago), you can at least imagine what it's like. It's probably the most filmed and recreated city in the whole of human history. In fact, having experienced Sesame Street, Ghostbusters, Spider-Man, Friends, Kimmy Schmidt, the Lego Marvel game, and 60% of rom-coms I felt like I'd accurately pieced together the bulk of what life was like there.

But my wife had been once before, and she really wanted to go back. And take me (Everybody: "Awww", in delight or disgust as you see fit). Now I've been in big cities before; Atlanta, Nashville, Seattle, and the Salvador Dali-esque streets of New Orleans, and I understood that while they mostly look the same from a distance they each tend to develop their own personality and quirks. So you can't really lean into 'if you've been to one city you've been to them all'.

At the same time though, I grew up in Louisiana around people who would not shut up about New York. The people! The shopping! The sites! The musicals! And I'd stand there, staring at them the way I'd later stare at fanboys who'd try to convince me that The Matrix was deep. So going into this three night stay at The Benjamin, I had legitimate doubts that I was going to feel the connection that had been over-over-hyped. But I was determined to answer one question as it pertained to people who were at least a little less cynical than me: What was the big damn deal with New York?

Here's what I learned.

Initial impressions

Our flight from Charlotte to Newark was delayed (side note: I believe it's Mayor Vi Lyles who does the welcome announcement in Charlotte's airport, and she could totally be a professional voice actress) and so we arrived in New Jersey around 10:30 at night. We got a cab from the airport's dispatcher, who really did not seem like she wanted to deal with us, and headed across what could easily have been a bridge to Gotham City.

Two things happened here. One, "New York, New York" from On the Town entered my head and stayed there for two days. Two, I turned into Hilary Duff as Lane Daniels trying to see through the cab window from every possible angle.

We arrived at The Benjamin, and still didn't know where The Benjamin was. There was a sign directly above us which we never saw because we were looking everywhere except directly above us, and even Siri had to draw in an exasperated breath before informing us that we were literally fifty feet away from the check-in desk.

We got our keys, a couple of bottled soft drinks on our daily ten dollar credit, and hopped into the fastest elevator I've ever been in that didn't have a lap bar; cheerfully oblivious to the $39 'hotel facilities' fee we were going to be charged each of the next three days. Now we needed to find dinner from somewhere, since COVID had shut down the hotel's kitchen.

Pizza -New York pizza. I'm happy to say that the famous New York oven baked pizza that I've heard so much about is even nicer in person. Some pizza parlors close at six, some at eleven, some at four in the morning; I can't tell you what the rhyme or reason behind any of it is. I'm just grateful that we were able to find something at almost midnight.

The oddest thing though was how comfortable I felt roaming the streets of New York by myself so late at night. I didn't feel like anybody was going to bother me. And interestingly enough there were a few points where I saw a woman walking by herself as well without the body language of someone on alert. It would take me a few more street strolls to fully understand the concept but simply put, New Yorkers mind their own business. This southern-born introvert has waited his whole life for this environment.

What We Saw on the Trip

1. The Central Park Zoo. Central Park is freaking huge and we only covered the south end of it. And they have a zoo. It's not a big zoo but it somehow still feels complete. Imagine going to a regular zoo and then taking just the highlights and editing out everything else. An aviary, snow leopards, a bear, some monkeys, a seal feeding, and a petting zoo (no elephants, damn it). At fourteen bucks, it was a good ticket; totally worth skipping the 4D Ice Age short.

2. The New York Public Library. Oh man, the architecture of this thing was beautiful. This was the old school library where everyone is quiet, librarians have to retrieve your books for you, and there are lion statues on the front steps (I never thought about it before, why do lions care about books?). I, jocundly, don't work in that kind of library, but I always love spending a few moment inside one whenever the chance arises.

3. The Hard Rock Cafe. It's kind of a tradition, whenever my wife and I are in a city with an HRC we have dinner there. This one felt like it was built from the ground to be a Hard Rock Cafe, as opposed to moving into a pre-existing space. I suppose even though it was a chain, the steak was officially New York steak, so I can check that off as well. Quick question, would any streaming service consider letting you just tap into their channel that plays music videos? They only seem to pick visually good ones.

4. The Rockefeller Center/Radio City Music Hall. Being August, and...you know...the middle of an ongoing pandemic I don't think we got the full effect. But we got the gist. FAO Schwarz was big, even if I didn't find anything I wanted to make room for in my backpack. I was a little disappointed in NBC's gift shop. During the past decade Saturday Night Live has changed. In addition to being the funniest it's been in years, the most recent cast has been surprisingly vulnerable. I would have bought just about anything with Cecily Strong's face on it, but all their merchandise was "More Cowbell", Stefon (a character I just never got), and generic things with 'Saturday Night Live' on them. It's always something.

5. Trash & Vaudeville. My wife loves fashion, so by proxy I've picked up on a handful of talking points. Ultimately it's not my thing, but if I had the money I'll be damned if this store wouldn't get me into it. There's an energy here where you can just feel the connection to Debbie Harry and My Shopping Addiction. I'm probably due for a midlife crisis; maybe I'll start dressing like an aging rock star.

6. Times Square. This was the heart of it all. I can't imagine what New Year's Eve is like here, but August 17th had the kind of party atmosphere I always expected, and never got, from Mardi Gras. Street dancers, music busses, a couple of mostly naked women, Batman and Deadpool posing together, and a short walk to flip off the Scientology center. I even got attacked by a homeless man who took offense to my COVID mask (a tidbit I'm peculiarly proud of), and adamantly defended by strangers. New Yorkers don't want you to interact with them, but they're really proactive when someone needs help.

What We Didn't See

1. The Statue of Liberty. It would have been nice but not worth the Lyft money, because she just wasn't on our way to anything we were looking to do.

2. A Broadway show. And I'll be honest, I'm not broken up about it. I love doing theater, but I've never been all that passionate about watching it.

3. Many kids or elderly people. Let's face it, New York is for people who don't mind walking. You've got to have stamina to survive there.

4. The subway. We just never had a reason to go underground; leaving me with the unanswered question, how does a city install a subway system? Do you assume you're going to need one before you add in the skyscrapers, or do you start digging and hope they're not as heavy as they look?

5. Individualism. All of my T-shirts have Nintendo logos or Disney characters on them, which probably identified me as a tourist since 99% of the New Yorkers I saw did not wear anything other than plain shirts or business outfits (with the occasional yoga wear). One single woman had her hair dyed an anime color. But aside from that, everyone seems to naturally want to blend in with everyone else.

6. Giant apes climbing buildings. Dude, what the hell?

What We Took Away

I'm a writer (amateur, yes, but shut up), so naturally I'm drawn to character. From my three days spent in what's esoterically known as the Big Apple, this is what I believe I understand. New York is a clock. It's the Big Ben of the United States. When New York decides it's time to fawn over Hamilton, the nation fawns over Hamilton. And everything in the city is in motion, and every wheel cog demands every other wheel cog respect that motion. It's the first city I've been to that had signs saying "No Standing Any Time".

It's a place for people who like to be on the go, grabbing hot dogs along the way and treating 'Don't Walk' as a caution light. You're a part of the city almost immediately; and you have to be or you're going to get run over. New York doesn't welcome you like Orlando, it just gets you moving.

But as quickly as New York makes you one of its own, I can't help but wonder how rare it is to succeed at whatever motive led you there in the first place. Did you want to be a fashion designer? A Broadway star? A CEO? I don't get the impression that the city cares if you make it, or how you feel about failing. I imagine you could be the best chef ever between two intersections and instantly become nobody when your card stops working at the bagel stand.

So I guess to close out without resorting to the cliché about visiting but not living there, I have to say that the city itself is a living, breathing titan that legitimately inspires awe. And for a brief time, it was a joy to be a single blood cell injected into its circulatory system going on the ride; killing my feet, getting my neck scratched, and becoming simultaneously wiser and poorer. But I don't think I would ever want to get to the point where that novelty becomes mundane.

Everybody's got the rhythm that works for them. For me, I can honestly say I love New York. But in small doses.

Looney Tunes: Back in Traction (Reflections, Reviews, and Revisions)

I am a huge Looney Tunes fan. I'm from the generation that didn't just grow up on them, we absorbed them. They were everywhere; comic books, TV specials, movies, and of course the never ending reruns of the classic shorts that just never seemed to get old.

In the early days of animation, the studios were all competing with Disney, as Walt's animation team had  risen to dominance. It was the creators of the Looney Tunes who first abandoned this approach in favor of finding their own voice, planting the seed of rebelliousness that Bugs and company have always embodied. To paraphrase people smarter than me, if Disney was classic music, the Looney Tunes were jazz.

It's that same rebellious spirit that's granted the Loonies (the word I've chosen to use) their post-Termite Terrace longevity but also made them a difficult fit for the long form storytelling of cinema, as their movies prior to Roger Rabbit had essentially been clip show excuses to recycle the shorts of the golden age. I mention Roger Rabbit because (curiously) every attempt to put Bugs and Daffy in a feature film since then have somehow obligatorily been a hybrid of animation and live action.

Perhaps the reason for this is because the Loonies by nature aren't meant to have character development, they're meant to be funny; and in their case funny is about seven minutes of pain and suffering and nobody learning anything until we do a palette cleanse and go again. Thus it makes sense to have a POV character to handle the film's plot from beginning to end so the animals can go back to trying to kill each other.

It's with this lens that I want to look at the unofficial film trilogy Space Jam, Not Space Jam, And Back to Space Jam, to figure out what went wrong, what went right, and what in theory Warner Brothers can do about it.

Space Jam

For me the 90's was a college degree that will never matter, a series of customer service jobs, and an overall sense of hopelessness. Visually, it's a tumbleweed rolling between Clerks and Reality Bites with the occasional espresso shot of joy from Kevin Conroy's Batman (I don't know if that's irony or just really sad). The then-younglings seemed to be having a much better time of it, with Spielberg's TV shows and an insatiable urge to zigazig ah.

Somewhere in the midst of it all, athletes became superheroes. I've always been on the geek side of jocks vs. geeks and we were never going to win with a dial-up connection, but we had a begrudging respect for the top tier personalities of basketball's "dream team" even if we couldn't tell you who they'd played for prior to the 1992 Olympics. It was only natural that a player of Michael Jordan's charm would go on to play himself in front of a green screen to the most 90's soundtrack ever Jock Jammed together.

So what can I say about 1996's Space Jam besides director Joe Pytka is a whiny bitch? Well, to summarize, the Looney Tunes live underneath the surface of the earth (in Hell maybe?) and Danny DeVito voicing a Danny DeVito knockoff decides we're overdue for a remake of The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan's Island. To WB's credit, they don't waste any time trying to infuse the premise with credibility; this film is just a theme park ride.

Stuff happens, some of it is smile-worthy, none of it feels particularly inspired; it's just dumb fun with a soundtrack. The problem is the Looney Tunes are not dumb fun, they're comedic art. Jordan is fine at playing himself but he's no Bob Hoskins, and the only way for him to get in and out of Bugs's anarchy is by removing the rabbit's teeth. These are Diet Looney Tunes, which raises a fundamental question for all three of these films: Does the person/committee calling the shots understand them?

In Space Jam the answer is a resounding no. First off, as mentioned previously this ain't Disney. These characters do not get along or cooperate for a common goal. One wonders if there was a draft of the script where DeVito's Swackhammer actually enticed the greedier Loonies over to his side in the first act. The second thing, Bugs Bunny is pure ego. He doesn't kowtow to anybody, even if his life depends on it. And finally there's Lola, who I assume started as sexualized fan art of Babs Bunny. The thing about Jessica Rabbit, and her precursor Red Hot Riding Hood, is the characters were sexy but they also had layers. Their respective creators took the time to at least answer the question for themselves "What does she want?". Lola apparently just wants to strut, which is fine if she's a running gag, but Space Jam is trying to pass her off as a new addition to the Looney Tunes cast. "Don't call me doll" isn't a character any more than if Bugs's whole shtick was his love of carrots.

So was there anything about the movie that caught my attention? Yeah, one scene. When Bugs and Daffy have to break into Michael Jordan's house to collect his gear there's a tiny bit of the lifetime of animosity between them. It's not much, Daffy just makes a couple of insincere grand bows to Bugs's orders. But the sense that Daffy's resentment is still tucked away in there is the one sign of life in the old bird. And in the movie. And where there's a spark...

Looney Tunes: Back in Action

Full disclosure, I saw this once in the theater and walked away thinking "Eh, that was okay," and didn't think much more about it. Until the next morning when my brain started replaying some beats from the movie; the frustrated Batman during the Roger Corman cameo, the scene in the Louvre, the moment Daffy Freaking Duck saves humanity from being turned into monkeys. I went back a second time and walked away thinking "This was actually pretty well done." Then a third, fourth, fifth, and sixth, dragging my various coworkers with me. I've since decided that this movie is a gem.

With flaws, but all gems are. None of which derail the movie, they just stand out in a film that shoots for the moon and damn near hits it. The first is the self-consciousness of the jokes. As someone who's actively tried writing comedy I can tell you that when you worry you're not being funny enough you overcompensate by cramming as many jokes into your work space as you can. The one liners come desperately fast, and it's no wonder; when you're trying to match Chuck Jones, Michael Maltese, and Mel Blanc, you're setting a Marx Brothers level bar (the good movies, not The Big Store). It's also worth acknowledging that the studio kept interfering with Joe Dante's direction, demanding changes that can't really be made that late into animation.

The other flaw is the human cast, which as I say isn't really a problem. Just...you know...not Bob Hoskins. Steve Martin's Acme Chairman could probably have used a test audience. He's good enough for an Austin Powers character, but we know what Martin is capable of; it's kind of late Steve Martin 'doing' early Steve Martin. Jenna Elfman is decent, but perhaps some coaching from Carol Burnett would have solidified the character she was going for. Timothy Dalton is quite funny, if underused. And Joan Cusack might be an actual cartoon character in disguise.

The wild card is Brendan Fraser, who has the thankless job of pretending the movie is about him. The short version: he's much better in the role than you think he is. Fraser is a subtle actor, which is easy to overlook if you're only familiar with his popular movies. Here the burden of convincing us of Back in Action's rules on the Looney Tunes (actors who play themselves) rests predominantly on his shoulders. Jordan played Jordan. Fraser plays DJ, an out of work stuntman who just lost his job before learning his actor-father is actually a secret agent while dealing with the always temperamental and recently fired Daffy Duck; and that's act one. And Fraser finds a way to make it all feel sincere while getting out of the spotlight of the real star. It's arguably the most generous performance I've ever seen an actor give.

The real star is Daffy. From the opening moments, this movie lets you know that it knows what it's about. Looney Tunes don't do 'heart' like the Muppets, it's just not their thing. But Back in Action allows the duck and the rabbit to dip their toes in a pool we've all wondered about: does Daffy hurt? Playing second fiddle is an enviable position to everyone except the one in that position, because right next to you is that damn first chair spot that no matter what you do you just can't crawl your way into.

The great Joe Alaskey voices both Bugs and Daffy and he infuses both characters with the whole of their long history together. Outwardly, Bugs is as much of a dick as he's always been, but behind the mallard's back Bugs is very defensive of him. Daffy wants respect, and he's never going to get it. It's not fair; it's comedy. In the end, nothing changes. Daffy doesn't get respect or resolution; hell, he's too self absorbed to even recognize that he saved all of humanity. As the audience, we know that Daffy is lovable, and he's working so hard to prove something that he doesn't have to. It's tragic in a way, but it's also comforting to see without question that Bugs knows what we know. No one can top Bugs, but Daffy is his equal.

Space Jam: A New Legacy

I want to start by talking about Don Cheadle. I've always thought he was a great actor, but I've never seen him go over the top. He is having so much fun as villain Al-G Rhythm, it's a contagious performance. Now with that said, for a movie with the freaking Looney Tunes in it, there's a real problem when the first thing I want to do is talk about Don Cheadle. In fact, I don't even want to talk about them next. Let's talk LeBron James.

I don't agree with any of the criticism James is getting about not being able to act. It's not to say that I think he can act; just that I've only seen him in this, and it's not a fair example. Green screen acting is hard. You need at least one of two things to not look completely like a dumbass, a director who can walk the actor through each performance beat or an actor who's skilled enough to ask the right questions. It's unreasonable to expect James to be the latter at this point in his Hollywood career, and I can't really gauge Malcolm D. Lee's directorial talent from his filmography (much less how much control he even had over the project). Suffice to say, James is serviceable. I wanted him to be better, and I still do, I'd like to see more from him. But I don't think he was bad, and I really believe he was trying, and in some ways succeeding.

The problem with this movie is the WB studio. I don't know what conglomerate calls the shots, but they understand their franchises as well as Michael Eisner understood Disney's. Essentially what we have here is about six executives worth of ideas and only one who gets it right part of the time. You know, pretty much a true to form follow up of the original. I will say I enjoyed watching it. Once. But like the original, I doubt I'll ever go back and revisit it. Why, you ask? Well let's pretend you do. Because it makes the same stupid mistake the original did and Back in Action didn't, it doesn't understand the Looney Tunes.

So instead of reviewing it, let me try story doctoring it. First off, open with Al-G in the serververse where he has the idea to allow WB franchises to intermingle. He sends it to the executives who turn it down because it seems like a stupid idea. That rejection hurts, so he tries to implement it anyway, by going to the Looney Tunes to test it out; and show that scene. They're all intrigued and head off to different worlds. But, being Looney Tunes, it's in their nature to f**k things up. So now Al-G has just taken an idea that nobody liked and made it harmful, thus making him both a sympathetic character as well as a potential villain.

He can't control them or get them to come back into their own world. So what might work? Space Jam sequel. He just needs a player. "LeBron, how would you like to test out our new technology and star in a new Space Jam movie? You'll actually play opposite the Looney Tunes in real time, not drawn by frames but performed virtually! kind of like a video game. Great! Let's do some screen tests. I'm gonna send you into various situations and you just kind of wing it, convince the characters to join your team."

From there it's about the serververse rewriting itself around Al-G's premise, probably making him more powerful but also locking him into the outcome of this basketball game. And it would give us more time to spend with the individual Loonies. Put Bugs in a world like Scooby-Doo where the rules don't favor him. Have him start playing along by dressing up as the monster but then have him start to forget who he is by adopting the new role (thus showing why this was a bad idea). Put Porky and Sylvester in a Final Destination movie (a la "Scaredy Cat"). Have Daffy battle Jim Carrey's Mask character (it's owned by WB, I looked it up). I mean, really go for it.

I don't know how it ends and I don't care, but doesn't that sound a lot more anarchic than what they did? Like the original, I enjoyed things about the movie. One of the few inspired choices was to have Bugs treat James as if he's an antagonist during their first meeting, because that's what Bugs is used to. Ultimately A New Legacy is bigger and noisier than its predecessor, but about the same in quality.

So What Should WB Do Next?

Besides turn the DCEU over to Bruce Timm and Paul Dini? Okay, the problem with handling the Looney Tunes isn't with the characters; they're timeless. Like all avatars for the soul of comedy they're the funhouse mirror that reflects on the world as it is, albeit distorted; there will never be a time when someone can correctly say that they're outdated.

But figuring out how to find our way back to that soul is a trickier approach. WB keeps trying, and once in a while they strike gold (see The Looney Tunes Show). But I think we can find a better strategy than throwing things at the wall to see what sticks; again, DCEU take note.

I want to tell a story that I love telling, and probably already have in another blog post. Later in his life Chuck Jones started making public appearances, and at one event a mom and her little girl went up to meet him. "This is Chuck Jones," said the mom to her daughter, "He draws Bugs Bunny." The girl quite firmly corrected her mother, "No, he draws pictures of Bugs Bunny."

This exchange stuck with Jones, and he took a little time to reflect on what the girl had meant. He realized she was right in the way that a child's wisdom always is. Nobody ever "created" Bugs Bunny. He existed, on some other unseen plane where he continues to exist. Periodically he reveals something of his personality and antics to those of a creative mindset, and it's the privilege of those artists to translate his existence into a form for the whole world to share. And it's with this understanding that WB's ideal direction becomes clear.

Double down on Lola.

A couple of reasons. One, the Looney Tunes as a whole has historically been a boys club and that element IS outdated. Two, we've already seen three different versions of Lola, in much the way that Jones's Daffy differed significantly from Robert McKimson's Daffy but they were still the same duck. And three, when my wife and I went to see A New Legacy there was a young woman in the theater dressed in Lola's outfit from the first movie; not the rabbit head mind you, but the unmistakable basketball uniform. As much of a non-character as she was in Space Jam, something about her connected with an audience. Almost like there's a new voice from that plane Bugs resides in, asking to be turned loose in our world.

So what I propose, all you decision makers who are never going to read this, is a half-hour cartoon series called Lola. Each episode is made up of three individual shorts, just like the old cartoons, that all feature Lola. Animation style can vary and there doesn't need to be any continuity, just give her a canvas to play on, to find her identity.

Imagine the possibilities just from having her interact with the other characters in already familiar situations. How would she deal with opera-diva Giovanni Jones from "Long-Haired Hare" differently than Bugs did? Would she focus more on humiliating him by redecorating his stage to look like a saloon and make him perform with an orchestra of banjoes? How would Elmer Fudd react to her? "Oh, I didn't weawize you wewe a wady," Would she take that as an insult and spend the whole cartoon demanding he shoot at her? What about Wile E. Coyote? Would she take an interest in his elaborate traps, even trying to help make them work without fully understanding their purpose? And what if she has a goal that comes into conflict with a 'winner' character like Speedy Gonzales?

There are always ways for the Loonies to evolve as times change and new issues come to the forefront. They're strong enough for a fresh take and some current risks. The main thing to remember, you don't go into comedy because it's safe, you go into it because it isn't. Give them their teeth and their dynamite and just roll with the carnage.

2020 Movie Wrap-Up: That Was the Year That Wasn't

I've tried about five times now to write this blog, but every time I pull it up I just get irritated. I think the months of social distancing has made me less motivated to write; despite being an introvert I do feed off other people's energy.

Well, let's  just get this over with then. The fragments of 2020 in film.

Birds of Prey

2016's Suicide Squad was a mess, but the one element nearly universally praised was Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn. So while DC continues to throw things at the wall to see what sticks, they've given us a Harley-centric sequel-of-sorts. About half the movie is pure Harley, while the other half is everybody else. The everybody else half is passable, maybe even better than most of Marvel's Phase Two, while the Harley half is spot on in every way. In the end, I really liked this one. It's not solid but it leaves a good impression; essentially this is what I'd wanted Suicide Squad to be.

Fantasy Island

Man, people hated this movie, and frankly I don't know why. It delivers on its premise exactly as promised and manages to put its pieces together creatively. I can understand why someone simply wouldn't like the movie, but its reputation as the worst of 2020 is unjustifiable. If you tend to like Blumhouse productions I would say give it a whirl, and think of it as the shady prequel to the more fantastical television series that we're all pretending to have an attachment to.

The Invisible Man

Objectively I can say this was a very good film. This is abusive relationship gas-lighting pushed to its psychologically horrific extreme, and the movie is probably flawless in that regard. But in terms of personal preference, it was the wrong flavor for me. I'm picky about my horror films, and I really need a fun factor to balance out the brutality. This movie was not fun. Intense, incredibly well-acted, poignant, triple yes. But if you're as hyper-sensitive as I am, you'll find this a real endurance test.

Scoob!

You may have noticed by now that I'm a huge Scooby-Doo fan, and for that reason I found this movie unforgivable. Every studio wants their own MCU, and WB's ownership of the Hanna-Barbera library provoked this bait and switch attempt to launch a Scooby-Doo All-Stars reboot. Essentially they tried to make a Blue Falcon movie, a character that never mattered. And they know it, that's why they had to hide it behind a Scooby/Shaggy mask. I know 2020 has made me a bitter human being, but I'm glad this flopped.

Bill & Ted Face the Music

There weren't many spots of hope this past year, but the warm return of Bill and Ted was one of the fleeting moments where I was reminded of what it felt like to be in a good mood. The Bill and Ted series has always been a labor of love, and nowhere is that more evident than this final romp through innocent optimism. For the love of humanity please make a Billie and Thea spin-off because the world desperately needs another Hendrix/Mozart duet.

Soul

I loved the movie Pixar was trying to make here. Soul wasn't the Inside Out/Up hybrid it was aiming for but it  also wasn't the narrative noise of Toy Story 4. I'm thinking this story didn't start as a feature but as about three and a half shorts that happened to fit a theme. The rough edges separating each element are noticeable, and the film doesn't fully explore it's unanswered questions, but it at least delivers on its title. I think one trip to the script doctor was all it needed to be a Pixar A-lister.

Promising Young Woman

There were two routes this movie could have taken. The first would have been to display the psychological realism of how much damage rape culture does, the other would be a superhero-esque revenge fantasy that the trailers promised. The movie tries to take both, and unfortunately they pull against each other; the end result landing somewhere in the 'good enough' middle. It's a pity, because Carey Mulligan's performance and the ideas presented (the horrible reality behind 'bro code') deserved so much better than 'good enough'. Bummer.

Wonder Woman 1984

Damn it! This was supposed to be the one! *sigh* Okay, to be fair WW84 wasn't a bad movie, but it truly was a noticeable downgrade from the previous film that had us chanting "Give the DCEU to Patty Jenkins". Taken on its own, it's flawed (as you may have heard) but fun...perhaps more Tilt-A-Whirl than roller coaster. But we honestly needed this movie to be solid, and instead it felt like it was in the hands of a first time director. Or a director who had no experience with superhero films. Or, just, what the hell happened Jenkins?

So that then there is the freshly spoiled milk of a movie year that was 2020. It's been suggested to me that there's nowhere to go but up, despite four years of evidence to the contrary. You know what? Things aren't all right. The world is not doing well. And I don't feel like looking for a positive takeaway, or feigning hope, or trying to be funny. Show's over. Roll the fucking credits.

Editorial: The Reason Peach Keeps Getting Kidnapped

My library recently had its 6th annual Sci-fi/Fantasy Festival, and because of that thing that's ruining the world in 2020 (No, not that one. The virus.) we did it as a virtual con for the first time. As such I had the privilege of speaking on more panels than usual; Monty Python, cartoons, female comic book characters, and nerd-dom in general, just to name all of the few of them.

A couple of different times, the panels came back to the damsel in distress trope. We're all familiar with this. Most people's feelings on the matter range from irritation to indifference. I don't think anybody really defends it, at most we just kind of shrug it off as a lazy motivator. Because it is. I'm not sure when exactly rescuing the damsel crossed over from trope to cliche, but at this point we seem to respond to it with a collective eye roll.

Except we seem more tolerant of it in video games. Perhaps because game play is more important to us than legitimacy when it comes to platformers we're more comfortable accepting the 'get the grail' motive, and by proxy less willing to demand that the pretty princess be treated as more of a character than 'the grail'.

Again, because of that thing that's ruining the world right now, I'm unable to make my long awaited Nintendo Switch purchase that I finally have the funds for. So to get my gaming fill I'm stuck watching playthroughs online. I recently watched Luigi's Mansion 3, which involves a mass kidnapping of Mario, Peach, and a handful of Toads. Luigi to the reluctant rescue. He goes through rescuing the characters in succession; first the unimportant Toads, then his brother, and at last Peach.

It got me thinking.

If Luigi (and the player) had managed to rescue Peach first, would you have still been inclined to keep playing? Presumably we play games because we want to complete them, but if the game includes a rewards system does it disrupt the feeling of accomplishment if 'the grail' is obtained before the climax? There are some problematic implications when a setting as big as the Mario-verse continues to equate its most high-profile female character as the ongoing grail.

If you were to list Princess Peach Toadstool's characteristics, being kidnapped is invariably at the top of the list. And this trait tends to evoke some strong emotions among her detractors; gamers who believe the character sucks often cite this as their primary argument. To a point I follow the logic, but I feel the knee-jerk conclusion is unfair. I don't believe she sucks. I do believe she's the victim of a string of disservices to her character, starting with Nintendo itself. And I also believe there's a way to turn it around without fundamentally changing the core of her character.

So here we go.

What is Peach?

Looking at her through the eyes of feminism (which is actually a very good thing, in case you need a reminder) she's in an uncomfortable place in Western culture. In Japan, the role of the homemaker is thought of highly. A woman who maintains an aesthetic home and excels at entertaining her guests is viewed honorably, and Princess Peach reflects these ideals. In America, not so much. The fifties sitcom housewife is viewed with no small amount of disdain over here. The role has taken on an implied subjugation to a patriarchy, which doesn't sit well with anyone pro-career woman.

I've said this before, but it's worth repeating. The problem with the housewife was never about the housewife role itself, but with who was deciding it for whom. There's been an unfortunate backlash among the feminist circles towards women who genuinely want to be homemakers because of how much of an emotional button the concept is. It's easy to get stuck on this idea that 'homemaker' and 'feminist' are incompatible when this is simply not true. Peach naturally taps into this highly emotive debate.

Now in Super Mario 64, I think we all had a good time yelling "Eff you!" at the screen when after 90+ vertigo inducing stars Mario's reward is going to be a cake (by the way, what happened to the one she claims to have already baked that got him to the castle in the first place?). Most of us were hoping for a strip tease, but that's not who Peach is (at least not until Thousand Year Door).

From Peach's perspective, baking a cake is the kindest thing she can do. And Mario is less of an egotist than the people controlling him, so he's accepting of the sentiment in its purest form. Can you imagine if you ever rescued Kate Middleton and she rewarded you with a cake she baked herself? Do you think whine about the fact that it wasn't a Mercedes? No. You'd sit there and eat it and like it even if you choked on it.

And that's a character trait with Peach that usually gets lost. She's royalty (for some reason), she's not obligated to be kind. We'll get back to that in a minute, for now let's look at the lack of details surrounding her monarchy.

I don't know what Nintendo considers canon about the origin of the Mushroom Kingdom. I think Peach's father was mentioned one time back in nineties in one of the game manuals, so that may not matter. We're left with theories. Here's mine. The world in which the Mushroom Kingdom exists is closely related to a pagan setting; in conjunction with sprites and cognitive forces of nature. It's why so many rocks have eyes. The Toads are an evolved form of Mushroom in the same way that humans evolved from primates, although in a much tighter time frame. Peach could be any number of things. Perhaps she's a mushroom that's gone one step further in mutation to appear more human. Or perhaps her in tuned-ness with the natural world was an influence in why the Toads sprang up in the first place. For whatever reason, Peach never entered into a pre-existing monarchy, the political structure grew organically around her (a similar thing happened with Daisy in Sarasaland).

The plumbers incidentally are not mushrooms. I don't know if they came from New York or New Donk, but they represent immigrants who came to a better place with the intent of making an honest living.

Who is Peach?

It's telling about Peach's character that she would develop such a close friendship with a member of the working class. At the end of the day Mario's aspirations are pretty straightforward. He wants to do his job, go home, and relax. All of the heroic adventures are things he happens to fall into. He possesses a kind of 'It needs to be done, and I can do it' attitude that an empath like Peach would be drawn to. So why does she bake him a cake instead of build him a house? Probably because simple comforts would make him happier than luxuries would.

The relationship between Peach and Mario is one of the all time great aromantic romances. We, as the spectators, seem to spend as much time with them as they spend together, suggesting they more or less have separate lives. So in that regard I don't think they're technically an item, and neither seems to have any drive to push the relationship into something it isn't already. But they're fond of each other, and even platonically it makes sense why they would be the other's 'special one'.

And that brings us to the royal beast (not Daisy unfortunately). Bowser and Peach both wear crowns but their approaches to ruling couldn't be more different. Peach motivates her subjects by empowering them, while King Koopa threatens his into obedience. It's unfair to label the dichotomy as good vs. evil; more accurately it's love vs. fear.

Bowser is the delegated bad guy, but let's look at his story from his perspective. Whereas the Mushroom Kingdom is in touch with the innocence of nature, Bowser is rooted in the animalistic side. He's king because he's the biggest and strongest, things that the wilds value. In his mind Peach should be his, by virtue of the fact that he wants her, and the natural order dictates that the king should get what he wants.

Mario should be nothing more than a nuisance, and a lot of the games do a wonderful job at presenting this incorrect viewpoint from the big guy. Bowser projects his own views onto Mario, presuming Mario wants Peach the same way he does; at least once straight up accusing Mario of also wanting to kidnap Peach.

And here's where it gets tricky. Bowser views Peach as the grail. Mario does not. Oddly enough, the players tend to come away from the games playing as Mario, but viewing Peach in a manner similar to the way Bowser does. Now this would be nothing more than a curiosity if we weren't seeing real life examples of how this mentality can manifest itself in legitimately horrifying ways. A few words I can throw out there; incels and gamer gate.

Now I'm not suggesting a cause and effect relationship between Mario games and the #metoo movement. But I am sharing how taken aback I was when I first found out that, within this community I hold so dear, there continues to exist an underbelly of hatred towards women. I don't even understand it. My life's experience has coincided with the birth of nerd culture, and I can confidentially say, "Guys! This is what you've ALWAYS wanted. A chance to talk to girls without leaving your comfort zone. So what in the hell is the problem?"

It's a question I can't satisfactorily answer, and I don't think the wisdom lies in the Mushroom Kingdom. But what I can say is that Bowser, being an animal who kidnaps Peach and tries to kill Mario, still comes off as less of an asshole than how I've seen a lot of guys behave online.

Why is Peach?

It's difficult to determine where continuity begins and ends for a video game character with a thirty-five year history across multiple genres. How much of Peach's sass and aggression in the Strikers series is hidden fury versus situational showboating? Can her infamous "I'm your mama?" to Bowser Jr. be attributed to a translation issue or raise a serious concern about reproduction? And then there's the 'baby' versions of all the VIPs that even the X-Men timeline can't untangle. All of this is to say that if Super Smash Brothers has ANY legitimacy, Peach should technically be able to break herself out of any dungeon using only her hips.

The idea that Peach purposefully allows herself to be kidnapped is not a new one, but people all too quickly jump to the "sort of into that kind of thing" explanation. I would argue that there's a more plausible, and interesting, reason that doesn't shoehorn a kinky side into a character who really has never demonstrated one (Sorry, deviantartists). Not to worry though; I'm sure Daisy's first solo adventure is right around the corner, and you know she's got stock in Nintendo's old hotel chain.

Here's what I think is going on. You've got Peach's Kingdom (Princessdom?) in close proximity with Bowser's. From a monarch's perspective, Bowser has a certain usefulness, as there's a whole world out there of pokeys, boos, blarggs, and a freaking sun that doesn't even know what it's on about. Bowser brings a certain level of organization to all of these creatures. If he weren't so ineffective as a king that might create a bigger problem the chaos of the wilds, but as it stands Bowser is providing an unintentional service to the Mushroom Kingdom. They don't attack until he says to, which creates a predictability around the assaults.

Now that by itself is smart politics. There are other threats in the world(s) and Bowser's minions offer a line of protection from outside sources. When you factor in that Bowser feels...something for Peach that he may never fully wrap his horned head around, she herself is not in any real danger. Her reliance on Mario comes when Bowser gets overzealous but her status quo is never to crush Bowser entirely, only to keep returning him to a useful arm's length.

That may sound manipulative; and it is, it's politics, and Peach is a responsible ruler. But where she really shines is how she sneaks her rule-by-love approach into Bowser's rule-by-fear. Out of the four elements of alchemy, love is always represented by water. And with good reason, it's the most powerful. Displace it, evaporate it, it will always come back, adapting to whatever container it needs to fill. Meanwhile, given enough time and patience, a single trickle can reshape a mountain. And that's what Peach is doing to Bowser. As I said, Bowser is a brute. You can't teach him a lesson directly because he'll ignore it. If you want to see him change, it has to be so gradual that he doesn't realize it's happening.

How many times has Bowser shown up at the Mushroom Kingdom with a tennis racquet? How many towns full of goombas and koopas have sprung up in walking distance that look to Peach for inspiration instead of Bowser? This is why Peach allows herself to be kidnapped, because she cares enough to keep the process going. She may never see Bowser become selfless, but she's carefully nurturing a decency in him that he's unaware of. If Mario has to take on the role of her paladin from time to time, he's fine with it. But beneath the cheerful obliviousness and the hair flips, Peach has a genuine wisdom and empathy.

Did you ever play Bowser's Inside Story for the DS? The quick version: Bowser accidentally becomes a hero without ever realizing he's doing anything other than moving obstacles out of his own way. In the end, he's not entirely sure what the hell just happened, but he knows his actions wound up keeping Peach safe. And she thanks him by baking him a cake. You remember the "Eff you" we all yelled at the N64 when the game ended on that note? This time it brought a tear to my eye.