Tuesday, October 4, 2005

Today I picked up Cinderella for my mum, and while I was waiting in the checkout line it dawned on me: if I were five years old, I could watch the movie a dozen times, possibly in the span of a week. That’s the kind of tolerance you possess as a kid, I guess, but the real question is why, 18 years later, the drop-off for my enjoyment of cartoons is so severe.

Certainly my mum doesn’t subscribe to a strict regimen wherein she must have Disney, lest she burst into song and computer-generated dance. I imagine she’ll appreciate the nostalgia when she receives it. And before you even think it, no, I didn’t purchase the movie for myself. I’m not trying to brown wrapper the situation. Hey, I’m man enough to admit to watching Bambi this year and failing miserably. I remember making it to the part where the titular character learns how to walk, but then I had to fast-forward to the sequence where the titular character’s mother dies. Then I ejected the DVD.

What was the problem exactly? When I unearth other relics from my childhood, such as an action figure or the old Nintendo, I can still evoke a sense of charm and slight amusement if I try hard enough. But cartoons, especially Disney cartoons? Pure loathing. I’m talking abject disgust.

I began formulating the most complex rationalization for this feeling, ultimately constructing a multi-tiered argument involving thresholds of suspense and the unique demarcations of juvenile entertainment. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Suddenly it struck me. It’s the eyes. More to the point, it’s the ratio of the iris to the white.

Let’s start at a happy place. The animated Batman series.

“Commissioner? I don’t even know her!”

Notice how Gordon is modest, even lacking, in the ol’ peepers department. Heck, Batman doesn’t even have eyes. I could honestly sit down and watch a few episodes right now. I’d probably even enjoy them. Now let’s move on to something more sinister.

Borderline appropriate.

This is a symbol, really, for the struggle between Disney and Pixar, crassness and taste. The whites of their eyes are valiantly holding against the encroaching darkness, which lends them some reprieve. It’s time to enter the Danger Zone.

Something’s wrong here.

The white is losing. Gus apparently woke one morning and decided his eyes needed perverse alteration, right after embarking on his daily cheddar binge. I don’t remember the names of the other mice, though the short one looks like an enabler. Before we plunge straight to the ninth, let’s pay a brief visit to a token anime character. I have no idea who she is. I found her on the Internet. She could be a man, you can never tell with these things.

“Super-charged, ultra-fusion-powered pupils are hot. Am I right?”

No wonder her hair’s totally white! Her eyes clearly drained directly into her scalp. I’d also like to point out the– Wait, what was that?

Oh hells no.

I don’t see an annoying, easily marketable bunny looking at me. I’m actually beholding two vacuous windows into a soulless shell, twin portals to the screaming, dilated depths wrought by Drizzt Quel’Gorath expressly for his dark knights of Sepulchrion. Bambi euphemistically calls this “Thumper,” but–

Holy fucking shit.

“Eating greens is a special treat, it makes long ears and–” paused Thumper. “And I’m going to make a gun using carrots and maybe pieces of the Wise Owl so I can kill you and your eyes, Bambi!”

I know you look to me for my prescriptive capacity, so here you go. When you witness such abominations, such grotesque exemplars of cuteness, there’s only one thing to do.

Shrink your pupils.