I had both this and the Beauty and the Beast strip poking around in my brain while finishing up the last big storyline, and thought about doing a Disney Week, but I couldn’t think up a third strip to finish out the week that was worthy of being paired with these two. Eventually I was all Screw it, just put them up whenever and forget the third one. So here you are.
Shortpacked! by David Willis
Toys are serious business.
Convention appearances:
Calgary Expo Calgary, AB: April 26-28
Phoenix Comicon Phoenix, AZ: May 23-26, 2013
BotCon San Diego, CA: June 28-30
San Diego Comic-Con San Diego, CA: July 18-21
SPX Bethesda, MD: September 14-15
Phoenix Comicon Phoenix, AZ: May 23-26, 2013
BotCon San Diego, CA: June 28-30
San Diego Comic-Con San Diego, CA: July 18-21
SPX Bethesda, MD: September 14-15
Multiplex
Sorcery 101
Templar, AZ
The Transformers Wiki
Hail to the Slash
80 page GIANT
Axe Cop
The Book of Biff
Butt-Taco
Comics Curmudgeon
College Roomies from Hell!!!
Diesel Sweeties
Dinosaur Comics
Dr. McNinja
Dresden Codak
Fans!
Fleen
Gastrophobia
Girl Genius
Girls with Slingshots
Goats
Hark, a vagrant
Hijinks Ensue
Intrepid Girlbot
Legend of Bill
Medium Large
Not Invented Here
Octopus Pie
Overcompensating
Penny Arcade
PhDcomics
Power Nap
Questionable Content
Real Life
Rob and Elliot
Bad Machinery
Schlock Mercenary
Sheldon
So Far Apart
Something Positive
Two Lumps
Wapsi Square
Wonderella
Wondermark
Frumph.NET
Sorcery 101
Templar, AZ
The Transformers Wiki
Hail to the Slash
80 page GIANT
Axe Cop
The Book of Biff
Butt-Taco
Comics Curmudgeon
College Roomies from Hell!!!
Diesel Sweeties
Dinosaur Comics
Dr. McNinja
Dresden Codak
Fans!
Fleen
Gastrophobia
Girl Genius
Girls with Slingshots
Goats
Hark, a vagrant
Hijinks Ensue
Intrepid Girlbot
Legend of Bill
Medium Large
Not Invented Here
Octopus Pie
Overcompensating
Penny Arcade
PhDcomics
Power Nap
Questionable Content
Real Life
Rob and Elliot
Bad Machinery
Schlock Mercenary
Sheldon
So Far Apart
Something Positive
Two Lumps
Wapsi Square
Wonderella
Wondermark
Frumph.NET
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©2005-2013 David Willis | Powered by WordPress with ComicPress | Subscribe: RSS | Back to Top ↑
Too Dumb To Live.
I’ve always found it odd that this supposed to be the first step towards more historical movies rather than ones based on fairy tales… and they went with a fairy tale made by Smith himself.
I found it odd they ever thought that this movie would be their big hit and the Lion King was just filler.
That’s the craziest thing I ever heard, and I was all like WHAAAAAAAAAAAT when I first heard about it.
What’s equally amazing is the story behind what became “The Emperor’s New Groove”.
If you can find a bootleg of “The Sweatbox” online, it’s a fascinating documentary into the behind-the-scenes process of the making of that film, and how it went from an epic in the vein of “Lion King” to a retooled-at-the-last-minute buddy comedy so that they could meet their merchandising tie-in deadlines. (It was originally meant to just be a “making of” film, but due to the behind-the-scenes events it ended up capturing the whole transition of the film into something else entirely)
(I say bootleg because thanks to Disney, the film has never and will never actually get distributed in any legal way, shape, or form, even though they allowed the documentary to be made. It’s only been screened a handful of times, I believe, but there’s a workprint floating around the Internet.)
Yeah, that one’s pretty fascinating. I don’t know the whole story, but I do find it quite interesting that the sun kingdom and villain trying to retain her youth made it into Tangled… only instead of trying to get rid of the sun, Gothel basically keeps its powers for herself. Wonder if there were some concepts finally seeing day from the old film there?
Also, “Snuff Out The Light” may well be one of my top five favorite Disney villain songs, and it’s a shame the plot changed so much it had to be scrapped.
I dunno, I love Eartha Kitt singing it and all, but when I heard it, I was really, really glad that they’d changed her motivation.
A villainess motivated by the loss of her youth and beauty? Ehhh…well, it was the very first thing Disney did. Also, c’mon, give the lady villain a good motivation for once. The best lady with motive we’ve seen has been Ursula. Almost all the rest want something shallow, like to be the prettiest or own the prettiest thing.
As it turned out, Yzma was motivated by Kuzco kicking her out. Real, actual motive.
Yeah, the motivation’s not the best, I’ll give you that. But it’s so very very catchy. I can forgive a lot of things if I think the song’s fun enough. I guess I just wish there were a way for her to go all sun-killy while still keeping the feel of the movie we got. And Kronk.
Hey now.
Maleficient had a great motivation.
Because she wanted to.
That is a very good point. Women don’t need a motive, they’re inherently evil. :p
She got snubbed at a party is the motivation.
Worse, she wasn’t even invited to the party.
So she crashed it and laid a killing curse on the birthday girl. As you do.
I doubt she even cared about the party, she just used it as an excuse so the parents would blame themselves.
Agreed, timemonkey.
You don’t become Mistress of All Evil by having petty motivations.
You ruin people’s shit and tell them you did it for a ridiculous reason.
I know.
Especially since you’d think if they were making THIS their big hit they’d do some research… for instance, what Virginia looks like. The Chesapeake area is not particularly rich in cliffside. Mostly we have marshes and swamps and rivers and such. Lots of them.
Disney has a twisted sense on popularity. They think anything for kids is popular, but if it has darker elements or things that adults would understand that it would be unpopular. It is not such a good idea to look down on kids cause quite often they are a lot smarter than you give them credit for.
Thing is that view point is fairly recent. I mean look at the classics and you see those darker elements pretty front and center. Snow White is a fairly dark movie. Same with Bambi. Yes you have alot of sunshine and music, but you also have death and the very real threat of death. They lost that edge along the way.
But why?
The entire plot of that was, “You’ve got to run away, Simba!” “… okay.” “You’ve got to go back, Simba!” “OK.” “The End.”
Hey, a movie I never saw…because John Smith’s “memoirs” had already been assigned for me to read in High School literature class and I knew even the “true” story was phony.
Did anyone else ever think Pocahontas looked kinda creepy?
Besides looking disturbingly mature for a 12yo, not really.
Well puberty is relative when you can see with your heart.
So when your heart swells up with love, so does your chest… by about three cup sizes.
Noone ever brings up that the Grinch passed away, 2 weeks later, from heart complications from such a rapid growth.
That or he broke his neck when he tripped over something he couldn’t see due to his DD-cups.
Or perhaps he threw out his back lifting a several ton sleigh over his head.
DD cups aren’t actually that big. FYI. I’m bigger and I have zero trouble seeing everything, including my feet.
Though I believe it’s cup size + band size to get a real, tangible size. 32 DDs are a lot smaller than 42 DDs. Bras are messed up.
The Grinch would have had a pretty big band size.
Wrong. The band size measures rib cage and tells you how skinny someone is or isn’t; 32DD breasts are exactly the same size as 48DD breasts, the size of the woman attached to them is just different.
Skinny is the wrong word for the thing I mean, though; one woman can have a bigger frame than another without being fat. But my point is that bra sizing is not messed up and cups are consistent.
Her wasp waist always bothered me. Sure, the women are always drawn that way, but something about the art style made it seem especially pronounced in her case. Or maybe it was the massive bust she was supporting on it, not sure.
There’s always doing something related to the fact that all the Aladdin movies take place BEFORE the third act of “Hercules”, chronologically. There’s a crossover episode of the TV shows.
No joke there offhand, sadly, except that the fact Jafar is in Hades raises questions about the legitimacy of whatever gods Aladdin and co. worship.
It doesn’t matter what gods they worship. Since it takes place around the time of Greek mythology, it is pre-Islam so Disney has nothing to worry from suicide bombers.
it’s kind of weird you go right to suicide bombers there
… The what? I don’t know what this comment means, and I’m not sure I want to.
Oh, a joke equating Muslims to suicide bombers! Hahahahaha. OH man, I totally haven’t heard that one before. >_<
S.T.R.A.W.M.A.N. starring Samuel L. Jackson
Not mention that apparently the Greeks invented giant robots…
The Greeks made everything first.
Greeks invented the steam turbine. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_steam_engine
Of course it took the Romans to combine the steam power and giant robot technologies to move beyond the Greeks’ primitive wood-burning robots.
Yes, they did. It all started with that tiny mechanical owl (apparently a test of concept). http://clash-of-the-titans.wikia.com/wiki/Bubo
(BTW, Bubo is Latin, not Greek for “owl”. Apparently the Greeks didn’t have a word for it! *rolls eyes*)
Bubo sounds like the greek word for “crotch”.
The Greeks DID love their crotches.
Especially the ones belonging to young boys…
You’re thinking of the Catholic church, there. Even the stereotypical Greek thing is much more comparable to the way the rest of the Western world has married off fourteen-year-old girls for… most of its existence! And how even today twenty-year age differences between man and wife are the norm.
Long paragraph slightly shorter, just because there might be a younger man in a relationship does not mean it is child molestation. “Young man” is a better term for the relationships you are referring to.
Now I don’t know the actual Greek word for “crotch”, but based on my recent experiences with medical terminology, I guess it will have “ph” and “my” letter combos in it and be at least a twelve syllable word. And it will be on Tuesday’s test.
From whence we get “bubonic plague.”
That’s the one that always gets me. “Pallas Athene has sent her charming mechanical owl, Plague Blister.”
Not Greeks, Hephaestus. I’m pretty sure there is one myth out there where he invented robots/androids. Obviously, it would take centuries for men to duplicate the invention. I also don’t know the myth off-hand (hearing about it mostly second-hand), so if anyone has the full story in any form, I’d be interested in hearing/reading it.
He’s (usually?) credited with the creation of Talos; the ginormous “Man of Bronze.”
Most modern re-interpretations depict Talos as a giant robot.
Wait, Doc Savage is an ancient Greek robot? That explains everything!
Talos, who was defeated because they pulled the plug on his oil drip plan and he seized up. Piss poor design for an automated guard in my opinion.
I dig giant robots, you dig giant robots, Greeks dig giant robots…
I see what you did there…and I like it!
Nice.
“whatever gods Aladdin and co. worship.”
Oh dear.
What? It’s pre-Christianity and pre-Islam; I have no clue what gods existed in the area back then. Was probably the standard model of “different peoples worship a different god.”
The only thing I meant by it was “they sure as hell aren’t worshipping the Greek pantheon.”
A quick google/Wikipedia search turns up this article which has a list of Arabian gods. Not a great one, since it combines a couple different cultures and isn’t a complete list, but enough to give an idea.
Eh… They mentioned Allah in the first movie…
Indeed, I had forgotten that. They mentioned Allah twice, IIRC.
(For some reason, at that point of my childhood, I would watch movies and count how many times certain words were said in the dialogue.)
What area? Islamic China?
Arabian Nights / 1001 Nights short stories were mostly Persian, not Arabic, and in the tale of Alladin, he was living in China when the false uncle, a Egyptian sorcerer, comes to visit him.
There was a real Pochahontas, and a real John Smith (2 of them in fact), but the fun thing is… she was like only 12 or 13 at the time.
Yeah… isn’t it romantic?
Not even close to uncommon in Europe at the time. :/
Keep in mind that 12 back then is way different than 12 now. Not condoning it or anything, but as our life span has increased, puberty has been getting pushed back later in life.
Huh, strike that. Just googled it and found out health class in public school lied to me. Go figure.
At least you checked and corrected yourself.
Just think about how many people go on living their lives believing health class lies?
“Duck and cover” indeed!
“Duck and cover”, as I’ve posted elsewhere, actually did make some sense at the time. The context was the early 50s, when nukes were most likely to be delivered by bomber and perhaps one per major city – so, much more like an atomic version of the Blitz than the “saturation carpet-MIRVing of the northern hemisphere” scenario that we grew up with. The first was potentially survivable, the latter not so much.
Duck and Cover has always been my preferred form of birth control. Thank you, Health Class!
HOWEVER it is true that the conceptions of “teenagehood” and “childhood” have changed dramatically throughout history. What we look at and still say “child,” many civillizations have looked at and said “adult,” and while there are absolute rights and wrongs about child treatment, it’s a bit teleologically judgemental and arrogant of people living in the “modern” 21st century to look back and diss ancient civillizations for their “barbaric” ways without understanding the context.
For example–in ancient Judea around the time of the Maccabees a 12-year-old boy already had the rights of a man. He could marry, own a house, seek out employment, and while as a YOUNG man he still lived under his parents’ protection (an authority he would stay under for most of his life), he could do more of what he wanted than children today. They already gave him many of the responsibilities and thought patterns of an adult, and he lived up to those expectations. He had to. In medieval England, a thirteen-year-old, according to the official policy of the church, could choose his or her spouse already regardless of what his or her parents said. IF the parents disagreed, official church policy was it didn’t matter, child got to choose as long as both girl and guy consented. Practice differed from the rules at times, especially with wealthier families where politics was at stake, but as you can see with the responsibilities and troubles of an expanded childhood came expanded rights that children today don’t have. I’ve even heard the argument that when we created the term teenager, we created infantile between-lings who sit at home playing video games all day to replace the heroic young people of yesteryear, who at 17 captained their own ships or ran their own companies or saved nations or otherwise changed the world. While it’s tough to say we’ve “weakened” the human race with our creation of teenagehood, it’s important to recognize that our conceptions of childhood and teenagehood aren’t necessarily “the right ones.” There are benefits to allowing teenagers the freedom to create their own world, rather than shepherding them forever and always, and there are cons, too. We tend to look down on a thirteen-year-old and tell her, “you don’t know how to love,” and maybe she doesn’t, but people before us didn’t do that. They said she did, and in many societies gave her legal rights to love as she pleased. (If this surprises you, I’d love to send you my thesis or some of the other historical primary-source research conducted during my bachelor’s) PLEASE don’t interpret this as me saying pedophilia is okay–it’s not–I’m saying that our conceptions of childhood and adulthood do not hold throughout history, and taekwondogirl, you’re right–a 12-year-old then was way different than now, through nurture if not nature.
So while your health argument was incorrect, the gist of your argument is historically sound and much more open-minded than our usual tendency to say “ha, we know so much better than those primitive barbarians.” If you think of time as a place, instead of an unreachable nothingness, we begin to look a bit imperialistic and culturally self-centered bashing the ancients all the time, don’t we?
tl;dr Thank you for not looking at history with today’s contexts as so many people do.
I did read it, and I applaud your wall of text explanation.
I want to read your Thesis just because you write good!
Actually the opposite! As our nutrition improves, puberty is occurring earlier and earlier in girls.
(Yes, I know you admitted your mistake, but I wanted to clear up that the opposite case is in fact the case.)
And allow me to clarify your clarification: it’s not necessarily “improved nutrition”. It is, however, a matter of caloric intake and whether or not you have a bit of extra paddin’, versus burning off crazy amounts all the time.
While each girl is different, young girls who count as overweight or obese are considerably more likely to have their periods around 8 or 9 years (the lower limit for most girls), than girls who are skinny as a rail. Likewise, girls who get a LOT of exercise (such as athletes) often find they skip several periods in a row even after puberty hits (I can confirm this with a weird anecdote: one week when a hurricane hit, I ended up clearing debris including whole sizable trees being dragged to the road, and I cooled off by swimming. A single day of relatively vigorous exercise was enough to delay my next period by a WEEK, and it’s held that “end of month rather than middle” pattern ever since).
The reason being of course, that the body isn’t going to waste resources on getting itself ready for procreation, if it’s in the middle of starving or otherwise not having excess resources. A baby is a terribly expensive thing for the body to keep up with; it requires LOTS of fat, and blood, and just all sorts of things that require extra food intake really.
This is also why hunter-gatherer groups tend to have smaller populations than agricultural ones, and why humans had a population explosion after they started farming, despite not actually having improved overall health (seriously, we got shorter and everything): when you have a consistent food supply, especially whole grains (which are extremely nutrient-dense), you will tend to have more bodily resources to spare on pregnancy than a woman who has to wander around looking for food much of the time.
Additionally, breastfeeding, which requires a LOT of calories, can act as a form of birth control (albeit an unreliable one) for women in hunter-gatherer societies… but in women who had regular access to things like milk and grains, suddenly you COULD get knocked up while nursing. And since having extra hands on the farm is always handy, there was no real incentive not to keep having kids anyway.
So, no, our nutrition isn’t necessarily any “better” – certain cultures and subcultures are terrible as a rule at keeping sugar intake safely low for instance – but we have MUCH easier access to higher-calorie foods now.
So you have, paradoxically, undernourished girls who are “overweight” and because of that get their periods at like 9. Fun times.
BTW, fun fact: you’d think obesity would be a problem of the middle and upper classes, but you’d be wrong, as it’s just as bad or worse in poorer regions. The reason being that when you’re not sure if you can afford all your meals for the week, you damn well get your calories, and salt, and protein where you can without breaking the bank… and since many poor are working poor, they often also don’t have time to prep and cook “healthy” foods. So what usually happens is they end up filling a lot of their calories out with cheap fast food. Because fattening food is way better than none, and cheap is better than not eating at all. Unfortunate fact.
Boom! Headshot.
SWIPE! Bear-claw.
BAM! Bearslap.
Mmm, bear claws. Now I wanna get a doughnut.
(extended musical noodling)
“NO WE’RE OUT OF BEAR CLAWS!”
“Well, in that case…in that case, what DO you got!?”
“All we’ve got is this box of half a dozen rabid weasels.”
“…I’ll take it!”
There is much you could poke at in The Little Mermaid. Also, I’d love to see you tackle that art style as you have these two.
Heck – just the fact she worships trash.
I’m sure somebody else has done the obvious “Hoarders” joke though. Although there’s always doing a “Underwater Shortpacked!” gag of some kind.
She doesn’t worship trash, she has a collection of things that caught her attention.
Worship? She treasures things she doesn’t because she is inquisitive.
Whats shocking and repolsive is that Disny theater redid the song where she looks at the things she likes, and replaced it all with jewelry and money. “I want MORE…!” I would have screamed in protest if my father wasn’t there, and if I wasn’t so awestruck. Disny disgusted my since that day.
*things she doesn’t understand
Disney: the source of all evil…and catchy music.
Wait, what? In a stage show or something? That’s pretty messed up… why would anyone do that?
Hell, it doesn’t even make sense. “I want more gems, so I’m gonna… stop being an underwater PRINCESS?”
Though I have yet to confirm it myself, according to an aunt our family is related to Pocahontas.
And thanks to this damn movie, people often respond with “What, like Disney?” No. Nothing like Disney. Think more smallpox.
I sympathize with you, but not because I have any famous relatives. (I have one relative who someone wrote a book about, but I doubt many people have read it.) No, it’s “fucking Disney.” I was trying to come up with a creative way to teach swimming to 4-6 year olds, and thought fairy tales would be a good theme. So I ask the kids to name some fairy tales, and one of them said, “Mulan?”
My apologies if Mulan is actually a fairy tale, but that’s more myth than legend as far as I understand it. Does no one read to kids these days, and instead babysit with DVDs?
chinese legend. not quite fairy tale, but not made up by disney either
To be fair, most plots used by Disney as a basis for movies aren’t made up (originally) by Disney either.
If they stay in business long enough, they’ll eventually do a Disney version of Star Wars.
… Oh, right. Honestly forgot about that for a second. XD
I’m pretty sure we didn’t murder *all* the native americans. Surely there are at least a couple still poking about.
In fairness, no, we didn’t kill them all. But we didn’t exactly taste the sun-sweet berries of the Earth by their side, either.
On this topic, “we” is debate-able. My ancestors were busy discovering their surprise cruise came with complimentary manacles and a full day’s worth of Vitamin Despair! So, you know. Don’t look at me. Also, before this becomes flame-bait, know that I am highly inflammable. That is to say, I burn up like a kickstarter aiming to analyze women in video games. That is to say, quickly. That is to say, Words!
So your ancestors were pirates or Australians? I’m just trying to be certain where your loyalties lie.
Neither, black folks. Hence, the manacles. Alas, I forgot to mention the whole diseased death-ships. Although, I could have an uncle or two who turned pirate.
The aussies were prisoners so the manacles doesn’t really clear that up.
And I think it’s safe to assume you have pirate uncles. Because really, life’s just better that way.
Black Australian Pirate Vikings. Because it’s awesome, that’s why.
Wow, for seriously? You got “Australians” out of that? Heh.
(The people being deported to Australia back when would not have been surprised by their cruise, or the fact that it came with manacles – the trial judge yelling “I sentence you to be deported to Australia! Clap him in irons!” would probably have been sufficient explanation)
ahhh Vitamin Despair, the only Vitamin your body doesn’t need.
It is unfortunate, but truth is while human history is full of azzhats
if it don’t happen the way it did none of us would be here. :/ So sad.
Sure looking back if things went differntly for the better, or heck a lot better, the truth is other humans would be in our places. In the grand scheme… All of us are the best of some one elses bad situation, so we got to try to make it better for the next unlucky smuck born along side or after us.
Blah. I want to time travel, but even “farting” let alone fixing things would probably negate my and most of current humankinds excistance,
and replaced with other humans who would live in a slightly better world.
hey, we can’t really be blamed. plague took out 90% of them before we even arrived.
“And scattered about, some in their overturned war-machines, were the Mayans – dead! – slain by the bacteria against which their systems were unprepared, slain after musket and sword had failed, by the humblest things that God, in his wisdom, has put upon this earth.”
I think we can be blamed for bringing the plague, actually.
Well, in most or all cases that wasn’t intentional, at least. Still sucks for the afflicted, of course.
My vague impression was that with regard to the non-disease killing, the native people did a respectable job of giving as good as they got. Various other factors resulted them losing out in the land-claiming/stealing game.
The whole “guns” thing may have tipped the scale a bit as well, but yeah, it’s always funny how modern culture treats “Native Americans” as all one totally homogenous group. There sure weren’t more and less peaceful tribes, nope. And they certainly wouldn’t have ever had conflicts with each other if there were different groups. Which there weren’t.
Gold is a rock and it doesn’t have a soul.
That is why it must STEAL the souls of men!!
Um.
Wow. ._. That was so dark it smudged my soul.
Willis is going to feel so foolish when he dies and sees rocks everywhere in the spirit realm.
This is Willis we’re talking about.
He’ll see Rock Lords.
… Thank you. I now have the Rock Lords jingle stuck in my head. You will be hearing from my lawyer, sir.
(insert transformers generation one theme music)
Rock lords! Rocks in disguise! As rocks!
I for one welcome our new rock (over)lords.
No matter how you look at it this movie ends unhappily cuz of history. But I guess Pochahantis became Spanish or something for a while and then died or something.
Pocahontas became a christian, changed her name to Rebecca, married John Rolfe, and died in England of disease. Her son eventually came to America. She’s got numerous descendants (like Nancy Reagan).
I can see how you can go from Pocahontas to Rebecca. They’re very similar.
It was likely chosen because the Biblical Rebecca was told by God that she had “two nations” in her womb, and Pocahontas herself, by marrying John Rolfe, was considered a bridge between two nations.
Maybe the names have the same/similar meaning behind them.
Well, Pocahontas wasn’t even her actual name. It was more like a nickname.
When changing your name for whatever reason, it’s pretty common to choose one that’s completely unrelated to your birth name – especially when that reason is converting to a new religion, or when your birth name (actually Matoaka in Pocahontas’s case) doesn’t actually have an equivalent in whatever language.
And she learned English in three seconds due to listening to her heart.
I still don’t know how Ma-Ti managed to live long enough to help out with that and still look youthful enough to join the Planeteers.
Hey, he was all set up to get an excellent grade on the “learning from your heart” curriculum.
Disney’s Pocahontas pisses me off. The sequel was even worse. Pocahontas never returned to America!! Hellooo!!
Im related to Pocahontas 6 ways to sunday. Not descended from her tho. Just related thru her descendants marrying various relatives of mine.
I always heard that Pochahantis didn’t return to America in the original story and lived overseas for the rest of her life.
So….countdown to Willis thinking of that third strip now?
I didn’t until I read this comment and tried not to think of one.
Thanks, JERK!
I think the line you were looking for is, “Damn you, showler!”
I appreciate the reversal of fate this section provides.
Could do something like making a joke about Quasimodo being mentally unstable with seeing living gargoyle statues. Heck why not just randomly have characters from the show Gargoyles be the imaginary friends XD.
Why would you do that? Goliath is no fun. I think his funny bone was literally eroded away all those years he was frozen in stone.
And they could sing a song about how a hot girl totally wants to do it with Quasimodo, building up his expectations amazingly high only for them to be inevitably shot down, adding to his mounting grief and personal tragedy.
This is, of course, while Paris is on fire. You know, to lighten the mood.
Always wondered what would happen if things didn’t go right during one of the musical numbers. Like if John Smith did shoot the bear or if Pocahontas touched the rock and realized it was dead or under-aged. The last one would seem a bit ironic come to think of it.
And that’s the tip of my thoughts on Disney movies. Just have to weed through all the things that have been done before.
Willis…this is messed up! LOL
Less messed up than a human after they play with grizzly cubs in front of mama bear, though.
Seriously, you will get messed up. Don’t do it. Especially if mama bear’s already looking at you funny.
So where’s the Beauty and the Beast strip? Or is that still in reserve for a later date? I can be patient, but at the same time, I don’t want to miss it!
Just go back like a week, man.
Feb. 27
Willis has heard your request and posted it so fast that it went back in time!
Damn you, Willis! You have defied the Laws of Comedy! Thou hast doom us all!
Wait, so what type of joke is trying to be told here, exactly? I’m asking this in all seriousness, because after reading it I’m left with a sort of “Wait, what?” sensation, to the say the least.
Is it that Disney presents an unrealized version of cultures? Or that the cultures and totemic faith systems tied to them are stupid? Or are we just pointing and laughing at the slapstick of two straw man characters?
And in either of those cases, was this joke worth telling in terms of taste/punchline?
The ‘joke told here’ is that it’s fucking ass insane to play with bear cubs no matter what your religion is, or how many willow trees talk to you. And John Smith, a seasoned adventurer and explorer, probably should have known this.
Judging by his reaction between being handed the bear cub and being bear-slapped, I think he was abundantly aware of this.
Well, then- Pocahontas, who has grown up around animals just like this, probably should have known better, too. Still, the moral of the story is- Don’t fuck with bears.
“Straw man characters”? Ehh. Sure, they’re one-sided reflections of the way they’re presented in the movie, but that’s the way of all parodies. Presenting a character in a parody in a sympathic way would get in the way of the pointing and laughing.
For once, symbolism doesn’t really play a part here. I don’t think the joke is anything related to cultural or societal significance, I think the joke is “playing with bear cubs gets you mauled”. “Slapstick” is the closest thing to that.
I used the term “straw man” since the comic seemed to be suggesting that Poccahontas is an idiotic character and thus gets them both killed for her idiocy, and that seemed to fit better for someone trying to make a point of some kind. In which case them being a “straw man” character would fit.
But I think you’re right that this is some sort of weak parody of “don’t play with baby animals”. Which…isn’t all that funny? I mean, it’s not offensive, its just not really a “Ha ha” punchline. I’m curious why David Willis thought to make this, now.
Thanks for the feedback and consideration of the serious question, though.
Don’t use the term “straw man” that way. It’s not what the term means.
Noted!
So was this just a parody of how if the musical moment happened in real life, they’d both get killed by a wild animal? I’m kinda surprised, but apparently that was the full extent of the joke, according to the comments I’ve seen related to my confusion rather than myself.
Soemtimes, a cygar is just a cygar…
There’s a reason that intelligent hunters and even hikers/campers in anyplace that can be described as ‘bear country” carry a large caliber pistol on their hip. If you happen to find yourself in between a mother bear and her cubs (she won’t care if you didn’t mean to do so) a .45, .44 Magnum, a .454 Casull, or at least a .357 Magnum will likely be the only thing that *might* prevent your head from being swatted off of your shoulders and eaten by bears. Bears are dangerous.
They played with bear cubs. You can’t do that.
…You don’t know what a strawman is, do you?
Probably not, but I’ll bet they do know what a buzzword is!
1. You apparently have no clue what the term “straw man” means. Wikipedia has a decent entry, please read it.
2. Don’t play with bear cubs. The mother bear will attack you.
3. Don’t play with bear cubs. The bear cubs will attack you.
4. Anyone dumb enough to play with bear cubs is going to get attacked by a bear, and it’s funny when it happens to people who should have known better.
5. Seriously, go look up “straw man”
Thanks for the attempt at education in a kindly way, but it seems its more my assumptionof the context rather than my understanding of “straw man” that’s at fault here.
As you and others pointed out this probably is just a parody of “don’t play with bear cubs”. So “Straw Man” doen’t apply to these characters since no point about the characters themselves outside of that mockery of the situation is being made.
But that just begs the question: Why use Poccahontas? Why make her out to be an idiot in this comic who gets two people killed? Why not any two shmoes who could do the same thing? Is it funnier with them? Why? Was Willis just watching Disney stuff and decided to make a comic about it, or what?
I know this’ll probably get me mocked or a slew of ad hominems thrown my way for overthinking a webcomic, but for some reason this is the first Shortpacked comic I’ve seen in a long time where I just went “The heck?” enough to want to actually voice a queston on its nature.
…watch the part of the movie with the song “Colors of the Wind.” The first four panels are pretty much exactly what happens.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=TkV-of_eN2w#t=58s
There you go.
Thanks, but I actually already got the film reference and specific moment fine. What I don’t get is why it’s being parodied, besides “Ha Ha, In Real Life They Would Have Died”.
Unless that IS the full extent of the joke? I kinda figured it wouldn’t just be that, since there isn’t much there.
Am I wrong?
Yeah, it is just that. Guess you’re just over thinking it a little. Sometimes someone getting mulled by a bear is just someone getting mulled by a bear.
Alas, if the bear was only thinking them over… Or warming them?
A film aimed to kids showed something utterly stupid as the right thing to do. Willis poked poked fun at it.
It’s that simple.
You are not using “begs the question” correctly, either.
http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/begs-the-question.aspx
What you mean to say is that it brings up the question.
I’d question your logic, but that would make me a strawman. Of course, not doing so would make me a strawman as well. Because, as everyone knows, strawman means whatever we want it to at any given time.
Bah.
You’re refusal to question or not proves you to be a double-strawman.
It’s that the ridiculous caricature of totemic faith systems presented in that film is stupid. Actual believers in Algonquian religion do not play with bear cubs, or have such a ridiculously, condescendingly green view of nature.
Beautiful art. Great comic.
God, I really feel for poor John in that 4th panel. He knows its over.
Panel 5 includes the mental subtitle, “Welp, I’m dead now.”
Cameo!
Oh… you silly ol’ bear!
Technically, it’s my third.
ROFLMAO – this one really struck the funnybone!! Good one David
NEXT WEEK: The start of a four-week McAwesome’s storyline.
Meanwhile, I imagine Mike building one of THESE for Amber’s office…
Huh, that comic is kinda… gruesome.
Never saw Pocahontas though, so I can’t say much about it.
Urhg. When I went through a marathon of Disney animated movies a number of years ago, this was one of the few I skipped. It’s just so…nnggh. I can’t.
You do know this means you’re going to think of a third Disney comic now, right?
Scroll up a bit.
He’s probably already drawn one about Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs, by this point.
OK, technically that’s a Warner Bros. parody of a Disney film. So he’ll have to draw another one too.
Speaking of Disney, what was with King Triton (who has got to be at least 50 something) having, like, a dozen teenage daughters of different scale, hair, and eye color hanging around the palace? And what happened to his wife? Does he have a harem or something?
His wife is dead. Unless we see a pregant mermaid it’s probably easiest to assume merfolk reproduce like fish.
There’s a rule in movies that a dad has to be a widower, divorced, or otherwise separated from his spouse. If the wife is still around, there is no reason for the dad to be there at all, since everyone knows dads never have any sort of interactions with their children under normal circumstances. The only way for a dad to be an actual character and for the marriage to be intact is if the plot is about the mom having been abducted by bad guys and the dad going to her rescue.
I actually understand why that was, animation was expensive and time consuming so they stuck with only the characters they’d need. It doesn’t quite work for that reason in The Little Mermaid as Ariel has a crapton of sisters but in that case it’s probably because if she’d had a mom in the picture things wouldn’t have got so out of control and Ariel wouldn’t have run off to Ursula.
I think Triton might assume Ariel’s mom being alive would fix everything (and he does mention it at one point), but he’s wrong. No matter how much Mom loves you, you’re still a teenager and your moods are still mercurial and you’re still secretive and convinced other people don’t get your pain. It doesn’t matter that your parents are married, you still know THEY’VE never been in love.
Etc.
Not true of all teens, but true enough if Ariel that I think her mom being in the picture would have just shifted the conflict a little, not resolved it.
Unless of course we assume Dad only hates the human world because of his dead wife, as apparently the third movie tries to assert, but that’s really stupid.
On the “third movie” his wife looks exactly like Ariel who got crushed by a ship Raiden style except offscreen. It’s assumed he had only one mate.
Reminds me, any of you seen that set of six prints of Disney villainesses with the same supermodel body? YES INCLUDING URSULA =p
Why am I laughing? Murder and decapitation is not funny. Why am I laughing?
Who says they aren’t?
Damn nature, you scary!!
Who else came back hear on Monday to read the comments about Strawmen? Because I did that thing.