Top Cartoons: A Wish For Wings That Work

It’s no holiday standard, but it means something to me.

Now that December is here, I’d like to talk about a TV Christmas special that I remember from my childhood. Adapted from the comic strip Bloom County by Berkeley Breathed, A Wish for Wings That Work tells the wistful tale of Opus the penguin, who pines for a pair of soaring feathered wings to replace the flightless fins he’s been cursed with. As a big budget production with sly adult humor, and featuring the voices of Michael Bell, Frank Welker, Joe Alaskey, Raven Symone, Tress McNielle, Robin Williams, and Dustin freakin’ Hoffman, A Wish for Wings That Work should have been a sensation. Sadly, it turned out to be just another cartoon special that never really got off the ground.

The tale begins in flashback via a letter to Santa Claus that Opus writes. He describes his desperate desire to fly as other birds do, the insecurity he feels because of it, and the building resentment he’s gathered for his mephitic but well-meaning friend, Bill the Cat.

Opus attends a support group for “earthbound birds,” but finds the thinly-veiled discussion on sexual inadequacy to be of little help. Later, he and Bill rig up a balloon harness to lift Opus into the sky, but Bill ties his tongue into the strings and dismantles the procedure. This sequence is very funny and well-animated, almost like something out of a Roger Rabbit cartoon, but it’s also a little brief. I kinda wish it had developed and expanded into a widespread catastrophe. I would have liked to see Opus and Bill drag an ever-growing train of detritus as Opus careens through streets, farms, and buildings. Still, what’s there is pretty good.

Fed up at his failures, Opus takes his frustration out on Bill and chews him out. As Bill sulks away, Opus realizes that there’s still one person who can help him: Santa.

Here we return to the present, when Opus closes his letter and, realizing that it’s too late for mailing, faxes it to the North Pole. As he dreams of waking up to new wings on Christmas morning, and Bill collects snow watching his friend’s house from a distance, we pan up, and up and up, until we’re in the troposphere. That’s where Santa emerges, sailing from cloud to cloud and ho-ho-ho-ing his enlarged heart out. It looks like dreams are about come true after all, but a loose sleigh hitch leads to disaster, and the funniest “Oh, NOOOOO!” I’ve ever heard in my life.

I won’t spoil what happens from here, but it’s not the fairy-tale ending you typically get in holiday programming. The story closes instead with a “We’ll do the best with what we’ve got” message that works well enough.

While I enjoyed its neurotic tone and gross-out humor, A Wish for Wings That Work was not a ratings sensation, and most of those who did see it didn’t much care for it. As far as I can remember, CBS only aired it once, and that confused me. Bloom County was popular, right? People knew what they were getting into when they watched this show, right? Hell, we were living in the age of The Simpsons, Liquid Television, and The Ren & Stimpy Show. Cartoons were growing up, and I was excited about it. Where was everyone else?

My guess at the downfall of Wings was its packaging as a sanitized, child-friendly Christmas special. When Mother and Father plop their kids down for some network-sanctioned holiday television, they’re looking for fat tabbies who hate Mondays, not emaciated ones who hork hairballs. They want beagles who pretend to be flying aces, not cockroaches who pretend to be different genders. So, I guess I can understand that. Had Opus made his television debut on Fox, he might have gotten away with his twisted take on Christmas. Hell, he might have given birth to a whole series, as The Simpsons did. On CBS, however, where Garfield and Snoopy make the rules, Opus was a dead duck.

Even Breathed considered the special a failure. He felt that the director was in over his head, and tried too hard to made the show edgy. Breathed didn’t like his own writing, would have preferred a different actor to play Opus, and generally despised the whole production. He says that an eventual Opus film will surely be better than this, but I was actually quite happy with what we already got. I love the ways that Opus and Bill walk, the bluesy musical score, the emotional and comical performances, and the exaggerated, striking backgrounds (even the ones with the disturbing visual gags).

I consider A Wish for Wings That Work to be a real tragedy. It stood at the vanguard of nuanced, adult-oriented cartoons, at a time when mainstream audiences appeared to be ready for them. Somehow, its particular formula just didn’t add up to commercial success. I admit that it’s a little dark, a little uncomfortable, a little out there, but that’s what I love about it. I say that as someone who’s not even a big Bloom County fan. I’m more of a Calvin & Hobbes guy, but you know what I’m getting at.

Final: John Goodman as Roland Turner

“Why is nothing going right for me? My life is a big bowl of shit.”

Here’s another certainty for you: If John Goodman is in a Coen brothers movie, he’s going to be a monster.

No exceptions. Consider Gale Snoats in Raising Arizona. Consider Karl Mundt in Barton Fink. Consider Walter Sobchak in The Big Lebowski. Consider Big Dan Teague in O Brother, Where Art Thou?, and then consider this: Roland Turner, the junkie jazzman of Inside Llewyn Davis. It’s Goodman’s best role yet, in the best Coen brothers movie yet.

Inside Llewyn Davis is a masterpiece of all things film. It reminds me of Barton Fink, in that it’s about an idealistic New York artist whose life enters progressive collapse, but its ambition is restrained. Llewyn’s purpose is small and specific: it means only to explain how its title character winds up beaten in a back alley. It walks to that line and then stops, and this frustrates people, because the story leading to the event is so captivating.

Llewyn Davis is an aspiring folk singer in the 60s, and a mess of contradictions. He has an image in his mind of what a musician should be, and he feels that uncompromising adherence to this image should be enough for him to find financial success. Of course, this attitude gets him nowhere: he surfs couches, eludes pregnancies, judges his peers, and generally bums off everyone he knows.

When a fellow musician offers a car seat for a trip to Chicago, Llewyn sees a real opportunity to break into the business and turn his life around. Maybe, once he gets there, Llewyn can get face-time with club owner Bud Grossman, and land himself a serious gig. It’s during this surreal sojourn that he becomes trapped with the grumbling beatnik Johnny Five, and the ultra-hip Turner.

Turner reminds me of Barton Fink’s W.P. Mayhew, in that he’s also an older, more successful version of his film’s protagonist, but who is also broken down, washed up, and chemically dependent. Worst of all, Turner is unlikeable in the worst possible way: he’s a complete and irredeemable egotist. Like the know-it-all at your office, Turner has an opinion on everything, and he’s happy to let you know about it. To him, folk songs are a joke, and only jazz counts as true music. He considers himself a master pool player, and a worldly connoisseur of food, though some of it makes him shit himself.

Turner occasionally shows interest in Llewyn’s life, but it’s only so he can find a platform to spring into stories about himself. Aside from that, Turner peppers Llewyn with insults, jabs him with his cane, and requires frequent stops for “bathroom breaks.” The only peace Llewyn gets on the trip are during the long periods when Turner’s zonked out on smack.

In time, Turner waddles into dangerous territory when he asks about Llewyn’s former singing partner, who committed suicide. This is a subject that, for Llewyn, is still fresh and painful, and even touching on it causes him to lash out in anger. Of course, Turner doesn’t touch on it, but stomps on it like a child on an anthill, and so Llewyn quietly threatens him.

In response, Turner explains that he’s a practitioner of Santeria and other strange arts. He tells Llewyn that he’s above the folderol of fist fighting; he has the power to curse people. At first, this bluster sounds like the “Real mature, guys” thing that nerds use on bullies, but one must wonder, in light of the events that follow, whether there’s something to it after all.

Going over this, I’m not really sure why I find Roland Turner so fascinating. Maybe it’s because I feel for his rap, as it were. He’s a terrific asshole, forever in the process of salving his own ego. He is proud to be so many miles above the rest of the world, and yet he’s bitter that the world doesn’t understand his greatness. His character is a sad warning to Llewyn, who is similarly deluded. The fact is that Llewyn may not be suited for the life of a professional musician, but to him, anything else is mere “existence.” He doesn’t see that living in his own head and craving superiority over others only results in hateful isolation.

John Goodman, for all his charm, has always had a bit of menace about him: there’s a well of rage beneath his skin that you don’t want to poke into. He doesn’t unleash that beast in this movie, though. Instead, he affects a distant haughtiness that’s perfect for the role. Some viewers might be confused at his inclusion in the story, as it seems ornamental, but the performance is too tremendous to leave out. I also think that his presence facilitates a certain decision for Llewyn, one that will devastate most audiences. God bless Mr. Goodman for making it unforgettable, and God bless the Coens for bringing us one of the best movies ever made.

Wake Up, Mr. Nibbles

Kitties on parade

More More More Mr. Nibbles

Vivo el gato

Mr. Nibbles Mania

It’s Super Kitty

More Mr. Nibbles

It’s the kitty show

America Loves Mr. Nibbles

Photos of the cat. She’s my little buddy.

 

Meet Mr. Nibbles

There’s a neighborhood cat who stops by my home every few days. My family calls her “Mr. Nibbles” even though she’s a girl. We call her that because she gently bites my fingers when I pet her. With each visit, she gets more and more comfortable, and she’s grown to trust me enough to fall asleep in my lap. She doesn’t want anything to eat, as she’ll only take a tiny bit of food or milk and then refuse the rest.

I think she just wants to feel safe and loved somewhere as she makes her rounds across the neighborhood. I imagine she has a number of families that she visits, in between her dog-dodging and mouse-hunting. I miss having a pet, and she doesn’t seem inclined to cause trouble, so I enjoy her company.

I’ve heard that cats communicate with each other somehow, and I’m curious to know what Mr. Nibbles tells the neighborhood cats about us. She must be keeping us secret, because no other cats have shown up here. Maybe she says we’re horrible people whom they’re better off staying away from so she can have us all to herself.

Not-so-Top Cartoons: The Cat Came Back

 

You might remember this animated fable with the catchy theme song if you watched a lot of Nickelodeon. That’s how I first saw it. The cartoon is by Cordell Barker, a highly skilled animator who fills his work to bursting with clever details, and his massive talent is evident in The Cat Came Back.

For some reason, though, I don’t like it.

I should like it. The Cat Came Back is magnificently produced, and a marvel to look at, but I can’t help but feel like it’s missing something. Sure, it’s a little scary, and a little disturbing, but I like scary. I like disturbing. The Ren & Stimpy episode “Man’s Best Friend” is one of my favorite cartoons ever.

Maybe it’s because I don’t find the characters appealing. The cat is a terror, and Mr. Johnson doesn’t really deserve the trouble it causes him. And yet, Johnson earns no sympathy for this. His increasingly desperate attempts to murder the cat, and the increasingly dire situations he ends up in because of them, make him look like some kind of ugly, writhing insect forever trapped in a glass jar.

Barker’s direction is astounding. He can transform a flat-looking drawing into a flowing, three-dimensional landscape in a flash. He knows how to use the camera as a character. He plays fun tricks with sound design. He has ideas that I would never have come up with, and I greatly admire his skill. When I watch The Cat Came Back, however, I feel sad, like I’m watching something mean and low, even though its creation was clearly full of love. This confusing paradox is what makes the cartoon so special to me, even if it’s not one of my favorites.