Why I Love Animation: Toy Story 2 - Part One

I am excited for Toy Story 3. Because I know I am going to see it no matter what, I’ve been trying to read and watch relatively little of the pre-release peeks at the film. But what I’ve seen and heard so far I like, for the most part. I think the premise is an extremely bold move and I can’t wait to see how Pixar pulls it off.

Roughly eleven years ago – and yes, it really has been that long – I was feeling a little less excited and a lot more worried about Toy Story 2.

How could I have ever been concerned about a movie that ended up being one of my favorite animated films of all time? For starters, it was 1999 and Pixar’s track record consisted of a whopping two films: the original Toy Story, which was a great movie, and A Bug’s Life, which was good but didn’t grab me quite as much as Toy Story did. So Pixar had made two quality films. A good start, but not enough to call it a pattern. Not enough to make me certain that they would keep making good films and avoid potential huge missteps. Five years before, Disney had kicked off their controversial direct-to-video sequels with The Return of Jafar and while I expected that a theatrically released Pixar film would be of better quality than most of Disney’s home video offerings, I did wonder if the release of a sequel relatively soon after the original film was due more to a desire to capitalize on the success of Toy Story than to a desire to tell another great story. But I think a big contributor to my nervousness was the teaser trailer:



I liked seeing the little squeaky toy aliens and Woody and Buzz back on the big screen. But what got me worrying was how Buzz and Woody were acting. To me, it felt a little to close to the animosity they displayed towards each other through most of the first movie. And that had me worried that Pixar was about to make one of the biggest mistakes the possibly could: releasing a sequel that was a retread of the original. The challenge of making a good sequel is finding the sweet spot between giving audiences more of what they loved the first time around and presenting them with something new and fresh. Too much of the latter and you lose the benefit of having a successful first movie, because your sequel doesn’t have enough connection to the original. Too much of the former, which was what I was afraid of here, and it’s like the first movie didn’t matter. Anything that the characters learned or gained in the original film gets erased in the name of ensuring that audiences get exactly what won them over the first time around.

Of course, I needn’t have worried. Toy Story 2 wasn’t a retread and didn’t erase everything that had happened in the previous film. It showed me that Pixar knew what they were doing and made me trust that their future films would be of high quality. It became my new favorite Pixar film (and remained in that spot for a long time, though now I can’t decide between it and The Incredibles), one of my very favorite animated films, and that rarest of beasts: a sequel that I liked more than the original.

As is always the case when I do a full-blown analysis, the rest of the article assumes that you have already seen the movie and spoilers abound. I would strongly recommend that if you’ve never seen the movie before, you find yourself a copy and watch it before reading further. Of course, you can just read the article without having seen the movie and even comment on your impressions if you so choose. Just keep in mind that this is no substitute for actually seeing the movie and in this case, you’re missing out on a really excellent film.



The movie kicks off with Buzz Lightyear, a character we all know from the first movie. The setting, however, is literally alien. Buzz dives down from outer space like a comet and soars through a rocky landscape before touching down on the strange planet. What’s going on here? We recognize Buzz, but the fist Toy Story was partly about Buzz accepting the fact that he is a toy, not a space ranger, not capable of doing exactly the things we’re seeing him do now. Is this a dream? Andy's view of a game he’s playing? Something else? As it turns out, it’s all a Buzz Lightyear video game. By the filmmakers’ own admission, it’s also a misdirect. This is part of that balancing act between staying faithful to what the original move was and creating something new and different. Giving the audience exactly what they’re expecting all the time can get boring for everyone, so this film starts with something that appears to be pretty far distant from what the original Toy Story was all about.

Is the opening to Toy Story 2 just a fake-out, the equivalent of saying “Ha ha, fooled you! Now here’s the real movie”? No. Aside from keeping the audience on their toes and letting them know that Toy Story 2 will not be the same movie as the first one, the video game scene gives us our first new character introduction, or our first two new character introductions, depending on how you look at it. The obvious one is the evil Emperor Zurg, intergalactic archenemy of Buzz Lightyear. Zurg did get a passing mention in the previous film, but he’s never actually appeared before and it would be a pretty big risk to assume that viewers would remember his name. So we get to see Zurg watching Buzz’s approach through his red-tinted monitor, laughing evilly, and blasting Buzz’s upper body into dust right before the true nature of the scene is revealed. We don’t know that Zurg is an actual character within the real story of the movie yet and he doesn’t appear in the plastic until much later. This scene sets him up in our minds so that when he does actually show up, our reaction is “uh-oh” rather than confusion.

The other character introduced in this scene is Buzz. No, I’m not losing it. I know Buzz was already in the first movie. But what this scene does is to remind us of the particulars of Buzz’s fictional backstory and his former delusions. This will become important later, when there are two Buzz Lightyears, one of whom is still under the impression that he is a real space ranger. Again, we don’t know that any of this is coming; we’re just having fun watching an exciting action scene. But when we meet the second Buzz later on, we’ll have a better idea of what to expect of him because of what we saw Buzz doing and saying in the opening.

The reveal comes about four an a half minutes into the movie and we see timid tyrannosaurus Rex with a proportionately huge control, wailing over his latest defeat at the hands of the virtual Zurg. This brings us back to the world of the familiar, the Toy Story 2 we were expecting, with all our favorite characters and everything we know and love from the first movie.



If I still had any concerns that this sequel was going to ignore the changes that the characters went through in the first movie in order to go back to the formula that had worked before, seeing Buzz talking to Rex all but erased them. What really reassured me was Buzz’s attempt to dull the sting of Rex’s video game loss by saying “In fact, you’re a better Buzz than I am.” This isn’t the same deluded, self-important guy who showed up o Andy’s bed in the previous film. Buzz knows who he is now and he’s comfortable with life as a toy. As the scene progresses, we see that Buzz’s relationship with Woody is much better than what it was through most of Toy Story. These are still two guys and Woody is understandably stressed at the moment. So they aren’t going to sing songs about what good friends they are, and Woody is still capable of getting mildly irritated by Buzz in his flustered state. But the really important detail in their interaction is that Woody is leaving Buzz in charge while he’s away, something that he never would have done willingly in the first film. The first time I saw the film, this was the point where my doubts were completely gone.

Since the first Toy Story was a big hit, it’s fair to assume that most people seeing the sequel already know who all of the major characters are. So instead of doing full introductions for them, all that’s needed is to lightly tap the audience’s memories. For starters, we have Andy’s room. It’s not the exact same Andy’s room where a good chunk of Toy Story took place; remember Andy’s family moved into a new house. But it still has enough recognizable features to let us know where we are, even without the added clue of all of Andy’s toys being there. Many of the furnishings are the same, though the layout is slightly different. The overall décor is still split between Buzz and outer space themed items and Woody wild west ones representing both Andy’s love of his two favorite toys and the hard won friendship between Woody and Buzz. The biggest difference is the wallpaper, and even that is similar enough to jog memories of Andy’s old room. Where the old room features a pattern of white clouds on a sky blue background, the new one swaps the clouds for yellow stars.

The characters themselves are reintroduced by giving them all some role in the task of finding Woody’s missing hat that recalls some aspects of their characters. When Woody’s frantic searching for his hat causes him to fall from the chest of drawers, Buzz rushes to his aid by way of the Hot Wheels track that helped him to “fly” in the first film. He no longer thinks he’s a space ranger, but Buzz is still an athletic and heroic character. Sarge is ordering the army men to continue digging through the toy chest. Hamm, who maintains the toys’ literal window to the outside world, is communicating with the next door lawn gnome, who reports that Woody’s hat is not in the yard. Mr. Potato Head is completely oblivious to Woody’s problem and only cares about himself and one other, who we’ll get to shortly. Loyal, laid-back Slinky, Woody’s best pal, is the one to actually track down his lost hat.



In addition to reintroducing the returning characters, this scene debuts no less than three new characters. First is Mrs. Potato Head, who was one of Andy’s sister Molly’s Christmas presents at the end of the previous movie. She ends up being more of a secondary character here and we won’t see all that much of her, but she still provides a lot of entertainment value when she does appear. We first see her reading to some of the preschool toys, a sign of her motherly nature. She clearly adores Mr. Potato Head and he loves her too. While the rest of Andy’s toys are busy looking for Woody’s hat, Mr. Potato Head is only concerned with finding his wife’s missing ear. He’s largely still the same surly spud from the first movie, but his wife’s influence does seem to have softened him a little.



The second new character, like Zurg and deluded Buzz, makes his first appearance without the audience realizing his importance to the story. “Al’s Toy Barn” was a throwaway line at the end of the Buzz Lightyear commercial in the original Toy Story. Now, through another commercial, we’re introduced to the eponymous Al. Al’s future significance is a little more obvious than that of the characters from the video game. Why bother showing the commercial and having Hamm comment on his distaste for the guy in the chicken suit if it’s not going to come up again? But Al is onscreen for less than twenty seconds here, so the audience isn’t being hit over the head with the idea of him.

I tend to think – and I believe rightly so – that the people at Pixar are very talented and very smart, among the best in the business. But this does not prevent them from making the occasional mistake. In a story recounted by Disney Legend Floyd Norman, credited as an additional storyboard artist on Toy Story 2, some elementary school children paid a visit to Pixar and got a look at an early version of the film. They liked what they saw, except for one small detail. “Hey, where’s the dog?” they asked, referring to the puppy that Andy got for Christmas at the very end of the original movie. And all of these wonderfully creative and intelligent filmmakers looked at each other and said “Whoops.”



So thanks in part to a group of schoolkids, we have our third new character: Buster the dog. His introduction is another misdirect and a bit more of a cheat than the video game opening. Though a lot of it does count on our memories of Sid’s vicious dog Scud and use similar shots to stir them up, the toys’ reactions to Buster’s approach seem a little too fearful once it’s revealed that Buster is really a sweet puppy and the only reason Woody has to hide quickly is so that he and Buster can play their customary game of hide and seek. Buster is another character who doesn’t have many scenes, but is still a lot of fun. Though, like the toys, he is capable of doing and understanding more than the humans in the house suspect, he is still very much a real dog. He can’t talk, walk upright, or do anything that a normal dog is physically incapable of doing. He may be a little smarter than the average dog, everything he does fits with the personality of an exuberant, eager to please puppy.

Buster is also the most obvious example of how computer animation has advanced since the first movie. Where Scud had a flat texture with marks carved into him to resemble fur, Buster has a fur texture much closer to that of a real dog. Although Pixar is very good about picking subjects for their films which their technology can handle well, their technological advancements tend to be dictated by the needs of the story. Buster is a necessary part of the narrative, not just a way to show off a cool new way of rendering fur.

We’ve reconnected with all of our old friends and met some new faces. But we also need to be reminded of what’s at the heart of the story. Woody is searching for his hat, desperate to find it. Why? Because Andy is leaving for cowboy camp today. Why is Woody excited about cowboy camp? Because it’s a trip where Woody gets to spend time alone with Andy, something that Woody can still appreciate even if he’s no longer jealous of Buzz. This brings back one of the big emotional points from the first movie: how much Woody loves Andy. And when Bo Peep reassures Woody, telling him that the boy who wrote his name on Woody’s foot will take him to cowboy camp with or without his hat, we’re reminded of how important Woody is to Andy and that the “Andy” on Woody’s boot is a symbol of the connection between them. So now we’re all caught up with the current state of affairs in Andy’s room and just about everything we needed to know from the first movie. On with the show!



I love this scene. I could easily watch twice as much of just Andy playing with his toys. Though we knew by the end of Toy Story that Andy cares very much about both Woody and Buzz, we never got to see how he now plays with them together. Here, we get both that and more of Andy’s genre-mixing way of playing. It’s also another good example of how some of Andy’s toys are permanent characters and other fill different roles on different days. Regardless of the scenario, Woody is always Sheriff Woody and Buzz is always Buzz Lightyear of Star Command (represented here by a cardboard box labeled “Star Command.” It’s possible that Bo Peep is always Woody’s love interest, a rare reflection of her real relationship with him. But Hamm has been promoted from playing the bank in Andy’s game from the opening of the original movie to the role of the misplaced Bond villain, Dr. Pork Chop. And Mr. Potato Head, formerly the infamous One-Eyed Bart, is now merely an unfortunate victim of “death by monkeys.”

But the real point of this scene is to create the rip in Woody’s shoulder which ultimately leads to him being left behind when Andy goes off to cowboy camp. Pains are taken to show both how upset Andy is when Woody is damaged and that Andy was not doing anything wrong to cause the rip. His toys do get knocked around when he plays, but most of them can take anything Andy can dish out. The problem is that Woody is not as sturdy as most of his fellow toys, a condition that may well be related to his age, which we will learn about later. Andy’s mom, compassionate as ever, suggests that they try to fix Woody on the way to cowboy camp. It is Andy who sadly decides that he’s better off leaving Woody behind, but his mom is the one who delivers the line that brings in one of the movie’s main themes: “Toys don’t last forever.”



Before this line, there isn’t much difference in tone and theme between Toy Story 2 and Toy Story. It’s still about a kid’s toys and what they do when no one is around. The emotional lynchpin is still Woody’s relationship with Andy. As a good sequel, Toy Story 2 picks up on these important threads from the first movie. Part of what makes Toy Story 2 both a great sequel and a great movie is that the central issue of the second film is much more complex than that of the first. The ultimate message of Toy Story is that Woody’s fears were unjustified and Andy was capable of loving both Woody and Buzz. New toys aren’t competition for the older ones and birthdays and Christmases are nothing to be afraid of. The important thing about the statement “toys don’t last forever” is that it’s undeniably true and the movie will never pretend that it isn’t. Woody is not Winnie the Pooh; he doesn’t live in a magical vision of childhood, forever safe, where Christopher Robin, children the world over, and the creators of the next Winnie the Pooh film can always find him for years to come. There will be no scene at the end where the toys no longer fear yard sales, which they equate with being discarded the way they once equated birthdays with being replaced. While the story does conclude that there is a “right” course of action, it is not an easy decision. The stakes are higher here and Woody’s decision feel all the more real and courageous because he knows the consequences. He can never deny that neither he nor what he has with Andy will go on forever. This one line not only lays the framework for this movie, but sows the seeds that look like they will bear fruit in Toy Story 3.

To be continued....


Trivia Time! Pixar frequently includes little in-joke references to their other films and shorts in their movies. Toy Story 2 is no exception. Your challenge this week is to name at least two such references in Toy Story 2 to previous Pixar works other than the first Toy Story. Post your reply in the comments. Winner get their name posted next week along with a link to a site of his or her choice.

All images in this article are copyright Disney/Pixar.

Why I Love Animation: Gargoyles - "The Edge"

I admit that I have been hesitant to start writing about animated TV shows. While there are plenty of excellent ones that I want to discuss, covering an entire animated series is a much more daunting task than analyzing a single movie or short film. I find it challenging to try to sum up an whole series without getting bogged down in individual episodes and their varying strengths and weaknesses. In order to keep myself sane, I’ve decided to limit my focus to a single episode of each show. I will be selecting episodes that I feel are particularly good examples of what the shows are all about. I intend to stay away from multiparters, at least for now. I will do my best to pick episodes that require the least possible amount of prior knowledge of the show so that those of you who haven’t seen it before don’t feel hopelessly lost and I don’t have to spend paragraphs just trying to get you up to speed. And I reserve the right to revisit the same show in the future and discuss a different episode.

Now that we’re all on the same page, let’s get started!

The Show:



By the 1990s, Disney had already established itself in the field of television animation, with popular series like Adventures of the Gummi Bears, DuckTales, and Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers created in the preceding decade. In the fall of 1990, the syndicated “Disney Afternoon” programming block began airing, featuring the aforementioned three shows and the new series TaleSpin. Disney continued to offer this two-hour block through 1997, altering the lineup every year to cycle in new shows. In 1994, Disney introduced a new show that marked the biggest departure yet from their previous Disney Afternoon offerings: Gargoyles.

As the show explains, gargoyles are creatures that turn to stone during the day and become flesh and blood warriors when the sun goes down. A thousand years ago, a clan of gargoyles defended a Scottish castle and its human inhabitants from danger. One morning, both humans and gargoyles were betrayed and a group of invading Vikings was able to sack the castle. All but six of the gargoyles are smashed in their sleep. The surviving gargoyles pursued the Vikings and liberated their Scottish prisoners, but were blamed unfairly for the apparent death of the castle’s princess. The castle’s sorcerer cast a spell on the gargoyles, condemning them to sleep in stone until the castle rises above the clouds.

Centuries passed and the gargoyles remain cursed. Finally, in 1994, the castle was purchased by wealthy businessman David Xanatos and moved – gargoyles included – to the top of his Manhattan skyscraper. This fulfilled the conditions of the spell and the gargoyles awoke in a strange new world.

The year 1994 proves no less exciting or dangerous for the gargoyles than the year 994. They explore their new home and realize that most humans are just as frightened of gargoyles as they were in the tenth century, maybe even more so. They befriend a police detective named Elisa Maza and discover that their benefactor Xanatos is not someone they can trust. Eventually, they are forced to leave their castle home for fear of what Xanatos may do to them while they are helpless during they daylight hours.

Because of the series’ urban nighttime setting and action-adventure focus, some viewers saw Gargoyles as Disney’s answer to Batman. While the success of Batman probably did pave the way for Gargoyles, the show was very much its own thing. Rather than simply aping the successful formula of Batman, Gargoyles built its own world, which eventually referenced everything from Scottish history to the works of Shakespeare. Smart writing that never talked down to the show’s target audience and continuing story arcs at a time when few shows were using the device kept fans of the series coming back for more.

Gargoyles ran for two seasons totaling sixty-five episodes on the Disney Afternoon. A third season known as Gargoyles: The Goliath Chronicles aired as part of Disney’s “One Saturday Morning” block on ABC in 1997. Unfortunately, the third season episodes were created almost entirely without the involvement of former series co-producer Greg Weisman, who was instrumental in setting the direction and tone of the show. (The one exception was the season premiere “The Journey,” which Weisman wrote.) With Weisman gone, much of what had made Gargoyles special was lost. Complex characters and continuing storylines gave way to clichéd stories that never had any future repercussions. The third season ended up being the last. Many years later, comics publisher Slave Labor Graphics produced new Gargoyles comics written by Weisman. The comics took place after the second season of the show and reflected Weisman’s original plans for the third season and possible Gargoyles spin-offs.

The Episode:

With a series like Gargoyles where continuity is so important, selecting just one episode to discuss is no easy task. Like most Disney television series of the time, Gargoyles started off with a five episode origin story, so beginning at the beginning is out. Since Gargoyles is an ensemble show, many of the first season episodes are centered around one particular character as a way of exploring that character’s personality, setting up story arcs for the character, and avoiding a scenario where every episode is trying to cram in a good moment with every character. What makes the episode I have chosen particularly interesting is that it focuses on one of the series’ main villains: David Xanatos. It’s also a very well animated episode, which isn’t always a given on a TV series where multiple studios may take on the animation chores. The title – “The Edge” – might initially seem like it would refer to the edges of buildings where the gargoyles typically perch, or an individual’s breaking point, as in “over the edge.” But in fact, “the edge” is the advantage in a conflict, that one thing that can mean the difference between victory and defeat.

Pretend that you have never seen an episode of Gargoyles before. (This will be easier for some of you than others.) You don’t know who the characters are, what they want, how they relate to one another. All you know is what you can see in the first scene. Based on that, what can you tell about the people you’re watching?



There are two men, one a tan brunette with a ponytail and goatee, the other pale and blonde. They’re both clothed in karate gis and the room their in has a mat on the floor and weight lifting equipment. So you can probably guess that this is not a serious life-or-death battle. Indeed, the “fight” is over in mere seconds, as the blonde man kicks the brunette and knocks him to the ground. The dark haired man, who we will shortly learn is David Xanatos, seems more surprised than angered at losing. As he mentions, he has never lost a match to the other man before. When his opponent, who respectfully refers to him as “Mr. Xanatos,” asks if Xanatos would prefer that he lose on purpose, Xanatos replies, with no hint of joking, that he would fire him if he did. Wanting to put the loss behind him, Xanatos tells his assistant to tell a certain emir he’s scheduled to meet with to be there an hour earlier.

So what do we know about David Xanatos, just from that scene? We know that he is the guy in charge. The other man – Owen Burnett – is his employee. He commands enough power to be meeting with emirs. But he isn’t the kind of boss – or the kind of villain – who sends his minions off to fight his battles for his while he watches from a safe distance. Even if what we’ve seen here is just some harmless sparring, he clearly isn’t afraid to get into the fray himself if he sees the need, a point that will be important later on. He also isn’t the sort of person who needs to have his ego stroked constantly. He doesn’t want to be told how strong or smart or wonderful he is, especially when it’s not true. He would rather lose the match and deal with the consequences than have his opponents pretend to lose to him. That isn’t to say that Xanatos isn’t troubled by this development. His problem throughout the episode will be his fear that he is losing his edge, his ability to stay on top. So what does he do to deal with his frustration? Throw a tantrum? Take it out on his underlings? Hardly. If Xanatos is going to push anyone around to reassert his dominance, it’s not going to be assistants who already respect him. David Xanatos pushes emirs around. He is not the stereotypical “Curses! Foiled again!” kind of villain. He is an entirely different animal.

But enough about Xanatos, for now. The next part of the story deals with Elisa Maza, the gargoyles’ only human friend. And what do you know; Elisa’s “edge” is under threat too! To Elisa’s mind, her ability to function as a cop – and to keep the existence of the gargoyles a secret – depends on being able to work alone. But her boss has just decided that Elisa needs a partner. Why? Because Elisa has been recuperating after being shot and, despite her protests that the shooting was accidental, her boss thinks she needs someone to watch her back. (The shooting really was accidental; the result of one of the gargoyles failing to understand how dangerous a loaded gun can be.) This is one of the greatest strengths of Gargoyles and other shows which use continuity to their advantage: actions have repercussions. Whether she likes it or not, Elisa now has to deal with her new partner, Matt Bluestone. To make matters worse, the guy is a conspiracy theorist, just the sort of person who might take notice of a couple of gargoyles flying around overhead.



Oh that’s right, there are gargoyles in this show! The series may be named after them, but in this episode, they’re the last to show up to the party. Even when the episode in question focuses mainly on one character, managing a large cast is still a balancing act. In this case, the gargoyles and their concerns get introduced last. This particular story has so much going on that we don’t even see the gargoyles awakening from their stone sleep. Previous episodes made a point of showing this, since it is a very important part of what makes the gargoyles unique. But “The Edge” is already a jam-packed show with little time to devote to something that loyal viewers have already seen several times. So when Elisa manages to ditch her new partner to go and visit the gargoyles, they’re already up and about.

Viewers who have been keeping up with the series know the gargoyles well by now. Most of them have already had their own feature episodes. But even newcomers can pick up a little bit about who these characters are by observing what they’re doing. Senior gargoyle Hudson is napping in his chair. (Except for Goliath, the leader of the clan, none of the gargoyles had names in the tenth century. They chose names relating to locations around the city after they awoke in the present day.) Broadway, the food lover of the group, is working on some culinary concoction. He pauses to help Elisa with the television she has brought as a gift for the gargoyles, hinting at a sensitivity towards others that we’ll see more of in future episodes. Lexington, the clan’s resident technophile, is playing with a remote controlled toy car.

Elisa heads over to the library, where Goliath is catching up on some of the books that have been published in the last thousand years. Goliath’s idea of a little light reading? Dostoyevsky. This, along with Goliath’s rather formal diction (as heard in the deep, rumbling vocals of the incredibly talented Keith David), clearly tells new viewers that Goliath is no uncouth barbarian. He’s smart, surprisingly well educated for someone from his time.



The next part of this scene is a good example of storytelling problem solving. Goliath and Elisa are discussing Goliath’s choice of reading material. But for the story to progress the conversation needs to move on to Xanatos and the clan’s current situation. How to get from here to there without just changing the subject abruptly? A large window in the library provides a convenient view of the castle atop a skyscraper that was, until very recently, the gargoyles’ home. But why would Goliath take notice of this view now and not earlier? The solution is to get Goliath and Elisa’s attention with the sound of a helicopter passing by. This gives them a reason to look out the window, see the castle, and get Goliath thinking and talking about what’s bothering him. It’s a small and seemingly simple moment, but a good story requires dozens of clever solutions like this that make the character’s action feel natural and not merely driven by the needs of the plot.

If any of the characters has real cause to feel like he has lost “the edge,” it’s Goliath. In the previous episode, he was forced to realize that the battle for control of the castle was not a fight he could win in this day and age. He and the rest of his clan reluctantly abandoned the home that was all they had left of their former life and took up residence in the clock tower at the top of a building housing both a library and the police station where Elisa works. Goliath is still unhappy about this turn of events, particularly the fact that he was powerless to stop it from happening. Xanatos seems to have every advantage and even Elisa and the law she serves are unable to stop him. He is a master at the game while the gargoyles are just figuring out the rules. Goliath wishes aloud that he could make Xanatos feel as Goliath feels now, not realizing that Xanatos is actually going through some very similar feelings.

It has been previously established that television is a twentieth century invention that the gargoyles like, so Elisa’s gift of a TV set for their new home makes sense. But like most TVs in television shows, this one has a knack for broadcasting important information at just the right time. In this case, it’s a news story about Xanatos donating a priceless gem called the Eye of Odin to the Museum of Modern Art. This only confirms Goliath’s feeling that Xanatos had all the power in this world. Seeing Xanatos looking happy and comfortable while the media fawns over his generosity is too much for Goliath to bear. He roars in frustration and runs off.

But mere seconds later, Xanatos is having a much tougher time than Goliath would ever suspect. The reporter who’s interviewing him turns to talking about his conviction for receiving stolen property, a result of the events of the series’ first five episodes. This is the closest Xanatos ever gets to seeming angry or flustered. He never loses his cool or his TV friendly smile. But he’s clearly not happy that his prison time is still hanging over him. “Would you rather I kept the Eye?” he asks before leaving with Owen for his next engagement. While he wasn’t exactly grilled, Xanatos is likely used to having the press wrapped around his little finger. To him, this is just another sign that he is losing the edge.



Now that all of the characters’ problems have been laid out, it’s time to up the ante. Elisa’s issues with her new partner come to a head when they are called to investigate a robbery in progress at the Museum of Modern Art. They arrive just in time to see a large, bat-winged figure leap from one of the museum’s windows into the night sky. Before Elisa can stop him, Matt pulls his gun and fires.

Fortunately, the bullet bounces off the figure’s side with a metallic “ping,” revealing to Elisa that the culprit is not a gargoyle. Elisa thinks fast enough to tell Matt that she tried to stop him because whatever it was he shot at might have exploded. But the problem that having a new partner poses for Elisa is clear. She isn’t willing to reveal the gargoyles’ existence to anyone else, partly since it’s not her call to make. But if she doesn’t trust Matt with her secret, he could end up killing one of her friends. If Elisa is going to work alongside Matt and protect the gargoyles, it’s going to require her to come up with many such excuses for her actions.

But Elisa and her friends have bigger problems. The museum’s security cameras caught a shadowy winged figure making off with the Eye of Odin. Now reports of “gargoyle” sightings are coming in from all over the city. Fake gargoyles committing brazen crimes could make it very difficult for the real gargoyles to avoid public attention, which is one of their main goals right now. One of the interesting aspects of the show is that the gargoyles don’t immediately set themselves up as the city’s new protectors after waking up in Manhattan and getting out from under Xanatos’s thumb. That decision won’t be made until later. For now, the gargoyles aren’t really heroes; they’re survivors, battling whatever life throws at them and trying to stay alive.

Based on the fact that Elisa heard Matt’s bullet hit metal, the gargoyles figure out that the thief was probably a “Steel Clan” robot, one of the mechanical gargoyles that Xanatos had built when it became clear that the gargoyles weren’t going to take orders from him. Hudson points out that the heist doesn’t make sense; why would Xanatos want to steal the Eye of Odin when he himself donated it to the museum? Goliath is past caring. Xanatos’s plan means trouble for the gargoyles. That’s all Goliath needs to know. As we learned before, Goliath’s inability to keep the gargoyles from losing their home weighs heavy on him. He’s not going to let Xanatos push his clan any further. It’s time for a direct confrontation.



Xanatos got a little bit shaken up by the reporter who mentioned his criminal record. So how is he going to deal with a very large, very angry Goliath getting right in his face? Exceedingly well, actually. The series often contrasts Goliath appearance and the expectations that come with it with his actual character. Goliath looks like a huge hulking monster, but he’s sitting in the library reading a book. Here, the show plays on our expectations of how heroes and villains act. Instead of the hero remaining calm and in control while the villain rants and raves, Goliath roars and breaks light fixtures while Xanatos keeps his cool and talks like the calm voice of reason. Scenes like this also make the characters that much more believable. Even if Goliath has every right to be angry, his ability to lose his temper is one of his flaws. Xanatos may not be someone you’d trust with…well, anything, but you still can’t help but admire his smarts and his grace under pressure.

We’ve seen how the Gargoyles crew handles minor story problems, like getting Goliath talking about losing the castle to Xanatos. Now we get a glimpse of how they deal with a much bigger issue, a whole series problem: how do you make both the heroes and villains of your show seem strong and competent? In some TV series, it’s a given that the heroes will always triumph and the villain never will. This can work; the show can cycle in new villains or make the drama how the heroes will defeat the villain’s evil scheme this time around. But Gargoyles needs Xanatos to be a constant, credible threat who viewers won’t write off as someone the gargoyles will stop at every turn. He may not be in every episode, but he is one of the series’ main villains. What keeps him from looking like a permanent loser? His goals.

In many animated TV series, the villains have one or two simple goals: kill the heroes, take over the world, control the ultimate power, etc. For the most part, these are goals that can never be attained because they would mean the end of the show. So the villains end up losing all the time. Most of Xanatos’s goals do not pose such a threat to the continuation of the series. Xanatos never really wanted to kill the gargoyles. He wants to have control of the gargoyles. While Xanatos achieving this goal certainly wouldn’t be good for our heroes, it wouldn’t be nearly as final as their deaths. There would still be the possibility that the gargoyles could regain their freedom. This particular goal is both something the audience could see Xanatos achieving and an explanation for why he doesn’t simply kill the gargoyles to keep them from interfering with his schemes. It also explains the existence of the Steel Clan. If Xanatos can’t have the real gargoyles working for him, he can make his own.

Xanatos’s current plan to regain control of the gargoyles is to use his robots to draw attention to them. The sightings and crimes will eventually lead to the real gargoyles being discovered and hunted down. As an alternative, Xanatos offers to house the clan at a facility of his upstate. The gargoyles escape from a panicked Manhattan and Xanatos has power over them once again.

Though he may be smart, Xanatos is a little lacking in the empathy department. From his perspective, Goliath is now faced with a logical choice: keep his clan in the city and risk eventual capture and death, or take Xanatos up on his offer. He considers the fact that he himself caused the public panic over gargoyles to be irrelevant. When Goliath angrily points this out, Xanatos calmly responds, “If you want to be picky, we won’t get anywhere. Let’s try to focus on the big picture.” Xanatos’s arguments do nothing to sway Goliath. His anger, his pride, and his general distrust of Xanatos will not allow him to accept the offer of a safe haven. After losing the castle to Xanatos, Goliath is not about to be forced into choosing between two bad options again.

As the gargoyles leave the castle, Goliath is at a pretty low point. As Goliath sees it, Xanatos clearly has the edge and is about to force him into giving up the clan’s freedom just as he was forced to give up the castle. He’s in such a foul mood that he even snaps at Brooklyn, one of the three adolescent gargoyles who accompanied him to the castle, when he asks Goliath what happened. And things are about to get worse from our heroes. They are soon under attack by three Steel Clan robots, two standard grey ones and one red one, seemingly a new model. Goliath gets blasted out of the sky and the fight is on.

If Xanatos has his own gargoyle robots, why does he still want to bother with the real gargoyles? The Steel Clan was originally intended as a replacement for Goliath and his clan. But Xanatos is only going to be satisfied if he knows that his “clan” is superior to Goliath’s. As we saw way back in the first scene with the karate match, Xanatos isn’t going to lie to himself and pretend that his metal gargoyles are better than the real thing if the facts say otherwise. Since the gargoyles destroyed the original Steel Clan robots in battle, the facts say otherwise. Throughout the course of the series, Xanatos will continue trying to build a better clan through various methods, none of which turn out quite as he expects.



One of the reasons I decided to discuss “The Edge” is because of its high quality animation and the fight scenes with the Steel Clan are among the best in the series. The characters all stay on model, even as they swoop and dive around in combat. The well-rendered reflections on the Steel Clan’s metal bodies make it clear that they’re robots, but you can tell which characters are living creatures and which are machines simply by the way they move. The Steel Clan mostly fly in straight paths with their metal wings rigid and motionless. The gargoyles’ movements, such as Broadway flailing through the air as he dodges the laser blasts aimed at him, are far more organic. They change direction faster and more frequently than the robots and the movement of their wings reflects these aerial maneuvers.



If we didn’t already know that Xanatos isn’t trying to kill the gargoyles, it becomes clear when the three robots just hover above the gargoyles after literally dropping a ton of bricks on them. Goliath admits what he was unwilling to tell Brooklyn earlier: that Xanatos wants to dominate the clan. So why bother attacking them at all? Why not just wait and let the public hunt down the gargoyles until Goliath has no choice but to accept Xanatos’s offer of sanctuary? Goliath figures that Xanatos has sent the robots to discover the clan’s new home, which would give him even more of an advantage over them. This is another aspect of Xanatos that makes him a formidable adversary: he almost never has just one plan in mind. If Goliath won’t play ball, Xanatos can find out where the gargoyles are spending their days and either cart them off in their sleep or use the information to force Goliath’s hand. And in the meantime, all the laser fire up in the clouds is attracting a lot of attention on the street level, increasing the locals fears about gargoyles and the danger they pose.



Arriving on the scene are Matt and Elisa, who has not been having a good day. She couldn’t convince Goliath to lie low instead of taking off to confront Xanatos. Her new partner insists on coming with her while she tries to follow the gargoyles to Xanatos’s skyscraper. Owen Burnett, who had previously allowed her to enter the building and visit the gargoyles whenever she pleased, turns her away for lack of a warrant. It certainly fits with the episode’s central theme of losing your edge, but why is it necessary to keep cutting back to Elisa and Matt following the gargoyles? One reason is so that Matt can have an opportunity to look through a pedestrian’s binoculars and see two groups of gargoyles flying away. The other reason comes later.

Once again, Goliath’s options are not looking good. The Steel Clan robots are far tougher than the ones the gargoyles battled before, particularly the red leader. They can’t return to their new home without giving its location away to Xanatos. They can’t continue the fight here; the top of a building in the middle of Manhattan is far too public and a crowd is already gathering down below. On top of all this, dawn is not far off, meaning the gargoyles will soon turn to stone and be helpless against any adversary. Goliath decides that the only solution is to move the fight to a more secluded location. He and the other gargoyles lead the robots out to the Statue of Liberty. (If you’re writing a story about heroes based in New York City, you’re pretty much required to have a fight there.)



If there is a hero of this next fight scene, it’s Broadway. In so many cartoon shows, a big, heavyset character like Broadway would be slow, dumb as a post, and mainly used for comedy relief. While Broadway and his brothers do provide some of the comedy in the series, all three of them are shown to be capable warriors, though for some reason, this battle is Broadway’s time to shine. He is fast enough to outfly one of the robots and pull up at the last second while the robot crashes into Lady Liberty’s tablet and smart enough to grab a claw from the destroyed robot and throw it at the other one, causing its electronics to short out.

The three younger gargoyles rejoin Goliath, who has been battling the robot leader. Realizing that the other two robots have been destroyed and the odds are now four against one, the red Steel Clan robot flies off in retreat. Before the real gargoyles can decide whether or not to pursue their foe, a helicopter arrives on the scene. The gargoyles depart before they can be discovered.

Why was it important that we know that Elisa and Matt were following the gargoyles? So that there appearance in the helicopter that arrives after the battle doesn’t come as a surprise. The only evidence left at the scene of any gargoyles, real or robotic, is the remains of the two Steel Clan robots. The two cops have brought the reporter who interviewed Xanatos earlier along with them. Elisa later tells Goliath that the public has been reassured that the “gargoyles” were actually robots. The reporter’s presence on the helicopter answers the question of how that happened.

The wrap up portion of the episode switches from showing how various characters feel they have lost their edge to showing how they get it back. The battle with the Steel Clan has restored Goliath’s self-confidence. It isn’t just that he and his clan were able to destroy the two robots. Far more importantly, Goliath was able to stop Xanatos from discovering his clan’s new home and foil his plan to force the gargoyles to return to him. It may be a small victory and it doesn’t mean that the long-term safety of the gargoyles is assured. But it’s just the reminder Goliath needs that he is not helpless to protect his family and that Xanatos is not an invincible foe. As Goliath reasons, they bested Xanatos once and they can do it again.

Not everyone’s problems are resolved though. Though most of the locals are now convinced that all of the gargoyles they saw were robots of unknown origin, Matt isn’t buying it. He maintains that he saw living creatures through the binoculars and he’s determined to find out exactly what they were. Even if no one else believes Matt, it’s clear that Elisa will have her hands full keeping the gargoyles a secret from her new partner. This is one of many story arcs that will play out over the course of many episodes. It isn’t always the main focus of the story, but the bits and pieces of this and other arcs we see from episodes to episode help to enhance the feeling of a large, interconnected world and keep fans of the show tuning in regularly.



But this is a Xanatos spotlight episode. So how is Xanatos taking his failure to either force the gargoyles to accept his hospitality once more or learn where they’ve been spending their days since leaving him? Quite well, even more remarkably so when you consider the fight he’s just been through. The episode’s big reveal is that that red Steel Clan robot is not a robot at all, but a robot suit worn by none other than David Xanatos. Far from being upset at his losses, Xanatos considers the day a win for him. He has the Eye of Odin back, but still retains all of the public relations benefits of donating it, since no one know that he was the one who stole it. The test of the suit – which he calls a “prototype battle exoframe” – was successful. And like Goliath, he has his confidence back. He may not have won the fight, but simply being able to go wing-to-wing with Goliath – who he acknowledges as “the greatest warrior alive” – and hold his own proves to Xanatos that he hasn’t lost his edge.

Another characteristic of Xanatos that makes him such a strong villain is that he doesn’t just have multiple plans for any given scenario; he has multiple goals. Because of this, the show can have stories where the gargoyles may stop Xanatos on one front, but Xanatos claims victory on another that our protagonists may be completely unaware of. Returning the Eye of Odin to the museum was never a priority for the gargoyles. Remember, they aren’t true heroes yet. The exoframe test? The gargoyles never even realized that it was Xanatos and not another robot. Goliath had even less way of knowing that he was inadvertently helping Xanatos through a crisis of confidence and even if he had somehow known, I doubt he would have avoided or thrown the fight simply to keep from giving his enemy an ego boost. Throughout the series, Xanatos has scenes like this last one where he claims victory even as it seems that the gargoyles have won. This episode is crucial in letting the audience know that Xanatos isn’t the type of person to just convince himself that he has gained something just to avoid having to admit defeat. We now know that Xanatos will not lie to himself that way. If he can find success in what looks like failure, it’s genuine.

Who is David Xanatos? He is an extremely wealthy man and a very smart on as well. He is accustomed to getting what he wants, but he isn’t the type to lose his cool when things aren’t going his way. He’s a man with a plan, and a backup plan, and probably an additional plan in case the backup fails. He can appreciate his successes even if he has failed in other areas, but he’s no hopeless optimist. Even if he isn’t quick to admit them to others, he takes what he sees as his personal failings and won’t stoop to soothing his wounded pride by belittling his foes or underlings. He is more than willing to fight his own battles, but he’ll take the necessary steps to insure that he comes out on top. Great adversaries forge great heroes and with Xanatos as a foe, the gargoyles repeatedly rise to the occasion whenever they clash with him. Thanks in no small part to Xanatos, Gargoyles can easily claim its place as one of the greatest animated series of all time.

All images in this article are copyright Disney.

Why I Love Animation: The Tell-Tale Heart

The world of animation is an ever-changing one, with long held assumptions about the medium constantly being challenged by new generations of artists. Sometimes these changes take effect gradually, the new idea passing through many hands and many different projects before finally taking hold with the general public. Computer animation, for example, did not begin with Pixar any more than hand-drawn animation began at Disney, but it took Toy Story to convince the world that a computer animated film could be both a critical and commercial success. But in some cases, an entire movement or concept in animation really can be traced back to one individual or studio. UPA is one such studio. Though their name and work may not be well known to the modern public, UPA was almost solely responsible for creating a graphic style of animation that still influences the medium to this day.

Founded in the early 1940s, UPA was born in part from the 1941 Disney animators’ strike. In addition to their dissatisfaction with Disney’s labor practices, some of these artists felt that Disney’s dedication to naturalism in animation was too restrictive and too pervasive in the industry. Former Disney layout artist John Hubley and other several other ex-Disney artists founded Industrial Film & Poster Service, which was later renamed United Productions of America. At their new studio, these animators pursued a radically different graphic style of animation that drew more inspiration from modern art of the time than from real life. Taking inspiration from Chuck Jones’s groundbreaking short The Dover Boys, UPA also pioneered the “limited animation” style, which uses a more limited number of movements, fewer drawings per movement, and more animation cycles that “full” animation. The UPA style had a huge influence on studio animation throughout the 50s and 60s and limited animation became an invaluable tool for studios trying their hand at producing animation for television, which requires a much smaller budget and faster production schedule that theatrical films or shorts.

(Please note that the terms “full” and “limited” animation are not quality judgments. Limited animation can be used to amazing effect while full animation can be absolutely terrible if the execution is poor. These are not “good” and “bad” animation styles, merely different approaches to animation. To learn more about limited animation and its history, check out parts one and two of an essay on the subject from Between The Frames, the TallGrassRadio Studios production blog.)

Today, UPA’s most well known works are the Mr. Magoo cartoons and Gerald McBoing-Boing - the story of a boy who speaks in sound effects instead of words based on a story by Dr. Seuss. Gerald McBoing-Boing and several of the Mr. Magoo shorts are excellent cartoons and still hold up well today. The only thing that has changed is how surprising the graphic imagery and limited animation feel. Since these cartoons were made, several generations have grown up with TV animation and are comfortable with the style of flat drawings and reduced movement that UPA pioneered. The only way to understand now how new and revelatory cartoons like Gerald must have seemed to audiences of 1951 is to imagine yourself in that time, when the cartoons of Disney and Warner Brothers set the standard and all other studios pretty much followed suit. Since then, the UPA style has been adapted or outright copied by everyone from Hanna-Barbera to Disney and Warner Brothers themselves and what was once new and challenging now feels familiar and inviting. But there is still at least one UPA short which manages to remain surprising and shocking, because is it both unlike any other UPA cartoon and unlike any cartoon I have ever seen, even to this day.

I was already familiar with Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart," a story of murder, guilt, and madness. I knew from a couple of animation books that UPA had made an animated short based on Poe’s classic tale. But until a few years ago, I had never seen it. All I had were a few still images, none of which really prepared me for what the film itself would be like. I came across the short almost by accident. My husband and I had picked up the special edition of Guillermo del Toro’s Hellboy and were surprised and delighted to find that it included four UPA cartoons which the title character watches during the film. The included shorts were Gerald McBoing-Boing, two later Gerald McBoing-Boing, cartoons, and The Tell-Tale Heart. I still can’t think of a better way to see this film – except for maybe projected on a big screen in a theater – than coming across it unexpectedly and watching it with all the lights turned off and barely a clue as to what we were about to see.

I was stunned. I was amazed. I was completely in love with this film.



Even were it not for the opening text – almost a warning explaining the film’s origins in the Poe short story and introducing it as the tale of a madman who “like all of us” thought himself perfectly sane, the film’s dark nature would be clear from its first frame. A tall house sits completely alone on an impossibly low and otherwise empty horizon line against an ominously darkened sky. In the foreground is an ornamental urn atop a pedestal, almost like a grave marker. As the credits begin, the camera draws back and house and statuary are shown in an empty picture frame sitting on an easel, perhaps a nod to Magritte. The soundtracks starts with the distant tolling of a bell, then gives way to discordant music, completing the feeling of foreboding.

The story begins with a man’s voice, a human shadow against a dark blue background, and a bright white moth fluttering around. The moth flies up close to the camera. A human hand, rendered in stark white highlights and black shadow, snatched the moth from the air. This first scene establishes a number of the film’s key concepts. Obviously it introduces our narrator the madman, and the idea that he does not understand that he is insane or why anyone else would think so. It also introduces the theme of light and shadow, which will be present throughout the film. There are several scenes in which there are no moving characters, only shadows and light. Here we have a white moth and a man who is seen almost exclusively as a shadow who snatches the moth from the air. The final point this opening scene makes is that the entire film is shown directly from the madman’s point of view. All that we see of our narrator is his shadow and his hand coming out to seize the moth after it flies into the camera, his eyes. This is one of the most chilling alterations from the original story. Poe puts the reader in the role of someone the madman is speaking to, giving readers a view into the madman’s twisted mind, yet keeping them at a comfortable distance. In the film, we still get the impression that the madman is speaking to someone. He starts out admitting that he is quite nervous, then asks “But why will you say that I am mad?” But “you” here is not the audience. We never see the madman’s face, or anything other than what he sees. “You” could be the moth for all we know. In the film, there is no safe distance from which to observe this man and his insanity. We are the madman.



The madman then introduces us to his victim, the old man with whom he lived. By the madman’s admission, he did not kill the old man over any slight – real or imagined – or any desire to possess whatever wealth the old man had. His only quarrel was with the man’s one strange, discolored eye. The actual movement of the character is minimal. The old man is briefly shown walking, but he doesn’t turn his head to reveal the offending eye. Instead, the light shifts from one side of his face to the other.



Seeing what the madman sees also gives us access to his subjective view of the world around him. Thin white tendrils grow out from the eye and branch across the screen like cracks in glass. A full moon decays into a crescent in a series of still images that fade into one another. Juxtaposition or cross-fading of still images is another technique the film uses again and again. From the moon, we go to an inky black and white vision of the old man and his horrible eye as the madman sees them, then to a white pitcher sitting on a dresser in skewed perspective. As the madman tells us how the eye was inescapable, “everywhere, in everything,” the camera zooms in on the pitcher, which lies broken on the floor in the next frame. When the madman concludes “Of course, I had to get rid of the eye,” we may not agree with him, but we can understand how he came to that conclusion, having seen the way he views the world.

The madman’s belief that he is not mad rests largely on his perception of what qualities madmen do and do not possess. Madmen are easily agitated and often hysterical, but he insists that he can tell his story calmly, even though it soon becomes clear that he cannot. Madmen have no patience, but he waited for seven nights after deciding upon his plan before putting it into action. The very fact that he had a plan seems to be an argument against his madness, if madmen act on wild impulse.



Shadows continue to play an important role. Only the madman’s shadow advances towards the silhouette of the old man over a background that is the barest suggestion of a room, a window, and floorboards, which will feature in the story later on. Other important imagery gets highlighted as well: the old man has a white pitcher identical to the on the madman smashed for its similarity to the eye. We see the old man’s bed, with its particularly shaped footboard and checkered bedspread. The madman relates his nightly ritual of secretly looking in on the old man as he sleeps and for once, his presence is represented not by shadow, but by the light that moves up the stairs and peers through the open door. Time is another major player in the story. The madman says that his nightly observation of the old man took place “in the hour of the slowest clock.” Shadows and time come together as the old man’s shadow spills out across the floorboards in stages to represent the madman’s week of patient waiting passing by. The face of a clock decays much like the full moon compared to the eye earlier, revealing its slowly turning gears as the madman describes the slowness of his movements as time itself grinding to a stop. When the old man is suddenly startled awake by the fluttering of a moth in front of the madman’s lantern and the madman snatching it from the air, the madman remains motionless for a full hour to avoid being seen and talks of being able to “feel the earth turn.”

It is impossible to discuss The Tell-Tale Heart without talking about James Mason in the role of the madman. Mason seems determined to put everything he possibly could into the performance, yet he does so without ever striking a false or hammy tone. The script itself is greatly changed from Poe’s original text, so much so that hardly a sentence remains that is completely intact. I am not sure what the reasoning behind this decision was, but one of the results is that some of Poe’s more archaic and verbose passages are lost, freeing up the visuals to tell their part of the story and Mason to give a tour-de-force performance that feels entirely natural. What Mason gives the story in place of what has been taken out is a tone of voice that brings out aspects of the character not evident in the original. Mason’s madman starts off with the calm retelling of his story that he believes will prove him sane. But as the story unfolds, he not only grows more agitated, but turns from being the narrator of past events to being completely present in the moment he is describing. He goes from describing his slow, careful movements as he enters the old man’s bedroom on that last fateful night to crying out in alarm when the disturbance of the moth threatens to unravel his plans. Neither the visuals of this film nor Mason’s performance can exist without the other. Mason’s narration becomes especially crucial when the madman is waiting silently in the darkness and there is nothing on the screen but black for nearly 20 seconds. It is he who makes clear the madman’s growing sense of dread as he hears the old man’s heartbeat grow louder and louder and begins to suspect that his victim and the entire world are aware of his presence and intentions, while abstract veiny patterns throbbing on the screen in time to the increasingly louder heartbeat give visual emphasis to the madman’s torment.



The actual murder is shown with the most actual animation in the film. The camera leaps past the white pitcher to where the terrified old man is huddles in his checkered bedspread. The distinctive black and yellow pattern not only makes the location – and later, the old man’s corpse wrapped in the bedspread – easy to recognize; it also gives definition and meaning to the swirls of black and yellow punctuated by the thrust of an arm and a ghoulish head that are the murder of the old man. There is no blood or weapon, but the stabbing staccato notes of the soundtrack, followed by a shot of the bedspread falling over a still hand, leaves no doubt of what has happened, even before the madman tells us that the heart was now still and the eye dead.



Numerous fans and critics have compared the style of this short to that of Salvador Dali and I think the resemblance is most striking in this shot. (I’ve reconstructed the complete artwork from the pan so you can see the whole thing.) The old man’s corpse, covered by the checkered bedspread, lies on the wood floor. Nearby are his bed and an overturned black table, both of which we’ll be seeing again. The white bedsheets are strewn over the window shutters, winding around to the top, where the shutters twist and skew strangely. The walls and ceiling are gone, leaving the room fully open to the night sky. “I was free,” says the madman and the absence of the walls could be seen as evidence of that freedom. But the full moon, already associated with the eye in our minds, looks down unimpeded over the whole scene. Even if the madman does not realize it, we know that his deed has not gone unnoticed and his freedom will not last.

No sooner has our narrator concealed the body beneath the floorboards and set the room back in order than a knock on the door draws his attention. “So soon?” he muses, bringing the theme of time back into the narrative. The neighbors heard a scream and called the police to investigate. The madman sounds as calm as we ever hear him as he easily explains both the scream and the old man’s absence. Our only clue to his inner fears is in the visuals, where the policemen turn from realistically rendered figured to rough black and white renderings of fragments of faces, brows drawn low and eyes staring accusingly. His voice does not betray any agitation until the moment the policemen are about to leave and, curiously, the madman asks them to stay for a cup of hot tea. Is he so completely convinced that he has committed the perfect crime that he can’t resist flaunting his success? Or is his reasoning, like his madness, beyond even the madman’s comprehension?



A dropped teacup lying shattered on the floor echoes the shattered white pitcher from earlier in the film and kicks off the madman’s downfall. The return of the heartbeat is represent by the repeated fall of single drops of water, though we never know if this is the real source of the sound. It hardly seems to matter. The madman is convinced that the sound is real, that he knows what it is, and that the policemen can all hear and identify it as well. The madman’s descent is portrayed through a series of nearly still images around the room: the table, the spilled tea on the floorboards, a shot of the whole room with the camera drawing closer and closer, step by step. At last, the madman can take it no longer. He screams out his confession and reveals the body in its checkered shroud to the policemen, now portrayed as dark, seemingly headless figures. They cast long shadows over the newly uncovered corpse as the madman wails “It is the beating of his hideous heart!”

The next shot is of a metal surface with two neat lines of bolts, much like the two neat lines of buttons on the jackets worn by the policemen. We hear the madman repeat his admission from the beginning of the film that he is very dreadfully nervous. The camera pans up and to the left as the madman’s hand slams against the metal surface. A small, barred, window is revealed in what we now realize is a door, just like the other we can see through the window. It is now the madman’s only view of anything or anyone in the world outside of his cell. There is still no clear addressee as he plaintively asks “But why will you say that I am mad?”



The greatest achievement of UPA’s The Tell-Tale Heart is that it sheds a light on the story that even Poe’s original tale never does. The reader of Poe’s work is presented with the horror of conversing with a madman who thinks that he can prove that he is sane and his actions justified. The animated short introduces the new horror of being the madman so thoroughly trapped by his own madness that he cannot see what is wrong with him. Because we have literally experienced the whole series of events through his eyes, we can even sympathize with his predicament, condemned as insane and locked away for reasons he cannot understand. He is still just as frightening as he was when Poe created him, but it is just as frightening to think that our confidence in our own sanity may not reflect reality, that the way we see ourselves could be completely different from how the rest of the world sees us.

The passage of time is not always kind to visual innovation. What was once cutting edge and exciting can become conventional and familiar at best, dated and forgotten at worst. Some animation survives because of its solid story and characters, elements that stand the test of time when state-of-the-art visuals have become commonplace. It is a rare film that retains its power to shock audiences with its visuals and engage them with a compelling story over fifty years after its release. The Tell-Tale Heart is one such film and anyone who makes the effort to track it down is in for a rare treat.

All images in this article are copyright Columbia Pictures Television.

Why I Love Animation: Kiki's Delivery Service - Part Three

Last time, Kiki made the terrible discovery that her waning self-confidence was causing her to lose her powers. Not only does this leave her unable to do her job, it puts the success of her year of training in jeopardy. The remainder of the film covers how Kiki regains her powers and her ability to believe in herself.

The broom that Kiki breaks is her mother’s broom, the one that Kiki didn’t even want to take initially. Kiki only agreed to use the older broom instead of the one she had made for herself when a friend of the family pointed out that she could make herself another new broom once she got settled. But Kiki never did make herself a new broom. Maybe once she didn’t have to argue the point with her mother, she realized that the big, old broom was safer and more dependable. Or maybe she just liked having a reminder of her home and family. Either way, Kiki doesn’t start making her own broom until her old one breaks and she has not other choice.

The next morning, Kiki breaks the bad news to Osono. As they’re talking, Osono’s husband runs out of the bakery and delivers his only line in the whole film: “Hey, look!” He points up into the sky where the “Freedom Adventurer” is flying overhead. Tombo is in the dirigible’s window, waving enthusiastically at Kiki down below. This only serves to highlight Kiki’s predicament. Tombo and the blimp are both up in the air while she is grounded. When he calls her later to ask if she saw him waving, she tells him not to call her anymore. She tells Osono that if she doesn’t regain her powers, she will have failed at her training. But it’s more than just that. Kiki sees flying as the thing that makes her special and fears that if she can’t fly, neither Tombo nor anyone else will like her anymore.

Though she doesn’t realize it yet, Kiki has already gained several loyal friends who care about her very much, regardless of whether she can fly. Ursula the artist has come to town to do some shopping and stops by to visit Kiki. When Ursula learns about Kiki’s recent trouble, she invites Kiki to come and spend the night at her cabin. Kiki halfheartedly agrees, but starts to feel better as they get out into the country. Nature is one of Miyazaki’s major themes and while it isn’t as prominently featured here as it is in My Neighbor Totoro or Nausciaä of the Valley of the Wind, it does play a role, whether hindering Kiki in the form of wind and rain or rejuvenating her spirits through rural landscapes and ocean views. The natural world is a powerful force for both good and ill in Kiki’s life.



Once they arrive at the cabin, Kiki gets a look at Ursula’s latest work. Ursula has painted a night scene of crows, a bull, and a winged horse flying over her cabin. Kiki is amazed at Ursula’s skill. Ursula points out a girl’s face up near the horse’s head and tells Kiki that she has been waiting for her to come and model so that she can get the face right. At first, Kiki can’t see why Ursula would want to paint her, but knowing that she could help to inspire Ursula to create such a beautiful painting has got to provide a little confidence boost. Maybe, just maybe, Kiki will start to realize that other people see the good things about her that have nothing to do with her being a witch.



While she sketches Kiki and later when they’re getting ready for bed, Ursula talks with Kiki. Though Ursula wasn’t born an artist the way Kiki was born a witch, she had decided that she wanted to spend her life painting by the time she was Kiki’s age. She tells Kiki about a time when she lost confidence in her own talent. She realized that all of her paintings were copies of ones she had seen before. But rather than giving up in despair, Ursula redoubled her efforts to find her own style and her own personal meaning for her art. Ursula believes that witchcraft is a very similar thing, based as much in self-confidence as in any innate ability. Kiki sees her point. “We fly with our spirits,” she tells her friend. Ursula tells Kiki that this inner spirit is not unique to witches. It is the same power that drives Ursula to bake and Osono and her husband to bake. The conversation helps to demystify the loss of her powers for Kiki. Her issues are no longer something strange and unique to her, but a common problem that many people have battled and overcome.

When Kiki calls the bakery then following day, Osono tells her that the elderly lady Kiki befriended wants her to make another delivery, even though Osono has told her that Kiki is taking a break from deliveries. Since Kiki will be passing by the lady’s house on her way home, she agrees to stop by

Kiki arrives at the lady’s house just as the lady and Bertha are watching the coverage of the launch of the “Freedom Adventurer” on TV. After a successful test flight a few days earlier, the blimp is ready to continue its voyage. The lady reveals what it is that she wants Kiki to deliver: a beautiful little chocolate cake with Kiki’s name and an image of Kiki and Jiji in flight in frosting. The lady plays cute, asking the astonished young witch to deliver the cake to “a girl named Kiki” who was very kind to the lady and asks Kiki to "find out when the girl’s birthday is" so the lady can bake her another cake for the occasion.



Kiki is moved almost to tears. The delivery of the pie that cost Kiki the party she had been looking forward to was not in vain. Kiki made a tremendous impact on this kind lady, not by being a witch who can fly, but by being a helpful and considerate person. It is proof that Kiki can make friends here and be liked for who she is.

There is a sudden commotion from the TV broadcast. A strong wind is causing serious problems at the dirigible launch. The “Freedom Adventurer” has broken free of its moorings and is being blown into the frightened crowd. Being man-made does not mean that the blimp is any less at nature’s mercy than Kiki is when she flies and in fact, it is far less able to effectively battle the elements than Kiki. Bertha can hardly contain her excitement over the catastrophe, but her glee fades at once when Kiki spots a familiar face in the crowd. The blimp starts to float away with one last cable still attached to it and a young boy clinging to the cable: Tombo.



Towards the end of the newscast, the reporter on the scene cries out “Oh the humanity!” This line is not in the English dub or the original. It is, of course, a reference to the 1927 Hindenberg disaster.

Terrified for her friend, Kiki races towards the center of town where the runaway dirigible is headed. Planning is still not her strong suit; there is no indication that she has any idea what she is going to do. All she knows at this point is that Tombo is in trouble and she needs to get to him. On her way, she comes across a street sweeper carrying a broom and asks him to let her borrow it. Barely waiting for his response, Kiki grabs the broom, brings it to the middle of the street that has been cleared for emergency vehicles, and climbs on. She takes several deep breaths and leans forward, shaking with a concentration so fierce that it causes the bristles of the broom to stand on end. The mystical breeze that accompanied Kiki’s very first flight of them film blows away the dust and assorted rubbish in the street and sends it swirling up around her. “Fly,” Kiki commands. The broom obeys.



It is to Miyazaki’s credit that the drama of the movie does not end here. Kiki’s troubles do not end the second she regains her ability to fly. As the film takes pains to point out, Kiki suffers through all of the problems of an ordinary adolescent girl and being a witch does not make her adolescence any easier. All of Kiki’s battles, including this one, will be hard fought and hard won. Magic in Kiki is not an easy cure-all. It is an ability like any other which requires practice and hard work to accomplish what you want to or, in this case, need to do.

So before Kiki can fly heroically to the rescue, she must contend with her already shaky flying skills and a broom that she has never flown before. She collides with the buildings on either side of the street three times – the same as the number of trees she hit when she left home, gets blown backwards, plummets off a roof towards the street below, and gets dragged through an open air restaurant. She tells the broom to either literally “straighten up and fly right” or face a future as firewood. Perhaps Kiki’s mom was right about the benefits of a dependable broom.



In the center of town, the helpless dirigible crashes into the city clock tower, with Tombo still hanging perilously from the one remaining cable. The tail end is leaking helium and finally comes crashing down on a building across the street, leaving the blimp precariously balanced between the building and the clock tower. As a reporter with a camera crew and an enormous crowd watches from below, Kiki manages to wrangle her unruly broom and fly up to Tombo. But she hasn’t saved the day just yet. She reaches out her hand to Tombo, but the broom drifts away or drops suddenly every time she gets close to him. The crowd below starts chanting “Don’t give up! Don’t give up!” Though it is a scene of tension and danger, it is also the closest Kiki has come to the moment she began her journey, with supportive friends and family surrounding her and chanting her name, since arriving in her new town. Tombo is exhausted from clutching the cable all this time. He can’t hold on any longer and his grip gives way. There is an agonizing moment of complete silence as the horrified crowd watches him fall.

The next shot has Kiki completely off her broom, only holding onto it with one hand. The other is clasped firmly around Tombo’s wrist. Even as the rescue reaches its end, Miyazaki makes it completely clear that this was a huge effort for Kiki, thought well worth it. Tombo is safe and the crowd goes wild with relief. Every available bit of paper is tossed from the windows of nearby buildings as confetti while Kiki slowly lowers her friend to safety. All around town, Kiki’s friends watch as her triumph is broadcast live. The street sweeper enjoys his broom’s fifteen minutes of fame. Bertha skips as she pushes the elderly lady around in her swivel chair. Osono wipes away a happy tear, but she doesn’t have long to enjoy the moment. Her contractions are starting and her husband rushes off to call the doctor.

At the scene of her heroic rescue, Kiki is looking a little overwhelmed by the reporters and microphones surrounding her. Kiki’s goals throughout the film have been independence, self-confidence, and finding her place in the world. Winning the adoration of the entire town through one heroic gesture wasn’t really on her agenda. So while Tombo talks excitedly with the reporters in the background, Kiki remains silent and looks more dazed than anything. Then, she spots a little black cat running through the crowd towards her. Jiji hops up onto her shoulder and meows. Kiki smiles and nuzzles her cheek against his side.



Up to this point, the differences between the subtitles and the dub have been fairly minor. The dub has some additional lines of dialogue not present in the subtitles or the original film. The elderly lady’s maid has two slightly different names. There are pieces of dialogue that are translated differently in the subtitles and the dub, but they seldom completely alter the nature of the scene. But there is a moment at the very end of the film where the dub diverges significantly from both the subtitles and the original film.

In the dub, as Jiji runs through the crowd towards Kiki, he calls out “Kiki, can you hear me?” He jumps onto her shoulder and belts out a somewhat operatic “Me-ow!” making it clear that he and Kiki can understand each other again.

What’s going on here? According to the FAQ on GhibliWiki, the children’s book Majo no Takkyuubin (“Witch’s Delivery Service”) on which Kiki is based, provides the explanation. Witches and their black cats are raised together from a very young age, creating a special bond that allows them to speak to and understand one another. Their ability to communicate is based less on magic than on that close bond between them, which is why Kiki’s mother doesn’t talk to Jiji, despite being a witch herself. As witch and cat grow older, they naturally start to grow apart and eventually lose the ability to talk to one another.

I know I’m going to get in trouble for saying this, but I kind of prefer the dub ending. And if you will all put down your pitchforks for just a moment, I’ll explain why.

Thematically, the original ending works extremely well. Since Jiji is only able to talk tot Kiki and no one else, he is almost like her imaginary friend. But since he is also a real cat, maybe it would be better to think of him as the one family member who comes along with Kiki on her journey. When she first left home, Kiki needed Jiji as someone she could talk to about her problems and even to act as the “adult” in her life. But as she has matured and started to find her place in the wider world, her relationship with him changes. Even Jiji’s life has expanded beyond Kiki. He has a relationship with Lily and the short vignettes that play out as the credits roll show that they have started of family: three fluffy white kittens and one sleek black one. Jiji is still very much a part of Kiki’s life; he and “Jiji Junior” accompany her on her deliveries and errands. But they both have more in their lives now but just each other. I would probably be fine with it, were it not for one important issue.

The problem is, I can only react to what is actually in the film and there is no mention of any alternate reason why Kiki and Jiji stop being able to understand one another. More importantly, when Kiki realizes that she can no longer understand Jiji, the very next thing she does is to grab her broom and check if she can still fly. This very clearly tells me that Kiki believes that her inability to talk to Jiji means that she is losing her powers, which she is. Since no one in the film ever tells Kiki that this is an incorrect notion, I can only assume that Kiki cannot understand Jiji because she is losing her powers. No matter what the source material, films based on existing stories need to be able to stand on their own. I shouldn’t have to read the book to know what’s really going on. (I can’t anyway, since it isn’t available in English.) I saw the dub of the film first, so I wasn’t aware of the discrepancy until sometime later. If I had seen the subtitled version first, I’m almost certain that I would be left wondering why Kiki still can’t understand Jiji and I doubt I would be the only one with that question. So much as I don’t want to, I have to admit that the film does have a pretty notable flaw. I love it. It’s among my top ten favorite movies. But it’s not perfect.



One fact is completely clear, though. In the last shot before the film's epilogue, Kiki sits next to Jiji and his son on her roof with her arm around Jiji as the three of them look out at the night sky. Whether they can still speak to each other or not, they will always be friends.

As the end credits play, we see how life continues for Kiki and her friends in their seaside town. The aviation club’s plane is finally completed and Tombo gets to live out his dream of flying alongside Kiki. For Kiki, it means a return to flying for the sheer joy of it, something that she had lost as she became more and more fixated on succeeding at her job and her training. Osono and her husband enjoy a picnic while caring for their new baby. Though Kiki is still not a fully independent adult, she no longer needs Osono to serve as her surrogate mother so desperately. Kiki has become kind of a local celebrity and is surprised to see a little girl walk by dressed exactly like her and toting a tiny broom, emulating the very things that made Kiki feel so out of place. Even the traffic cop who stopped Kiki on her first day in town no waves to her as he walks by the bakery. More importantly, she has made friends with one of Tombo’s buddies and happily chats with her while minding the store.



Once again, a different song plays over the credits depending on whether you watch the subtitles or the dub. The Japanese soundtrack has a song entitled “If Enveloped In Tenderness,” another pre-existing song by the same vocalist, Yumi Arai. The English song is called “I’m Gonna Fly” and focuses on themes of achieving success and finding your way in the world.

The last credit plays as Kiki’s father rushes inside with a letter from Kiki. (The only visual difference between the dub and the original film that I’ve noticed is that Kiki’s letter is in English for the dub.) Kiki reports that she and Jiji are well and her business is continuing to thrive. The challenges in Kiki’s life are not completely behind her. She admits to her parents that she still has moments of sadness and that she is “starting to gain some confidence,” showing that she is still not completely sure of herself. But she ends by telling her parents how much she loves her new town. Kiki will still find obstacles in her path as she continues her journey to adulthood, but she has gained a new confidence in her abilities and herself that will help her to weather any storm.

I've been trying to figure out a way to sum up Kiki's Delivery Service in one last paragraph. Over the course of the analysis, I've talked about the reasons why this is a good film and why the narrative works so well. But in addition to those reason, Kiki's Delivery Service is important to me because it's been there when I've needed it. I know it sounds like an odd thing to say about a movie, but there have been times when I've felt like I didn't fit in, like the talents that made me special were fading away, or just plain felt bad. Strange as it may seem, it's during the times when the movie speaks to me most and honestly leaves me with a better outlook than before i watched it. The term "feel-good movie" gets tossed around a lot these days, to the point where it's little more than a meaningless platitude. For me, Kiki's Delivery Service redeems that term by being a movie I can rely on to help me feel good again.

All images from this article are copyright Eiko Kandono, Nibariki, Tokuma Shoten, and Buena Vista Home Entertainment Inc.