This is not so much a review as a reminder that there are fun things out there beyond the average Marvel sidekick character spin-off series. Not that I hate or even dislike Hawkeye or Black Widow—they’re cute little characters—but they don’t hold my interest for long. I can’t understand how anyone could sit through mindless hours of sloppy-cam footage in a failed attempt to make bowstring pulling or unbelievable martial art action more exciting.
(And here, I have to admit, I haven’t even seen the Hawkeye, or the other, series to say for sure it does have sloppy-camera, but it is probably so, since the ones I’ve seen have all had it. Loki had the least, and that’s why Loki is in the lead.)
There are fun things out there.
What fun?
“Mickey’s Christmas Carol”. That’s what fun.
It was made in 1983, and a couple of interesting trivia factoids are these: an early Christmas Carol movie was made in 1938 (probably only a coincidental transposition of numbers); John Lasseter was credited as one of the many in the making of this cartoon rendition of A Christmas Carol written by Charles Dickens. John Lasseter you could possibly recognize as the name behind some of the great early Pixar movies. He’s been around.
“Mickey’s Christmas Carol”, by the way, is only 26 minutes long. Just right for a busy holiday season. You can watch it and not lose much time out of your day. Go wrap a present for your mom already.
While I watched it, I also had fun picking out the classic Disney characters that make appearances. I won’t spoil it for you by telling you which ones are in the short film. Keep your eyes open—they’re everywhere.
One idea that I got from this one, which I had never thought of with any other rendition, is that I’d rather be Scrooge than Marley. The character Marley is burdened with chains and a guilty conscience, or both, because of how he lived his life, and he doesn’t seem to have any way to escape his chains. Those chains are eternal. He’s also burdened with the apparent obligation to tell Scrooge about the guilt, and to rattle the chains. Scrooge, however is given the chance, by Marley and the other nightly visitors, to change himself, to repent, to be redeemed. So the question I have to ask Chuck the writer is this: “Is Marley’s redemption in the act of challenging Scrooge to hear the ghosts?”
Now I really want to read the book to find out if there’s any hint to answer my question.
Another funny side note to “Mickey’s Christmas Carol” is that this 1983 cartoon employed a sort of sloppy-cam. The irony’s joke is on me. It looks like they moved a single cel up and down quickly to suggest earthquake-size movement. Silly, but fortunately it doesn’t last too long. It’s bareable in its brevity.
Speaking of brief: if time is money, and Scrooge McDuck would say it is, then 26 minutes is cheap. You can definitely afford to watch “Mickey’s Christmas Carol” and still have a ha’penny left for a gift for your mom this Christmas.
Enjoy.
Xenosthesia.com 