Tuesday, October 06, 2009

Mr. Ed: Jerk?

In brief, a funny post on NPR:
A Jerk Is A Jerk, Of Course, Of Course: The Psychosocial Complexities Of 'Mr. Ed'.

Now that the first season of Mr. Ed is available on DVD, there's a pretty compelling, and obvious argument that that horse was one big insufferable 'emotional bully' and a real pain in the ass. Like everyone else, I'm surprised he wasn't sold for glue in a lot of those episodes. But I also found Holme's suggestion amusing:
Then again, maybe it can be explained by my theory that the whole "talking horse" thing was simply Wilbur suffering from Donnie Darko-like delusions, which stemmed from brain damage caused by a blunt trauma to his head, which totally happened in the very first episode.
Almost as interesting a suggestion as those reinvented Garfield strips, Garfield Minus Garfield which repositions the protagonist Jon Arbuckle as a troubled young man on an existential journey.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Yes, Carol stepped on one end of the rake and the handle hit Wilbur in the head. She thought all of his ravings about a horse talking and winking at him was the result of head trauma. I think Mr. Ed was not so much a jerk as a bratty child who may be smart for his age (7, which is much younger than Bamboo Harvester really was) but still as impulsive and self centered as a seven year old can be.