Saturday, March 14, 2015

Rain Is the Reason

It was gloomy and raining when I got up this morning. I tried to brighten the day with another Easter special as I ate breakfast. Yogi the Easter Bear starts in Jellystone National Park, on the morning of the Easter Jamboree. Yogi's not feeling smarter than the average bear after he eats all the goodies that were intended for the festival and gets himself and Ranger Smith into trouble. Hoping to make up for it and to avoid being sent to the Siberian Zoo, Yogi and Boo Boo set out to find the Easter Bunny himself. Two odd plastic-obsessed villains are also after the Easter Bunny - they want to eliminate him and make their plastic eggs the only things children get in their baskets. Yogi and Boo Boo have to find the Bunny and get him to Jellystone fast, before they all end up dipped in plastic!

It was still showering when I went to work. I wasn't going to call for a ride after Rose made such a fuss last week, so I just rode to work and got wet. We were busy all day again, and once again busy with cranky, crabby people stuck in very long lines. We were short on help, too - there were call-outs. And my relief was late. I was so glad I got out just barely on time.

It was raining again when I headed home, but not as heavily as it was in the morning. It's rained on and off for the rest of the evening. I went nowhere else. Spent the next hour or so doing classwork. Our next big assignment is to go through a junk drawer, pick one of three things, then write an essay around it. I didn't even need to pick three things. I chose the spare bike inner tube and got half-way through writing about my love of biking and how important it is to me when I decided to break for dinner. I'll finish tomorrow or Monday.

Had leftovers and made the Acme mix brownies while watching Happily Ever After. This odd sequel to the Disney Snow White was the last project by the TV animation studio Filmation. It does feel rather like "Snow White crossed with He-Man" at times. The wicked Maliss (Malcom McDowell) kidnaps the Prince to revenge his sister, the Evil Queen. Snow White (Irene Cara) gets help from the Dwarfelles, seven goofy little women who control nature, Mother Nature (Phyllis Diller) herself, and the Orko-like "Shadow Man" who follows them through the Land of Doom.

Happily Ever After was made in 1988 but not released until 1993...and it feels like it, from the cast (Sally Struthers, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Tracey Ullman, and Carol Channing play Dwarfelles) to the error-plagued animation, to the synthesizer score. Except for the rather nice song over the end credits, "Love Is the Reason," the music is dreadful. The owl and bat hench-animals are completely useless and feel more like they're there as filler, rather than as actual characters.

For all the problems, there's a reason this has become something of a cult favorite in the last few years. The Dwarfelles are hilarious. Maliss is actually a scary and competent villain, almost on a par with the original Evil Queen. Snow White is a little bit more proactive than she is in most versions of this story. Her relationship with "The Shadow Man" is rather sweet, especially if you figure out who he really is before the end.

While this is on DVD, it's apparently been edited to remove violence, damaging the continuity. If you can find the original on video or online, do so. This isn't a great film, but it's a surprisingly cute animated adventure, especially for girls.

The rain sounds like it's slowed down for now...what I can hear of it over the noise that's coming from the VFW. They have parties there from time to time, and this one is really insane, with music blasting so loud, I can hear it back hear. If I'm really lucky, they'll all get drunk and pass out before midnight.

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