Archive for the ‘furry’ category

Happy Halloween from Foxsylvania!

October 31, 2024

Hello, Boils and Ghouls, and welcome to this special Halloween Edition of Foxsylvania! Halloween is special to me, always has been and always will be. It’s an occasion relatively free of suffocating family obligations and not awash in commercialism, a time of imagination and dipping into the dark corners of our psyche…here there be dragons! So gather ’round, kiddies, and let your Uncle Vulpes bring you items to thrill, chill, and amaze you…(well, maybe, just a little!) This is what we mean by, Cheap Thrills…

That’s it…come closer as I begin to be fired up, and my true form I share with you! For I am both man and beast, substance and shadow, flame and air…that’s really what a firefox is! I am fox, I am feral, and I am DANGEROUS! (Cue up that Michael Jackson number, please…)

(Firefox dancing with dark animal spirits to Dangerous…)

Brief, all too brief is All Hallow’s Eve when we can take off the masks that society makes us wear to please others. Join me in this dark dance of kindred furry spirits! It is a fine kind of madness that we enjoy as we gyrate and spin faster and faster, until the dancers become the dance!

In Praise of Walter Lantz ‘Toons…

October 26, 2024

Walter Lantz cartoons often play a distant third to Disney and Warner Bros. creations, but they can be worthy of your attention, and display a level of creativity and simple exuberant ‘toon fun that’s really noteworthy. One of my fave Walter Lantz characters is Smedley, illustrated above. Now Smedley is a dog, but his tail looks rather foxy to me, and if you stare at his face and body type, you can almost see a bit of Yogi Bear reflected. What really struck me is that Smedley’s voice sounded very evocative of Huckleberry Hound…

No coincidence, that…both Smedley and Huckleberry Hound were voiced by legendary voice performer Daws Butler, who also voiced Yogi Bear for many years as well as numerous other cartoon characters. One of those characters included Fibber Fox, who of course I have a personal affection for!

Fibber Fox was drawn somewhat cat-like, and I consider him likable and a good guy, in spite of the fact that he was an antagonist to Yakkey Duck, and would try to eat him while never succeeding. We all knew that Yakkey would never be eaten, however, as he was almost unbearably cute! Death itself in cartoons, of course, is at worst a temporary inconvenience, with many characters sustaining what would have been mortal poundings and mishaps only to emerge whole and none the worst for the wear in the very next sequence…

Getting back to the Walter Lantz stable, Chilly Willy the penguin was another memorable character who sometimes spoke not at all but communicated with expressions and gestures, and at other times spoke in kind of an abbreviated English (example: “Yes, me like!”) . Chilly Willy was largely concerned with finding food and keeping warm, and while cute and appealing was far from defenseless…

The kingpin of Walter Lantz cartoons was of course Woody Woodpecker, he of the iconic laugh, who took on a variety of antagonists, mocking and thwarting their most insidious schemes against him…

All I am saying is that Walter Lantz cartoons are frequently overlooked, and don’t get their proper respect…and voice actor Daws Butler was like the legendary Mel Blanc, but without the size of Mel’s WB paycheck…

“The Day the Earth Blew Up” is Coming!

October 22, 2024

I’ve got bad news, and I’ve got good news. First, the bad news: the movie Coyote VS. Acme has been shelved, perhaps forever, even though the film is complete. While I would have been thrilled to see Wile E. Coyote headlining in his own feature, perhaps Warner Brothers decided that this was too much of a niche audience for a full-length film, and decided to take a tax write-off...

Now, the good news; The Day The Earth Blew Up has officially received a theatrical release in Europe, and will be all over the U.S. in late February!

Featuring Daffy Duck and Porky and Petunia Pig, The Day The Earth Blew Up is the first theatrically released Looney Tunes movie since 2021’s critically-panned Space Jam: A New Legacy. The trio of unlikely heroes team up to prevent an alien invasion that threatens life on Earth…

The film is released by Ketchup Entertainment, which bought the rights from Warner Bros back in August. Cartoon Network writer Pete Browngardt directs, using Looney Tunes voice talent. Playing in Europe, the film has been well-received, is true to its heritage, and appears to be set up to become one of the most beloved feature-length Looney Tunes outings of all time, playing off vibes of 1950’s-1960’s science fiction films. I do think, however, that Marvin the Martian could have bested this film’s villainous alien without breaking a sweat…I’m a Marvin loyalist!

So while Americans must wait until February 28th to begin seeing it, The Day The Earth Blew Up should be worth the wait…

The Gospel According to “Felix…”

September 26, 2024

Exploding Kittens on Netflix is a hoot, although not for those who prefer their religion unpilloried

It seems that God is felt by a divine council to need to be rehabilitated, and so He is sent to Earth in the form of a talking cat, devoid of his most useful but not all powers. He is to help a human family who prayed for his assistance, all the while contending against a similar demonic cat sent to thwart him… 🙀

This is pretty wild stuff that plays like Sunday School on heavy psychoactive medication. God-Cat has not long arrived on Earth before He is corralled by an animal control officer, and sedated. He escapes confinement, and goes on as a strange mixture of deity, human, and feline, railing against his cat incarnation while gradually embracing it. He learns the ways of man, and has frequent epic but hilarious battles against the opposing Devil-Cat.

You might say that God becomes a better fur-son because of all this, but you’ll just have to watch Exploding Kittens to learn of all the enabling details… Meow! 😸

Disney’s Shelved Movies and Characters…

September 23, 2024

It’s well-known that Disney studios have shelved Song of the South, a 1946 production that depicted such racially-insensitive stereotypes as happy, servile black slaves. Song of the South has never been seen on home video, DVR, or released to streaming, and has remained in the Disney vaults since 1986 where it will likely remain forever. I guess that means we won’t be seeing Br’er Fox anytime soon, although frankly he hardly represented the best of my kind…

Disney has also eliminated the “crow chorus” from the 2019 live-action remake of “Dumbo,” as the crows have been called racist caricatures for their minstrel show-like behavior. The leader of the crow clique was even originally named Jim Crow, a reference to a blackface character who supplied the name for the Jim Crow laws…

Fantasia was edited in the 1960’s to remove Sunflower, a dark-skinned centaur who acted as a ladies’ maid to several other white centaurs! Her stereotypic look was enough to raise concern, and the character was fully removed in 1969 from the film’s re-release…

The Siamese Cat Song was completely revised from the new version of Lady and the Tramp, as the original Siamese cats were considered Asian stereotypes, despite being cool cats and smooth operators…

Liver Lips McGrowl” from Disneyland was removed from the Country Bear Jamboree at Disney World due to fears that the inebriated character was offensive to alcoholics, and transformed into the character of Romeo McGrowl

Even the iconic character of Tinker Bell from Peter Pan has been considered as a negative role model for her vanity and jealous possessiveness of Peter Pan when Wendy rolls around. While Tink is under some scrutiny, she appears safe in Pixie Hollow, at least for now…

Cultural standards change public perceptions over time, and those characters cited represent only a few examples. When it comes to extreme political correctness, however. I often find that I just don’t give a “Zip-a-Dee-DooDah”…

Buffalo Wild Wings “Box Out” Commercial…

September 11, 2024

The buffalo, whose name is Hank, is voiced by Beck Bennett. Crafted for the March Madness event, the commercial is certainly mad and wild. Hank, who thinks that he knows a bit about playing defense, goes into a demonstration by unintentionally knocking people about, even breaking out the window, complete with a bodily ejection and flying glass. One would certainly want to be on this bison’s team, as his opponents might not survive him!

I’ve never posted about a buffalo before, but Hank does cut an impressive and imposing furry figure in this ad; you’d just want to think twice about inviting him to your apartment, however! Unanswered are the questions of whether Hank will be held liable for damages…

And BTW, this fox was born in Buffalo, New York!

NJM’s “Secret” Commercial…

September 2, 2024

For a company that disavows mascots, NJM insurance presents a lot of mascots of the fictitious competition, and they frequently are pretty good! These dastardly mascots also try their best to cover up advertising copy for NJM. As this commercial begins, we are shown a peacock who spreads his tail feathers at a bus stop to cover a posted ad for NJM. Then at an office, the purple arm of some thing appears to close the lid of a laptop that might be preparing to display NJM copy. A large green” Kraken” hangs from the roof of a bus to spread its tentacles over an NJM ad. Lastly, a bear using a riding mower runs over and thoroughly shreds a delivered newspaper bearing NJM ad copy, pieces of which then float in the air like confetti around a bewildered homeowner…

It’s no “secret,” you see, that NJM insurance is so good that it stands on its own merits, and doesn’t need mascots…

I Blog Because …

August 31, 2024

Daily writing prompt
Why do you blog?

I guess that experience initially led me to identify as a horse in the fandom, and I functioned acceptably that way for a while, but I could only take the identification so far. So I tried being a wolf for a whole, but wasn’t really a pack animal nor could I handle the frequently expected aggressiveness. Many of us in the fandom need to experiment and essentially try on different identities before we find the right one, and that’s fine! It’s kinda like deciding on a career field, but far deeper psychologically…

So blogging can reinforce your sense of personal identity, tie you in with a community of like-minded spirits, and it can even be a kick, to boot (pun intended). It’s also humbling to draw readers from different locations around the world. So thank you, WordPress, for giving each of us our own crazy personal niches! It may not be a second Eden, but it still beats Berwyn, right?

Back to business in my next post. But right now, it’s time for a group hug or skritch in appreciation for my readers who put up with me!

“Earl” from Smalls Food For Cats Commercial…

July 13, 2024

“Feed The Pig” Chase Commercial…

July 6, 2024