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FICTIONALRODENTSM A G A Z I N E

VOL. 2

WORLDWIDE Rodents are talking

LITTLE STARS, BIG MONEY Over the years Rodent franchises have pulled in some serious coin

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RODENT CLASSICS Dormouse in WonderlandGiftguide

2012/13

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TWO OF A KIND Rodent duos P.14

P.8HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE Take a look at our rodent themed gift ideas for your family, friends or yourself ;)

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FICTIONALRODENTS

My loyal interest (not obsession) in talking rodents began in child-hood. At my fifth birthday party the other kids were probably bored as I shushed them to re-watch The Secret of N.I.M.H. The film contained the imposing image of rats being injected with a syringe and transforming into intelligent creatures; consequently they faced the existential and moral dilemmas of becoming civilized -- the same problem a child faces as their own intelligence blooms.

I was raised in an era when talk-ing mice were becoming big busi-ness. From 1973 to today, box-office earnings of mice movies total more than US$740 million. (See ‘Million Dollar Mice’ on page 20.) A child of the 1980s was born into megahits such as The Rescuers and The Great Mouse Detective, both based on book series from the 1950s and published as films in the 1970s-80s by Disney. Both titles exist in a similar prem-ise which forms the bedrock for the genre thereafter: there is a replica of our world just for mice, and their friends. Anything you might see out your window, a mouse sees out his. Programs such as Motorcycle Mouse and childhood books like Stuart Little were intimate portions of my youth.

These other anthropomorphic mouse titles don’t have the science-fiction-like premise of Secret of N.I.M.H, which was not produced by Disney. For that reason it is darker and more nuanced, perhaps deeply affecting my taste as a young man and may have helped to shape my ideas about society itself.

A question -- posed in my editori-al for volume one -- was asked by au-thor Kristen den Hartog. She writes on her blog, “I wonder why mice so often figure in children’s literature?” (This story is republished on page 6.) Her question covers some inter-esting ground and includes a review of a kid’s book Mouse Soup which is about the ingredients of reading

skills and storytelling.She notes, “In many of the sto-

ries that come to mind, the mouse is threatened by someone bigger and stronger, and needs to be brave to overcome the odds.”

I think this is adept because it touches upon the idea of scale. Being as small as an action figure is the per-spective occupied by these furry little creatures. Seeing the world from the perspective of being six inches tall means even the smallest, most dis-interesting space, is a huge chasm to be experienced by a rodent-sized explorer. While a naked mouse may look like a mere mouse, we know there is an unseen side to his life. He dashes for the hole in the wall and beyond it who knows what is beyond. May as well assume there is passage-ways that lead to a Mouse’s replica of the city of London, complete with Big Ben made from popsicle sticks.

For every Sherlock Holmes, there is a Basil of Bakerstreet. For every United Nations, there is the Rescue Aid Society. Anthropomorphic mice, in their pure form, are often a parody of our own society. In this way they offer storytellers the ability to express the larger structures of society with-out directly disturbing or boring the child with un-due seriousness. The danger of action and adventure is contained in the promise that it’s just silly mice, not serious men, who are embarking upon saving the day.

The rodent-society fantasy takes the framework of our society and shrinks it the scale of being so small that even a four year old could com-mand it.

The appearance of the Dormouse in Alice in Wonderland is a more pri-mal occasion. Here we see an embel-lishment of the insanity of childhood itself, as, quite perplexingly, a mouse (of all creatures!) begins to speak to Alice and tell her sad tale. Perhaps Alice puts the words in Dormouse’s mouth, just as child breathes life into his or her action figures. (A re-print

of the sad tale of the Dormouse is on page 5).

When I got my first hamster I wondered why only talking mice were being represented in stories and thus (as discussed in volume one) be-gan designing my own hamster hero project. Apparently I wasn’t the only one in the early 1990s who noticed hamsters needed some representa-tion as a series of titles appeared - almost as soon as I made the obser-vation. Titles were imported from Japan featuring hamsters such as Rick the Hamster from the Gameboy game Kirby’s Dreamland 2; and the TV shows and toys of Hamtaro, Zhu-zhu Pets. Picking up on this more re-cently Disney incorporated the sup-porting character Rhino the hamster in the film Bolt.

They also resolved my childhood ambition to create a troupe of crime-fighting rodents when they released G-Force in 2009. I have watched titles appear in mediascape since the early 1990s which have seemed to specifi-cally satisfy what I wanted to see in this genre. Either I could read the zeitgeist, or the zeitgeist could read me, but even more recently titles such as Flushed Away and Ratatouille seem perfectly tailored for what I would hope to see, and both contin-ue the tradition of exploring a secret world of rodents that lives among us. (Check out the ‘Nine Films You Should See’ on Page 16.)

The popularity of rodents leads in-evitably to a plethora of toys, books, comics, and other entertainment products. In this edition of Fictional Rodents we have a colourful and di-verse four-page ‘Gift Guide’ on page 8. We sing Three Blind Mice on page 12 take note of more than a half doz-en famous pairs of rodent ‘Dynamic Duos’ on page 14. Finally, we look at a handful of ‘Rodents International’ (page 22) from around the world.

This is the second volume of a total of three volumes of Fictional Rodents Magazine.

VOLUME 2

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Rats of Decay: Banksy, Ebichu, Calhoun

VOLUME ONE: PUBLISHED FALL 2012

VOLUME TWO: PUBLISHED WINTER 2012

VOLUME THREE: PUBLISHED SPRING 2013

Family Values: Gifts, Films, Duos

Creativity: Contemporary Artists

Volume 2

Fictional Rodents is a free digital publication produced by Sandor Ligetfalvy

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FICTIONALRODENTS

M A G A Z I N E

YOU SHOULD SEENINE MOVIES14

20MILLION

MICEDOLLAR fictionalrodents.tumblr.com

Classics

Editorial

Rodent Duos

International

Gift Guide

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14

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Classics

Dormouse Alice In WonderlandBy Lewis Carroll

John Tenniel, 1869ILLUSTRATION

1951 2010

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“The Mouse’s Tale” is a concrete poem by Lewis Carroll which appears in his novel Alice’s Adven-tures in Wonderland. Though no formal title for the poem is given in the novel, the chapter title refers to “A Long Tale” and the Mouse introduces it by saying, “Mine is a long and sad tale!”

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I wonder why mice so often figure in children’s literature? Think of Be-atrix Potter, Aesop’s Fables, The Tale of Desperaux, Stuart Little, Chrysan-themum, Library Mouse, The Gruf-falo, and Doctor DeSoto. There’s the Dormouse in Alice, as well as the Three Blind Mice and Hickory, Dick-ory, Dock of nursery rhymes.

In many of the stories that come to mind, the mouse is threatened by someone bigger and stronger, and needs to be brave to overcome the odds.

I’m thinking back to a time when my cat and I chased a mouse. Actu-ally I was chasing the cat, trying to keep him from catching the mouse. And the poor mouse’s heart must have been ready to explode as he darted in and out of hiding spaces. Finally he was trapped, and I man-aged to scoop my cat out of the way and peer in at him, wedged as he was into a corner. I looked into his quivering mouse face and he actual-ly squeezed his eyes shut in terror. I suppose sometimes you reach those moments, when there is nothing left to do but hope the inevitable will not happen. And amazingly, some-times it doesn’t.

One of my top mouse books is Mouse Soup by Arnold Lobel, who wrote the wonderful Frog and Toad series I’ve mentioned before (here and here). My child has been home

sick the last couple of days and wants to hear Mouse Soup over and over. It’s constructed as stories with-in a story, a concept she easily grasps now, whereas a few years ago, when we first got the book, she didn’t seem aware of that architecture. Now, she calls these brackets at each end of the book her favourite part.

Note the book beside the mouse in the dreaded soup pot

Mouse Soup begins with a mouse sitting quietly, reading his book, when suddenly he’s caught by a wea-sel, taken up by the tail, and carted off to “be soup.” But the mouse – as charming and as quick-thinking as the mouse in The Gruffalo – tells him, Oh no! Your soup won’t taste good if it doesn’t have any stories in

it! The belly-rumbling weasel falls for this trick, and the stories unfold as ingredients.

The first is about a mouse plagued by a nest of bees who’ve decided to live on his head like a huge hat. How will he trick them into moving elsewhere when they constantly tell him how much they like his nose, his ears, his whiskers? The second features two large stones confined to a sedentary life on one side of a hill, believing for 100 years that life on the other side is better. How will they ever be happy? The third sees a mouse trying to sleep, but kept awake by a cricket chirping. She shouts at him to be quiet, but he misunderstands her, and invites more and more crickets to join him

Putting stories into soupBy Kristen den Hartog

Darwin’s leaf-eared mouse, from George Robert Waterhouse’s Mammalia

http://blogofgreengables.wordpress.com/2011/01/05/putting-stories-into-soup/THIS STORY WAS ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON ‘BLOG OF GREEN GABLES’ BY KRISTEN DEN HARTOG

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in song. How will she ever get any sleep? The fourth and final soup sto-ry is about a policeman who comes upon a crying woman. She’s sat on her beloved thorn bush and now all the branches are falling over. How will they revive the suffering plant?

Each of the four stories is deco-rated in the top corner with an im-age of the mouse in his soup pot, his tiny book on the counter beside him. When we finish the last story we see the weasel scratching his head, the mouse gesticulating, the ominous salt and pepper shakers sitting near a spoon.

“But how can I put the stories into the soup?” the weasel asks.

The mouse tells him to run out-side and gather a nest of bees, two large stones, ten crickets, and a thorn bush. “Come back and put them all into the soup.” Which of course allows the mouse to make his getaway.

Stories can be powerful things, and the little mouse has known this all along. It’s why he carries that book with him right through the tales, and why he goes home with it under his arm once he’s fooled the weasel. He settles into his mouse easy chair, eats his supper by the crackling fire, and then finishes his book right to the end. What a per-fect, subtle way to convey to chil-dren the joy of reading.

http://blogofgreengables.wordpress.com/2011/01/05/putting-stories-into-soup/THIS STORY WAS ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ON ‘BLOG OF GREEN GABLES’ BY KRISTEN DEN HARTOG

Note the book beside the mouse in the dreaded soup pot

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Fictional Rodents Gift Guide

THE CHRISTMAS MOUSE

I YOU GIVE A MOUSE A COOKIE

GUINEA PIG, PET SHOP DETECTIVE “HAMSTER AND CHEESE”

CHRISTMAS WITH THE CHIPMUNKS

fictionalrodents.tumblr.comTALE OF DESPERAUX (Book and DVD/Bluray)

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Venable & Yue

Numeroff & Bond

Kate DiCamillo

BY

BY

BY

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Fictional Rodents Gift Guide

ZHUZHU PETS

MINNIE MOUSE STUFFED DOLL

MORE ON NEXT PAGE

DIDDLGiftcard and Cardstock series

BABY MOUSE QUEEN OF THE WORLD

Jennifer and Matthew HolmBY

Thomas Goletz BY

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GERONIMO STILTONCOURAGEOUS CAT

& MINUTE MOUSE

CHATIMALS Talking Hamster

TY STUFFED HAMSTER

lionbrand.com

Terry Pratchett

FREE / D.I.Y

AMIGURUMI CHRISTMAS MOUSE ORNAMENT

WHERE

BY

PRICE

THE AMAZING MAURICEAND HIS TALKING RODENTS

Fictional Rodents Gift Guide

ZHUZHU PETS

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David Petersen

Warner Brothers

Jake Parker

Glass & Oeming

BY

BY

BY

BY

MICE TEMPLAR Comic book series

MOUSE GUARD Comic book series

MISSILE MOUSE“The Star Crusher” Graphic novel series

PINKY AND THE BRAIN Comic Book series (1997)

Fictional Rodents Gift Guide

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Three Blind Mice

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See more ‘Dynamic Duos’ on Page 14Pixie and Dixie

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Dynamic Duos

SLAPPY AND SKIPPYPIXIE AND DIXIE THE GOOFY GOPHERS

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TWO BAD MICEBeatrix Potter

BERNARD AND BIANCAThe Rescuers

JAQ AND GUS

PINKY & THE BRAIN

CHIP AND DALE

ANGRY BEAVERS

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#9 TALE OF DESPEREAUX Rich textures but stiff animation and storytelling. The characters are very cute and wholesome.

Nine Movies You Should See

#8 G-FORCE A crew of elite special-ops guinea pigs battle transformer toasters and microwaves in awesome action scenes.

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7 6 5#7 STUART LITTLE 1 & 2 Classic book becomes landmark film combining comput-er graphics and live action.

#3 THE RESCUERS Is a foundational piece of rodent cin-ema featuring a U.N. parody that intervenes in rescue ops

#2 BOLT The story of a dog who thinks he’s a superhero is benefited by the insane and heroic Rhino the Hamster

Rhino the Hamster

#6 GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE Parody of Sherlock Holmes, Basil of Baker Street com-bats the charismatic and evil Ratigan

#5 FLUSHED AWAY The creators of Wal-lace and Gromit foray into computer anima-tion in this hilarious sewer saga.

4#4 RATATOUILLE This film has great fantastic artwork, animation, and story, with an extremely valuable lesson: “anyone can cook”

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Nine Movies You Should See

1#1 MRS. BRISBY AND THE RATS OF N.I.M.H. A mother seeks help for her sick child from genetically engineered rats who are grappling with moral issues in an attempt to transcend their past as thieving vermin.

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#1 MRS. BRISBY AND THE RATS OF N.I.M.H. A mother seeks help for her sick child from genetically engineered rats who are grappling with moral issues in an attempt to transcend their past as thieving vermin.

N.I.M.H is the National Institute for Mental Health which was well known for conducting experiments on mice and rats. The book which the film is based on was directly inspired by the research of John B. Calhoun who created ‘Mouse Utopias’.

> See more on this in Fictional Rodents Magazine Vol. 1

Did you know?

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MILLION

MICEDOLLAR

$ $

Little heros are big money.

Top box office earners total $743 Million

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$64M

$50M

#4

#6 #8

#1

$206M

$38M $22M

#10

1 Ratatouille $206,445,654

2 Stuart Little $140,035,367

3 Stuart Little 2 $64,956,806

4 Flushed Away $64,665,672

5 Mouse Hunt $61,917,389

6 The Tale of Despereaux $50,877,145

7 An American Tail $47,483,002

8 The Great Mouse Detective $38,625,550

9 The Rescuers Down Under $27,931,461

10 An American Tail: Fievel Goes West $22,166,041

11 The Secret of NIMH $14,665,733

13 Tom & Jerry - The Movie $3,560,469

$743,990,289

$204M2 FILMS

#2

$14M

#11

Source: BoxOfficeMojo.com • Search Mouse/Rat Category

BOX OFFICEEARNINGS

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PEREZ EL RATON (Perez the Rat) English film title “The Hairy Toothfairy”

ARGENTINA

Topo GigioITALY SPAIN

U.K.Rastamouse

Níquel Náusea BRAZIL

INTERNATIONALRODENTS

U.K.

Hammy the Hamster/ Tales of the RiverbankCANADA

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INTERNATIONALRODENTS

RUMINIHUNGARY

Čudnovate zgode šegrta Hlapića(Lapitch the Little Shoemaker)

CROATIA

Ebichu The Housekeeping Hamster

JAPANRead more Fictional Rodents Vol.1

Die Sendung mit der Maus(The Program With the Mouse)GERMANY

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Everyone is safe again.

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