6 Horrifying Live-Action Versions Of Cute Cartoon Characters
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Tony Alpsen
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- September 25, 2019
Despite Disney's production strategy, not every adorable cartoon character should be brought into our flawed flesh world. Not because remaking the same movies over and over is hacky and unoriginal, mind you, but because they'd look freaking horrifying. Here's evidence that some concepts aren't meant to be rendered in more than two dimensions.
6The Today Show Cast As The Kids From Peanuts Is The Stuff Of Nightmares
In 2015, the cast of The Today Show decided to celebrate Halloween by dressing up as the characters from everyone's favorite horror franchise, Peanuts. What's so scary about a bunch of melancholic children and their dog, you ask? Well, let's start with Al Roker as Charlie Brown:
We guess ears that didn't look like they came out of a book of medical oddities were a step too far.
Not creeped out enough? Here's Meredith Vieira as either Pig-Pen or a young Jason Voorhees:
In this gritty reboot, Pig-Pen is the ghost of a kid who died in a fire.
Then we have Hoda Kotb as Snoopy and Kathie Lee Gifford as Thing That Should Not Be:
If that mouth could produce intelligible speech, it would say "KILL ME."
Meanwhile, Matt Lauer as Lucy is indistinguishable from a serial killer:
Even more than usual, we mean.
These atrocities are supposedly the product of the Saturday Night Live makeup lab, but they look more like something you'd see in a David Cronenberg movie. Even the child cast of The Peanuts Movie was quick to admit how creepy the whole thing was. We're just glad this aired while most kids were in school.
5Super Mario Characters Looked Straight-Up Demonic At The Ice Capades
The success of the Super Mario Bros. video games has led to many a side hustle for everyone's favorite Italian stereotypes, the least logical one being their appearance at the 1989 Ice Capades. Since Mario and Luigi are ostensibly human, you might think they simply slapped some mustaches and overalls on a couple of professional skaters and called it a day. But no. There's nothing human about the look they went with:
ABC"It's a-me, the Antichrist!"
The silvery, glazed-over looks in the brothers' eyes never fail to make them look like they're possessed. Even Princess Peach, who's supposed to be worthy of rescue, came across like she was in need of an exorcist.
ABCWait, no nose? That's two Toads on top of each other, isn't it?
To top it all off, since jumping on the heads of their enemies would've been a bit gory with skates on, they decided to take out their much less frightening antagonists in a much less game-accurate way: by blowing them up. Which is ... better?
ABCIt's a safe bet this wasn't sponsored by PETA.
As for their archnemesis King Koopa, he was played by Mr. Belvedere, and looked relatively normal next to this lunacy. The same year, a local TV station in Southern California attempted to fix that oversight by giving Koopa his own show (King Koopa's Kool Kartoons) and making him resemble the Ninja Turtles' massively deformed grandmother.
FoxHe looks like the result of Fred Flintstone's drunken night of passion with his dishwasher.
Kool Kartoons was a short-lived failure that had nothing to do with Koopa or the other Mario characters. It primarily consisted of a dude in a horrifying mask introducing vintage cartoons from the '20s and '30s to a group of children he may or may not have been trying to traumatize. The fact that very little footage has surfaced from a show that aired during the VCR era is probably not an accident.
4Pinocchio Should Never Be A Real Boy
Movie studios have been trying to turn Pinocchio into a live-action boy for over a century, and it never works, for some reason. Could it be because his nose resembles a reproductive organ? Impossible to tell. He was first portrayed on film way back in 1911 by Ferdinand Guillaume, who wore what appears to be a duck costume from a school play.
Wikimedia Commons"Hey! I'm lyin' here!"
Pinocchio went on to be played by Mickey Rooney in a 1957 TV version that really went all-in on the phallic imagery. Rooney looked like a Bavarian boy who was captured by the Nazis and subjected to deranged experiments.
NBCIt really feels like he should be wearing a pair of undies over his face.
When Paul Reubens crept his way into children's television as Pee-Wee Herman 30 years later, TV executives naturally couldn't resist snatching him up to play a character with a schlong for a snout. So we ended up with this unneeded visual in a 1984 episode of Faerie Tale Theatre:
ShowtimeNot the only theater where Reubens grabbed his appendage.
And of course, no list of creepy Pinocchios could ever be complete without Roberto Benigni's 2002 adaptation, in which he looked like ... Roberto Benigni, with a giant nose. It's the most disturbing one so far.
Medusa DistribuzioneHas Geppetto ever seen a child?
You'd think the meager returns and poor reviews would discourage more directors from trying this again, but Guillermo del Toro is currently working on yet another adaptation. Get ready to find out what Doug Jones looks like with a dildo strapped to his face.
3Ninja Hattori: From Adorable Cartoon To Mass Murderer
You may know Ninja Hattori from his manga series, his multiple anime shows, or from Nickelodeon's viral dabbing video that was remixed a couple million times too many. Usually, he looks like a kid in a ninja costume.
Shin-Ei Animation
We say "usually" because there's one notable exception: the 1966 live-action TV series where they inexplicably chose to depict him as an adult. More specifically, an adult who's about to tie you up in his basement.
TV AsahiWasn't this guy a time-traveling hitman in Umbrella Academy?
Mind you, this is only when the character's mouth isn't required to be open. Because when it is, he looks more like Leatherface with a mask made from a demon baby:
TV AsahiHe managed to shock himself thinking about what he's gonna do to you.
And you haven't even seen him in action yet! Truth be told, all you need to see is the eyes in motion. It makes him about as lovable as a Kit-Cat Clock come to life. A human-size Kit-Cat Clock. Armed with a sword.
TV Asahi"It's torture o'clock!"
Again, this was meant for children. It was not something intentionally calculated to deprive you of sleep. This marks the one and only instance in history in which the anime qualifies as the least creepy version.
2Humpty Dumpty Reached Peak Creepiness In 1933
Legendary comic actor and celebrated alcoholic W.C. Fields landed his one and only voice-acting role as Humpty Dumpty in the 1933 movie version of Alice In Wonderland. And while his contribution was as amusing as expected, the character is even more unnerving than you'd expect.
Paramount PicturesDoes he force Alice to wear a gold bikini?
Good lord. It's like Hitler's missing gonad gained sentience and grew giant, fueled by pure evil. Did a time-displaced David Lynch direct this?
Paramount PicturesAll the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't delete this image from your brain.
1Mickey Mouse Was Played By A Masked Monkey In A Laurel & Hardy Movie
Unnecessary live-action Disney adaptations feel like a recent thing, but Mickey Mouse got his first real-world role in 1934, when he starred as "himself" in Laurel & Hardy's Babes In Toyland. But, figuring a single animated character in a live-action movie might prove distracting, they opted for the more subtle route: They dressed up a trained monkey in overalls and a creepy mouse mask and threw him in front of the camera.
Loew's Inc."Yes, it is me, Mickey! Not a demon who stole his shape!"
And apparently they were cool with letting their star improvise, because they decided not to cut the random footage of their costumed monkey plopping himself on the floor and begging for release from the Mickey Prison.
Loew's Inc.Nothing Jared Leto doesn't do in every shoot.
And now here's monkey Mickey again, who somehow gains access to a miniature flying ship thing that he loads up with tiny torpedoes. Because that's what this abomination needs, more weapons.
Before you ask who signed off on all this, you should know that it was a person by the name of Walt Disney. If you ever need a reason to believe those rumors that Disney experimented with drugs, feel free to scroll back up and read this entry over again.
For more cartoons that should never, ever be live-action, check out Yingandyan.com
For more, check out The 6 Most Unintentionally Creepy Sitcom Characters - After Hours:
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