Saturday Six – Pop Culture Mice

Welcome to the Saturday Six, where each week I let you get to know me a bit better with the help of a list. Any idiot can do a Top 5 list, which is why I kicked it up a notch to a Top 6. This week’s topic: Mice.

Let me just start out with this: Even though I am going to Disneyland in two weeks, I don’t get Mickey Mouse. Maybe that’s because I am a single adult male with no kids, but I never really got him when I was younger either, and we paid extra for The Disney Channel back when it was a premium subscription service. To me he was always like the wacky sitcom neighbor. He’s always around on the periphery causing hi-jinks, but never the center of attention. He’d show up in a brief cameo scene on TV as like a host or presenter, but was never really the “star” or anything. Even on The Mickey Mouse Club, a show named after him, he never appeared. In fact, in my 33 years on Earth, he’s only been in 4 theatrical releases, all shorts: Mickey’s Christmas Carol (1983), The Prince and the Pauper (1990), Runaway Brain (1995), and Get a Horse (2013). Before that, his last appearance on screen was in 1953’s The Simple Things. That kind of work effort hardly seems like the type of thing to base an entire multinational conglomerate around. He’s been in plenty of direct to DVD movies, but that’s not really helping his case any.

Anyway, enough of my rant about why I don’t like Mickey Mouse. Instead, let’s turn to some mice I do like.

1. The Space Mice – Voltron – Now, it’s been quite a while since I watched Voltron, but I seem to recall towards the end of the series, the Voltron Force gets stuck somewhere, or need something to destroy the Space Cannon, and who saves the day? The fucking Space Mice, Princess Allura’s friends, in their own mouse sized Voltron. It was badass, and without them, Prince Zarkon would never have been defeated. You could almost call them the most important team on the show. Plus they were all cute as hell.

 

2. Monterey Jack and Gadget – Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers – Ahhh. Monterey Jack. A mouse after my own heart. A big fat guy who loves cheese. Now that’s a character I can get behind. He’s pretty much Ron Swanson if he were a mouse. And Gadget? She was the awesome, hip, smart chick who was basically MacGyver. Plus, I may have been only 10 at the time, but she was certainly attractive, for a mouse. A quick Googling tells me I am not the only person with this opinion.

 

3. Pinky and the Brain – One is a Genius, the other’s insane! The only bit from Animaniacs to get it’s own spin off. If someone asks you what you’re doing tonight, and you don’t answer “Same as every other night. Try to take over the world!”, you had a terrible childhood.

 

4. Danger Mouse – This was almost impossible to miss as a kid, as it ran on Nickelodeon near incessantly. I was too young to get all the spoofs on James Bond, but it didn’t matter. He lived in a mailbox, had a butler, and drove a flying car, what kid wouldn’t love that?

 

5. Fievel – An American Tale – This is the first movie I ever remember seeing. It was playing at the old converted Vaudeville theatre 3 blocks from my house right before it went out of business. I remember they gave away some type of coloring book or something with each ticket. That’s really all I remember, since I don’t think I’ve seen it again since then. I just really wanted to share this video of Troy and Abed singing “Somewhere Out There”, since it’s been stuck in my head for weeks now.

 

6. Chuck E. Cheese – I feel bad for the children of today, as their definition of “arcade” is pretty much limited to Chuck E Cheese, and that’s a shame. Frankly, no one should ever go to Chuck E Cheese, as they are almost all universally dumps. And I’m not just saying that because I held my 11th birthday party there, then spent the entire time antagonizing Mr. Cheese (kicking his feet, punching him the back, calling him names, etc.) until he followed me and a friend into the bathroom, picked me up by my feet and held me upside down while saying “Hi! I’m a dog. Arfff!” until my friend had to punch him in the face to let me go. Why he said that I’ll never know, as he is clearly a mouse and not a dog. OK, so maybe I’m a little biased, but their pizza is terrible, regardless of any personal childhood traumas.

 

JohnScott is the proud owner of a life size replica Captain Kirk Chair. He is a hoarder of Comic Books, Transformers, and Star Trek action figures. He attended Space Camp as an adult. He has taken vacations to the closing of the Star Trek Experience and the final night Shuttle launch. He has been known to yell at his television when the kids can't put together the damn statue in the Shrine of the Silver Monkey. When not writing for InsufficientScotty, he is a Software Engineer for a major healthcare communications company. You can Email or follow on Twitter @NotEnoughScotty or Facebook