Anyone who framed Roger Rabbit’s Dip death is one of the...

Who Framed Roger Rabbit? was one of the few films in my VHS rotation after school, somewhere in between Aladdin and hook. Most of the adult themes in the film were over my head; I was unfamiliar with Raymond Chandler’s influences, and I didn’t care (or understand) the freeway construction property at all. I was only there for the toons – the rubbery slapstick, the bright colors, and the familiar animated characters.

As an adult, I can better appreciate the complexity of the story, from the drunk detective Eddie Valiant hanging on (sometimes literally) on a finger to the judge’s genocidal plot to wipe out Toontown. As a pre-puberty bisexual, I was confused and intrigued by Jessica Rabbits whole Deal, but only as an adult could I begin to analyze the layers of her confident femme fatale joke: “I’m not bad; I’m just drawn like that. “

Children are immune to the horror that adults shy away from. It’s easy to look back at the shows we enjoyed as kids and say, “It’s actually a mess. What the hell? ”But sometimes the horror is so obvious that even as children – right? in particular as children – we understand.

And there’s something in there Roger Hase so terrible that even a child can understand.

Der Dip.

Turpentine, acetone, benzene – essentially the dip is just thinner and can instantly dissolve a painted toon into nothing. This is a fundamental threat to a child.

Cartoons are similar to martyr saints for children. They’re crushed, pierced, walled in, and worse. But they form anew like an original plasma. Injuries are a punch line, bandages played for props. They’re immortal so it’s okay to laugh at the crazy physics of their existence. The toons can bend the material world to their whims, even in the service of humans, like when Lena Hyena saves Eddie from a fatal fall by catching him at the last moment.

A shoe that whimpers and begs for mercy is exposed to the dip and rot in seconds. Nothing is left but a pink slick on the judge’s rubber gloves, and implicitly the couple’s other shoe is forever orphaned.

The dip violated an essential rule for all cartoons, not just those exposed to it Roger Hase. It can hurt cartoons. Really hurt her. It makes them vulnerable and permanently damaged. The dip reveals a reality that children are often shielded from: all bodies, no matter how impermeable they may be, will eventually decay.

What’s worse are the toons knows What is Judge Doom’s awful liquid and they are clearly afraid of it. From a filmmaking standpoint, that’s brilliant. The only time Jessica breaks off her pouty lips, which was so marked, is to scream at the mere sight of the dip. The emotional stakes are presented so clearly and frighteningly that from the first moment the game was over, there was no longer any doubt. The dip was serious business. To this day, Kathleen Turner has exaggerated, “Oh my God, it’s DIP!” Rings in my head.

What happens to toons in the abundance of time? You certainly don’t age; Betty Boop is still a sucker despite being a waitress now as the changing demands of feminine beauty have made her obsolete. The weasels laugh themselves “to death”, but that just sends their soul-clad souls to the cartoon that hovers over Toontown.

No soul arises from the shoe. It has become unimportant.

The dip threatens not only the death of an immortal, but also absolute oblivion. For a kid who takes the eternity of a cartoon’s fools for granted, the dip is blasphemy. As an adult, I understand the innuendo behind patty cake and the importance of a vanishing will. But the horror of the dip is uniquely youthful and threatens to wipe out all of a child’s favorite creatures. Regardless of age, this is pure terror.