Ban as a bird...man:
Ban's slimy boss:
Ezmeralda (sort of a love interest):
Homeless man:
Ban's kids:
monster the homeless man becomes in a subway scene:
Ban's wife:
REFLECT!
So this is a bit late, but only because I can't place who my "Mickey Mouse" would be. I had a billion beloved cartoon characters in my wild youth, each a sort of flavor of the month. I'm like a cartoon whore, constantly chasing after different characters and never loyal to any particular "obsession". My first love was Donald Duck-everything in my room adorning his image. It wasn't so much the way he looked, unlike Sendak's Mickey affinity, but more about his personality. I had a soft spot for spicy-yet-downtrodden characters who longed for the spotlight, only to have it constantly snatched away by a more popular (and usually, in my opinion, a more boring) character. This logic was applied to so many 'toons-Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote of Loony Tunes, Plucky of Tiny Toons, (a lot of ducks, for some reason) and so on until my attention turned to The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. As an aesthetic, I liked the color pairing of Donatello-green and purple is my favorite color combination. My favorite turtle, however, was Rafael. His colors were pleasing as well (I later learned red and green are complimentary-go figure), but again, his personality attracted me the most. Like Donald, he was hot-tempered, but in a completely reckeless, ne'r-do-well way. He was the "bad boy", and what little girl isn't a sucker for that? Needless to say, I had EVERY TMNT toy that existed, along with posters, wall stickers, the whole shebang.
Not suprisingly, my 'tween years became a free-for-all with the discovery of 90's Nickelodeon Cartoons, or "Nicktoons". After school became an orgy of great characters with great designs and bright colors-all mine for those few glorious hours. Doug, Rocko's Modern Life, Ah! Real Monsters, Angry Beavers, Catdog, Hey, Arnold!, one right after the other. I had an intelectual opinion about each character on each show, sizing them all up as I saw fit. Looking back it was more sad then quirky because my obsession led me to believe I really "knew" all these fictional characters.
This illusion may have matured, but never subsided-even into teenage years and adulthood. I found a more "sophisticated" lust of fictional characters in comic books. To this day, I'd say the founder of my comic book character love, my adulthood "Mickey Mouse", is Patch from a sickeningly colorful comic book series entitled "Pirates of Coney Island". In a nutshell, Patch (about 16 or 17 years old) and a car-stealing street gang called "The Pirates" reek havoc upon their city and brawl over territory/revenge with their arch enemies-a gang of hardcore grrls called "The Cherries". Patch, a nickname given to him for wearing one over his empty eye socket (this eye was brutally stabbed out by the leader of the Cherries), is a green/black mohawk wearing, pick-pocketing, runaway punk with a fun, exagerrated character design. I still go back and read those "Pirates..." comics to cheer me up on my "pissy" days. It's been years since that series was put out (ironically, the writer and artist abandoned the project 1 issue proir to it's completion), but reading it still puts a smile on my face.
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