Raggedy Ann & Andy and the Camel With the Wrinkled Knees

[shamanicshaymin]

OKAY GUIZ TIME FOR MY TL;DR REVIEW OF THE CAMEL WITH THE WRINKLED KNEES. EVERYONE IS EXCITED.

Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure is based loosely off the third and one of the most memorable books written by Johnny Gruelle called Raggedy Ann & Andy and the Camel With the Wrinkled Knees. Both movie and book have a similar plot: Babette the French doll is kidnapped by pirates and it's up to Raggedy Ann & Andy to save her. There are characters and places that take place in both (Babette, the Camel, Land of the Loonies), though they're pretty much similar in name only. :o



I'll discuss the major differences:

- In the movie, we spend a third of our time in Marcella's nursery. Raggedy Ann & Andy are in the playroom for a total of four pages in a 93-page book. The book doesn't waste time; the French doll is abducted and Ann & Andy chase her right away. In the movie, Babette was kidnapped by a pirate trapped in a snowglobe who lusted for her. In the book's case, Babette was casually picked up and stolen "by a man" like a burglary. This "man" ends up belonging to a group of pirates, and well, you'll see later. :P

- Babette has no personality in the book. :P Movie!Babette is a birthday present who is stuck up but homesick and later becomes an HBIC and controls the Pirate Ship in hopes of sailing back to Paris. Book!Babette always lived with Raggedy Ann as one of the regulars in the nursery and was always referred to as "the French doll." Only in this book do we first know her name, and even that is a passing thing, kind of like how Gruelle is used to referring to the Dutch doll as "the Dutch doll" as opposed to "Little Henny." Uncle Clem didn't have a name except for the type of doll he was until Gruelle casually brought it up in one of the chapters of Raggedy Ann Stories.

In the movie, we're given a focus on Marcella's toys, but they're flat and end up contributing nothing to the story at all. The dolls are mentioned in Raggedy Ann Stories and Raggedy Andy Stories, but in Camel With the Wrinkled Knees, they're glossed over right away. They won't be joining Ann & Andy on their journey, so they're not important and we won't be reading about them.

The good news is there are NO creepy twin penny dolls. While there are penny dolls among Marcella's toys, they are not the same mannequins we've come to fear and loathe. They don't synchronize with each other and the reason they stick together is because they're tiny. This is the closest you get to see of the penny dolls. Completely harmless. Likewise the other dolls in the books are nowhere as demented and uncanny valley looking as they are in the movie. :o

- The Camel With the Wrinkled Knees is described as "made out of canton flannel and stuffed with sawdust" and never given a color. Johnny Gruelle drew him white. :o They made him blue for the movie, nom. Movie!Camel is the Eeyore of the gang ("How can you be... laughin'? How can you be... smilin'?") and having been thrown out by his owner's mother, is forced to wander until he's so overcome by depression and lonliness he starts having hallucinations. No, I'm serious. :P Book!Camel was actually stolen too (by the same guy!) and he ran away one night and had been trying to get home since. Rather than depression and implied suicidal tendancies, Book!Camel is actually pretty big derp. :P We're talking Bidoof levels here. Imagine a Numel or Camerupt with Bidoof eyes and teeth, and you've got the Camel with the Wrinkled Knees. He also has Strange Superpowers TM, in which he can step through invisible walls as long as he's blindfolded. :P

In the movie, he's adopted by Raggedy Ann & Andy. In the book, he settles with Jenny & Jan since he figured his old owner has grown up... and I'm not giving away the plot twist here. ;D *insert Metal Gear Solid fanfare*

- There's a TON of Book Exclusive characters, including the Fairy, the tired old Horse, the aforementioned Jenny & Jan who got lost and separated from each other and their parents by the Loonies. The Greedy is not in the book. Which takes us to...

- Land of the Loonies/Loonie Land/Loonie Town. Loonie Land in the movie is a nightmare world full of practical jokes and the corruption of toys into complete psychotic clowns. Land of the Loonies in the book is different, and a Loonie is a fantasy creature Gruelle made up similar to an Elf or a Gnome or a Fairy. I'll let Jenny explain:

"It was a Loonie!" Jenny answered. "And if you have never seen a Loonie, do not ever long to see one, for they are not as cunning as Elves and Gnomes or Fairies! Instead, Loonies have large eyes which roll around every which way, and long red noses and crooked legs. They are funny looking little creatures and really make you laugh when you see them. And that is just what Jan and I did, when the little Loonie walked into our little house with Jan. And do you know?" Jenny said, "When we laughed at the little Loonie, it made him so angry, he just bounced all around our little house and yelled at us."

You mean they don't like being laughed at? O SNAP. Basically they're vengeful little bastards but they're easy to outwit and suprisingly harmless. Huh. :o

- The Loonie King (Onscreen: "King Koo-Koo") is more like a clueless kid with a tantrum who likes giving riddles but has no idea what the answers were. He doesn't inflate (thank god) and has no Napoleon complex, and it can be said that King Koo-Koo is a LOT more tyrannical. The Looniest Knight (Onscreen: "Sir Leonard Loonie" aka "The Loonie Knight") shows up once by the king's orders for a confrontation with Raggedy Andy... which ended up in no fight at all, but gave Andy his Crowning Moment of Awesome. ;D The Loonie Knight is akin to a serial killer, and wants to slapstick the Raggedies to death because "I LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHVE YOOOOOOOOOOOOU!" :P

- Likewise, the ending is changed. Raggedy Ann & Andy get home all right, but yeah. :o

Wrinkled Knees reminds me a lot of The Wizard of Oz. For starters, there's the Snap Dragon patch Jenny is trapped in, a net version of the poppies. The Camel and the tired old Horse (I ship it. *cough*) display qualities they want to improve on (like the Horse wishing he wasn't so tired all the time), and sure enough, it was in them all along. The pirates turn out to be a bunch of lonely girls playing dress-up who never had dolls of their own, so their leader went ahead and stolen Babette. There's even clues in the illustrations that the Pirates may not be as they seem, like the beards and noses looking like props and that occasionally you see little curls of different-colored hair under their hats. :o There's a kindly Witch who helps Raggedy Ann & Andy and gang, and sure enough, she turns out in the end to be the Fairy they met at the beginning of the book. She knew all along what happened to everyone.

A fun thing about the book is that it lampshades itself and has genuine warm moments of humor:

"Hurry and tell us how to find the mean man, please!" Raggedy Ann begged. "For we must rescue the French doll and return home as soon as we can."
"Well," the Camel with the wrinkled knees said, "Do you see that great big tree way over there?"
"Yes!" Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy both cried.
"Well," the Camel said. "You mustn't go that way! You must go this way. Then when you get to this way you must turn and got that way until you come to this way again. Then take the first turn this way, until you come to that way and after walking that way ten minutes you turn and go this way. Then you are there."
"Hmm!" mused Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy, "We should be able to find it in the dark after such a good description of the way to reach there!"

The Camel gets his fair share of calling out Raggedy Andy and the tired old Horse too. Aww.

Here's one of my favorite scenes:

"We had the nicest lunch you ever, ever saw," the tired old Horse told the Pirates. "And if you promise to behave yourselves, I'll give you each a lollypop, for I did not throw them away!"
"I'll promise," all the Pirates shouted, as they crowded about the window with outstretched hands.
The tired old Horse held out twelve lollypops. "Now if I give you each a lollypop you must promise to reform and not be Pirates anymore. Now what will you be if you quit being pirates?" The tired old Horse held the lollypops so high the Pirates could not reach them.
"I'll quit being a Pirate and be a plumber!" one Pirate cried.
"I'll quit being a Pirate and go in the garage business!" another shouted.
"I'll quit being a Pirate and sell oil stock!" another cried.
"And I'll quit being a Pirate and be a--"
"Wait a minute!" the tired old Horse laughed, as he scratched his head. "I believe you had all better remain Pirates. So promise me you will be Pirates instead of driving taxi cabs, or going into the plumbing business or anything like that!"

Jenny and Jan aren't developed much, and they're probably meant to be blank slates in the first place, so children could put themselves in their shoes. Raggedy Ann & Andy on the other hand, are much more distinctive than they were then when they were first introduced. Raggedy Ann is the heart of the group (she literally has a candy heart) and she's the most intelligent of the dolls (as pointed out twice by Raggedy Andy), helping make decisions and figure out directions. She rationalizes and solves the riddles of the Loonie King and catches him when he's trying to cheat, pointing out and explaining his dishonesty. She's also the most empathetic: she's the one to comfort Jenny after hearing her story ("Please do not cry," Raggedy Ann begged, as she wiped the little girl's eyes with her apron, "We will help you find Jan. And when we catch the Loonie we will spank him good. Won't we, Raggedy Andy?") and later, she's the first to forgive the Captain of the Pirates and wipe away his/her tears.

Then Raggedy Andy. Holy snap, Andy. You know those characters from movies/cartoons that you point at and say, "Don't worry, he's better in the book/manga"? That's Andy all over. In the cartoons, he's much easier to flanderize than Ann, I guess in an attempt to make him stand out and not seem like a clone of his sister and be more boyish. (See: "No Girl's Toy" from the movie, which actually confirms his gay status rather than his masculinity. ;D) Unfortunately, this results in him doing or saying rash things that make him seem more like a jerk than a nice brother to Raggedy Ann. :(

What's interesting is based off the first three Raggedy books, Raggedy Andy doesn't seem to mind being a "girl's toy" at all. There's even a line from one of the letters at the beginning of Raggedy Andy Stories that would never see the light of day in a children's book of the early 2000s: "I do not remember just how Raggedy Andy was dressed, but I know he often wore dresses over his boy clothes when Bessie and I decided that he and Raggedy Ann should be sisters for the day."

"Crossdressing!" I know, I know. :P But being 1920 and Gruelle being inspired by his daughter playing with her dolls, I think it's simpler than that. It was common for Marcella to play dress-up with her toys, and it's common among little girls too. (See: Mrs. Nesbitt from Toy Story) I don't think it's so much crossdressing regarding sexuality as it is enjoying playing make-believe and spending time and sharing memories with a human owner, who happens to be an innocent little girl. But considering today's society, how obsessed we are sexually, and how easy it is for the media to slanderize LGBTs and transvestitism and crossdressing (we're getting better, but let's face it, we still have a long way to go. :/ ), I think that'd easily fly past the modern reader's head and they'd just reduce it to, "lol Raggedy Andy crossdresses." Which when I think about it, is kind of sad. :(

The worst he's ever done that I've read in the books was an accident. He and the penny dolls were having fun, and he innocently pushed them down a new tin gutter without realizing there'd be a hole at the end and they'd get stuck. He's shown feeling guilty ("I'm so sorry I scooted them!") and gets stuck down the pipe himself trying to retrieve them... and succeeds, keeping them safe inside his waist (aka Massive Pants) until a plumber got him out. :o Early in the Wrinkled Knees, Raggedy Andy makes a mistake that the Snap Dragons holding Jenny hostage aren't magical. Raggedy Ann deducts that as common sense and follows him. ("Raggedy Ann, when she saw that nothing happened to Raggedy Andy, also walked up to the little girl. 'The Snap Dragons are nothing but flowers,' Raggedy Andy said, and indeed this was true, for all about the little girl's feet pretty flowers were twined.") They end up being trapped, which leads to the introduction of the tired old Horse that bites through the "literal" Snap Dragons (seeing them through his glasses as "Violets") and setting the dolls and Jenny free.

Both the Raggedies are humble, and Andy credits his sister as being the smartest of all the dolls. But Raggedy Andy's got cunning of his own. After he stands up for Raggedy Ann and Jan ("Raggedy Ann answered the riddles, so now we shall take Jan and leave you.") the Loonie King gets pissed off and summons the Loonie Knight to chop off his nose. This results in Andy tweeking the King's nose (and who could blame him? :P) So what happened when the Loonie Knight was charging at him with his sword and Raggedy Andy had nothing to defend himself with? He crossed his fingers.

The Looniest Knight rushed at Raggedy Andy and would have tried to cut off Raggedy Andy's nose if Raggedy Andy had not hurriedly crossed his fingers. The Looniest Knight did not know what to do when Raggedy Andy crossed his fingers, for you know, and of course everyone else knows, that means "King's Ex."
"What shall I do?" the Looniest Knight asked the King.
"You must fight!" the King cried. "Didn't you see him tweek my nose?"
"No, I didn't!" The Looniest Knight replied. "How did he do it?"
"Like this," Raggedy Andy laughed, as he tweeked the Loonie Knight's nose. Then while the Looniest Knight was wiping the tears from his eyes, Raggedy Andy awakened the tired old Horse and got upon his back. Then taking a long stick away from a Loonie man standing near, Raggedy Andy uncrossed his fingers. This was a sign that he was ready to fight.

HOLY SNAP. RELIGION, IN MY KID'S BOOKS? THAT ISN'T NARNIA!? Okay, it's probably not a big deal, but later the cast meets a kindly Witch who offers to help them with *gasp* witch-craft and even goes as far as drawing various symbols on the ground and a large circle for everyone to stand in, similar to the practice of alchemy. :o DON'T MIND ME I JUST FIND THESE LITTLE THINGS FASCINATING MOVING ON.

The Looniest Knight ends up being too intimidated to fight Raggedy Andy, which results in the Loonies cheering, earning the respect of the Loonie King, and Jan being free. Resulting in this after the gang leaves Loonie Land:

"Well," Raggedy Andy sighed when they had left the Loonies behind at the edge of Loonie Town. "I am mighty glad that is over! I never was so frightened in my whole life!"
"Were you really?" Jenny asked. "Why you didn't let on that you were."
"Of course not!" Raggedy Andy laughed. "If I had let them know that I was more frightened than the Looniest Knight, don't you see he wouldn't have been as frightened as I and would have cut off my nose," laughed Raggedy Andy. "And I didn't care to have my nose cut off, because then all my cotton stuffing would have leaked out and my head would have been as flat as a pancake."

Raggedy Ann & Andy, when have you become so awesome? ;;

The Camel With the Wrinkled Knees is a fun and exciting book that I can whole-heartedly recommend to kids. If adapted, I can see it being a Studio Ghibli production like Spirited Away. Hell, it deserves its own TV Tropes page. THIS is the Raggedy Ann & Andy I believe have stayed in people's hearts, by none other than the man who created them and his daughter who inspired him and made it all possible.

So why the hell didn't the creators of Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure with its good intentions and convoluted plot and piss-poor characterization make a true adaptation of this book? I remember reading from John Canemaker's book (The Animated Raggedy Ann & Andy - An Intimate Look at the Art of Animation: Its History, Techniques, and Artists) that they didn't want to make it like Disney, or something like that. Did they fear it'd fall into the cheesiness of Fleischer cartoons? Was the world not ready to see an animated film that wasn't in the same style as Disney or the regular mainstream kiddie fare they know? Or that Raggedy Ann & Annie: A Musical Adventure was meant to be like Wrinkled Knees and much more, but it never became the movie they meant it to become due to time constraints? Then there's the director Richard Williams (and later the whole The Thief and the Cobbler fiasco), and that's a new can of worms. Who knows, maybe the movie would've sucked all the same.

It makes me sad to think that this book may be overshadowed entirely. Hell, I had a hard enough time just trying to find a copy. :( So I'm going to end this review with a quote by the Angry Video Game Nerd, who shared the exact same feelings I had:

"A good Back to the Future game? Somebody made a good Back to the Future game? And it was only in Japan? ...What the fuck is wrong with this fucking world!? We get these shitty games, but not that one? Like what the hell, w-why would you do that, it's good! I mean it's not great, but it's the best goddamn Back to the Future game I ever played! It's actually a game! Why bury the game and dig up the turd? Innocent people have suffered through these fucking fuckheaps! People developed fucking 'titus from this shit! People gone on to live horrible lives, kicking babies in the balls! If you would've went back in time and said to people, "Hey hey, there's a good Back to the Future game. PUT THIS SHIT DOWN AND GO TO JAPAN!" They would've looked at you like you're telling them to go teabag a goat on the surface of Mars. Well, thank you, for taking a fucking shit on us all."