By: Annna
[2001-07-10]
The Complete Petey, Part Nine
June 1969 - October 1969
June, 1969 - Punkin continues to establish his presence. While last time he had clearly-defined if chubby literal rabbit ears, now his head resembles an acorn or perhaps a pumpkin. Punkin is still an unfinished creature; his right leg and his neck are only half there.
Petey is also unfinished and unbalanced - his shorts are uncolored and his shirt does not connect to his head. His antennae appear almost parallel. This is the second strip Petey has ended, in his savagery, simply with "
RABBIT MEAT!"
July, 1969 - A dog in the background hearkens back to the forgotten dog in the very first
Petey. Petey is free of Punkin, but Punkin's border still lingers. The other boy is interesting - he has Petey's outfit, legs and stature. Only the coloring and the new boy's strange hair (or possibly head) is different. Followed by the black kid, he is the most physically Petey-like character. Perhaps he
is Petey, symbolically showing what Petey had to give up for rabbit meat.
October, 1969 - Another Halloween comic, this time with Petey participating in the revels. His hat and headband combination prompts a double-take. His necklace resembles nothing more than an alligator bite mark, unconnected as the beads or holes seem to be.
If Petey's companion is the same boy from the last comic, perhaps the helmet is symbolic of some consciousness-building exercise in rabbit-deprivation, undertaken under Petey's supervision. "How?" the boy asks. However Petey answers, whether it is a koan or a slap to his bubble, the boy may become Enlightened.
Hmmmm, today's offerings seem to support my initial perspective on Punkin: that what looked like rabbit ears in the initial foray, was really just his coiff, and where the "rabbit ears" met was just the part in his hair. Take another look, he makes more sense that way.
As to the other mystery boy, I can't help but recall a scene from the New Testament where a rich man asked Jesus what he could do to become a disciple. Jesus's answer was that the rich man had to give up all that he owned. Right there in the second panel, we see this tableau revisited, except that "eternal salvation" has given way to "anal rape" (sorry, "rabbit meat" -- I'll never read these things the same way).
I ordered a box of anal rape!
Punkin puts me in mind of Toad from Super Mario Brothers 2.
Oh yes.
Maybe it's just me, or maybe the coffee hasn't kicked-in yet, but the messages in some of these ads isn't likely what was intended. Like the one with the kid in the space suit: it seems that high-tech and rabbit meat aren't compatible. The frame with the kid with his wagonload of stuff to trade has the unsavory connotation that rabbit meat and dog meat are somehow equivalent. Parenthetically, Philippine bbq'd dog with adobo is very tastey! Koreans eat dog meat, too, as well as some American Indians. Not that Koreans eat American Indians. I'll skip the Donner Pass speech. But bad ads are a pet peeve. Volkswagon recently ran an ad with an obese and self-admittedly dishonest yes-man which made me want to disassociate myself from their product. The Pentium "Blue Men" ad doesn't make me want to buy their product; it does, however, make me want to paint myself blue and boogie like a berserk Bantu bowling team. I think that the people in the ad dept. are having too much fun and forget to get a second opinion. I'm reminded of Putney Swope, who may secretly be in charge of the Pel-Freez account.
Insidious, is it not? Muah-ha-ha-ha.
Umm...more like bilious!
If memory serves, "golem" means "yet-unformed thing". Punkin is a yet-unformed thing. So perhaps he was a golem created by Petey, for protection from the superstitious townspeople of Rogers?
Interesting... presumably the magic words in his head read "I really like rabbit meat"? I shouldn't think that a golem could actually eat, though... it's like Douglas Adams' proverbial robot that likes cheese sandwiches.
I wonder about the last panel. Perhaps it is a satire about the era's view towards the "Native American" - "white man" relations. The rabbit is the Petey's "peace offering" while the white man tries to communicate the only way he knows how: mimmicking stereotypes. The space suit also satire's the white man's closed-mindedness.
I've also wondered how cartoons manage to chew huge amounts of food and lick their lips at the same time. I can't pull it off without making a mess.
As for Punkin, he just scares the hell outta me. I'll go with the golem idea.
If you're a cartoon, you could lick your eyeballs like a damn lizard! Hell, you could play double-dutch jump rope with your tongue! Or bungie jump! That's the cool part about being a cartoon, normal physics don't apply. Shirley, you have seen "Plastic Sam!"
I'll second it!
I wish I could lick my eyeballs like a lizard. Then I'd be popular.
Giraffes can clean out their ears with their tongues, but that doesn't sound as much fun.
As I review that second cartoon again and again, I am persuaded that Annna's musings are correct, and it is symbolic of Petey's transformation from normal child to Pel-Freez pitchboy. The stripes are particularly revealing, as they shift from a horizontal motif on the torso to a convergence at the base of the antennae. Petey's ascent towards Enlightenment has begun.
Unfortunately, I am disturbed by ... well ... take a look at the second cartoon, perform the standard word replacements, and then observe that Petey is standing there smiling with an enormous piece of meat in his hand. Oh, that other little boy's going to get all the "rabbit meat" he can stand ...
Has this new boy replaced Petey's previous love interest Patty?
"If you can't eat that rabbit meat, I'll take it and murder you with my tomahawk!!"
