|
MANGOS :: ESSAYS ::
Here's your chance to rant away about the series, its characters, dub or whatever else you can think of. Please email me your rants and essays to aves76@hotmail.com.
♥♥♥♥
By Starkiller
---------
Hare Rant
I have a lot of sympathy for Hare’s character. Many people tend to forget about him because we don’t know a great deal about his past in comparison with the other main characters and, as Richard Ryley rightly commented, he appears the least emotionally attached to his friends. It’s not until Episode 56 (Season 3) that we discover more about his history.
Like Tiger, Hare was a part of a notorious group of Robin Hood-like bandits who stole from the Baddies to give to… well that's probably where the Robin Hood analogy ends. The other two members of this group were Fairy Hare and Wild Hare. Jealous of the close relationship Hare and Fairy Hare shared, Wild Hare betrayed them by setting up a fake heist. In the Salamander attack which followed, the three were separated – Wild Hare leaving to join Muu’s army. Hare returned to look for his teammates with little luck, believing they had both been killed or captured.
During the episode it becomes quite clear that Hare still has feelings for his old Fairy Hare partner. After losing his friends, we’re left to assume Hare continued thieving and battling at monster tournaments before finally meeting up with the searchers.
It has always been a bit of a mystery why Hare initially joined the group – considering his recent deception – but bear in mind, like Tiger he’s just lost the equivalent of a brother as well as a mate. Hare’s an opportunist; he saw a chance to get revenge on Muu for his lost friends (and maybe earn a few golds on the side). He never willingly shares his history with his friends, indicating that he is a very private character and while he may not show his feelings as openly as Genki or even Tiger, they are evident in his actions. I only wish we had found out a little more about his past before the third season – it might have endeared a few more people towards him.
By Gary L Thompson
---------
"Bugs 'n Hare"
Am I the only one to see some strong parallels between Hare and Bugs Bunny as characters? Certainly, both have to owe much to the "trickster" archtype from folktale. Though Hare is a lot more interesting in some ways. As you've just depicted, Hare benefits from being involved with a interesting love/hate relationship with a true peer. I imagine it would be interesting to see Bugs Bunny interacting with a character that he'd have to respect as capable of giving him a run for his money, but we've never seen it. He only interacts with hapless fall guys or (on rare occasion) serves as the hapless maroon himself. Another significant difference I see is that Hare is a lot more comfortable with his decent impulses than Bugs is.
Now Bugs may tend to be the non-aggressor and go to war strictly in defense (particularly when scripted by Chuck Jones), he certainly isn't the out-and-out thief that Hare can be. But on those infrequent occasions when instead of his usual villainous-but-stupid maroons, Bugs is faced with actually hurting a sympthetic character, he doesn't have his usual assuredness. Like the time when the drunk stork mixed Bugs up with an infant kangeroo he was supposed to deliver to his mother. When Bugs tells the mother he wants no part of her and starts walking off, she bursts into weeping, and Bugs can only walk so far before he slows to a halt, and stands there fidgeting for a while before finally reluctantly shuffling back to "mama". I could imagine Bugs helping a Tama or Fairy Hare. But unlike Hare, he would be very embarrassed about it.
|
|
