You are probably thinking that I will force this to be about the Holocaust like I forced Care Bears to be about capitalism. But trust me, this episode is about the Holocaust.
If I trust one company to teach kids about disabilities, it's definitely the one who markets candy made of glucose syrup, sugar, dextrose, gelatin,fruit and plant extracts, flavors, colors and citric acid.
Gummi Bears is essentially a Care Bears knock-off featuring the candy. Each color Gummi Bear is a different character. It is definitely a good idea to teach kids that all Gummi Bears with the same color has the same personality.
Making kids emotionally identify with the product that they bite into maybe isn't the best idea either.
This is the episode summary for "What You See is Me": "Tummi learns through his new friend, the blind shepherd Trina, that the handicapped don't always need help."
Some underpaid writer is probably secretly resentful of Haribo and used blind shepherd as a metaphor for the company misleading children.
This is a Disney production.
Imagine you are a writer on Disney, expecting to help work on the next feature film. Instead, they tell you to make a TV show out of Gummi Bears. What would you do?
The team behind this show decided that a high-fantasy with castles, ogres, serpents, and magic is the most logical choice.
The theme song is actually really good.
The first image in the episode ruins the whole Gummi thing.
It looks like the Gummi Bears aren't actually Gummi, but are just Care Bears with a different brand.
Maybe Nelvana had a surplus of Care Bear scripts, and decided to sell them to Haribo and Disney.
The purple bear is Tummi. He is sorry for breaking Grammi's foot. Grammi snaps at Tummi for apologizing and stirs her tea. Tummi tries to help Grammi stir her tea because she is"an invalid" but she snaps again and says she doesn't stir tea with her foot.
Already this is better than Care Bears.
I really hope that we learn how her foot got broken.
Grammi sarcastically asks whether Tummi wants to scratch her nose for her next. Tummi says okay and reaches for it, but she slaps it away and says she can do things for herself.
This is like in Care Bears where the character learns the lesson in the first few minutes, and then they have to relearn in in another context over the course of the episode. It's hard to fill an 11 minute episode.
Grammi tells Tummi to leave and not come back until supper.
We cut to the ogres.
The villain plans to boil secrets out of a captured Gummi Bear.
I wasn't sure what I was expecting from a Gummi Bears cartoon. Maybe some Gummi Bears dancing around and learning about honesty or something. I wasn't expecting a fantasy land with warring tribes and attempted torture/murder.
Before he can boil the Gummi Bears. he has to trap them with a berry bait. This is clever marketing because it emphasizes that fruit is bad. Also, I am disturbed that a kid's show trying to sell gelatin candy includes boiling someone for interrogation.
Tummi walks by, grabs a berry from the top, and eats it.
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The ogres run after Tummi, but he hides in a pen of Gummi Bear purchasers.
One ogre uses a bag to capture Tummi, but grab a sheep instead. He doesn't bother looking or even feeling the bag to see whether he got Tummi. Tummi escapes into a house through a window. The ogre says his boss with promote him for this.I didn't know that ogres had hierarchical societies
Tummi says it is hot in the house as a guard dog pants near him. He backs away and the blind shepherd says "Watcher, sit."
The blind woman's dog is named Watcher. I'm not going to complain about subtlety in a Gummi Bear cartoon.
Tummi nervously says "A human" This brings up a problem with a Gummi Bear cartoon. Gummi Bears are candy in real life, but actual bears in the cartoon. If Tummi was a candy, it would make sense for him to be afraid of humans. But he is a bear. This also makes the part about boiling Gummi Bears more horrifying.
Tummi says "Don't believe your eyes." The shepherd replies "I seldom do."
The shepherd begins feeling Tummis face and declares it to be "fuzzy."
We are completely disregarding the whole "made of gelatin" thing, correct? Otherwise, that would be horrifying. But they were clearly bouncing in the intro song.
The shepherd says that Tummi is "plump". Fat-shaming for kids in a cartoon-length candy commercial? Who thought this was a good idea?
The shepherd introduces herself as Trina. She offers Tummi some pancakes. Tummi says no, but pancakes make him do this:
I googled whether Haribo makes pancakes, and they do not. However some people have made Gummi Bear pancakes.
Trina starts carrying a bucket of water to the well. She asks why, and Tummi answers "Because you're helpless." He clearly has not seen Crimson Bat 1: Crimson Bat, The Blind Swordswoman.
The ogres come back with the bag and tell "Your Dukeness" that they got a Gummi bear, Of course, it is a sheep. Your Dukeness tells a small ogre to take the other ogres back to the cottage and find Tummi.
Back at the cottage, Tummi says. "Thanks, I haven't had a meal like that since...breakfast" That's 90% of the way to a joke.
Trina says she hears someone coming and to get inside. I can't believe Gummi Bears live in such a land where they have to hide whenever they hear a member of the opposing side. I thought they were just candy.
Trina and Tummi go up a ladder into a hay loft. Trina starts counting out loud the steps to figure out when to stop. Tummi is impressed. I would have thought that she wouldn't have to count, but it's for kids.
A small ogre knocks and demands to be let in in the name of the Duke. When nobody answers in a few seconds, he says he will break down the door.
I made jokes about how the Care Bears lived in an authoritarian society. The Gummi Bears actually do live in a police state. #GummiLivesMatter.
The ogre backs up and runs towards the door, but at the last second, Trina opens the door. She did Nazi him coming.
(I know that is an over-used Nazi pun, but since it has a double meaning in this context with blindness, I feel justified using it.)
Trina picks up the ogre. The ogre orders the other ogres to search the cottage. He tells Trina that they are looking for a "a small, furry creature" and asks whether she has seen one, forgetting to check his privilege.
Trina ignores the micro-aggression and says "Hardly, I'm blind"
The ogre starts to climb up the hayloft. Trina tells him to be her Guestapo, but to watch out for the bats. Namely, the Crimson Bat.
Tummi makes sounds like a bat and the orc climbs down, claiming he gets dizzy in high places. He orders another orc to climb up. The orc looks reluctant to climb up and look for a Gummi Bear hiding from them, Anne Frankly, I don't blame him.
Trina cooperates with the State and pulls up the rug to prove there is no trap door. This knocks over the small ogre. Trina says sorry and turns around "accidentally" knocking over the ladder and causing the ogre to fall down. She turns around once again to hit the other orge, and then backs into the head ogre.
They run out. I knew slapstick defeated tyranny!
Trina warns Tummi not to leave until nightfall. Tummi worries that the Duke will come. Trina tells him that they will set up booby traps.
If you ever get discouraged nobody will like your story idea, remember that someone got paid for combining Gummi Bears, Lord of the Rings, the Holocaust, and Home Alone.
The orcs report that they went through the blind woman's home with a "fine tooth comb." The Duke asks whether they checked everywhere, and the big orc replies "Yes, everywhere except the hayloft"
Remember kids, when searching for members of a persecuted minority under the orders of a political figure who wants to boil them alive, don't forget to check the hayloft.
Duke Igthon knocks on the door. and orders Trina to open up. She does.
The ogres say that it is dark and scary inside, but Igthon is not afraid.
Igthon enters into the (cartoon-level) pitch-darkness. We can still see some things so kids watching this can see what is happening. Maybe pitch-darkness would be healthier for children's minds than this story.
Igthon trips over the stool and curses the darkness. Trina says "You get used to it." I have a feeling she has been reciting that line in her head for many years waiting for the perfect moment to use it.
Igthon says to show him the hayloft. Trina leads him to the ladder, and they climb up. Tummi approaches the ladder and the show cuts to the top of the hayloft. As they walk across the loft, Igthon bangs his head comically on several beams.
I always thought the Diary of Anne Frank needed slapstick.
Tummi removes the ladder with a chord that indicates the sound director wanted this to be a suspenseful scene.
Igthon falls down on a pile of hay. He feels it, determines it is Tummi, takes out his sword, and stabs it.
Just another reminder that this Care Bears knock-off that promotes a candy company has an episode in which a dictator searches a house for a member of persecuted minority and attempts to kill him with a sword,
Since this is kid's shows, it isn't actually Tummi in there. The genocide is okay, but showing an act of violence is too much. Instead, there is an anvil.
You would think that he could tell the difference between a bear and an anvil from feeling the hay.
Igthon says that he will have the ogres tear down the cottage.
Shot of ogres celebrating because kid's can't keep their attention on the same plot for so long.
He falls down the opening because Tummi had removed the ladder. Tummi puts the ladder back so that Trina could climb down.
How can Tummi do all of this in the darkness? The point of this episode is to be a
Trina asks what Igthon was looking for. Igthon says a "small, furry creature." Trina says "Well here he is" and presents Watcher.
Watcher bites Igthon's hand. Igthon calls the ogres "idiots" This is supposed to teach kids the people with disabilities can do things by themselves, and now they are using ableist slurs. More importantly, I don't want to buy Gummi Bears any more than I did before I started watch this.
Igthon and Trina walk outside. Igthon yells at his ogres that they had him looking for a dog. Yeah, how dare they mistake one minority for the persecuted minority
Igthon tells Trina that the ogres will never bother her again. She waves good-bye to them.
First they came for the Gummi Bears, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Gummi Bear.
Tummi finishes his meal and says he has to leave. Trina asks if he could find his way back to her cottage to visit and Tummi says "Yeah, with my eyes closed." It's a joke.
Tummi returns home to his thematically appropriate conflict. Grammi apologizes and asks Tummi to bring her a book. Tummi says no, because she should learn how to do for herself.
Whimsical music.
This is actually a good depiction of a blind person, especially for children. However...
I joked about how the Care Bears lived in an authoritarian society.
The Gummi Bears have to hide in hay lofts to avoid police forces who have the authority to search any house looking for creatures of a certain race and boiling them alive.
I would recommend skipping this one and showing your young children something with more age-appropriate themes, such as One-Armed Executioner.
(Don't actually show your kids One-Armed Executioner.)
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