Dear Pixar: Please Make a SuperHero Movie With a Pony Villain
Oh Pixar, you did it again. “The Incredibles 2″ movie was a trip down memory lane, a subtle commentary on social injustice, and a unique view of superheroes and villains. It hit all the feels.
When we were leaving the theater, my boyfriend asked me who I would pick as my supervillain sidekick.
“A pony!” I replied immediately. I grabbed his arm excitedly before he had a chance to roll his eyes. “No, you don’t get it! Ponies are so evil. There’s a saying in the horse world that the smaller the pony, the more satanic,” I tried to explain.
I went on to describe the marauding ways of these diminutive, destructive little horses. What makes them so dangerous is that they come in such adorable and innocuous packaging, all fluff and big brown eyes asking for a sugar cube. They know, I’ve seen them look at an innocent child shrewdly, sizing them up for dump-ability, nip-ability and general havoc.
They have an almost human-like ability to calculate, planning escape routes and malicious deeds like tromping on feet and crawling under fences. They delight in simple pleasures, like waiting until the very last millisecond before doing an abrupt 180 before a crossrail, destroying all trust in the little tot who was unsuspectingly grabbing mane and staring somewhere up at the sky.
I could only imagine a scruffy little Thelwell-style beastie, seeking revenge for all the times he got called ‘cute’ and ‘adorable.’ Munching on a carrot in the same way that Cruella de Vil smoked her long cigarettes, he would plot some kind of master plan. The world would take him seriously, once and for all. No more pink ribbons in his mane, no simpering little girls insisting on suffocating face hugs. And destroy all the grazing reins! He would smack his tiny hoof on the table.
Complex villains are the best villains – the ones that you can’t resist loving just a little bit. The ones that end up teaching the audience an endearing lesson in the end. One could theorize that a small child develops much more character in the moments they spend chasing their galloping pony around the cross-country field, all smeared in mud than they ever would with a pretty ribbon.
What’s more, ponies have an endless supply of mischief. When I was coaching, I had an auntie of one of my students call me up because she simply could not believe that the pony her daughter was riding was the same one she herself rode (and got dumped off of) when she was a child. “Yes,” I replied. “A quarter of a century later, he’s still the same little devil.”
Supervillain sidekick? There’s no way anyone could upstage a pony. This guy needs his own movie.