A Dog’s Life: Chinese New Year

The Chinese New Year goes from February 16-March 17 this year. Because the 17 is also Saint Patrick’s Day, I decided that I would post 8 of my favorite fictional dogs and 7 Irish heroes, posting both on the same day.

Alright!

Years of the Dogs are 1934, 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, 2006, 2018, and 2030. Some qualities of Dogs are loyal, honest, kind, cautious and prudent.  Dogs will do everything for the person who they think is most important. Dogs are not good at communication and it is difficult for them to convey their thoughts to others-often they seem to be stubborn. Dogs have good natures, are always ready to help others, and tend to be sarcastic.

Dogs are best with rabbits, but also compatible with rat, tiger, monkey, and pig.

So now onto the countdown.

8) Ambrosius from Labyrinth (1986)

Sarah accidentally wishes her little brother to be taken by the Goblin King. She has to go after him and complete a series of tasks to win him back before Midnight or else he is lost forever.

***Ambrosius***

An adorable sheepdog who is a strong, cute, and noble steed for his rider, Sir Didymus.

For more on Labyrinth, go to Changes, Turn and Face the Strange

7) Pooka from Anastasia (1997)

Anastasia is a fictional story based on the real life Romanov missing princess. In this story, Anastasia loses her memory during the rebellion, and is put into an orphanage where she is given the name Anya, and is released on her 18 birthday. She adopts a stray pup and meets two conmen, Dimitri and Vladimir, who try to dress her up as the lost princess to fool the Dowager Empress. Meanwhile, the evil Rasputin is trying to kill Anya and destroy every shred of the Romanov family.

***Pooka***

Pooka is an adorable little pup that becomes Anya’s friend and family member when she has no one. As Rasputin and his minions try to attack her, he does all he can to protect his girl.

For more on Anastasia, go to I’ll Always Be There When You Need Me: Anastasia (1997)

 

6) Asta from The Thin Man (1934)

Nick Charles is retired famous police detective, having left that life behind when he married the wealthy socialite and heiress, Nora. But it is hard to stay out of the game as cops, criminals, and old friends are always trying to bring him back in.

***Asta***

Asta is an adorable police pup that helps out his masters with protecting them and providing some fun comedic moments.

5) Toto from The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Dorothy Gale is a young girl in grey Kansas. She lives with her aunt and uncle on their farm, along with the farmhands. When their mean neighbor takes Dorothy’s dog away for snapping at her; Dorothy decides to grab her dog and run away. She gets caught up in a twister and ends up in the land of Oz. She ends up on a journey to find the Wizard to get home; pairing up with a Scarecrow, a Tin Man, a Cowardly Lion; and chased by the Wicked Witch of the West.

***Toto***

Toto is the best friend a gal could have. He protects Dorothy in everything-man neighbors, witches, and even against a lion. He keeps her company, he makes her life, and is just plain adorable.

For more on The Wizard of Oz, go to There’s a Cyclone Coming: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

4) Snoopy from Peanuts

Peanuts  is the story of a group of kids that are more adult than kids. Charlie Brown is often depressed and struggles with life, Linus philosophizes but still carries his security blanket, Lucy is bossy, mean, and a psychiatrist for a nickel, Charlie’s dog Snoopy who writes novels, imagines himself as a WWI flying ace, and more.

***Snoopy***

Snoopy is a cute, silly, prankster with a great imagination that makes every comic, film, and TV program hilarious.

For more on Peanuts, go to 25 Films of Christmas

3) Bruno from Cinderella (1950)

Cinderella was born wealthy, but after her father died the stepmother took all power away and set her as a servant. She has her animal friends and keeps her positivity. When the Prince has a ball, Cinderella does all she can to go.

***Bruno***

Bruno is an adorable and cute dog that tries to protect the farm and the animals. He hates the cat Lucifer, but tries to follow Cinderella’s commands and is friends and helpful to all. He is loyal to a fault and protects Cinderella as much as he can.

For more on Cinderella, go to Waiter, There’s Some Disney in My Jane Austen

2) Scooby-Doo from Scooby-Doo Where Are You & More

I used to watch Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?, 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, The New Scooby-Doo Movies, The New Scooby-Doo, What’s New Scooby-Doo, Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School, Scooby-Doo and the Reluctant Werewolf, Scooby-Doo Meets the Boo Brothers, Scooby-Doo! in Arabian Nights, Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island, Scooby-Doo and the Alien Invaders, Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, etc.

Scooby-Doo is about a group of teenage friends who travel throughout the United States, and later the world, solving mysteries and having a great time.

***Scooby-Dooby Doo***

Scooby-Doo was adopted by Shaggy and is “his” dog, but in reality Scooby doesn’t even consider himself a dog as he is so advanced. Scooby can talk, think, and loves to eat. He often steals somebody’s meal, typically Shaggy. Scooby is a total coward, but in the end will come through for his friends, as long as he is given a Scooby snack. He assists Shaggy with the comedy, helping them accidentally foil any plans made by the criminals. He and Shaggy are the only characters to appear in every TV show & film.

For more on Scooby-Doo, go to The Cruel Giggling Ghoul: Teen Titans Go (2016)

1) Wishbone from Wishbone (1995-1998)

The show was about a dog named Wishbone, his master Joe and Joe’s mom (Joe’s dad passed away) along with Joe’s friends Sam and David. In every episode it covered something happening with the characters and related it to a classic novel that Wishbone was reading and would retell. When Wishbone would tell the story, he would always be the main character.

***Wishbone***

Wishbone was absolutely adorable, everyone wanted their own Jack Russell Terrier. Plus he was the best dog as he was kind, caring, loyal, helpful, and just perfectly trained. And most of all, he brought such a strong love of reading and reading the classics. After this show I read almost every book he mentioned, the children’s version of course.

For more on Wishbone, go to To Fandom With Love

For the 2017 Chinese New Year, go to Nobody calls me Chicken: Chinese New Year

For the 2016 post, go to A Little Monkey Business: Chinese New Year

For the 2015 post, go to Well I Feel Sheepish: Chinese New Year

For the 2014 post, go to A Horse’s Tale: Chinese New Year

For the 2013 list, go to Snakes on a Post: Chinese New Year

 

For All You Know, A Witch Might Be Living Next Door to You: The Witches (1990)

For all you know, a witch might be living next door to you.

So I’m a giant fan of Roald Dahl, I’ve read pretty much everything he has written.

One book I had never read before was The Witches. I wasn’t really interested in reading about witches.

However, I was able to get a free copy of the book for free and decided to read it. The next step after reading-of course checking out the film version.

Luke Eveshim visits his grandmother in Norway and she tells them all about Witches. Witches hate children and wish to wipe them off the face of the Earth. They can smell a child a mile away.

Helga: Real witches are very cruel, and they have a highly developed sense of smell. A real witch could smell you across the street on a pitch-black night.

Luke: She couldn’t smell me. I’ve just had a shower.

Helga: Oh yes, she could. The cleaner you are, the more a witch can smell you.

Luke: That doesn’t make sense.

Helga: Oh, yes it does. A dirty child, it is the dirt she smells. A clean child, it is the child.

She then goes on to tell him how he can tell a woman is a witch:

1. “They always wear gloves–A real witch will always be wearing gloves when you meet her because she doesn’t have finger-nails. Instead of finger-nails, she has thin curvy claws, like a cat, and she wears the gloves to hide them.”
2. “They’ll be as ‘bald as a boiled egg’–Not a single hair grows on a witch’s head. You’d think this would make them easy to spot? Wrong! Real witches always wear a wig. And not just any wig. An expensive first class wig that looks like real hair. The only way to check is to give it a pull to see if it comes off.”
3. “They’ll have large nose-holes–Witches have the most amazing powers of smell and therefore have slightly larger nose-holes than ordinary people. They can even smell out a child who is standing on the other side of the street on a pitch-black night, and the cleaner you are, the more smelly you are to a witch. Witches call them stink-waves.”
4. “Their eyes change colour– Look carefully into their eyes, right into the middle of the eye where there’s normally a little black dot. If she’s a witch, the black dot will keep changing in colour, and you’ll see fire and you’ll see ice dancing right in the very centre of the coloured dot. It will send shivers running all over your skin.”
5. “They have no toes– Witches don’t have any toes. They just have feet with square ends. A real witch will hide her ugly feet by squeezing them into pretty shoes, which they find extremely uncomfortable. Look very closely and you might see a real witch limping very slightly.”
6. “They have blue spit– Real witches have blue spit, like ink (they even use it to write with). If you look very carefully you might be able to see a slight blueish tinge on their teeth.”

Shortly after, Luke’s parents die and he is to go live with his grandma. He doesn’t mind it too much, but then his grandma becomes ill and can no longer eat sweets. The doctor recommends visiting the English sea to improve her health.

They head out with Luke bringing along his pet mice, even though the manager is very much against it. He warns them that if the mouse is found anywhere not in its cage, they are out of the hotel.

Luke tries to train his mice in secret, running into an overweight boy, Bruno  who only wants to eat and then finds an empty conference room. It soon is filled with the RSPCC-the Prevention of Cruelty to Children group. But this group turns out to be something much different.

When I saw this scene I was like:

AAAAAAHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And I was an adult watching it. I can’t imagine how terrifying it would be to a child.

The Grand High Witch (Anjelica Huston), the boss, goes over her new plan to destroy all the children in the world.

Grand High Witch: Now, this is my plan: Each of you will go back to your homes… and resign from your jobs. Give notice. Retire. You will then buy with the money I give you…[Irvine gives her the money from the case box] Sweet shops. Candy stores. The best and most respectable sweet shops in England. [throws the money, the ladies are picking up the money] Upstairs: I have a trunkload of this English money… So, you’ll be able to offer three, maybe four times what these shops are worth. Go, go, go.

Yes, her plan is for them to sell chocolate that will transform children into:

Ahhh!

Yep, their plan is pretty sound. The only thing that throws a wrench in it is that Luke has heard the whole thing and is preparing what to do to stop them.

That is until his mouse gets away from him and reveals that he is in the room. The witches see him and turn him into a mouse as well.

Luke has to navigate the hotel, one of which does not allow mice and has said if they find any about the Eveshims will be out.

Luke hurries back to his room as fast as he can in the hopes he can make it to their room without being squished. He hurries as fast as he can and tells his grandma the whole story. The two come up with a plan to steal the Witches formula and stick it in their special banquet soup, turning them all into witches.

There are only two problems: 1) How to get past the hotel staff without being caught.

Hmmm….

And how to change Luke and Bruno back to boys again?

Will they succeed and save the world? Fail and every child be turned into mice?

So I really liked it.

It isn’t like American film, slower paced and has more dialogue than action but I really enjoyed it. Best of all they kept it almost exactly like the book.

When they showed the way the witches looked it was amazing! Completely perfect in how terrifying it is.

I liked the ending of the book better than how they changed it in the end, but the film’s ending would appeal to children more I’m sure.

To start Horrorfest VI, from the beginning, go to One of Our Guests is a Werewolf, I Know It.: The Beast Must Die (1974)

For the previous post, go to One Blow to the Head and the Deed is Done: Candlestick (2014)

For more on Roald Dahl, go to Come With Me and You’ll Be in a World of Pure Imagination: Happy 100th Birthday Roald Dahl

For more on Anjelica Huston, go to Someone Very Special: The Addam’s Family Values (1993)

For more on witches, go to It was a Horseman, a Dead One. Headless: Sleepy Hollow (1999)