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Draconmouth: The Thoughts of Jaya Lakshmi |
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Here’s something that I thought about on the way to the school library: how was I able to get over his death so easily? After the first shocking day where my older sister broke the bad news and we cried together outside of my summer camp, I slowly stopped feeling sad. Now I can talk about it to anyone without crying or feeling depressed. How? Was it the bereavement group that we joined? Was it that we had no problems during that year; that no one got into drugs or lost their job? Was it because our family stuck together? (My mom and my brother confide in this and believe that my theory barely exists.) Maybe, but it may have also been this factor: my favorite Disney movies that I watch over and over again include The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast. In The Lion King the protagonist suffers when his father dies before his eyes. The saddest scene was when he crawled up to his dad’s body and realized that he wasn’t going to get up. There was minimal dialog. The score was so . . .depressing, and yet it was beautiful. Perhaps my subconscious was remembering this scene and that helped alleviate the pain. Beauty and the Beast had a similar scene at the end where the Beast was dying and Belle was hugging him and whispering, “I love you” as she cries. (It’s not as sad as it would have been had the Beast actually died, but it was my favorite moment.) You know what this implies? It means that if children see movies or television series with death scenes, whether in flashback or present, it might help them deal with grief if they lose a family member, a good friend or teacher. Granted, most children won’t see these people die in front of their eyes, but they can relate and they can understand. Disney understood this; even before my dad died, I cried when someone died in Tarzan in the movie theater. In fact, death occurs or is implied in most of Disney’s famous 2d animation movies: Snow White, Pinocchio, Sleeping Beauty, The Rescuers and its sequel, The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, The Jungle Book, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Mulan, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and The Little Mermaid. (It’s a shame that Disney isn’t making these kinds of movies anymore; have you seen Chicken Little or the Wild? If you have, thank God you’re still alive.) Now I’ll get to the point. Alan Tse talked about in his “One Piece” editorial how cutting out Bellemére’s death brought down the dub’s quality and also One Piece’s. I’ve read the manga involving Nami’s past and I agree that cutting out Bellemére’s death ruins the series. There’s a reason why the author devoted half the book to Nami’s past and how she came to work for Arlong. I loved Bellemére. She had the coolest hairstyle and was a complex and tough character. Her death made an impact on me as well, but it was mainly important how it affected Nami. In fact, children reading the manga or seeing the anime uncut would realize how death has a profound impact on our lives and they may think about it. They might appreciate everything about life more, including the parental figures in their lives. I’ve only started to recently. Another example would be in Sailor Moon. When DiC was doing the series, they’re infamous for cutting out the death scenes from the season 1 finale. I remember seeing the finale over and over again and feeling confused about what happened to the Senshi (Scouts in dub) and later on to Tuxedo Kamen (Tuxedo Mask to American viewers). I wish that DiC had kept the fact that the Senshi died because that was why Sailor Moon was close to giving up. Even though the dubbed show was garbage compared to the original, I loved each and every one of the Senshi. True, their deaths would have been shocking, but in the end they come back to life and by the next episode Sailor Moon is back to fighting monsters. Another less irrelevant example would be in W.I.T.C.H. the TV show. In the comic book W.I.T.C.H. Caleb was more than just the rebel leader and Cornelia’s love interest. I’d rather let the reader find out about his background, but an important event happened that is repeated throughout the show and comic’s fan-base: he died. Technically he didn’t, but that’s the term that fans use. Phobos killed him. In the show, however, he didn’t have a “death” until the second season episode “F is for Facade”. Towards the end someone told the Guardians that Caleb was “gone”. It affected the Earth Guardian Cornelia the most because she loves Caleb and she cheated on him during that particular episode. There was a depressing scene with the right music and right sober expressions. Then he came back and things worked out. I was disappointed because not only was this a cop-out, but it also eradicated any opportunity for Caleb to really die during the show. I like Caleb, but I was willing to let him go for the plot’s sake. Whoever wrote that episode screwed up. (Another character that died in the comics is also alive during the show, but she’s funny and useful enough to make up for it.) 4Kids and DiC may be thinking of the censors, but they forget to look at the bigger picture. Normally I’d make fun of them for it, but I don’t know how to do so. It’s not just some stupid thing they’ve done; 4Kids took out an important part out of One Piece, forgetting that most kids of our generation have seen The Lion King and other such animated movies that deal with death. DiC did the same with Sailor Moon. We aren’t stupid idiots and we don’t deserve to be treated like idiots; knowledge of death is linked to losing innocence, but I knew about death long before my father died. You lose innocence when you lose someone who loved you very much and who loved you. You don’t when you watch someone die on TV. I don’t get the psychology, but that’s the way it is. One day I’ll write a rant about how Y7 animated TV shows are no longer allowed to use death and how dumb it is because a kid isn’t going to be traumatized on hearing the word over and over again. It’s not a bad word like “damn” or “crap”; it’s existed since the time we were born. But for now, I’m going to let you, faithful readers, ponder on this editorial. It’s depressing for me to write, but I feel since no one has made this statement before that it’s something you should think about. Jaya Lakshmi is a featured columnist at Yuugiou Uncensored. You can contact her through e-mail or by going to her forum at the Message Boards.
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