Goodbye, Kitty! Hello, Turtles!

I'm a dude who grew up playing with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Ghostbusters, Power Rangers, wrestling action figures and Marvel superheroes, so I never really thought I knew all that much about Hello Kitty. I believed she was a cat cartoon from Japan, and that was basically all I claimed to know.

Apparently, I knew even less than that. I knew NOTHING!

According to Sanrio, the company behind this cutesy cartoon, she is neither cat nor Japanese. They claim that she's a "little girl" from London. Well, the London part, I can buy, since I've never really heard the thing speak. However, I've never met a "little girl" with fur, cat ears and whiskers. Hell, that's the kind of thing Wes Craven or John Carpenter might throw into one of their horror movies to give us all nightmares!

At least when Disney pulled this stunt with Goofy a few years back, claiming that he wasn't a dog and leading us all down the speculative path of wondering whether he was in actuality a skinny cattle, as some Disney reps have claimed, or a fox, as other Disney reps have stated, it made some semblance of sense, since Goofy ain't really supposed to be something normal, but rather something "goofy." Hence, his name. But here, it makes absolutely no sense: the thing looks like a cat, nobody ever assumed it was anything but that, and the darn thing even has the word "Kitty" in its name.

So yeah, Sanrio might want to stop spreading that backstory ASAP. I'm not claiming to be a marketing expert or anything -- in fact, I don't think I've ever sold more than 50 units of anything in my whole entire life -- but I'm pretty sure their fanbase, with not a single Y chromosome to be found among them, much rather play with a cute little cat than some weird mutant English chick.

Now that I've gotten that out of my system, let me switch the topic of conversation from one anthropomorphic creature to a whole 'nother group of them. My guy friends, my girlfriend and I have finally decided what we're going to be for Halloween, and I'll give y'all a hint...

 

That's right, speaking of mutant cartoons, we're actually going to be repping them this Oct. 31st, as the TMNT!

Cowabunga, dudes!