• remotelove@lemmy.caEnglish
        5·
        1 day ago

        I see it as morbid from the imagination of Calvin. Calvin seems perfectly cool with the idea of letting his tiger devour bullies in front of the rest of the kids. He is almost smiling about it.

        If Hobbes was actually real, that would be one of the most terrifying things a kid could see. It’s not like Hobbes could unhinge his jaw and swallow the kid whole: It would be fucking brutal.

        Since all of this is in Calvin’s imagination, it should start to create doubt about his mental health. (That is, if his extreme version of an imaginary friend didn’t create that doubt first.) Calvin continuously shows that he is 100% unable to tell his imagination from reality and his parents almost encourage the behavior.

        Stepping back and looking at the comic as a real-life scenario is really fucking weird. Alas, it’s not real (sorry) and it still remains one of my favorites for life.

        • Libb@piefed.socialEnglish
          61·
          1 day ago

          I often think we have this strange notion, at least here in the West,that kids are some kind of nice innocent little creatures, almost angel-like. They’re not. They’re kids, for sure, they’re smaller and more fragile and they need help with a lot of things but they’re still full on human beings. Meaning they can be as cruel as we adults (suffice to observe kids fighting one other, or a bunch of kids bullying one of them they consider a weakling)… if not more than us, as most kids have yet to learn the skill of hypocrisy, aka the art of hiding their true feelings and emotions.

          But I do agree with you, this strip is quite unsettling.

          • remotelove@lemmy.caEnglish
            1·
            18 hours ago

            Imaginary friends may be considered normal during childhood. The level of interaction Calvin has with his imaginary friend is extraordinary and if this was a real life situation, it might be comparable to how Wilson came to be in the movie Cast Away.

            I am absolutely not a shrink, but times of extreme stress or some kind of deep trauma might be a trigger to create an imaginary friend such as Hobbes or Wilson. It could he helpful to a person in some circumstances as a means of survival, I suppose.

            As a cartoon, Calvin and Hobbes works perfectly. If it were real life, this would be a different situation. It’s that dichotomy that may make some of the C&H cartoons seem very strange or morbid to some people.