I like studying villains.  According to Social Media Jedi, Kristen Lamb, having a strong antagonist or trouble maker, is what makes a great story.  In the story, Rumpelstiltskin, he comes to help a a beautiful woman who’s father bragged to a king that she could turn a bale of straw to gold.

In my mind, the villain here is good ole’ dad.  I mean, during the whole story he’s never really mentioned again, and yes, Rumpelstiltskin at the end requests the woman’s first born child in exchange for help; but seriously, where was the father that put the woman in this mess to begin with.  Or what about the king that she’s all set to marry?  It’s the greedy king that shoves her in a tower room with bales of straw that he wants turned to gold, or he says he’s going to cut off her head.  What kind of woman in this situation would say, “Okay, you’ve imprisoned me because you are a selfish jerk, but I’ll marry you and have your babies.” Um no, at this point, if I had been the girl, the deal I would have made Rumpel is to imprison the kind with daddy and let them fight it out “Hunger Games” style.  At least Rumpelstiltskin is honest and upfront about what it will take to get his help.

I really like how Disney has changed up some of their classics in Once Upon a Time, giving some crazy twists and interesting background that changes up how we view those stories.  I love when writers “flip the script” and give us a fresh take on stories we already know, and they defiantly gave some different background on Rumpel than I was expecting.

What about you?  Who is your favorite villain and why?

So, usually I think most people struggle with the letter “Q” for this challenge, but for some reason, Quick Draw McGraw came right to me.  (For those of you who are too young to know who he is, check out the link, but please don’t tell me – I don’t need that this morning. *smiles)

I can remember a clear time when I used to watch cartoons in the evening on a channel that at eight p.m. would change over to Turner Classic Movies.  And not the TCM of today, but they would show mostly old black and white movies, some early color editions.  It would be a Saturday evening (Saturday mornings where the best, but I lived overseas for a little while and didn’t have access as much to them) and I was watching shows like Quick Draw here, Top Cat, and Wacky Races. (I’ve got this big ole’ grin on my face just thinking about it – my generation know what I mean.)

I loved Quick Draw.  For some reason, his show always made me laugh a little, especially when he came in as El Kabong.  Top Cat was this cool and suave kitty that all the other cats wanted to be like and I loved how the other cats called him, “T.C.”

All those cartoons that we liked during that time, that aren’t really on TV anymore.

What was your favorite cartoon when you were a kid?

Did you know that this was actually a fairy tale?  Well, I didn’t.  The actual story of Puss in Boots follows almost the same theme as when I saw him on TV; he basically uses trickery to help his master win the hand of a princess.  Nice of him, but I get the feeling that the cat wasn’t always as sweet as you might think since he’s a little kitty wearing black boots.

I’ve got to wonder what the original author was thinking when he/she told the tale about a cat.  Why couldn’t it be a dog?  Or a goose?  Or perhaps a T-Rex?  (Wouldn’t that look awesome?  But how would poor T-Rex get in his boots?  I almost snorted coffee out my nose thinking about the poor guy constantly falling off his bed trying to get his tiny hands on his boots.  Poor T-Rexy.  For a quick laugh, take a look at this link that shows a bunch of funny pictures of animals in clothes.)

From what I’ve read, the cat already had the ability to talk and such before he got his boots, but I kept wondering if it was something like the hat in Frosty the Snowman that gave him his abilities to talk and such.  And going along with this line of thinking could we then consider attaching magical properties to any clothing accessory?  Could we have magic belts? Socks? Ponchos?  (This might be the better option for poor T-Rexy – the magic Poncho!)

If you could choose any article of clothing to give you magic powers, what would that be?  And what magic power would you choose to have? (You can only choose one.)