No phenomenon has had such a large impact on my childhood as the Moomins. I was a sucker for the awesome comics by Lars and Tove Jansson, I bought tons of little models of the cast of characters, my family even took me to Moomin Valley in Nådendal, Finland (of course, a human-sized Muminmamma trying to hug me was a bit too much for a 5-something-year old like me... brrr...). As I grew older and a brain, I read through all of the wonderfully atmospheric novels which, after all, started it all. But the single most powerful thing about the Moomins was the TV show. It had it all.
Horror! The scene where Moomin was transformed into a monster when he hid in the Wizard's hat scarred me for life. I still shudder as I see the Groke outside the Moomin valley, staring at the poor sods. I don't care if the Groke was a pitiful and sad creature who only wanted to make friends, to me she'll always be the greatest movie monster that humanity has ever created. Monsters like King Kong or Freddy Krueger are barely a 0.5 out of 10 on the Groke scale.
Comedy! Sniff and Little My, the hotheaded redhead, cracked me up.
Drama! The sorrow Moomin feels when his best friend the Snusmumrik leaves for the south during the autumn is something anyone can relate to.
Characters! The Moomin family, the Snorks, the Sniff, Little My, Snusmumriken, The Hemul, The Groke, Too-ticky, Stinky, Ninni, the Witch, etc, etc, etc, there were a myriad of multi-layered characters in these stories, none of them a stereotype or a one-note character, each with a billion times more depth than any of the "deep" Hollywood dramas.
As I grew a little older I left Moomin and started watching a more "badass" show that actually had some action in it - Pokémon (although it sucked in retrospect, it was a Saturday morning fave for me). But the Moomin series has stayed with me and it is, in some way, a part of me. As awful, dumb and naive series like Pokémon or Moomin may seem to adults, it's all us kids of the nineties have. When you were five, did you really want to watch Goodfellas or Nattvardsgästerna? No, you wanted to watch The Transformers, or Flash Gordon, depending on how old you were when they aired. Pretty lame as they may seem today, they were great when you were a kid, and classic today for anyone who grew up with series like these.
Ramble ramble... to sum up: This is a great show and I love it with all my heart. It's been a while since I saw it but I'm positive even adults will be able to enjoy it - unless you're scared of losing your status. Moomin is awesome. That's it. (r#38)
