A brief note

I'm currently travelling at the moment, so the posting is going to be pretty lax for a while, but I just wanted to come on and mention that, on the last flight I took, this was one of the TV shows that they had on. It's a sort-of-interesting look at the "real" history behind fairy tales. I can't find a site for the English version of the show, although I know that it exists and they show it in Australia. Still, I'll have a look...

Little Red - The Prequel

Wandering through the woods alone? Never mind worrying about wolves, just make sure you don't go and pick the wrong kind of mushroom. This sound enough advice is dramatised in this animation by WelshGed.

Burger King commercial

Sticking with the advertising theme, here's a Burger King commercial in which the product is apparently even more tempting than a (bizarrely sexualised) Red Riding Hood.

Bensons for Beds commercial

Once again, the product trumps true love in this advert for Bensons for Beds.

Hansel Sandwiches commercials

In this series of adverts for Hansel biscuit/cookie sandwiches, the message seems to be that the product is tasty enough to tempt these familiar fairytale characters away from the established narratives and help them avoid their traditional trials (the exception being the Sleeping Beauty commercial, where the product instead enables the expected ending; true love is overrated compared to chocolate snacks, it seems).

Run Baby Run

There's certainly a LRRH vibe to Run Baby Run, what with it's focus on wolves chasing red-clad girls through the woods. Enjoy this sweet Pacman-esque game from redflash121.

Chibi Fairy Tale Spot 5

Here's another fairytale-themed spot-the-difference game: Chibi Fairy Tale Spot 5, starring ultra-cutesy versions of various classic fairy tale characters and with art by the fabulous Kinkei.

The Lineup by Smartkat

Red picks the Wolf from a line-up in this t-shirt design from Smartkat aka Katrina Greenslade.

I found this via Super Punch, a blog that actually has quite a lot of LRRH-related stuff which I urge readers to check out.

Bluefley's First Snow

Here we have some more cyberpunk/steampunk LRRH, courtesy of Bluefley.

Prettyism's Red Riding Hood

Prettyism presents a very sweet Red Riding Hood doll.

Little Red Riding Hood by Charles Perrault - France

I can't seem to track down much information on this one, but I just wanted to present this short animated version of Little Red Riding Hood, apparently originating from Japan. In this adaptation, the wolf is a distinctly comedic figure and comes to a rather unusual ending.

Ray Harryhausen's "The Story of Little Red Riding Hood"

Watch Little Red Riding Hood ( 1949 ) in Anime | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Although much more famous for his work on monster and fantasy movies, Ray Harryhausen also produced a series of shorts based upon fairytales during the 1940s and '50s. These films included stop-motion animation versions of Rapunzel, Hansel and Gretel and of course, the above Little Red Riding Hood.

I have to admit to finding Harryhausen's version of LRRH a little odd, though. The narration seems to add little that isn't communicated by the animation itself and the whole story is strangely bowdlerised, with no-one getting harmed, eaten or killed (which raises the question of why the wolf doesn't just come back and get Red Riding Hood the next day, I think).

This video comes courtesy of Cometin-Jetson who has also posted the other Harryhausen works mentioned above.

Akazukin Chacha

Akazukin Chacha - Creditless Opening 1 (Episodes 1 - 30)
by Yukito06

One of my favourite LRRH-themed TV shows is the Japanese children's animated series Akazukin Chacha (Red hood chacha) which tells the story of a young trainee witch and her misadventures.

This particular iteration of the opening credits sequence (of which there are several) makes a great deal out of the potential for romance between Chacha and her friend Liiya (alternately spelled as Riiya), a werewolf character no doubt inspired by the Big Bad Wolf (despite his cute and cuddly appearance here). The third side of this love triangle comes in the form of Shiine, a boy also training to become a witch.

Somewhat weirdly, Akazukin Chacha is a magical girl anime and features Chacha transforming, Sailor Moon-style, into an adult superhero who fights monsters. This seems to jar somewhat with the big-eyed cuteness of the rest of the show and is a feature that was ultimately cut from the series.

Theatre in the Forest: The Winter's Tale

At first I couldn't work out the connection between Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale and the fairytale image presented above, other than the simple fact that this particular production takes place in a forest, which is a rather dubious link. Then I remembered that The Winter's Tale is the source of Shakespeare's most famously odd stage direction: "Exit, pursued by a bear," which I suppose explains the LRRH-meets-Goldilocks poster to some degree.

A larger picture, from a photograph taken by yours truly, is presented below.

This production of The Winter's Tale is by the Red Rose Chain Film & Theatre Company.