Dora the Explorer- the perky, adventuring Latina with the high-pitched voice who has enchanted millions of children and irritated millions of adults for almost a decade now- is getting a new, tweenage alter ego courtesy of Nickelodeon and Mattel. The companies have only revealed Tween Dora’s sihouette so far and a few comments on the dolls Mattel will be making, but parents are already angered that the spunky and smart Latina heroine is being made over in what appears to be an attempt to compete with Barbie and Bratz. Apparently, Dora has moved to the big city and solves mysteries with her pals, the Explorer Girls. Of course, the original kid Dora will be around to stay as well.
A few thoughts come to my mind upon this:
The Humor Thought. Of course, anything is ripe for satire, and I got a funny mental image of a tweenage Dora the Explorer who acts like a stereotypical teen, but also does everything her young counterpart does, mainly shouting at the top of her lungs to nobody in particular. I can imagine her in a clothing store: “I THINK THIS DRESS IS CUTE! DO YOU THINK THIS DRESS IS CUTE?” “Uh…who are you talking to?”
The Why-Complain-Now? Thought. Why has it taken until now for people to complain about how Nick and Mattel are branching out Dora from her original concept? For years now, Mattel and other companies have made licensed Dora products that do what most Barbie-types do: mainly, dress Dora up as a princess or someone fancier than she is or allow you to style her hair and change its color. If the fashionista Tween Dora is a travesty to Dora’s original character, aren’t these uncharacteristic uses of Dora just as a travesty?
The Been-There-Done-That Thought. Tons of cartoon characters have been aged up and down- aging down to babies is the most popular, but aging them up is sometimes done. The Rugrats were aged ten years in honor of their tenth anniversary. And it’s not just Americans who do it: the Japanese produced a anime series featuring aged versions of the Yankee-born Powerpuff Girls, and in possibly one of the closest examples, a well-known character in Brazil named Monica who is about Dora’s age also got a tween alter-ego.
The This Too Shall Pass Thought. Remember the Loonatics? You’re not alone. A few years ago, Warner Bros. announced a new TV series featuring futuristic superheroes with personalities similar to those of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and the rest of the classic characters. There was a bunch of “OMG THEIR RUINING BUG BUNNY” outcry from the press and fears that this XTREEEM makeovers were going to replace the classic characters. The characters were redesigned and ended up looking less hip and dark and ended up looking more overly cute than the original characters they were based on. And then the show premiered…and no one noticed. Loonatics ran its course with no one noticing. Although I’m sure Tween Dora and Regular Dora will most likely coexist as Tween Monica and Regular Monica do over in Brazil, there is the (scant) possibility that no one will notice Tween Dora once she hits the scene, just as [del]Buzz[/del] Ace Bunny and his fellow futurists were after the initial panic. I’m just amazed that, like when the Loonatics first hit the scene, so many people are looking at something so common and really unimportant as a spinoff/redesign of a familiar cartoon character and taking the cry of another Nickelodeon star to heart: “This is sewious!”
