Last night we watched Disney's Handy Manny Motorcycle Adventure. If you're not familiar with the show's premise, here it is in a nutshell -- Manny is a handyman who repairs stuff with the help of his talking tools. It's really designed for kids younger than mine, but for some inexplicable reason, Zoe and Maya love it. Go figure!
The show last night was an hour-long special, with Manny taking his motorcycle with sidecar full of tools to his family reunion. Pat, the hammer, wishes he had a family like Manny's, but Manny reassures him that he and the other tools are Manny's family. Pat isn't satisfied by that answer, and ends up climbing into a truck with a hammer logo on the side that he thinks looks like him (unlike all other hammers, this one has eyes, like Pat does).
When the truck takes him to a big-box hardware store, he makes his way to the hammer aisle and sings a song about needing to find someone who is like him, and says at one point that finding the hammer aisle is like finding "Planet Me." Unfortunately, he comes to realize, the hammer logo is just that, a drawing of a hammer, not a real hammer who might be a relative.
Not surprisingly, the show doesn't deal much with this theme of needing to know biological family, of needing to be with those who look like you. The whole focus was on family as those who care for each other, and that's okay. And the action was all about Manny and the other tools looking for Pat, despite all obstacles, because they're family.
And in light of the Anita Tedaldi fiasco, I'm happy with a kid's show that says family sticks together no matter what.
The a Winnie the Pooh movie like this, too. I think it is the Tigger movie? Tigger wants to see his real family, and Pooh and the gang dress up as his family and unsuccessfully try to fool him, and then of course it ends up with Pooh and Gang being his real family.
ReplyDeleteSorry if you've seen it! This seems to be a recurring theme in kids' shows doesn't it? I gues Disney does not have a lot of imagination. Or maybe the Tigger movie writers and the Handy Manny writers are the same people, lol!
DD also loves Handy Manny even though she's started jr. high and knows it's a baby show! Just like me and Sponge Bob. Insisted on watching the SB movie last nite (of course, I have the second-childhood thing going for me). Have never run into this Handy Manny special but will keep our eyes open for it.
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