"In the Land of Wonderful Dreams" dated June 02, 1912:
Transcript of Tweets by @LittleNemo1905 (MAY 19, 2021):
First, this strip is another that I think is very well coloured. If I'm being totally fair to the NY American colouring team, I would have to admit that they seem to have found a bit of a groove… - 1/22
Either that, or I'm getting more used to the way the strip is coloured now and it's less… frustrating in it's inconsistency. - 2/22
That said, there is still some weird things happening. Doctor Pills clothing for instance; it's colour is always changing. I suppose he might be wearing different clothes each strip, but they are the same just a different colour… - 3/22
The first two tiers are pretty tourist-y… we meet more characters from Mother Gooseville and old nursery rhymes. "Hey Diddle Diddle" is the cat with the fiddle and Flip comes in riding "the cow that jumped over the moon". - 4/22
Suspiciously absent from this strip is the laughing dog and the dish who runs away with the spoon… I wonder why? - 5/22
I will say, I expected Impie to get quite a scratching in panel two after pulling the cat's tail… but he is a mild mannered feline and just goes back to playing his fiddle. - 6/22
Speaking of Impie, he again says almost nothing this strip… why did McCay give Impie a voice only to take it away again after the briefest of moments using it? - 7/22
Pill again comes off quite aggressively in his dealings with Impie… his body language in panel 2 is almost threatening; his closeness and stare are cold. - 8/22
Panel 5 might give us an indication as to why Impie has been not speaking lately… Pill tells him to "be quiet", but he hasn't said a word in strips… - 9/22
Is he being told not to speak? If so, why do as he's told? Is he afraid he'll be excluded? I suppose you can't really blame him… he's been left out before… - 10/22
Now, obviously, the real meat to this strip comes in the final two tiers when they are bucked off the cow as it jumps over the moon. Thankfully, they are caught in a net by none other than the "man in the moon". - 11/22
Though we've never seen him like this… we've seen the face of the man in the moon before (if they are, indeed, the same person… Remember, back in the earliest days of #LittleNemo, he was a recurring background character. - 12/22
Probably the most famous "Nemo and the Moon" strip is this one from December 03, 1905: - 13/22
The "man in the moon" has always been (for us anyway) just a moon with a face. This depiction marks a stark departure from that tradition… the question is what exactly the departure means? - 14/22
The first explanation is that it means nothing. It is, of course, a dream and the fluidity of representation in Nemo's unconscious mind makes this a rather easy sell (even if it is unsatisfying). - 15/22
Alternatively, it's possible that this is the physical body of the face that we've come to know and love. Why wouldn't the "man in the moon" be able to take on both a traditional physical form and be one with the moon? - 16/22
Lastly, the "face" in the moon and the "man" in the moon could simply be different characters. We've already seen an example of *other* beings living on the moon (in this case, giants), so it's possible. - 17/22
The wikipedia entry on the "Man in the Moon" identifies some other pareidolic images that might be used to explore an alternative reading here, from Dante to English ballads. I'm really interested to hear thoughts on this: - 18/22
I'll just end with a few notes on the narrative here, particularly the MitM's intent to eat Flip at the end… - 19/22
Now, to be sure, Flip has been insulting… but why is eating and swallowing him his go-to method of payback? I wonder if it's possible that this came from whatever source material McCay was using when he designed this character? - 20/22
Is there a nursery rhyme about someone or something being eaten by the "man in the moon"? I couldn't find anything, but maybe someone knows something about this? - 21/22
This is my reading of "In the Land of Wonderful Dreams" #338. What's yours? - 22/22