Tubi's Winnie the Pooh animation is both terrifying and hilarious
Since being catapulted into the public domain last year, Winnie the Pooh has been subject to an onslaught of questionable reimaginings. Still, none have chilled me to the bone quite like the latest piece of Pooh-based content from the streaming service Tubi.
The animated film, simply titled 'Winnie the Pooh', is a retelling of the classic tales by A. A. Milne, featuring a host of disturbing royalty-free 3D versions of the beloved characters, complete with ghastly voice acting and uncanny animation. (For some positive character design inspiration, check out our collection of the best character design books).
The animated movie was brought to the attention of X users by JWCartoonist, who shared their disturbing discovery. "Somehow it's even more unsettling and horrifying than the actual horror movie," (more on that here). With its naive sunny backgrounds juxtaposed with frightening 3D models, the film has an uncanny foreboding quality that definitely qualifies it as nightmare fuel.
That's partly down to the 3D character models, who have little to no resemblance to the wholesome characters that we've come to love. For instance, Eeyore has been replaced by a model of a rotund brown horse, who seems to have little control of his appendages and moves across the screen via spinning – but that doesn't compare to what they've done to poor old Pooh.
The animation style, which appears to be motion capture, results in a strange array of contorted facial expressions. In a painful imitation of Sterling Hollaway's Winnie the Pooh, the creepy voice acting alongside the odd character model makes for a rather chilling Pooh bear – especially when we get a glimpse of his full set of teeth.
The motion capture makes the characters both scarily over-expressive in the face, and hilariously awkward in movement, resulting in very limited dynamic motion. The animation comes across as entirely lazy, even incorporating raw 3D models in the T-pose position. With the script seemingly copying the original stories word for word, I'd say that perhaps in this situation, it might be better to stick to the classics.
It's safe to say that X users were extremely passionate in their fervent dislike of this disturbing animation. Many were quick to say that the film had an uncanny quality, and others even claimed that the production seemed to be the work of AI, but as one user says: "Well, it's public domain, so I guess anything goes."
If you're after news from the world of Winnie the Pooh that's a little less nightmarish, take a look at the re-illustrated edition of the original tales that share a poignant warning about deforestation.
