The worlds he creates are liminal and populated by megalithic structures and conscious beasts. They're ruled by ordered chaos that outsiders have no hope of figuring out. As a kid, what always scared me most was imagining how I would survive in the Suess-iverse and knowing I didn't have a chance
3 months ago | 43
Very specifically: the way the drawings include small eyes, fluffy fingertips, folds of skin, and exaggerated facial expressions (especially angry ones). All those features made everything very uncanny valley. Not a single one of their humanoids were recognizable in nature but definitely close enough to human.
3 months ago | 14
The older I grow the darker the stories seem. Not because they're secretly evil or something, but because they highlight deep truths of humanity that are often ignored by many. Especially those in power.
3 months ago | 7
When I was little, a part in "HOP ON POP" that I found creepy was the 2 pages that went "We play all day, We fight all night," and on the "play all day" page it showed 2 who's all cute and happy with big eyelashes and smiles and the "fight all night" page had them all angry looking in a dark room, eyes narrowed all wickedly. I used to think that meant they were always trying to unalive each other at night when their parents were asleep but during the day would hide their evil rivalry with big happy smiles until nobody was looking again.
3 months ago
| 1
When I was little, it was one of the first times I remember feeling a story was about something else. Not thinking it was about something else or told it was about something else but really feeling it. And sometimes those feelings were ominous - specifically I remember the Butter Battle Book giving me chills.
3 months ago | 9
The butter battle book always freaked me out as a kid because I watched the animated version of it with all the creepy music and dark lighting I didn't even know it was an analogy for the Cold War until I looked it up again when I was like 15
3 months ago | 4
As a kid , there was a particular scene from a doctor Seuss film that would keep me out , I can’t even remember exactly what it sounds like or what that still frame looked like . But I remember how it felt
3 months ago | 0
@AlexanderFromTheStarDimension
I honestly believe "Oh, The Places You'll Go!" to be a precursor of the "liminal space" aesthetic. I mean, more than half of that book is literally JUST liminal spaces with little context. I think it's hauntingly beautiful.
3 months ago | 2
Depends on the book and it’s not really the characters themselves but the surrounding world.
3 months ago | 0
Some of the character designs are a bit creepy; they hit that uncanny valley feeling of not being completely human. The backgrounds also often look like hell worlds of their own - especially whichever book has the colorful spiral background, iykyk!
3 months ago | 14
Everything felt nonsensical but in the uncanny way rather than silly and childish to me. I had the Oh The Places You'll Go book and always got caught up on how freaky the scenery is.
3 months ago | 2
He wrote about the most destructive tendencies of human society in the same way Jonathan Swift wrote A Modest Proposal.
3 months ago | 0
For some unknown reason to my older self I was deeply terrified of hop on pop when I was younger I remember when he got angry at his kids I didn't like that part. Older me now recognizes the slight Eldritch horror present in all of his books.
3 months ago | 0
His characters are overly animated humanoid monsters and the backgrounds are hauntingly void
3 months ago | 0
I always felt strange. Seuss has a way of truly transporting me in that way of Miyazaki. Not to the same depth as Miyazaki, but I get the same feeling of some lived in other world. The strange liminal architecture and furry beasts. The stairs going nowhere. I felt like I'd truly been elsewhere by the end. Like I got a nice glimpse someplace
3 months ago | 1
The Widdershin Bros from the animated Horton Hears a Who really scared me as a little kid, and I don’t know why!
3 months ago | 0
Clark Elieson
If you find Dr Seuss books creepy or unsettling, what about them makes you feel this way?
3 months ago | [YT] | 233