Missmediajunkie v. The Tsum Tsums

In a previous post about the Pokemon Go craze, I remarked that the game didn't have much appeal for me because I had never been all that attached to Pokemon. However, if there were ever a Disney branded version of the game, it would be a different story. Classic Disney animation has always been the epicenter of my childhood nostalgia, and it's always been a war between the stringently anti-clutter, anti-merchandise part of my personality, and the instant gratification enabling, media junkie part of me that loves cute stuff. I've always had an addictive personality, and can get carried away with any kind of collecting. I worry that with my completionist impulses, even the most innocuous collection can get out of hand, and I'll wind up spending all of my disposable income on branded junk. And I mean, it could happen pretty easily with Disney merchandise. The mouse doesn't fool around.

I thought something like Pokemon Go would be a perfect solution to this dilemma, since the game is free and all the Pokemon you collect are digital, taking up no real space. So I was very excited to discover "LINE: Disney Tsum Tsum," a mobile video game where you can collect various Disney characters in their Tsum Tsum incarnations. The massively popular Tsum Tsum plushies first came out of Japan in 2013, and spawned their own animated webseries, a Marvel superhero spinoff, and tons of related merchandise. What I found especially attractive was that there were Tsum Tsums for so many of the more obscure Disney characters. There's a "Fantasia" Tsum Tsum set. There's a "Three Caballeros" Tsum Tsum set. There's even a "Pete's Dragon" Tsum Tsum of Elliot the dragon, who I don't ever remember seeing other merchandise for. What Disney nerd could resist?

So I downloaded the game and spent two days playing it. I collected a dozen digital Tsum Tsums and worked my way up to Level 10. And it became very clear to me that 1) I disliked playing the game, and 2) I disliked the Tsum Tsums too. The game is made for touchscreens, and each timed round requires playing connect the dots with your finger and a random assortment of Tsum Tsums as fast as possible. The gameplay was more action-oriented than puzzle-oriented, and gave me a headache from eyestrain after a few hours. There are the usual game mechanics like limited lives with timers, incentives to involve your social network, and in-app purchases, which I didn't much mind. I can see why the game is popular, with the steady stream of rewards opportunities, the spiffy animation, and various "missions" to unlock different achievements. However, I didn't find it fun to play on a fundamental level, and deleted it quickly.

Then there are the Tsum Tsums themselves. Each Tsum Tsum plush is shaped like a cylinder, with a super simplified chibi face on one end, reminiscent of Hello Kitty. These can look pretty cute when the original character is already sort of cylindrical or pillow shaped, like all the animal characters. However, anything remotely humanoid like Elsa from "Frozen" or Han Solo look terrible. Also, the chibi faces are so simplified, often with no mouths, that they often don't look much like the original characters. It was difficult to tell them apart in the digital game, where only the face is visible. The Tinkerbell Tsum Tsum, for instance, is simply a female face with a blonde bun. There's no visible green dress or fairy wings. And where you can see them on the plushie, they're warped by the cylindrical body shape. The iconic silhouette is totally gone. I have a relative who loves and collects Tinkerbell merchandise, but I'd hesitate buying her one of these toys. The Tsum Tsum Tink just doesn't look right to me.

And this is also the reason that I've been resistant to the popular Funko Pop! bobbleheads, which use a similar design aesthetic. And the more recent Disney Ufufy plushie line, where the characters are shaped like eggs instead of cylinders. I quite like some of the redesigns that Disney has done for its characters for other merchandise lines - the Disney Infinity figurines were amazing - but the trend seems to be toward these more Japanese influenced images that I'm not really onboard with. Oh well. If I really want to collect something, there are some Disney character keychains and cel-phone charms that I've been eyeing. Or maybe I'll give that Disney Emoji game a try.

It's just that the Tsum Tsums looked like they would have been perfect. They checked off so many of the boxes I wanted. I guess I'm more stuck on the idea of being a certain kind of fan than, well, actually being fan.
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