Skip to main content

R is for Ren Höek

There have been a few letters that brought to mind, this tasteless character. "I" for example, 'idiot' reverberated around in my mind but I passed on it. Who is this cartoon character that is oft referred to as emotionally unstable? I'm talking about the fanatical Ren Höek. Ren is the very embodiment of the exclamation point. He doesn't speak. He yells or is emphatic at every twist and turn.




A couple of decades ago, Ren and Stimpy, of the Ren and Stimpy Show, took the air waves by storm. Soon enough though, they were dumped from television, after all they were on a children's cable network. They were just too inappropriate.

Ren is a chihuahua who is abusive and somewhat kinky. He is also extremely emphatic, as I mentioned, in everything he says and does. Much like our frienemy the exclamation point, he prefers shouting to speaking. He gets particularly edgy when he is referring to his dopey kitty pal, Stimpson J. Cat, a manx otherwise known as Stimpy. Poor Stimpy is almost constantly being called an idiot by the Idiot-in-Chief. Ultimately, Stimpy's antics backfire and Stimpy isn't too badly effected.

In 1993, when I watched this show, I was traveling through Australia with my family. However topsy-turvy our days were, we could depend on Ren and Stimpy for pure escapism in the evening. Ren, with his exclamation point touting self, is my complete opposite. There's always something to be learned from these cartoons, however different they may seem. Love 'em or hate, cartoons reflect our fears, anxieties, joys and wonder in a humorous and light way.

So, I leave you with one of their classics, Don't Whiz on the Electric Fence! featuring Ren, Stimpy and Stimpy's cousin Sven.






Comments

  1. Ha ha Stephanie. (!) You're right, I remember cartoons and the escapades they got up to, quite nasty a lot of them but reflecting our hidden fears and waiting and wanting to get the other. I won't watch the cartoon now ... I'm constructing posts for A-Z, am falling behind, though a little light relief would be in order ...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well when you have time, it's not a bad one and only 4.5 minutes to boot. A to Z does require a lot of time, creativity and energy, doesn't it? I've written out the rest of my words but that's it. No posts to go along with them at this point. When you need the comic relief its here.

      Delete
  2. I've never seen Ren and Stimpy but I loved the escapism of the Roadrunner when I was younger...a long, long time ago. Oh, and Fractured Fairytales.
    Thanks for stopping by the Untethered Realms blog today!
    River Fairchild – A to Z April Challenge
    Untethered Realms

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Roadrunner was crazy. You're welcome. Its always a pleasure.

      Delete
  3. Never heard of these characters. Must have been restricted to TV in Oz. I don't watch cartoons anyway. Never did.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh. Well no, actually it was an American cartoon that started in the US.

      Delete
  4. I could never watch the Ren and Stimpy Show because of how obnoxious it was.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. People seem to either love it or hate it, that's for sure.

      Delete
  5. I remember it. It was crazy and funny. Had a humor one had to give in to, but it was funny. I grew up with 4 brothers, the laugh was always like these guys.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Somehow it really seems to hit the guys' funny bone. Same thing was true in my family. Go figure.

      Delete
  6. Could never get enough of this show.

    Bob @
    It Came From the Man Cave!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I loved Ren and Stimpy! My dad used to record every episode. He might still have them on good old VHS cassettes. My favorite episode was probably the rubber nipples one haha (I can't type that without laughing).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sara, that sounds like fun. I'm going to have to rediscover that nipple episode.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Go ahead. Make my day by leaving a comment.

Popular posts from this blog

Gran Bwa

Gran Bwa is a lwa that helps you connect to ancestral roots or the spiritual home of Vodou. A friend of mine, who is an expert on Haitian Vodou, who has spent a lot of time in Haiti with the artists there, told me I had painted Gran Bwa when I made this spontaneous work out of walnut ink and sumi-ink on handmade paper. I had considered this painting a self-portrait. She now holds this piece in her private collection: Quite a few people are afraid of Vodou but it is an awe-inspiring tradition of bringing together plant energy with divinity, spiritual and personal energy. My friend who is very involved with Vodou, especially the art that surrounds it, is from European ancestry. She is light in spirit and bubbly, with a close relationship to nature and her garden.  Vodou affirms the relationships between cycles of life, trees of knowledge and spirit.  The Vodou vision of lwa , understands them as the intelligence of energy present in humans, nature and thoughts.  ...

Tree Whispers

Tree Whispers Shinrin-yoku is a complementary medicine modality, designed to up-lift sub-par health conditions, through lifestyle changes that involve immersion in nature, specifically the wildness, we call a forest, where the senses, including our intuitive sense and ability to heal ourselves through it, is ignited. Forest bathing, as Shinrin-yoku is popularly called, has come to our attention, at a time when the scientific community is abuzz about the ability of trees - be it in stands, groves, or forests, to build community. This, at a time, when we as humans, struggle hard to build and sustain healthy in-person communities, in the face of Online communications. Books like “The Hidden Life of Trees: What they Feel, How they Communicate Discoveries from a Secret World,” (Wohlleben 2016) by Peter Wohlleben is a Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington Post bestseller. It makes readers privy to trees’ communication skills and social networks, that is, it helps us entertain...

Xochitl--Flower

                                     (Winter Poinsettia by Stephanie Rose Bird, oil on wood) One of my Facebook friends does daily posts and shares called "I love Flowers." I love flowers too, in real life, in my garden, in paintings and as they are related to the gods and goddesses, in healing, as well as their use in folklore like Hoodoo. Not long ago I posted about Xochipelli (Sho-CHEE-pee-lee) prince of flowers and Xochiquetzal (Sho-CHEE-ket-zul) goddess of flowers in anticipation of April's blooming season.  The Goddess and Prince of Flowers post  is here. Today, I want to focus in on the root word of their names and it's symbolism. This word is Xochitl (Show-CHEE-tul) in the Nahuatl language of the Aztecs. This word means flower.                                         ...