The dark side of the Moomins

Posted by SebaSeba 4/13/2025

The dark side of the Moomins(www.newstatesman.com)

310 points | 99 commentspage 3

_def 4/13/2025|

Ha and I thought it was just me. Have been rewatching some episodes some years ago and found it a bit creepy at times, although of course a bit sugar coated and abstract. Actually a great way to make it work for all ages.

brador 4/13/2025||

Significant number of lost episodes of MOOMINS. Was around 20 episodes never found last time I checked.

It used to be even more but someone from Japan found a few.

And the creator refuses to talk about some of the lost episodes.

y2236li 4/13/2025||

It’s fascinating how the Moomins’ appeal seems to stem from a comforting, albeit slightly skewed, portrayal of family dynamics – a familiar, albeit idealized, model. While I appreciate the insightful analysis of the misinterpretations, I’m more drawn to the sheer whimsicalness and resilience of the stories themselves, rather than a bleak, pessimistic view of domestic life. It's a brilliant observation to connect the Moomins’ narrative to broader themes of longing and escape, a quality I find deeply compelling.

kaffeeringe 4/14/2025||

I literally finished the movie about Tove Jansson minutes before I found this article! Thank you for sharing!

Unearned5161 4/13/2025||

website causes full page malware ad with the "your phone has a virus" pop-up if opened on ad-blockless browser

jonstewart 4/14/2025||

It’s not so unlike Charles Schultz.

fuzzy_biscuit 4/13/2025||

When I get manipulative ads right off the bat after rejecting cookies, I bounce. A shame as I was curious about the actual content.

initramfs 4/13/2025||

excellent. like Hobbits' Bag End turned upside down

bazoom42 4/13/2025||

Multiple comments here referring to tv-shows. Just be aware that Tove Jansson wrote and illustrated books and comics but did not produce tv shows. What you have seen was not created by Tove Jansson.

The comics and the books are different in genre, even if they use the same characters and storylines. The comics are darkly satirial of modern life while the illustrated books feels more poetic and timeless.

Fun fact: Jansson illustrated The Hobbit and drew Gollum as a giant. Tolkien realized he never described the size of Gollum and made adjustments to later editions.

franek 4/13/2025||

> Fun fact: Jansson illustrated The Hobbit and drew Gollum as a giant. Tolkien realized he never described the size of Gollum and made adjustments to later editions.

For those curious like me, here are some low-res images:

https://zepe.de/tjillu/hobbit/index.html

And here an article about the illustrations (haven't read) with a a few images in higher resolution (including Gollum):

https://tovejansson.com/hobbit-tolkien/

gs17 4/13/2025|||

I don't think there's any reason to gatekeep this so strongly. The original anime and it's sequel, maybe, but both Tove and Lars Jansson were heavily involved with other series.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Moomins_(TV_series) :

> It is, in contrast to the 1990s series, widely believed to be the most faithful TV adaptation of Tove Jansson's stories, and much closer to her vision. Tove herself had a great deal of involvement during the series' production and was very happy with it (as revealed in an interview with Anne Wood in Simon Sheridan's 2007 book The A to Z of Classic Children's Television). The scripts for each episode were translated from Polish into Swedish and sent to Tove and Lars Jansson, who, if they felt that anything needed to be changed, corrected the script, expanding or rewriting it; afterwards, the scripts were sent back and only then did production of the particular episode begin.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moomin_(1990_TV_series) :

> Tove and Lars Jansson were also involved with the screenplay by doing certain changes in scripts.

bazoom42 4/13/2025||

OK but the article in question describes and reviews the books and illustrations by the Finnish artist Tove Jansson. It is not about a tv-show.

gs17 4/13/2025||

People like the animation too, there's no reason to gatekeep Moomin of all things.

bazoom42 4/14/2025||

I’m not making a value judgement. In particular the Polish animations are very beautiful.

But the article describes some specific themes in Tove Janssons books which are just not present in the animations.

raptorraver 4/13/2025|

Don't have time to read through the whole article. But just wanted to point out that there are also Moomin cartoons which have really politically uncorrect stories: like Moomins travelling to spain, trying to buy opium but eating some weird drugs instead and then staring for sea for a week and missing their fligth back.

buovjaga 4/13/2025||

Moomins at Torrelorca: https://www.oocities.org/ghb17/muumit.html

Relevant pages:

https://www.oocities.org/ghb17/muumi/18.jpg

https://www.oocities.org/ghb17/muumi/19.jpg

https://www.oocities.org/ghb17/muumi/20.jpg

https://www.oocities.org/ghb17/muumi/21.jpg

"Waiter, four marijuanas" - they end up scoring LBJ pills instead as marijuana was so last season.

Note that the comic is by Lars Jansson, Tove's brother.

biorach 4/13/2025|||

To be fair, that's an uncannily accurate prediction of many visitors' experiences when visiting Ibiza

anthk 4/13/2025||

For Spaniards, Ibiza was and it's seen as a place for electronic music, posh-background hippies and psychodelics.

designerarvid 4/13/2025|||

Tove Jansson also drew political satire cartoons during WW2. Before Mumintrollen.

https://tovejansson.com/sv/story/illustrator-barnboksforfatt...

nabla9 4/13/2025|||

“How can I be so thirsty when I've been drinking all night?” – Moomintroll (in the Cartoon)

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