Last week, Korean Twitter fell crazy in love with one artist’s human adaptation of a scene from Lady and the Tramp. Artist @pixxcc reimagined the characters Peg and Lady as gijinka, or anthropomorphisms in a cutesy anime or manga style, showing how the classic cartoon might look if it came out as an anime today in a tweet that garnered more than 125,000 likes.
https://twitter.com/pixxcc/status/1051598717747265536
The practice is fairly common within fandoms, with everything being recreated as gijinka from Pokémon to operating systems like Windows and, more recently, a smug version of Wendy’s mascot (a.k.a Wendy-chan) to reflect the company’s strong Twitter game.
As for why Lady and the Tramp, @pixxcc explained, “animals’ facial expressions and movements are very soft and attractive. I loved Peg’s elegant and free-spirited feel, and I was inspired to see what it would be like to be portrayed as a human being.”
The artist enjoyed Peg’s spirit so much that they recreated another scene featuring the feisty pup by herself with the comment “Her name’s Peg. Everybody loves her.”
https://twitter.com/pixxcc/status/1052308076504604672
Inspired by @pixxcc’s attempt, several other artists began posting their attempts at recreating the same scene, some gaining tens of thousands of likes.
#원작장면_자기_그림체로_그리기
— 록 (@rok0813) October 16, 2018
투표 감사합니다~!! pic.twitter.com/oLIZi5LdSZ
As it quickly spread beyond Korean Twitter and onto more mainstream channels, fans and fellow artists began calling it the Lady and the Tramp “redraw meme”.
https://twitter.com/Kisenoi/status/1052929738992320512
https://twitter.com/BombStaticz/status/1052589916054593537
A day after @pixxcc’s first image, Twitter user @peter_seaside contributed a more realistic rendition, adding who the characters’ actors should be in a Lady and the Tramp live-action film. The artist’s picks? Cate Blanchett for Peg and Anne Hathaway as the prim and proper Lady.
https://twitter.com/peter_seaside/status/1051880089439240192
Which, of course, led to a debate about who would best bring the iconic characters to life. Hathaway as Lady seemed pretty perfect, but for Peg, others users floated actresses like Susan Sarandon and Goldie Hawn as better matches for her sultry personality.
Disney has already selected the actors to voice the characters in the upcoming Lady and the Tramp live-action remake: Tessa Thompson as Lady, and Janelle Monáe as Peg. Judging from the vehemence of Twitter’s response from a single scene recreated, the film will be a hit with fans.
READ MORE:
