If someone had told me when I created this account that my first post would be an analysis of an electro swing Bubble Guppies songs, I don’t know if I would have believed them. And yet.
Now obviously, I’m going to be reading into this song. A lot. Because this is an educational song in a kid’s show meant to teach children about flightless birds. So this actually wouldn’t be so much of an analysis per se, as much as a fun exercise in which I try to pull a deeper meaning from a song that probably has none, because I think it could be an interesting metaphor. (That’s the beautiful thing about art though—its meaning can be subjective.)
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Okay, let’s assume a narrative. We have a primary narrator, and the group they speak about, the flightless birds.
“Who wrote the rule that said a thing with feathers absolutely has to fly? (Why must they fly?)
Some creatures have two wings that flap, but you won’t find them up there in the sky. (Try, try, try, they’re not up there in the sky.)”
These birds seemingly have all the means to fly. They have feathers, and wings, and they can move those wings in the way that they’re supposed to be moved. “Try, try, try,” and yet they still can’t fly?
“Gravity they don’t defy, they’ll never soar, won’t even try.”
They can’t fly. We’ve established this. Have they actually tried though? Does “won’t even try,” not seem to be contradictory to the statement (“try, try, try”) made not even ten seconds prior? Maybe the birds gave up on trying after experiencing failure after failure; maybe this is an unreliable narrator.
“Well, have you heard about the flightless bird?
With wings that flap they’ve been supplied, but after that things went awry.
Well, have you heard about the flightless bird?”
The tone of the narrator is bordering on condescending. Asking if you’ve heard of the flightless birds, as if they’re some spectacle to be marveled at. It feels like something the mean girls would whisper about you knowing that you were only a few feet away and in complete earshot of the conversation.
And the line about their wings. Yes, they have wings that look functional; that wasn’t enough. Another two-faced way to rub it in?
“They’re quite content there on the ground,
To see them don’t look up, look down.”
Condescending, quite literally (hah), mocking even. The narrator makes these claims that the birds are content where they are. Is that true? Can we trust that?
And telling you to “look down” to find them... well, there are clear connotations tied with the two directions, and it’s not hard to figure out. Look down. Don’t expect much from them, they can’t live up to it anyway. They’ll always disappoint.
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I'm just going to cover a few more lines, food for thought, and whatnot.
Skipping ahead:
“Some birds were born to fly, but I just gotta be me!
We won’t cry, we won’t frown, we’re happy right here on the ground!
Gravity we won’t defy, we’ll never soar, won’t even try.”
We’ve switched to the perspective of the flightless birds, acknowledging their intrinsic differences and accepting it, embracing it even. These lines are confirmation that there was nothing more nefarious going on, that they really are... content. Right?
Could they be lying? To us? Themselves?
Should everyone thrive, or prosper? Does everyone want to? Is everyone able to?
Can you even define "thriving" or "prospering" (or "flying") in such a general sense?
“So what if we can’t fly? Neither can you.”
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{ I don’t know what this devolved into but I hope you enjoyed. Please be patient with my writing skills, admittedly I haven’t written anything non-academic in a very long time and I’m also writing this at 1:30 in the morning and I’m analyzing a Bubble Guppies song. This was just some fun, I promise future entries will be longer, more thought out, and overall just better quality (I hope). }
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