The Tragedy of Penny Bleat
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So this has been on my mind for the last few days.
Has anyone ever thought about how Penny Bleat's entire existence is kinda tragic?
She's widely considered to be the most hated character in all of CartoonMania.
Hell, she literally has a page on The Loathsome Characters Wiki!
And that's largely because she only has two personality traits.
Starting off with the smallest one and least important, she's a snarker.
Throwing snarky and sarcastic jabs at her peers, especially Matthew.
However, this trait is hardly shown.
And like everyone else in this series, she's not funny.
Not helping is her voice performance, which, no offense to PinkGalaxxy, is frankly mediocre.
And the biggest one (and the only one that really matters) is her love for Victor.
That's it.
She only really exists to be Victor's girlfriend and to be in love with him.
Like I said before, Penny has the same problem as Millie from Helluva Boss, but even worse.
But at least with Millie, she had a few things going for her.
But Penny, she has....
Like, what are her interests? What are her hobbies? What does she strive to do in life?
Given from what we've seen, nothing.
I know the other CartoonMania characters are not much better in this regard either, but at the very least, they have a sole personality trait that helps them stand out from each other.
Penny's only trait is that she's in love with Victor.
And not helping is how Penny and Victor's relationship is portrayed in general.
To be frank, this relationship is forced as all hell.
They have no damn chemistry with each other.
I don't think I've ever seen a couple that just actively refuses to bounce off each other or feel compatible.
And besides that, the way they're portrayed is....kinda creepy.
Now in the series, they were admittedly kinda cute.
But that was largely because neither of them really talked and their romance was used pretty sparingly.
Plus, it was often things like loving glances and hugs.
But then you look at the comics, which started shortly after the series premiered, where the couple are much more present as main characters.
Plus they actually got to talk.
And the problems with this relationship become far more apparent.
She constantly ambushes him with hugs, kisses and tickles everyday.
They call each other names like "sweetie" and "honey", and Penny often looks at Victor with a clearly sensual expression.
They go on dates.
Penny is shown coddle and be very overprotective of Victor, to the point of threatening people when they just want to talk to him.
As just shown, she refers to Victor as her "baby".
And she states that she would die if she ever lost Victor.
Hell, in a roleplay Matthew did on his Discord for Halloween of 2019, after he and Victor were able to Penny back to normal from being a tickling monstrosity by making it look like the latter had died, she breaks down.
So much so that she decides that she can't go on without Victor and readies to KILL HERSELF!
Even drawing out a sword to do the job!
You see the problem, right?
This is not how any sort of healthy relationship should be written at all!
While it's clear that Penny does genuinely love Victor, she's also clearly very obsessed with him.
Not exactly something most people would want to look for in a relationship.
Now that I think about it, why would anyone want to be with Penny?
While yes, you would be very much loved.
You would also be constantly be hugged, kissed and tickled to a ridiculous extent.
Which would get really annoying.
Plus you would constantly be coddled by her and barely be allowed to casually interact with anyone else without her throwing a fit.
Penny would be a SUFFOCATING girlfriend for anyone to have!
I genuinely don't know what Victor sees in her.
But there's two other things about this relationship that doesn't make it work.
1#) Their ages. Penny and Victor are canonically children, with the former being 5 and the latter being 4. Let me ask you all this. Have you see any kids around that age range being a couple? Going on dates? Calling each terms of endearment? Literally referring to each other as "their baby"? I'm guessing NO. Because, why the fuck would pre-schoolers be dating each other? I'm certain they don't even know what a date is yet! Speaking of which, Penny calling Victor her "baby", gives off heavy predatory vibes.
2#) The series and the movie (where the relationship is also in the forefront) constantly tries to portray Penny and Victor's relationship as being cute. Which it's not. It's very weird and creepy.
Speaking of the movie, it features the same issues as the comics.
Three particular moments come to mind.
The first being the scenes where Penny refuses to do something that seems difficult, but then a character tells her to imagine if Victor was in danger, and then she proceeds to do it!
The second is the moment after the toons save Victor from being deleted, he and Penny start making out.
Remember, they're pre-school aged.
And the third (and the one that sticks with me the most) is when she's looking through a photo album even though she's suppose to helping Matthew find clues in the library to find out what happened to Stanley.
The reason why is to just look at photos of Victor.
This is what I'm talking about.
Penny literally has no character.
She only exists just to love Victor.
That's all she's good for!
The only thing she can think of and care about is Victor!
In fact, I've seen comments recently saying that the way Matthew writes his female characters frankly sucks.
And they're right.
It's already not looking good given how much the male characters outnumber the female characters.
Plus it took until the movie for any of them to even talk!
And the way the main female characters are written leaves much to be desired.
Besides being a prankster, Tanya is a dancer.
A belly dancer.
A CHILD belly dancer.
JoJo always speaks in overly smart terms to the point where even Jimmy Neutron would tell her to shut the fuck up.
But Penny is by far the worst example.
Like I said, her only personality is being madly in love and obsessed with a boy.
Which is like, one of the most misogynistic ways you could write a female character.
Having their entire personality being revolved around a guy.
During CartoonMania's original run, many people were pretty open about how they found Penny x Victor to be really creepy and how it made them uncomfortable.
Including members of the CartoonMania crew!
But the generally low opinion on the ship would only sink even lower thanks to Matthew's exposure.
As we all know, in July 2020, many members of the CartoonMania crew would leak screenshots that revealed that Matthew was, for lack of a better terms, a terrible person.
From acting inappropriately in his servers and making everyone in them uncomfortable with how down-bad horny he was.
To being an egotistical asshat who regularly looked down on other people's art and even actively harassing them for it.
Including members of his own crew!
But the most well-known thing Matthew was exposed for was for having done NSFW work of his characters.
Specifically the underage ones.
Those being Penny, Victor, Timmy and Tanya (who are both 8).
Yeah.....Matthew is a pedophile.
Hell, he even openly admitted that he found some of his characters attractive, including Penny and Tanya, even though he knows that they're minors in the single digits.
People already kinda suspected that there was something sus about Matthew given some of the stuff featured in his works.
I already went over the questionable content in the movie last time, and if you want proof on that, he's a link to it.
Plus the infamous Hug a Sheep Day comic.
There were some things even in the main series.
Like in the episode Sandwich, where when Matthew runs out to the pool to extinguish his flames, Penny is shown in a two-piece bikini.
And in the Halloween special Handle with Scare, Penny was not only dressed as Ariel from The Little Mermaid, but when she, Stanley and JoJo were trying to lure the ghost into a trap, she does a hip swaying dance with a sensual look on her face.
But these leaks more or less confirmed that he was indeed into children thanks to his NSFW work.
And the ones who got this the most were, who else?
But Penny and Victor.....
While these may not be the most graphic artwork out there, this was still unacceptable since remember....
THEY WERE CANONICALLY CHILDREN!
And Matthew knew this!
But he went ahead with it because to him, they were the sexist characters he had!
And he wanted them to come off as sexy!
Besides the infamous 69th Floor animation, the best example of this is with this infamous image of Penny, posing in a sensual fashion, while in a bathrobe.
This was done as a homage to the character of Minerva Mink from Animaniacs.
A character who was intentionally written to be sexy.
And Matthew, in his all knowing wisdom decided to implement that on a character who is canonically 5.......
As Anthony Bourdain would say....
"The more you look up about Matthew Littlemore, the more you develop the urge to beat him to death with your bare hands."
Penny and Victor were also the subject of Matthew's notorious tickling fetish.
As well as his not nearly as known fat fetish.
Yep!
Like that one French guy from Mr. Peabody and Sherman, Matthew was into fat bitches!
It's the reason why Penny and Tanya had bigger guts when compared to the other female characters.
Plus, as shown above, whenever Penny was in her pajamas, her navel was exposed.
Now we come to the current reboot of CartoonMania: 320 Freleng Avenue.
And while Penny is little better than her original counterpart (with the fact that she actually has a character trait with her being a magician), she's still not a good character.
And that's because of besides that new character trait, she's still the same as before.
And that includes her relationship with Victor.
As I was doing research for this post, I've realized something that only a few others have pointed out.
That being Penny is a perfect representation of two unsavory aspects of Matthew.
1#) The most obvious being his inability to change. If you've seen his current work, you can tell he never learned from his mistakes. Not only with Penny and Victor still being a smothering couple, but also with Tanya being a belly dancer and looking the part now. He's also still mad about some petty shit, like before. Hell, Matthew's inability to learn from his past mistakes and become better was actually what got him into his infamous controversy. A good chunk of the NSFW work I just showcased was actually from 2019, about a year before his exposure. However, this situation was kept under wraps thanks to his friends and co-workers, who stopped him from doing more of this stuff and had him seek professional help. However, this ended up falling on deaf ears as Matthew would continue doing his NSFW work. And it was revealed that he never went to see a therapist. As you would expect, this greatly angered his friends. Along with other stuff he was doing like the aforementioned actively harassing people and making his friends all uncomfortable with weird names and trying to push his fetishes onto them. And after seeing the Minerva Mink tribute, that was the last straw for them. And so, they leaked all of Matthew's nasty work to The Internet.
2#) Penny is Matthew's id. For those who don't know what that is, the id is the part of the mind in which innate instinctive impulses and primary processes are manifested. Basically it's what makes us human, being the source of many of our natural impulses. And as we all know, Matthew has no control of his impulses. Plus he's infamous for never taking responsibility for his actions and blaming others for them. Essentially, Penny's is Matthew's self insert in a way. Well, other self insert. That's the reason why she and Victor are used as the primary vehicle for his tickle fetish and why they were the ones featured the most in the NSFW work. That's also probably the reason why Penny never had a real personality. She was a way for Matthew to bring his deepest (and perverted) desires to life. As well as why he constantly tried to paint Penny and Victor's relationship are being cute and romantic. Since Matthew sees himself as never being in the wrong, in his mind, there's nothing wrong with their relationship and they should still be the way they are. Even though everyone has told him the way he portrays these two is very much creepy and disturbing. And like I said before, Matthew is aware of the criticism that Penny had gotten. Hence why he made her into a magician. Plus he's made tons of jokes about how everyone else finds her and Victor's relationship to be weird and concerning. But given how he still portrays the two, it's clear he doesn't care. And while I'm not sure if he's ever stated, it's pretty clear that Penny is his favorite character. That's largely why most of his art nowadays is largely of those two. Yeah, he barely does art of any of the other characters. Including the main ones! JoJo, Stanley, Timmy and Tanya. Hell, even Sylvester Nelvana (the new alias of Matthew's self insert and the main character of this whole thing) rarely appears in any art nowadays!
So that's the tale of Penny Bleat.
And it's boy howdy, it's a rough and pretty depressing one.
Like all the other characters of CartoonMania (and the series itself), Penny had the potential to be a genuinely good and intriguing character.
Unfortunately, she (as well as the rest of the characters) was put in the hands of a complete doofus who prioritized quantity over quality.
And as a result, she was heavily underutilized, despite supposedly being one of the main characters.
And when she was used, it was only for a forced and creepy relationship.
And if it wasn't that, it was just to bring her creator's sick perverted fantasies to life.
Sometimes, I keep thinking about this story where Penny has an existential crisis, realizing how much of a blank slate she really is.
Wondering why Matthew made her the way he did. He was the one responsible for her creation....and the one responsible for not giving her an actual personality.
Hell, even bringing her infamous relationship with Victor into question and asking whether she really actually loves him or is it only because Matthew said she had to.