That lump on Andrew’s back proves to be a mixed blessing.
Tag Archives: Animation
APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: DECORADO (2025)
366 Weird Movies may earn commissions from purchases made through product links.
DIRECTED BY: Alberto Vázquez
FEATURING: Voices of Asier Hormaza, Aintzane Gamiz, Kandido Uranga (original Spanish); David Goldstein, Marissa Parness, Peter Giles (English dub)
PLOT: Arnold, a mouse, feels like he’s trapped in an artificial reality.
WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: Decorado combines two seemingly out of place aesthetics—cute cartoons and psychodrama—but also uses an Orwellian dystopia as camouflage to discuss themes that are far more existential in nature.
COMMENTS: Alberto Vázquez’s animations distinctly combine the cartoonish with a heavy dose of pessimism and existentialist dread. His latest feature effort, expanded from his eponymous short film, is no different. What is new is the ambiguous nature of the surrounding environment, a perfect metaphor for the confusion and angst of these anthropomorphic animals. But let’s start from the beginning.
The story revolves around mouse Arnold and his wife Maria. They live in a town structured like a miniature capitalist system, where a major corporation named ALMA governs everything. Both mice are social outcasts. Arnold remains unemployed for years, while Maria struggles to build a career as a graphic designer. Feeling exhausted by this way of life, Arnold wants to believe there is something more, a figurative and/or literal way of escape. A dark forest surrounds his hometown, and he can’t stop wondering about what might exist beyond that. Perhaps somewhere beyond lies the ideal world of absolute freedom and truth that he desperately desires.
The parabolic tone of this plot is clear. Arnold lives in an Orwellian nightmare where extensive surveillance is the norm, everyone takes medicines to stay calm and happy, and class differences are tremendous. As Arnold rebels, he finds companionship in an eclectic variety of characters, but at the same time he pays a price, by discovering the true nature of his cage.
This is not a social parable, even if it starts like one. It existentialist—almost nihilistic—in nature. Later revelations recall The Truman Show (1998), as the line between what is real and what is a facade starts to blur. That film, however, had a clear ending and catharsis, offering a concrete explanation for its world. Here, no easy answers are given. As the owl-guardian of the forest says, in this case “the (whole) World is a stage” and, perhaps, there is nothing beyond that other than the vastness of a cosmic void.
From a philosophical standpoint, Decorado has some parallelisms with Alejandro Jodorowsky‘s The Holy Mountain (1973): both movies deconstruct ideas regarding salvation and a ultimate truth by constantly reminding us, in a Brechtian way, that everything is artificial, props and cardboard cutouts on a theatrical stage. Decorado is undoubtedly darker in tone, however, and not so explicitly didactic.
Decorado‘s narrative also works as a portrait of psychopathology. Vázquez’s works are always interested in exploring the world of the mentally ill. In Birdboy (2015) a teenage boy shows symptoms of schizophrenia; Unicorn Wars (2022) studies the mindset of a sociopath. Here, Arnold’s wife struggles with depression—in the form of a Tinker Bell-like fairy that follows her around—while he is diagnosed with derealization disorder. Clinically defined, derealization (also known as depersonalization or dissociation) is a sense of detachment from reality—a gut feeling that something is off about the world. Decorado can therefore also be interpreted, through a strictly psychological prism, as an externalization of Arnold’s disorder. A work of art can be read in many ways, after all.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
CHANNEL 366: THE AMAZING DIGITAL CIRCUS (2023-2026)
366 Weird Movies may earn commissions from purchases made through product links.
DIRECTED BY: Gooseworx
FEATURING: Voices of Lizzie Freeman, Alex Rochon, Michael Kovach
PLOT: A young woman arrives in a strange alternate reality.
COMMENTS: Glitch Productions was founded in 2017 in Sydney, Australia, as an independent studio specializing in animated web series. “The Amazing Digital Circus,” its latest effort, is the show that stands out the most from the crowd, at least at first glance, thanks to its zany art style. But there are many layers hidden underneath the visuals.
The plot revolves around an alternate digital reality, where trapped souls live in cartoon bodies under the surveillance of a giant mouth with eyes named Caine. None of them remembers their real name, and they are given new ones as soon they appear in this place. The newest arrival, a clown-like woman Caine names Pomni, is the story’s main focus. Her point of view is our entry point to get to know this strange realm and the people that inhabit it.
Every once in a while Caine gives a nonsensical quest to the trapped souls, like facing bandits in a fantasy kingdom or working in a fast food restaurant, as a distraction so that they can forget that there is no escape from their digital hell. More often than not, these quests prove excruciating, playing out like a parody of tropes of reality TV shows or video games. There is a mystery-box aspect to the world, too, with possible existentialist undertones as our characters can’t stop attempting to escape. Imagine TV shows like “Lost,” “From,” or “The Prisoner” combined with Looney Tunes animation and you get a sense of the style.
The best comparison for this show in its entirety would be “Dispatches From Elsewhere” (2020); the way “Digital Circus” develops The Matrix‘s ideas while simultaneously putting an emphasis on character development recalls “Dispatches” in cartoon form. In fact, character development is the most important part of this adventure, what makes it relatable and meaningful in the end, as our heroine and her newfound friends find meaning in their connections and companionship by caring for each other—with some exceptions.
While it may seem at first that every character fits an archetype, they gradually reveal more depth. Through the tasks Caine gives them and their intimate private interactions, their personalities and worldviews come to the forefront—as well as their deepest fears, insecurities, and secrets. They may not remember their names from their previous life, but they recall events that happened to them and retain their sense of self; for the time being, at least, because in this world there is the threat that they will eventually be consumed by despair and become “abstracted,” transforming into an amorphous mass —the digital equivalent of dying.
In the end “Digital Circus” is a distorted mirror of real world anxieties, especially those of young adults in their 20s. The series is not afraid to tackle dark issues regarding interpersonal relationships and family dysfunctions. The dreamcore-inspired aesthetic and sci-fi twists are just the surface. Underneath that are real human tales waiting to be shared.
“The Amazing Digital Circus” streams exclusively on Netflix; it was a big enough hit that the final episode was briefly released to theaters in 2026.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
CAPSULE: WINDS OF CHANGE (1979)
AKA Metamorphoses
366 Weird Movies may earn commissions from purchases made through product links.
DIRECTED BY: Takashi Masunaga
FEATURING: Peter Ustinov
PLOT: Five tales loosely based on Ovid’s “Metamorphoses.”
COMMENTS: Masunaga’s debut is a decent, if somewhat clumsy, attempt at a collaboration with Hollywood’s studios. Even if it plays it by the book—this is a children’s film, after all—it remains a hidden gem, making it of some interest for those loving obscure and long-forgotten cartoons.
This anthology, loosely based on Ovid’s “Metamorphoses,” starts with Peter Ustinov’s pompous voice-over. Ustinov is the only voice in the film—none of the characters speak for themselves. This admittedly cheapens the experience a bit, but in the end it doesn’t prove too distracting. The stories take place in the heaven of Greco-Roman mythology, with a young boy playing a different role in each tale. It may seem unnecessary to have the same character as a different protagonist each time, but works for younger viewers by creating a point of familiarity.
The stories are familiar to older viewers. We have the doomed love affair between Orpheus and Euridice, the campaign of Perseus against Medusa, and the tragedy of Phaethon. Light psychedelia accompanies everything—we are in the seventies, after all —with some segments even recalling “Alice in Wonderland.” With its lush environments full of cute animals as well as eerie secrets, the art style will appeal to fans of Disney’s animated classics. Fantasia (1940) is a point of reference, even if Winds of Change remains mild in comparison. We can’t really talk about dream logic or surreal imagery here; instead, we have a magical realist visual feast with a rich soundtrack on top. Anachronistic pop ballads, classical tunes, and a hint of Africa complement the visuals, creating a sense of phantasmagoria.
Let it be noted that the alternate edit titled Metamorphoses from 1977, with songs by Joan Baez and Mick Jagger, is unavailable.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
SATURDAY SHORT: SOMEBODY GOOFED (2024)
Before becoming an award-winning documentary filmmaker, Rodney Ascher collaborated with animator Syd Garon on this Jack Chick tract brought to life as an After Effects collage in which a young man discovers he has eternally goofed by not accepting Jesus Christ.