Does anyone think this guy might be symboloc of The Devil? This whole episode seemed to have a lot of religious metaphors and undertone and cetrain things can be applied to religion. I'm assuming that The Gnome might have resembled Satan. However, at the same time, he also took on the role of the Christian God, making people blindly follow his orders and see him as a gracious deity, but at the same time, he also manipulated them, stole the souls of The Powerpuff Girls after they "Made a deal with him" and his pointed beard, just gives off that kind of "Devil" vibe.
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I had a theory that the reason the episode was banned was because kids shouldn't sell their souls to "the fork guy" as the puffs sorta did to the gnome. Appearance wise I dunno, red is his fashion after all. Also he might have just deceived the people of Towsville all along, adding one further connection to mr Lucifer.
(Edited by SpaceCakeHell2000)
I've always found the episode to be a metaphor as to how religion brainwashes people. The whole thing about people being controlled by the Gnome was undeniably a reference to the Christian church. And of course they had Professor Utonoum (the scientist) provide the Atheistic point of view. However, only that plotline seemed to follow that undertone, as other parts of the episode used to confuse me and/or contradict my theory and still do today. Like, why's The Gnome guy playing the role of God and The Devil? Is it because what Christians see as "God" is really just as evil and sinful as their ideology of "Satan"? I can't make heads or tails of this, mostly because I don't know the social standpoint of the show's writers.
(Edited by Boyariffic)
Well that's a whole new perspective for me. If there's any god figure in this episode I'd say it's the four (or more, who knows) elders granting the chant to the gnome. To me the gnome would only be Satan.
I guess shouldn't engage too much in this kind of discussion not being that educated about it; from my standpoint however: the church may very well represent Satan, as churches are not truly connected with Christianity; so, I could see how the gnome could represent the church, I do not see how he represents god however.
Actually it's really hard for me to grasp what the episode truly is about. They're not exactly straight forward about it. At least two people mention "collectivism" in the comment section:
Dread-Eye God wrote:
The main idea of the episode's message was that the citizens (and the Powerpuff Girls) relinquished their freedoms and individuality for security and harmony. This is called collectivism. It is made prominent when all of the townsfolk are in the exact same outfits and lose a lot of their distinctive appearances due to that. What the Professor says furthers this truth by how he says they gave up their dreams and their individuality for "freedom" away from evil or danger, thus security.
The main idea of the episode's message was that the citizens (and the Powerpuff Girls) relinquished their freedoms and individuality for security and harmony. This is called collectivism. It is made prominent when all of the townsfolk are in the exact same outfits and lose a lot of their distinctive appearances due to that. What the Professor says furthers this truth by how he says they gave up their dreams and their individuality for "freedom" away from evil or danger, thus security.
Collectivism and the erase of individuality is very synonymous with Communist theory and philosophy. Communism's main goal is to transcend the earth and its human society into utter perfection, harmony, and total equality. This would mean giving up individuality as individualism is juxtapose to harmony, perfection, and equality due to different personalities clashing.
Capitalism is a very pro-freedom system as it promotes individualism and the freedom to do what you wish economically. This is where the "Capitalism v. Communism' label this episode received originates.
Also, all people dressed in red further connects it to communism.
I guess that last part serves partly as my conclusion. I don't think the main focus of the episode is religion vs society. This doesn't hinder any connection between the Gnome and the Devil though. For me it's more likely that it's about the above mentioned collectivism; I'm not sure about that however.
(Edited by SpaceCakeHell2000)
Cult, definetly a cult. The people of Townsville were all dressed in the same clothes with those creepy smiles.
(Edited by Steven Bomb 17)
(Edited by Inksaness)
@Inksaness I never thought of it that way. The theory seems like kind of a stretch but it's not out of character for HIM to do something like that.
Now that I think about it, during the song, "Townsville's Going Down", there was the shot of HIM creating a ball of power in a way that could possibly parallel The Gnome, when he was obtaining the power from The Powerpuff Girls.