Skylander Comparisons: or, How does this kid perceive things?!

Little Bear loves Skylanders. He has fought hard about my decision to get rid of them. Since my major complaint is the level of violence in the game, I recently realized that he wants to play with the figurines in his hands a lot more than he wants to play with them in the virtual world of the game. So I decided to let him keep the figures he likes, but we will still get rid of the game.

Of course, now he wants me to go right on collecting the figures for him. No way. I think they are creepy and a waste of money, and I'm not pinching and scraping on our slimmer than slim budget to buy things I hate. However, when we saw their dad last week, he told them he had bought the new Skylanders Swap Force collection for them. (By collection, he meant starter pack, and apparently even that was a lie.) So once again I found myself trying to make up his deficiency with something I didn't even want them to have in the first place. I tried to convince them to buy Disney Infinity figures, but the stocks are pretty slim and the only single-pack figures we could find in stock are ones we already have. We can't afford the triple packs right now. So he begged and begged and finally I told him he could pick his favorite Swap Force character instead (it was cheaper, after all). He did, and convinced his brother to pick another one so the two of them could battle. The second choice was not available, and they settled on a character called "Zoo Lou." Whiz Kid chose the Legendary version. (Yes, they make multiple versions of the same characters. It's a shameless ripoff and yet we fall for it anyway.)

On the way home, Little Bear said that he didn't really like the Legendary Zoo Lou. He would have preferred the other one. The Legendary, he said, was creepy. I asked him how one could be creepier than the other. His answer? The Legendary guy has hair. That freaks him out.

???? The "hair" is actually a sort of ponytail on top of the figure's head, which in fact the standard character also has. It's just not as obvious. Of course I busted up laughing, and he didn't like that. But I can't help wondering what goes through his little 7-year-old head, to look at a ferocious little toothy figurine swinging a mace and decide the ponytail makes it creepy. Lol!