Merbabies (characters) (2024)

The Merbabies are the titular characters from the 1938 Silly Symphony animated short.

Background[]

The Merbabies are diminutive-sized aquatic beings with a humanoid appearance resembling mermaids formed by bubbles and foam on the surface of the ocean. Most Merbabies have fair skin around their body with pale orange hair and pale green fish tails. They are also shown to have a playful personality during a typical day in their life, such as playing in water, interacting with sea creatures (such as seahorses), or even using instruments made from shells, and certain other activities such as interacting with bubbles.

Appearances[]

Merbabies[]

The Merbabies are first seen emerging from a rock being formed by bubbles and foam on the surface of the ocean, where one of them sees more Merbabies interacting with the waves, just as they happily play at the surface of the ocean. They spontaneously play around the water during their happy moments, but not before they hear a fanfare underwater. All the other Merbabies head to the underwater seafloor to see where the fanfare is coming from, to which the sound is revealed to have been coming from a parade at the bottom of the ocean.

As the parade begins, Merbabies on seahorses blow their trumpets while the bandleader conducts a band of musicians on the chariot, followed by two more Merbabies banging cymbals and a pufferfish using it as a drum during the parade. It is then revealed that there is a circus parade occurring in the ocean, where the crowd is gathered to watch the parade. The Merbabies then watch a whole group of octopus elephants walk across the seafloor, followed by two more Merbabies on an octopus elephant and a small seahorse chariot pass by, excited to see the parade. As the parade continues, more Merbabies continue marching across the ocean floor - some interacting with caged sea creatures such as a tiger fish or riding on seahorses pulling cages, or even riding on sharks during the parade. A Hawaiian-themed parade float depicts a hula-dancing Merbaby listening to another one play music using her ukulele, followed by another one riding on an eel substituting a camel, just as the parade head towards a grotto.

After the parade, the camera zooms inside the grotto where the Merbabies are gathered to watch a circus perform in an underwater grotto. Throughout the show, a crowd of Merbabies and fish are gathered to watch the circus perform in front of them. Throughout the show, the Merbabies perform certain types of circus acts like various methods of animal taming acts. One Merbaby trains an octopus elephant to stand on a pufferfish, another one training a group of Merbabies riding seahorses in the style of a Wild West show, and another facing sharks and catfish inside a cage resembling a lion taming act. The animal tamer inside the cage swims inside the mouth of a shark, impressing the crowd. Back with the other Merbaby training the octopus elephant who is standing on the blowfish, he suddenly flattens the fish, just before the animal tamer leaves. Later, Merbabies riding on seahorses leap through an eel transforming into the shapes of several hoops. More Merbabies also interact with snails substituting sea lions bouncing pearls on their heads while another one conducts a larger snail blowing on shells used as horns.

After a montage of circus acts, two Merbabies sound a fanfare presenting the arrival of other Merbabies swimming around a large sleeping whale, where they interact with bubbles spouted by the whale. One of the bubbles where one of them stands on it pops, causing her to fall onto the whale's spout while interacting with him. However, the baby snail becomes distracted and interacts with the bubbles the Merbabies were playing with - unaware of the whale behind him. The whale suddenly wakes up, causing the Merbabies and the crowd to react in fear, interrupting the show. The Merbabies all cling on seaweed to hold on tight before getting swallowed by the whale, only for the whale to sneeze instead.

After the whale sneezes, the Merbabies are caught within bubbles leading them up to the surface of the ocean, just before they head back to they dissolve back into foam. Despite not appearing in the very last shot of the short, the next scene transitions to the surface of the ocean where the rock formation the Merbabies were on appears from a distance.

Gallery[]

Trivia[]

• The working title for Merbabies was Little Mermaids, suggesting that the titular Merbabies would take inspiration from the Hans Christian Andersen tale The Little Mermaid before the title was changed to avoid confusion with the mermaid protagonist.^[1]
• While Merbabies was labeled as a sequel to Water Babies in official Disney venues, the Merbabies themselves are completely different from the Water Babies, making them completely separate characters judging by their appearances.
• At one point during the circus parade sequence when the Hawaiian-themed parade float passes by, one of the Merbabies plays an instrumental version of "Aloha ʻOe" using a ukulele.
• Though King Neptune himself does not appear in Merbabies, a December 1938 issue of a Good Housekeeping states that Neptune was the one who holds a circus for the Merbabies in the sea once a year, suggesting that Neptune would appear with the Merbabies before being absent from the short itself.^[2] Additionally, it is unknown if this version of Neptune was intended to be the same one from the 1932 short or this Neptune would be a completely different character.

References[]