Dis­en­chant­ment and Matt Groening’s lov­able, flawed heroes

The man who cre­at­ed a TV insti­tu­tion, Matt Groen­ing, has entered the world of stream­ing with Dis­en­chant­ment. The ani­mat­ed show is a fan­ta­sy com­e­dy set in Dream­land, a world of mag­ic, elves, witch­es and a princess. Except, this princess isn’t exact­ly tra­di­tion­al. Alco­holic, irre­spon­si­ble and rebel­lious, Princess Bean is the antithe­sis of what is expect­ed of roy­al­ty, screw­ing up mis­sions and tak­ing drugs with her com­pan­ions, an awk­ward lovelorn elf and a per­son­al demon who may have more morals than she does. As sub­ver­sive a char­ac­ter as Bean may be in the con­text of the fan­ta­sy genre, for Groen­ing she is mere­ly a con­tin­u­a­tion of his lov­able, flawed heroes.

“I don’t know why I did it, I don’t know why I enjoyed it, and I don’t know why I’ll do it again.” This quote, from the 1990 Simp­sons episode ​‘Bart Vs Thanks­giv­ing’, sums up the men­tal­i­ty of one of its pro­tag­o­nists beau­ti­ful­ly. Bart Simp­son is a fam­i­ly-friend­ly anar­chist, a brat who destroys, van­dalis­es and pranks for the sim­ple plea­sure of it. Whether fizzing up beer or assum­ing the guise of graf­fi­ti scourge ​‘El Bar­to’, the goal is not to send any kind of mes­sage, it’s sim­ply to observe the chaos and cackle.

In many ways, it’s a fam­i­ly trait. His father Homer is moti­vat­ed by self-inter­est, embark­ing on the wildest of schemes on a whim, often dis­re­gard­ing the inter­ests of his fam­i­ly and friends for his own grat­i­fi­ca­tion. What Bart is to Chaos, Homer is to glut­tony. Hun­dreds of years lat­er, Futu­ra­ma​’s Ben­der rep­re­sents the worst of the bunch. Like Bean, he is a sub­ver­sion of genre expec­ta­tions – not a sub­servient, noble android, but a hard-drink­ing, thiev­ing, wom­an­is­ing sleaze who would sell out every­one close to him for the right price, or for his own amusement.

Dis­en­chant­ment fits per­fect­ly into the nar­ra­tive. The first season’s main focus is Bean’s rail­ing against the wish­es of her father, who wants her to be more respon­si­ble and ​‘princess-like’, turn­ing up drunk to polit­i­cal events and screw­ing up the small­est of tasks. There are lots of rea­sons giv­en for her flaws, but per­haps most press­ing is her desire to stave off adult­hood for just a lit­tle while longer, even at the expense of the kingdom.

So why are Bean and her pre­de­ces­sors heroes? Because they are us at our worst. Because respon­si­bil­i­ty can be annoy­ing and think­ing of our­selves is grat­i­fy­ing. They are the part of us that would rather go to the pub than the gym, or watch TV rather than do home­work. Best of all, they get away with it. Homer has stum­bled into a life­time of adven­tures, Bart is arguably hap­pi­er with his lot than gift­ed sis­ter Lisa, and Bean has found a new fam­i­ly in a duo of reck­less misfits.

The appeal of Matt Groening’s cre­ations can be found in their endurance. The Simp­sons is a cor­ner­stone of mod­ern pop­u­lar cul­ture, while Futu­ra­ma enjoyed a good run from 1999 to 2013, revived sev­er­al times by the pas­sion of its fans. After a suc­cess­ful first sea­son, Disenchantment’s Princess Bean has every chance of repli­cat­ing that suc­cess – once her hang­over clears up, of course.