Actually, I have never been asked this question inside the "Animorphs web community," and no one has mailed me after seing my page, asking me that, probably because practically the only way you could just find this page is by doing a search for "Animorphs" and surfing. But anywhere outside here, in other groups that I associate with such as anime/Sailor Moon, Babylon 5, etc, sometimes I don't even mention Animorphs among my list of interests, because when I do there is always the question, even when they too are fanatic about something of which fans are in the minority: "Why do you like Animorphs?" And then I have to give a long explaination so that I don't appear weird. After all, I'm not that young, what am I doing reading a kid's series? This question is most emphatic by people who have seen the T.V. show; many people who had an open mind to Animorphs previously, saw it and now wonder how on Earth I can be hooked on something like that.

All right, I will admit it was the "changing into animals" motif that drew me in. When ANIMORPHS first came out two years ago, I was really interested, because I was currently reading a novel that involved the shapeshifting folklore mostly contained in European fairy tales. Except Animorphs was a sci-fi series, which made it even more intriguing; could someone actually come up with a scientific explaination for changing shape? I was a little dubious, though, when I saw that it was made by Scholastic (I have been well aquainted with Goosebumps and other such series, which I found lifeless) and was growing to what I was sure would be huge numbers, as well as sporting the "weird" covers, from which I figured the main demographic were kids who just liked reading the books because they were about kids who changed into animals and were attracted to the flashy book covers.
    Then, my little brother brought home the first three ANIMORPHS books, and despite my bias against it I was still intrigued and read The Invasion. I thought it was pretty good and read #2: The Visitor, which I thought was wonderful, and after #3 I was hooked.

Which brings us to the original point (I'm sorry if I got a little away from that, now you know why it's called the Opinion and Editorial Section ^_^;) But why do I actually like the series? As I said before, I was attracted to the idea of "changing into animals," but that is not the reason I like it. Morphing, in the series, is not the main feature, but simply a motif, though a tool to the plotline, because without their morphing ability none of the stories of the five kids would be possible. Sometimes it's symbolic, sometimes it creates a turning point, and sometimes it changes their lives forever. The strongest example of this is Tobias. Even after he accpts his identitiy as a nothlit: a human in a hawk body, even after he is given back his lost morphing ability and human form, he constantly has to face the problems of how he is to deal with this, whether to try to become and remain human, or to give himself over to the feral instincts of the hawk, or to find some balance in between.

And that is the main reason I like Animorphs: the character depth. Each character has many layers: they are all multifacited, three-dimensional [though not always human] beings who are often much more than they seem. Even the villains, the bodysnatching Yeerks, have several faces, both as a race and as individuals, like the reluctant Aftran or the ambitious Temrash, even the supreme, Darth Vader-like archnemisis Visser Three, though his character unfolds a lot more slowly. Actually, he is one of my favorite characters; his personality is the perfect blend of absolute evil and an ordinary person doing what they were born to do and dreaming of better. But then, I could go on and on about Visser Three's character, so I'll save it for a full-blown character analysis later. And there is also the sifting narration, and we can see the distinct personalities of the six characters coming through in their narratives, like Cassie's thoughtfulness, Rachel's fierce determination, Marco's laugh-it-off approach to life, Jake's burden of leadership, Tobias's uncertainty about himself or Ax's loneliness and homesickness.

Another thing I should point out: contrary to what skeptics who doubt that Animorphs is anything more than another reincarnation of Goosebumps may think, the Animorphs books are not "all the same." There are several different structures for type of book, such as discovery, major mission/battle, new angle, personal conflict, etc, but the books are much more than a narrative of a plot, and each book is a distinct step in a progressive story, a larger, epic story, each book lending its own element to complete that puzzle, even if it seems to be a relativly insignifigant, humerous book. And even larger than this story, the whole ANIMORPHS story, is one that I often call the "big-picture" plot. It involves not only the six youths struggling to save Earth, but the intergalactic war of the Andalites and the Yeerks and all the others who were swept in, all the other races who, in their own ways, became involved and have, are or will shape Earth's fate. And in the end, the fate of the galaxy.

So that, basically is why I like Animorphs so much. Of course, that's not all the reasons, but the purpose of writing this was to explain my views in order to avoid finger cramping from typing various versions of this over and over to inquisitors, not to put you all to sleep.

Back to Opinions and Editorials
Back to Home