I just want to offer my sincerest apologies for bringing this post extremely late! I had some delay in obtaining a copy of today’s film!
And what is today’s film, you may ask? Well, it’s Disney’s 26th animated feature, “The Great Mouse Detective” or as it’s sometimes been known, “The Adventures of the Great Mouse Detective” (which is kinda misleading, since the movie is really only about one particular adventure of the great mouse detective)! Regardless, let’s take a look at this movie!
Released in 1986, this film gave Disney the comeback that they were seeking after “The Black Cauldron” critically and financially embarrassed them and their forefathers!
That’s not to say that this film didn’t have its problems too! After the executives at Disney decided to re-name the film to “The Great Mouse Detective” instead of its original title, “Basil of Baker Street”, the filmmakers were not happy! One of the animators actually wrote a fake memo, supposedly from one of the Disney executives, stating that most of the previous animated Disney films would be re-named with generic titles!
“No, John, I’d rather see ‘The Evil Bonehead’! That sounds like classic Disney!”
Anyway, the movie, based on a series of books, is pretty much the “Sherlock Holmes” stories told in the world of mice and rats! Our hero is the Sherlock Holmes of his people, Basil of Baker Street, and solves crimes for people much in the same manner as Sherlock Holmes!
Heck, he actually lives inside the house of the real Sherlock Holmes himself!
But Basil’s main crimes are those correlated with the evil mastermind, Professor Ratigan, a sewer rat/gentleman wanna-be voiced by Vincent Price himself!
Many a time has Professor Ratigan slipped through the hands…umm…claws…umm…paws…umm…appendages of Basil; and Basil is given one more chance to capture the culprit when a young mouse girl, Olivia comes to him seeking his aid! She is accompanied by mouse doctor, David Q. Dawson, who would play as Basil’s Watson!
Olivia informs Basil that her Scottish father
has been kidnapped by a peg-legged Candy Candido-voiced bat;
and Basil puts the clues together and realizes that Ratigan is behind the kidnapping! The rest of the movie sees Basil, Dawson, and Olivia try to find Olivia’s father and stop Ratigan and possibly even save the kingdom!
Our forgotten/minor character today is Mrs. Judson, Basil’s housekeeper! Based on Sherlock Holmes’ housekeeper, Mrs. Hudson; Mrs. Judson is seen briefly near the beginning of the film and is never seen again! So, not all that much is known about her! But, seeing as this is a “Sherlock Holmes”-type film, let’s put on our deerstalkers and see if we can deduce anything about her!
Well, first of all, we see that she is a somewhat elderly woman-mouse! This implies that….umm…the best housekeepers in the world of mice are elderly and female?
Oh well, moving on! We know that she seems to have a special bond with her pillows which is evident after Basil shoots them to smithereens…with a gun…and on purpose, to top it all off!
It seems as if she is a quite patient lady mouse to put up with Basil’s antics and near-manic behaviors! Maybe she secretly sees Basil as a son and adores him and although she may get annoyed now and then because of his inconsiderate actions, she will stay by his side until the very end!
Or, the absence of her character from the rest of the movie could mean that she’s snuck off under Basil’s nose, boarded a ship, crossed the ocean, and got a job working for the Antarctic branch of the “Rescue Aid Society” in order to stay as far away from Basil as she can!
“Volunteering…Antarctic…Are you sure she doesn’t need rescuing herself?”
Whatever the case, Mrs. Judson definitely had to put up with a lot from our friend, Basil, and for that I award her with the “Forgotten/Minor Character” badge for one of my favorite animated Disney films, “The Great Mouse Detective”!
P.S. We are officially halfway through my “Disney Canon-Forgotten/Minor Characters” project! Applause, people, applause!
The Animation Commendation 
Okay. I officially love this blog. You included many favorites: Sherlock Holmes, Robert Downey, Jr., the new Sherlock Holmes series on BBC, and last but not least, the Great Mouse Detective. As I mentioned, I’m so glad to discover your blog!
Lol, thanks! I’m glad it’s been made official that you love this blog! Please continue to visit it!
Please I appreciate you use my drawing. But will you please add some credit? Just write by NightMagican on deviantART 🙂 Thank you
Forgive me, I didn’t know how your name. I’ll definitely edit it now 🙂 !
It’s okay^^ Just reminder that when you post others things and tell them
This film is pretty good though the animation is iffy. I like our forgotten character and she seems so sweet. I never forgot her.
I’m a big “Sherlock Holmes” fan, so this is one of my favorite films in the Canon.
Gods, do I pity Mrs. Judson! All the mishegaas (“craziness,” in Yiddish) that Basil puts her through!
For Ron Clements’ and John Musker’s directorial debut, GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE is a winner in my book. All of the characters in this movie are really well-developed, the humor is infectious, and Ratigan is easily one of the most delightful villains in animation history– Vincent Price’s hammy voice performance and Glen Keane’s animation make it clear that this character KNOWS he’s the bad guy, and loves every second of it. (Same goes with Eartha Kitt and Dale Baer’s joint collaboration on Yzma, and Betty Lou Gerson’s teaming with Marc Davis on Cruella de Vil.)
Interestingly enough, that fake memo spread around the studio wound up as a category on JEOPARDY!, entitled “In Other Words.” (I found this out from the documentary WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY.)
So THAT’S what mishegaas means! I wanted to know since I heard it in the ‘Mushnik and Son’ song from ‘Little Shop of Horrors’.
Hi! Loving your blog… especially all these forgotten characters that so deserve mentioning!!! (I actually haven’t forgotten hardly any of them–of the movies I’ve seen at least–love these characters) =D
Um, random question, do you by any chance happen to hate bagpipes? Seems like all the other Disney blogs I’ve read rant on multiple posts about how much they hate them… and I happen to love them =P Lol, maybe I shouldn’t ask. Seems to be a touchy point with some people.
Thanks for the comment!
No, I have no hatred towards bagpipes, lol!