Fantastic Mr. Fox

If Roald Dahl came back from the dead, and saw all that several of his books have been made or remade into successful movies, he'd probably ask the single question that is at the forefront of all hardcore Roald Dahl fans' minds: why aren't there any children being killed and/or eaten in any of these movies?

A lot of people will probably come to the defense of the films, saying that it is inappropriate to have children killed and/or eaten in movies that are made primarily for children. Or that children aren't actually eaten in Matilda, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Fantastic Mr. Fox.

To these people, I say there are certainly children eaten in all of those stories; you just need to learn how to read between the lines. And furthermore, there was never any greater advocate of child consumption than Roald Dahl himself. The only thing he liked more than eating children was eating children in front of other children he was going to eat later.

I seem to remember an enormous crocodile just all of a sudden deciding that he wants to eat some fucking children for lunch. So what does he do? He goes into town, and brags to everyone he sees on the way about the carnage to be. What am I talking about? Some fucked-up fever dream I had? No. That's the actual plot of The Enormous Crocodile, a book written by Dahl for readers aged 5 and up (probably the only reason it's targeted for kids so young is that the crocodile doesn't get to eat the kids in the end. Instead he just gets thrown into outer space, and into the fucking sun!)

If Roald Dahl were alive today, I guarantee you he would be in Wes Anderson's office right now, demanding that more children be dismembered and gobbled up by whatever horrible creatures were in his fantastic brain that day. And I'll tell you what, he doesn't care that none of that happened in Fantastic Mr. Fox either. Fuck it – let's throw some giants in there who go around and eat orphans like they're candy, is what he would say.

God rest your soul, Mr. Dahl.

4 out of 5 stars.