Hello & welcome back to the Sterling Holloway Spotlight. Today, we are taking look at the character of Amos from the 20 minute short, Ben and Me that first debuted on November 10, 1953. I have an interesting history with this short. Two years ago, I reviewed this short on Classic Shorts Showcase and I didn't care for it at all. I said it was the worst short, I'd reviewed up to that point. Cut to two years later and... this short still sucks. But this is not a re review of the short but rather a look at the short's character of Amos. As in the previous entries, we will look at his First Appearance, Role, Personality, Favorite Moment, and finally Is The Character Still Around?
First Appearance
Amos' first appearance. Well, there are actually two answers to this as you see the short starts in what this then present day as there is a field trip of school children learning about Ben Franklin standing at a statute of him and on top of said statute, there lies a statute of Amos with school mice learning abut Amos.
But then, we are truly introduced to Amos in story as the mouse teaching the mice children about Amos, opens up Amos' memoir and reads it. Then the short transfers over to first person narration as we see Amos at the church he lives with his family that consists of 26 children including himself. This is when we see him decide to leave and look for a job. After many failed attempts, he comes across Ben Franklin and they start a long and prosperous (and one sided) relationship.
Role
The best way to sum up Amos' role in this short is to compare to that of Remy from Ratatouille and Ben Franklin to Linguini in that the mouse is smarter then the person and this bugs me here because Ben Franklin was a real person. Yet according to this short, it was Amos that came up with all the great ideas. Even including the words in The Declaration of Independence. I honestly don't know why but that really bugged me in this short. Even more then the first time, I watched this.
Personality
He's proud, patriotic and easily upset by Ben's stupid antics. That's about it, he is a very patriotic mouse wanting to see his country succeed and there is nothing more to him, really.
Favorite Moment
Yeah, trying to find a favorite moment for this character is about as easy as saying something positive about Home on The Range. If you couldn't tell, I'm not really a fan but for me, it had to be, when he left Ben because he was tired of putting up with Ben's antics after Ben got him electrocuted. I was quite frankly pissed at Ben Franklin for endangering someone that was supposed to be his friend. So, I didn't feel any sympathy for him, and Amos should've never returned to that jerk.
Is The Character Still Around?
No! And he doesn't need to make a comeback, he was a one off character and I can't imagine that this short was ever that popular to begin with. Even though, I've seen Amos merchandise at Disney World but that was like five years ago. But other then that, Amos is a forgettable from a terrible short that I regret re watching but I made a vow to cover every character, Sterling voiced for the Spotlight. Ah, well join me next time for a better character as we look at Kaa from The Jungle Book.
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