Redwall Foxes

[Alden the Fox]

aren't they so smart, and crafty? there'sjust one problem! THEY'RE ALL EVIL, CRUEL, VICIOUS, TRAITOROUS, AND BAAAAD!!!!!!!!

who else doesn't like this?







look at them! they're so evil!


fortunately the fantasy world also has

[Korin S.]

Got to remember that Redwall wasn't written with furries in mind, but children. Jacques wanted his good Redwallers to be the small herbivorous woodland animals, so naturally the villains would be their real-world predators. Children can understand all of that.

That said, I don't actually like the stereotype of foxes being the 'bad' guys. That however is more common in media with wolves and maybe panthers, or the like. I would think that a more accurate stereotype would be foxes being the antiheroes. Where their morals lie is debatable, but the cleverness and subterfuge will always be there. That would probably be more concurrent with real-life foxes too; foxes are omnivores, and opportunistic hunters, not ferocious and dangerous predators that take down animals several times their size.

[Alden the Fox]

Got to remember that Redwall wasn't written with furries in mind, but children.

    yes, but children love Foxes!

[Korin S.]

Got to remember that Redwall wasn't written with furries in mind, but children.

    yes, but children love Foxes!

Not if you show them killing their lackeys for sport, or poisoning their superiors... they must be evil, then! Oh, but that was your point in the first place.

I guess I mean that Redwall are very black-and-white books, too. Character development? Unexpected plot twists? Deep backstory and emotional dynamics? Kids don't need that. There are the good guys (certain species) and the bad guys (other species), and the good guys are going to win somehow by the end of the book. But I guess furries are sick of species stereotyping by now, though. Darn humans, amirite?

[Ryffnah]

(Disclaimer:  I haven't watched the Redwall television series, but I did read the first seven or so Redwall books.)

The fact that the foxes and other predator type animals were always evil deep down never really bothered me in Redwall.  I mean, the stories are basically told from the point of view of mice, and, from a mouse's point of view, you can't get a whole lot more evil than eating mice.  I'm actually much more bothered by things like the sabertooth tiger in Ice Age who becomes a good guy at the end -- what does he eat???  Seriously, now that he's friends with prey animals, what does he eat???  I can ignore it, because I know I'm supposed to, but it seems like a much bigger flaw to me than predator animals always being evil deep inside in stories told about prey animals.

The flip side of this is that I'm also fine with stories told primarily from the perspective of predatory animals (like cats) where prey animals (like mice and small birds) are basically seen as living toys with no particular moral significance attached to destroying them.

[Volt]

Yeah, I also always wished that some of the animals in Redwall would be portrayed differently, such as, like you said, a good fox. The reason why Outcast of Redwall is one of my favorites is because of Veil, a ferret who was found and raised inside Redwall. He had a lot of naughty habits (stealing, trying to get revenge by poison), and was eventually banished from Redwall, but in the very end he showed that he did have a good side after all. The Taggerung is my favorite also, though it's kind of opposite, where the protagonist is raised by the bad guys but always had a "good" heart, though he's an otter which is typically a good guy species anyway. In Salamandastron (I think?), there was a rat who turned good after he and his partner stayed at Redwall for some reason or other.

But yeah, I do agree, though I don't really take much issue with it.

[Alden the Fox]

Yeah, I also always wished that some of the animals in Redwall would be portrayed differently, such as, like you said, a good fox. The reason why Outcast of Redwall is one of my favorites is because of Veil, a ferret who was found and raised inside Redwall. He had a lot of naughty habits (stealing, trying to get revenge by poison), and was eventually banished from Redwall, but in the very end he showed that he did have a good side after all. The Taggerung is my favorite also, though it's kind of opposite, where the protagonist is raised by the bad guys but always had a "good" heart, though he's an otter which is typically a good guy species anyway. In Salamandastron (I think?), there was a rat who turned good after he and his partner stayed at Redwall for some reason or other.

But yeah, I do agree, though I don't really take much issue with it.

but they all died didn't they?

[Smart Wolf]

You know, I really wish there was SOMETHING with anthro animals that wasn't a cartoon...I hate tv ratings.

[Rocket T. Coyote]

#2--Slagar The Slaver

[phoenixwolf]

I read welkin weasles and redwall.welkin weasles has good foxes!

[Alden the Fox]

#2--Slagar The Slaver

durn rat! ah thank he's uh purdy evil wun.

[Wereaibo]

I read several of the Redwall books but could never get into them. I hated how black and white it was. If you're this, this and this species you're good but if you're that, that or that species you're irredeemably evil. That kind of thing always bugs me.  It's right up there with the ideas that ugliness is automatically evil and that it's okay to kill it if it isn't human for things that will make me hate a story.

[Aloneness]

Literature is very black and white, sorry, same goes for most games.

Predators are Evil
Space Aliens are Evil
Humans are Evil
Robots are Evil
Monsters are Evil
Everyone is Evil

[Mylo]

Literature is very black and white, sorry, same goes for most games.

Predators are Evil
Space Aliens are Evil
Humans are Evil
Robots are Evil
Monsters are Evil
Everyone is Evil

That's a very Western concept.

[Aloneness]

Literature is very black and white, sorry, same goes for most games.

Predators are Evil
Space Aliens are Evil
Humans are Evil
Robots are Evil
Monsters are Evil
Everyone is Evil

That's a very Western concept.

Maybe so, I was only making a joke it wasn't anything to be taken seriously...

[Old Rabbit]

In book 1 of Redwall the foxes weren't really evil killers. Just portrayed
as fortune hunters and thieves.  Granted the young fox killed the old
mouse of Redwall. But he was only trying to escape and struck a weak
old mouse too hard.

He and his mother were more victims than evil characters. They accually
helped the mice of Redwall even though they failed to profit from it.

[TravellingStoryteller]

It has more to do with animal stereotypes I feel, foxes may not always be evil but they are more often then not always tricksters that don't often tell the truth. Many stories have shown foxes deceiving others and advising one never to trust them. Such is actually a very old concept, and in Redwall this is added on with the fact predators and omnivores are often shown as as threat to the heroes.

The heroes have support from each other, they can develop the more positive relationships and have strong morals. Rats, wolves, foxes, ferrets... these races can't trust each others and much rely on their own wits to survive. These are races willing to lie, cheat, and kill others to get what they want because such works for them.

All in all, for a series like Redwall I feel it works (Keeping in mind I consider myself a fox more then anything else).