This page contains brainstorming about potential changes in the set of characters depicted in Who's Cuter, to be incorporated into a future revision.
It may be used for other types of feature requests and bug reports.
Specific requests for replacement
- Natalie Portman: Replace with another, more recently active celebrity
- Or if we take the theme to be "online communities" (that is, Slashdot) rather than "actresses," perhaps replace with Snoo the Reddit Alien (whose merchandise includes a spherical "Squishable Snoo" form)?
- a dog: Replace with a different dog, preferably one notable as an Internet meme; more specifically, I suggest doge
- Cacodemon: Maybe replace with Mike Wazowski from the Monsters, Inc. franchise? This is of dubious importance.
- Hampsterdance: Replace with a fresher meme? No idea which one though...
Additions without decided replacements
Uncontested cuteness
Weak or ambiguous cuteness
- Nyan Cat – highly-stylized fictional cats are not preferred
- Serious Cat
- Dora the Explorer - character design is cute enough, but the concept/setting may be considered creepy by some; see AtT discussion
- L'Inconnue de la Seine - more sexy than neotenous, therefore dubious for our purposes
Cuteness blended with an opposing trait
Real people
Real animals
Fictional characters
- Selkie (protagonist of the webcomic of the same name)
- Erma (protagonist of the webcomic of the same name) - cute and creepy ghost/undead(?) girl with a mother of the same nature
- Something about The Nightmare Before Christmas or other Tim Burton works (TODO: specify better)
Walter Margaret Keane's "Big Eyed Waifs" (a.k.a. "Keane Eyes") series of paintings - alleged to have inspired Tim Burton; also alleged to be an inspiration for the Powerpuff Girls
- xkcd!Sleipnir, shown as a reindeer with spider-like legs (mirror (Explain xkcd))
Regarding cats, my understanding is that Longcat is undesirable due to the requirement for a picture in landscape format
South Park is still relevant enough - no change needed there.
It might be worth removing one of Yoshi and Toad (no opinion which one) if we need to free up space for non-Nintendo characters.
Is Espurr worth a spot in the Pokémon pic, or would that conflate pure-cute with creepy-cute too much? We could theoretically resolve that issue by having a separate image for each Pokémon, but that would be wasteful. (TODO: Any other Pokémon worth mentioning, especially those notable as memes?)
See also