Being Pretty | No Monsters | Children's Toys | Don't Feed The Freaks | Model Citizen | Friendly Shadow | Immortal Machine
First Released: January 10, 2020
A documentation of the lives of the Robinson family, true model citizens.
Model Citizen contains examples of:
- A Day in the Limelight: The short follows the life of the Robinson couple, showing the typical life cycle of an Autodale family: they live their lives, and once their children grow up and start families of their own, they willingly declare themselves Ugly and allow themselves to be executed.
- Bait-and-Switch: A Handyman praises the Robinson couple as they are about to be executed. This prompts Mr. Robinson to take off his mask. It seems as though he'll finally buck the status quo or try to escape. But instead, he takes the Handyman by his hand, happy to die.
- Mr. Robinson: Thank you, Joe.
- Conditioned to Accept Horror: Played with. The Robinson couple willingly brand themselves Ugly once Junior marries and moves out of the house, due to there being no more use for them. Still, they are scared when they walk to their deaths, comforted with the knowledge that they raised Junior to be a dutiful citizen, and that they were true model citizens.
- Downer Ending: Overlaps with Bittersweet Ending: the Robinson couple did a great job raising Junior. However, they have still been willingly executed for being old, and have raised Junior with the same mindset of following the strict rules of Autodale. It is implied he and his wife - now the only Robinson family - will follow his parents down the same self-destructive route.
- Exact Words: "Your families are what keeps our engines turning and turning!" Doubles as foreshadowing for Immortal Machine where it's revealed the blood of the "Uglies" is used to sustain the Matriarch.
- Identical Stranger: Throughout the short, the Robinson couple have nicknamed a particular Handyman who does daily checks Joe. At the end of the short, a Handyman praises the couple for being model citizens. Mr. Robinson thanks him, referring to him as "Joe."
Word of God states that these two Handymen are different, as Joe has scratches on his breastplate, but the Handyman who executes the couple doesn't possess these. - Never Say "Die": In the short, the word "death" is never used. The Robinson couple simply say its time after Junior moves out. Meanwhile, the propaganda says that a Model Citizen "knows when their time is up."
- Soundtrack Dissonance: Tchaikovsky's beautiful Waltz of the Flowers continues to play over the Uglies lining up to be summarily executed and chucked in a pit. Justified, as the tune is played over speakers alongside the Death March presumably to keep the victims calm.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Previous shorts imply one is declared Ugly as a form of eugenics, such as if they're mentally or physically impaired. This episode shows that one can be declared Ugly simply because their children have grown up and left the house. Like a rusty, squeaky cog, they are replaced once there no longer is a use for them anymore.
