These shorts wouldn't even attempt to hide it.
The Elmo Shorts, created by Newgrounds user mecagir
is a series of shorts released on the website, Newgrounds. As their names imply, stars Sesame Street's lovable mascot, Elmo. However, the shorts also feature original characters, namely the sentient calculator Mathman, and the Mad Scientist, Doctor.To summarize this particular internet phenomenon, the shorts were essentially expies of the famous web show Happy Tree Friends. The Elmo shorts feature the same Nightmare Fuel and Body Horror. In virtually all episodes, Elmo or another character are doomed to suffer a merciless and gruesome death. These animations were somewhat popular, as they earned a fanbase, spawned a few interactive flash videos, and even gained a cult following. However, the series is currently on a halt as of 2011, and in 2013, the creator became inactive altogether.
This show provides grisly examples of:
- Art Evolution: At first, the animation was admittedly crude to put it lightly. However, as the episodes progressed, the art style became more refined, if still a little amateur.
- Body Horror: The driving point of the shorts.
- The Cameo: Lumpy makes a cameo in Elmo Dies The Game: Xmas Edition.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Every single Elmo short puts the red monster through agonizing pain.
- Comedic Sociopathy: Doctor in the early shorts. He was always a Mad Scientist who would put Elmo or others in harm for a twisted experiment.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: All of the characters have gone through this.
- Death Is Cheap: Elmo, or any other character for that matter, has been killed many times. Yet, they come back in the next short.
- Early-Installment Weirdness:
- In the earlier shorts, Elmo and friends had more chances to speak proper dialogue while distinct stories were conveyed. In later episodes, a character spends most of their screen time getting tormented trying to accomplish a task. However, this format has briefly resurfaced in the short "elmo the zombie".
- Eye Scream: Oddly, the eye injuries are more so gruesome than the series they are trying to parody.
- Facial Horror: It's common for a character's face to be skinned.
- They Killed Kenny Again: Every major character has died multiple times.
- Vague Age: Elmo's age is never stated in this series. While Elmo's canon age was stated to be three years old, Elmo looks and acts much older in the shorts created by mecagir.
