The Popular Cartoon Mascot Americans Have Never Heard Of

Originally for children, cartoon characters are loved by everyone. Mickey Mouse? Absolutely! Snoopy? Definitely! The Moomins? To people overseas, this is an easy answer: of course! But as Americans, you’re probably wondering who these white, hippo-like creatures may be. To know, one must delve into the world of Moominvalley and its creator: Tove Jansson.

Tove Jansson was born in 1914 in Helsinki, the capital of Finland. Born to creative, artistic parents, Tove would soon find herself going down the same path as her parents. At the age of fourteen, Tove wrote and illustrated her first children’s book, titled Sara and Pelle and Neptune’s Children.

The story behind the first Moomin ever created is a very interesting one. One summer's day by the outhouse of her family’s cottage, Tove and her brother find themselves arguing about literary philosophy. Something in the argument had offended Tove, so she proceeded to draw the most ugly creature imaginable on the outhouse : a Moomin! At the time, the creature was called a snork and looked more menacing and pointy. The Moomin had been created.

But what exactly is a Moomin? Well, the Moomins are a family featured in Tove Jansson’s children book series of the same name. They are white, chubby trolls with large snouts. The Moomin family consists of Moominpappa, Moominmamma, and Moomintroll, who is also simply referred to as “Moomin”. The family lives in Moominvalley in their big Moomin house and the entire series is a collection of adventures featuring an assortment of friends and characters. Tove believed that her book series needed to be made because of the winter war in 1939, which occurred after WWII had broken out. Tove felt that as the war went on, the happiness in people had disappeared. For this reason, Tove felt like she needed to restore the joy by writing a story that ended happily. This led us to the start of the first Moomin book:The Moomins and the Great Flood.

Tove wrote The Moomins and the Great Flood in 1939, but it didn’t see publication until 1945, when the war had ended. Even though this is canonically the first book in the franchise, it’s seen more as a prelude to the series. This is because the majority of the characters weren’t introduced until the second book, Comets in Moominland. The second installment in the series was published in 1946 and is vital when it comes to the introduction of famous characters that fans know today.

While the first two Moomin books were simply setting up the Moomin universe and went mostly unnoticed, it wasn’t until Tove’s third book in the series, Finn Family Moomintroll, was translated into English that Tove would receive international fame. However, in Finland, the book was titled The Magician’s Hat. The English name had been given to the book since and until 1980, it was marketed as the first book in the franchise, like C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe.

The following books, Moominpappa’s Memoirs and Moominsummer Madness, followed the same wholesome and well-natured formula as the first three books. Then came Moominland Winter. Moominland Winter was the first book in the Moomin franchise that Tove Jansson wrote knowing she had a world-wide audience waiting for her next tenderhearted book to go along with the previous installments. This, however, was not the case. The tone of the books had completely changed and would stay that way in future books.

Moominland Winter was about Moomintroll, who finds himself unable to sleep during his family’s hibernation period. He spends most of the book feeling depressed, angry, and fearful. Many fans considered this book to be a pivotal point in the series, one where they got a deeper look into the character of Moomintroll. The book series only continued to develop from there, with the next book, Moominpappa At Sea making the final transition from children’s to adult literature.

Moominpappa At Sea was written in honor of Tove Jansson’s father, Viktor Jansson. The book was meant to serve as a portrayal of his nature and was meant as a heartfelt goodbye, as he had passed prior to the book’s release. The final book, Moominvalley in November was absent of the Moomin family and featured an ensemble cast of characters. The characters all reminisced over the good times they spent in Moominvalley while taking turns to visit the Moomin house— only to find out that the Moomins were not there. The rest of the book consisted of the interactions between the characters who had occupied the Moomin residence in their absence.

The somber tone this book took on was said to be written in response to the death of Tove Jansson’s mother, Signe Hammarsten-Jansson. Tove stated after the publishing of this book that no more Moomin books would be written for she “couldn’t go back and find that Moominvalley happy again” (Entertainment Weekly). Screenwriter and children’s author Frank Cottrell Boyce described the book as “the wisest and most moving book about mourning [he’d] ever read” (The Guardian).

Coinciding with the books, there had always been televised adaptations of the stories starting in 1959 with the German-made television show, Die Muminfamilie (The Moomin Family). It ran for twelve episodes, all in black and white, with the family portrayed by puppets. It adapted all the stories featured in Finn Family Moomintroll and Moominsummer Madness.

In 1969, Tokyo Movie Shinsha, a Japanese animation studio, picked up the beloved characters and made a Japanese animated series simply titled Moomin. This show has quite a controversial history to it since the characters and wholesome nature of the Moomin franchise were completely discarded in favor of a more Japanese-appealing theme. For example, Moomintroll was depicted as a typical Japanese boy who got into fights and acted the complete opposite of how he was originally written. Tove felt very displeased with her characters’ treatment and requested that Tokyo Movie Shinsha be removed from the project after twenty-five episodes. Another studio called Mushi Productions took over, and although Tove never stated her opinion on this adaptation, it’s believed that she had no problems with it. The sixty-five episodes produced by Mushi Productions followed the tone of the books much more closely and removed all out-of-character actions.

What came next was the most faithful adaptation of the Moomin family. In 1977, Poland released its own stop-motion adaptation of the book series, referred to by many as The Fuzzy Felt Moomins. In this version, Tove would often be involved in the creation of all 100 five-minute episodes. Despite the fact that it was seen as the best adaptation, the show was exposed to criticism every now and then as it was believed to be too dark and scary at times for its target audience.

In 1990, Japan represented the Moomin franchise once more. This portrayal became the most popular, most successful, and best remembered adaptation of the family. The series, which wasn’t as long as Poland’s 1977 version, ran much longer than the 1969 one. This series was the one to ignite the fire known as the “Moomin Boom”.

Although the Moomin books were always best sellers within Finland, the television series created a Moomin craze not only in its country of origin, but also overseas—especially in Japan. The cute appearance of the Moomin family was highly marketable and they soon became everything from shopping center mascots to the main features of t-shirts. The Moomins quickly became a way that Finland represented itself to outsiders and tourists. At one point, the Moomins even covered the airplanes of the Helsinki airport. Even though the Moomin boom was heavily criticized for not following the philosophical Moomin brand, the rights to the Moomins still stayed with the Jansson family, with the family turning down offers from Disney in an effort to keep the series authentic. One should note that the brand still makes a yearly value of about eight hundred million USD.

In February of 2019, the first half of a new Moomin reboot titled Moominvalley aired in the UK, Finland, Japan, and many other countries. The show was made with a mix of 3D and 2D animation and had a budget of twenty million dollars, making it the most expensive Finnish television show of all time. As a result of the Moomin boom, a Moomin amusement park called Moomin World was built in Finland in 1993. The most popular feature within the park was easily the Moomin house, where you could visit and experience all five floors of the house in which the characters had lived. There was also another version of the Moomin house built in Japan.

Even though Tove Jansson died at the grand old age of 86 in June 2001, her legacy and books still live on, making the popularity of her white creatures grow as the years go by. Instead of being gritty and featuring dark themes like most media nowadays, the Moomin franchise challenges these concepts with the protagonist having two living and loving parents that go on adventures. If something can leave us with more than a smile, but in a positive state of mind, then it has succeeded in providing a real escape that many shows can’t provide. The Moomin franchise as a whole is happiness and, to me, that’s the trick to escapism.