The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Wednesday, March 17, 2021 — 9

Remember the “Cheese Touch”?
You know what I’m talking about. 

It was 2011. You were nine years old. 
You were on the bus ride back home, 
settled into your assigned seat and 
beginning to zone out, dreaming 
about your 30 minutes of allotted 
computer time on Poptropica that 
night. 

Suddenly, you felt a violent jab 

into the back of your arm. A smug-
sounding classmate then shouted 
“Cheese Touch!” in your ear, their 
voice dripping with ridicule, plus an 
undertone of relief. “Crossies!” 

Panic sets in. You turn around to 

view the offender, and they hold up 
their crossed fingers to your face to 
prove their immunity. The middle 
section of the bus explodes with 
laughter. You quickly search around 
to see everyone’s faces. They taunt you 
by rapidly holding up their crossed 
fingers, laughing. Desperate to get rid 
of the Cheese Touch, you scan the bus 
for any unsuspecting bystanders on 
which to pass off your deadly touch. 

Remember that nightmare? Well, 

we have one person to thank for 
that. Surprisingly, we have the same 
person to thank for your 30 minutes 
of allotted time on Poptropica: Jeff 
Kinney.

Initially a newspaper cartoonist 

in college, Jeff Kinney’s comics were 
criticized for looking too much like 
those of a “seventh-grader.” Citing 
the Peter Principle, Kinney decided to 
lean into his (perceived lack of) style. 

Now, Kinney is the author of “Diary 
of a Wimpy Kid,” one of the world’s 
most widely consumed children’s 
series, and the creator of Poptropica, 
the incredibly famous role-player 
gaming website for kids. He also owns 
a bookstore in Plainville, Mass., with 
his wife Julie. Talk about range! 

Kinney’s work is far-reaching — his 

series can be found at any book fair. 
However, children’s media experts 
and English teachers rarely seem to 
hold it in high regard. In fifth grade, 
my favorite English teacher Mr. 
Jonathan bemoaned the members 
of our class (including me) who read 
“Stick-Man,” as he called it. Too 
often, “Wimpy Kid” is seen as too 
“low-brow” to engage with (without, 
at least, some semblance of shame). 
However, I disagree: I think the 
“Wimpy Kid” series is a masterpiece 
on many levels. 

Let’s not put on airs: we read 

the book for its humor (mostly 
situational 
comedy, 
with 
a 

tasteful sprinkle of barf jokes). 
Greg, a tween assured of his 
own greatness, regularly tries to 
manipulate others, like his best 
friend Rowley, as well as his family, 
into doing his bidding. He fails a lot. 
Greg pretends his arm is broken to 
get sympathy, ridicules Rowley and 
concocts schemes for his crush, 
Holly Hills, to pay attention to him. 
These behaviors indicate a healthy 
dose of adolescent narcissism — 
Greg is manipulative, selfish and, 
honestly, kind of a jerk. However, 
anyone who remembers the ordeals 
of middle school knows what it feels 
like to fight their way through these 

grades — to tweens, this behavior 
might even seem normal. 

“It really captures the struggle of a 

child that age trying to figure out what 
it means to be a person,” Dr. Joshua 
Sparrow, a psychiatrist at Harvard 
Medical School, said in an interview 
with the New York Times. Greg 
definitely isn’t the best role model. 
He can be ridiculously terrible, yet, at 
times, relatable. 

However, it brings the unreliable 

narrator trope to mind: If Greg cannot 
be trusted, can his storytelling? Upon 
further examination, Greg’s problems 
seem very obvious to everyone except 
him. His accounts of constant jealousy 
of his younger brother, Manny (who 
represents everything Greg hopes to 
be), his desperation to play the victim 
when speaking to his older brother, 
Rodrick (who really didn’t do much 
wrong) and his constant dismissal 
of both Rowley and his mother (who 
make efforts to bond with him) feel 
one-sided. Greg, trapped in a prison of 

his own mind where he tries and fails 
to manipulate others, would do well to 
care about those around him. Maybe, 
were he to gain empathy for the 
people in his life, Greg’s never-ending 
cycle of manipulation would end, and 
he would finally graduate middle 
school. Kinney’s characterization of 
Greg feels simple and complex at the 
same time.

In elementary school, I ran to the 

Scholastic Book Fair during lunch to 
read the latest release. Today, “Wimpy 
Kid” still enthralls kids. It’s rare not to 
see a Wimpy Kid book at the top of the 
Children’s Bestseller List. Jeff Kinney 
might not be a household name, but 
Greg Heffley certainly is.

Less people know about Kinney’s 

involvement 
with 
Poptropica, 

launched in 2007, the same year the 
first “Wimpy Kid” was published in 
print. Many people are surprised to 
find out Kinney is the developer and 
creative director, despite spending 
countless hours on the website in their 

childhood. If “Wimpy Kid” feels like 
the continuation of one long story, 
Poptropica is the opposite: users jump 
from island to island, each containing 
its own interactive story that involves 
a quest, many of which are written by 
Kinney. 

Poptropica’s 
iconic 
character 

design, for which characters’ faces are 
sideways ellipses, with large blinking 
eyes, one slightly larger than the other 
depending on which way the camera 
is facing, is recognizable anywhere. 
Poptropica continues to live in a 
nostalgic class of online media for 
many late millennials and early Gen-
Zers, alongside websites like Webkinz 
and Club Penguin. In the ultimate 
super-mega 
nostalgia-extreme 

crossover of the decade, Kinney even 
created two “Wimpy Kid” islands 
within Poptropica, with storylines 
based on helping Greg babysit Manny 
and other cool, fun stuff. 

I have many fond memories of 

playing 
Poptropica, 
specifically 

the Greek Mythology island which 
coincided with one of my other 
childhood interests: the children’s 
book series “Percy Jackson and the 
Olympians,” written by Rick Riordan, 
with whom Kinney happens to be 
friends. It took me two years (and a 
lot of online tutorials) to get past the 
Underworld in Greek Mythology 
Island — this is not something I 
admit freely. Embarrassingly, over 
quarantine, 
I’ve 
started 
playing 

Poptropica again, and I’m still 
struggling with completing many of 
the quests. 

Kinney’s work isn’t without its 

faults. One wonders if Kinney has 

anything to gain artistically from 
continuing to publish seemingly 
indiscernible 
stories 
of 
Greg. 

Additionally, no one can forget 
Chirag Gupta (personally, my self-
insert character), the only person of 
color in his books, who was literally 
gaslighted into believing he was 
invisible and then deaf (I can’t make 
this up). Despite these flaws, Kinney’s 
varied body of work somehow has a 
kiddish, comfortable charm to it — it 
feels safe. 

To discuss the topic of evolution, 

it’s essential to note Kinney’s relative 
consistency after creating Poptropica. 
Kinney has been publishing the 
“Wimpy Kid” series since 2007 — of 
which there are 15 books (Yes! 15!). 
Greg and company have stayed in the 
same suburban middle school for 14 
years now. In Poptropica, while new 
islands and an app have been released, 
the overall feel has stayed the same. 
In an extremely short period, Kinney 
went through an intense multimedia 
ideation period that spawned cultural 
touchstones. Since then, Kinney 
hasn’t created any new franchises; 
with 
two 
long-lived, 
financially 

lucrative projects, he stays busy. 

However, to call him stagnant 

would 
be 
unfair. 
Within 
his 

established projects, he continues to 
expand worlds familiar to us. He’s 
created new story-based islands in 
Poptropica. He’s made a Rowley 
spin-off series within the “Diary of a 
Wimpy Kid” universe. It seems to be 
what Kinney does best as an artist: 
create an immersive world that is 
untouched by the passage of time, and 
flesh it out for years to come.

A few weeks ago, I was listening 

to music with my roommates on a 
Friday night. Much to their chagrin, 
I ended up controlling Spotify and 
turned on a playlist with some of my 
favorites. My close friend stopped me 
as Lauryn Hill’s “Ex-Factor” started 
and said, “This is from a Drake song!” 
Drake, who in 2012 called himself 
“the first person to successfully rap 
and sing,” was borrowing from one 
of the unsung pioneers of the hip-hop 
genre. It saddens me that most of us 
know Hill from her samples on tracks 
written by those who benefit from the 
style of hip-hop she pioneered. 

Lauryn Hill, whose work precedes 

that of artistically acclaimed rappers 
like 
Kendrick 
Lamar, 
is 
often 

overlooked as the originator of the 
hip-hop/soul genre, with beautiful 
instrumentation, impressive vocals 
and amazing flow. Her work seems 
to have been lost in the ’90s, when 
The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill was 
released. So how did this example of 
sweeping range that revolutionized 
hip-hop get lost?

Hill rose to fame through her 1992 

band The Fugees, which she formed 
with Wyclef Jean and Pras Michel. 
The band found immense commercial 
success and critical acclaim with 
the release of their 1996 sophomore 
album The Score. Hill, specifically, 
was praised for her interpretation of 

Roberta Flack’s “Killing Me Softly 
With His Song,” which blended 
hip-hop, 
reggae 
and 
Caribbean 

influences while at the same time 
maintaining elements of the original 
soul. Additionally, Hill showed her 
versatility with her verse on “Ready 
or Not,” in which she showcased her 
hip-hop credentials by rapping along 
to Jean. Overall, the band showcased 
a new neo-soul sense that blended 
Jean’s Jamaican roots with Hill’s vocal 
abilities and hip-hop background, but 
Hill specifically began her journey as 
a versatile artist. 

The Fugees disbanded in 1997 

due to internal strife between Jean 
and Hill. This separation would 
bring Hill’s greatest work yet, in 
the form of an album and style 
that would revolutionize the music 
industry. In 1998, Hill released The 
Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, her 
debut and only solo album. The 
album opens with audio of a school 
bell, and we hear conversations 
about love between the “students.” 
Every track ends with audio from 
one of these conversations, which 
describe the experience of love as 
a Black woman. Presumably, Hill 
herself is one of the students, getting 
“re-educated” after her titular 
“miseducation” about love. 

The album’s opener, “Lost Ones,” 

shows Hill’s rap prowess right out of 
the gate, establishing her abilities in 
the more traditional hip-hop genre. 
However, as we move through the 
album we hear Hill mix genres that 

she’d never fully dipped into during 
her time with The Fugees. Her range 
starts to shine through on “Ex-Factor,” 
where she pairs beautiful rhythm and 
blues vocals and instrumentation 
with rap. 

“Ex-Factor” is the type of track 

that blends so many genres it feels 
like you’re listening to every song 
on a diverse album, but the blending 
is seamless. Hill incorporates the 
guitar skills of artist Carlos Santana 

on “To Zion,” an ode to her firstborn 
son, incorporating Latin jazz into her 
style. Arguably her most famous song, 
“Doo Wop (That Thing)” showcases 
her rapping and singing prowess in 
another genre-mixing song, filled 

with the warnings of things that she 
was never warned against in her 
“miseducation” on life and love. 

We do see Hill divert into the “true” 

genres that she utilizes, specifically on 
her ballad track “The Miseducation 

of Lauryn Hill,” her R&B anthem 
in “Nothing Even Matters” and her 
more pure rap style on tracks like 
“Every Ghetto, Every City.” Hearing 
the record takes the listener across the 
entire musical spectrum, yet it always 

comes together thanks to a touch that 
is distinct to Hill. 

Women 
are 
often 
dismissed 

in the hip-hop world due to their 
gender, and it can feel like they have 
to choose their styles very explicitly. 

Women in hip hop who write about 
sexuality, like Cardi B, are dismissed 
as cheap shots despite men rapping 
about these same topics for decades. 
Hill’s range on Miseducation goes 
beyond musical range: She addresses 
a variety of topics related to her 
experience as a Black woman. Hill’s 
decision to mix styles and messages 
changed what it means to be a hip-
hop artist — a woman in hip-hop — 
and these changes are still felt today. 

Consider Kendrick Lamar’s To 

Pimp a Butterfly from 2015: Mixing 
jazz instrumentals with a spoken-
word style of rap and featuring 
artists from a variety of backgrounds 
felt revolutionary and fresh because 
of how well it was executed. But 
after listening to Miseducation, one 
quickly realizes that it all started 
with Hill’s style and fearlessness in 
mixing and mastering a spectrum of 
themes and disciplines. 

Understanding 
the 
influence 

of Lauryn Hill on the music 
industry and the groundbreaking 
impact of her debut album is key 
in recognizing the development of 
music at large. So the next time you 
listen to modern hip-hop and enjoy 
the now-popular style of blending 
vocals and rap, don’t forget the 
artists who started it. 

Lauryn Hill’s legacy deserves to 

be one of an artist who pioneered a 
style years before it caught on and 
beautifully 
mastered 
individual 

disciplines across an immense 
range.

Basement Arts has a longstanding 

reputation 
for 
showcasing 
the 

talents of University of Michigan 
actors and directors; it occupies 
the upper echelon of student-run 
theater 
organizations. 
Basement 

Arts’s collaboration with Blank Space 
Workshop, a student organization 
dedicated to showcasing the work of 
emerging playwrights, has been much 
anticipated. Unfortunately, the debut 
performance of this collaborative 
effort, “SHE,” fails to measure up.

Devised and directed by Music, 

Theatre & Dance junior Claire Vogel, 
Basement Arts’s short film “SHE” was 
conceived with one purpose in mind: 
To create a feminist play. Narrative 
and characterization are left by the 
wayside in favor of neon lights and 
funky eyeshadow. The production 
relies far too heavily on aesthetic, but 
aesthetic alone does not make a play. 
To paraphrase prominent YA author 
Rainbow Rowell, “Art isn’t supposed 
to look nice, it’s supposed to make you 
feel something.” 

And while the mere feat of making 

a play look “nice” and maintaining 
production value is nothing to scoff at 
during the era of Zoom plays and radio 
dramas, these efforts were wasted 

on a hackneyed feminist manifesto 
devoid of soul.

For a play whose only aim is to 

celebrate femininity, the script is 
remarkably tone-deaf. In the hour-
long film, trans women and BIPOC 
women are only mentioned once. 
I might add that they are clumped 
together in the same monologue, a 
thinly-veiled tokenization of these 
women and their experiences. That 
monologue, two minutes long at 
most, is the most intersectional 
feminism you’re going to get from this 
production. 

The rest are cringy montages of 

women “indulging” in junk food, 
comparing their bodies to numerous 
species of flora and defining their 
femininity by the way men treat and 
view them. In light of the tragedies of 
the past year, which disproportionately 
affected trans women and women of 
color, these tacky technicolor tales ring 
particularly distasteful. The heyday 
of trans-exclusive white feminism is 
long behind us, yet “SHE” continues to 
glorify it. 

If 
“SHE” 
seeks 
to 
promote 

unification 
and 
sisterhood, 
it 

succeeds. However, this sisterhood is 
only available to a privileged few. The 
cast is fairly homogeneous in terms of 
representation of varying identities 
— comprised almost entirely of thin, 
white, cisgender women.

That being said, the piece certainly 

has its virtues. In a powerful 
monologue, School of Music, Theatre 
& Dance freshman Emilia Vizachero 
details the role of a white woman’s 
tears in perpetuating racist myths 
about the danger men of color pose. 
This is perhaps one of my favorite 
pieces in the play, closely followed by 
Music, Theatre & Dance freshman 
Victoria Vourkoutiotis’s performance 
of a piece detailing the concerted 
erasure 
of 
same-gender 
sexual 

partners.

The level of performance from 

the actors and musicians involved 
was 
consistently 
strong, 
with 

beautiful renditions of “Armor” 
by Sara Bareilles and “Girls Just 
Wanna Have Fun” by Cyndi Lauper 
— the delivery is as good as it 
possibly could be given the intrinsic 
weakness of the script. 

Perhaps the greatest failure of 

“SHE” is its inability to develop 
any sort of narrative or character 
development (and this is coming 
from someone whose favorite 
contemporary 
playwright 
is 

Samuel Beckett). I adore the 
theater of doing nothing. I live 
for people lollygagging on stage 
and simultaneously evoking the 
meaninglessness of existence. I 
am in love with artistic genius 
masquerading as nonsense. What 

I cannot stand is nonsense that 
masquerades as artistic genius.

Simply put, a plethora of free-

verse 
similes 
comparing 
your 

genitalia to various types of flora is 
not brave. It’s boring.

It generalizes, it does little to 

build character and it utilizes 
talented actors as little more than 
talking paintings. It is a love letter 
to white feminism, and frankly, it’s 
one I’m tired of reading.

Ultimately, 
feminism 
doesn’t 

exist in a vacuum: It’s a situational 
response to both subjective and 
generalized oppression. The great 
existential 
philosopher 
Simone 

de Beauvoir asserts that “one is 
not born, but rather becomes, a 
woman.” 

“SHE” ignores the second part 

of this statement entirely. It focuses 
on the mantras, the stereotypes and 
the mores. It not only suppresses the 
experiences of any type of woman 
outside of the cis-heterosexual, white 
cultural norm, but it erases what can 
be considered one of the chief defining 
characteristics 
of 
the 
feminine 

experience: its subjectivity.

We cannot create a common 

narrative of femininity because it 
does not exist. You cannot reduce 
the female experience to a handful 
of cherry-picked narratives that you 
deem pretty enough and palatable 

enough to write about. If we attempt 
to define feminism within certain 
parameters, we will fail time and time 
again. The theatrical arts hold the 
utmost privilege in their ability to be 
subjective. No great play has ever been 
written with the intent of universality. 

Theater is powerful because 

it allows us to understand and 
empathize with those who are 

unlike us. Hence, attempting to 
create shapeless narratives and 
vapid characters serves no one. I 
am a white feminist, and my story 
has been told time and time again. I 
want to understand someone else’s 
story. Maybe it’s time we ditch our 
eyeshadow and neon lights; maybe 
it’s time to step aside and listen to 
someone else for a change.

Basement Arts’s ‘SHE’ tells a story we’ve heard one too many times

Zoo-wee mama: The evolution of Jeff Kinney

‘The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill’ and the evolving nature of hip hop

DARBY WILLIAMS

Daily Arts Writer

MADELINE POUPARD

For The Daily

MEERA KUMAR

For The Daily

Design by Brianna Manzor

Design by Erin Ruark

Design by Yassmine El-Rewini

