The Binding Of Pinocchio

The Adventures of Pinocchio
The Adventures Of Pinocchio started as a serial in an Italian children’s periodical, with each issue containing an episode which would later become a chapter of the novel. It was one of the earliest examples of modern children’s literature. The author, Carlo Collodi, didn’t actually like children at all, and The Tale Of A Puppet was basically slapstick torture porn combined with mockery of the ignorance of rural people who came to the city. Pinocchio was a disobedient brat who knew nothing, and constantly got himself into ridiculous and horrible situations in which he suffered greatly as a result of his bad behavior. Despite this- or actually because of it- kids ate up the cautionary tale with its rich descriptions of terrible things happening to Pinocchio, which appealed in much the same way as Looney Tunes characters’ attempts to kill one another. After fourteen episodes Collodi got tired of the series, and decided to give it a tragic, cautionary finale: in the fifteenth episode the Fox and the Cat (who had earned Pinocchio’s trust by pretending to be lame in one leg and blind respectively) trick Pinocchio into entering the forest alone at night, disguise themselves, and then capture him, all in an attempt to get his money. When he won’t give it up, they tie his hands, bind his arms, and hang him by the neck from a tree in a heavy wind until he dies- a cruel and ironic fate for a marionette. And that was the end of Pinocchio’s adventures. Does this sound familiar at all? Maybe does it remind you of a certain robot girl getting garroted by her own strings? Or of the deception of a certain boy pretending to have a broken leg and a girl who secretly has the power to cloud the vision of others? Well, if you thought Penny Polendina’s destruction was an awful and pointlessly dark and cruel ending to the story of such an upbeat character, you’re in good company. Naturally, Collodi’s young readers were aghast as well. They were so upset that the editor asked Collodi to please continue the serial and bring the puppet back, and try to give it a happier conclusion. Collodi begrudgingly agreed, and picked back up with the Blue Fairy cutting Pinocchio down and bringing him home. She calls some incompetent doctors who humorously argue over the puppet’s condition, and eventually determine that Pinocchio is only mostly dead; over the next episode the Blue Fairy gradually nurses Pinocchio back to health. The serial went on to have twenty-one more installments after Pinocchio’s ‘death’, and when the installments were collected into the chapters of a novel, the original hanging episode was retained, becoming the fifteenth chapter out of thirty-six.

Disney of course found the hanging scene too gruesome to include in its adaptation, but other adaptations have retained it: the 1978 British animated adaptation of Pinocchio includes it, for example, and you can also see it in K. C. Green’s very faithful webcomic adaptation of Carlo Collodi’s novel.

Penny’s shocking and heartbreaking destruction wasn’t pulled out of nowhere; it was recapitulating Pinocchio’s story, and referencing the darkness of the original ending to the serial. It was never intended to be the end of her character. There’s every reason to expect that, just as Carlo Collodi saved his own story by bringing back the boy puppet and continuing his adventures, Miles and Kerry plan to bring back the girl robot in RWBY and continue retelling Pinocchio’s story- and she has got a ways to go before that story is complete. …unfortunately, that doesn’t mean Penny’s not going to have to face death again. Because, like every member of team JNPR, Penny is a gender-swapped version of a character who crossdresses and dies at the end of their story. In the original novel, Pinocchio doesn’t simply transform into a real boy; his puppet body actually dies- and stays dead- and he wakes up in a new, human body, with his old dead body laying next to him. As creepy as that is, Disney’s adaptation goes quite a lot further:

While in the novel Pinocchio and Geppetto manage to escape the stomach of The Terrible Dogfish unharmed, in Disney’s Pinocchio, when the living puppet attempts to rescue his father Geppetto from the belly of the whale Monstro, he pays with his life. And considering that Thor also dies to a giant sea monster, well… watch the seas.

Polendina
“Polendina” is Geppeto’s nickname around town in The Adventures of Pinocchio. It is not a name he likes or wants to be called; it’s actually an insult.

The nickname “Polendina” is the name of the Italian dish ‘Polenta’ combined with the feminine Italian agent suffix ’-ina’, the same one which in combination with 'ballet’ makes 'ballerina’, and equivalent to the English ’-er’ that combines with words like 'read’ to make words like 'reader’. Polenta is a mush made of boiled corn meal, often served as a porridge similar in form to the oatmeal porridge popular throughout the United States. Polenta is bright yellow in color, just like cornbread, and is a traditional northern Italian staple and a cheap and humble food associated with the lower classes. So, Geppeto is literally being called 'Porridge Girl’ by youthful hecklers.

The reason Geppeto is called this nickname is that he is very poor and has lost his hair and has taken to wearing a cheap, obviously fake bright yellow blonde wig to cover it up. The artificial yellow color of the wig reminds people of Polenta. So, while literally what “Polendina” means is 'Porridge Girl’, contextually what “Polendina” means is 'Humble person who is affecting a cheerfully bright and colorful imitation of the real thing that isn’t fooling anyone.’

And that describes Penny Polendina perfectly.