Luxo Jr. was the mischievous desklamp star of Pixar's first Oscar-nominated short -- a lively light source who'd later go on to grace their animated logo and become the closest thing they have to a Mickey Mouse. His presence is always a welcome one -- well, to everyone but the Luxo company of Norway, who sued last month for copyright infringement when they learned Disney would be packaging some copies of the Up Blu-ray with a limited edition Luxo Jr. lamp. The complaint also cites a new attraction at Walt Disney World, the LA Times reports, that is "a six-foot animatronic version of the lamp." And yet that would seem to be the least of the beloved mascot's troubles, at least as envisioned by this ingenious short film parody from CollegeHumor.com.
It begins with the familiar: Curious Luxo bouncing into the logo, then squashing the I into a pancake as he proudly takes its place. The only problem -- in this universe of anthopomorphized office equipment, the letters of the alphabet are just as human as anything else. A blood splat where the I once was evokes horrified reactions and vomiting from the victim's close friends, P, X, A and R. We then follow beleaguered Luxo through the criminal justice system, where he's tried, convicted, lands in a cell with a giant menacing penis, then meets his fusebox-addling doom in an electric chair. We'd never thought a lamp could affect us as much as a Björk or Sean Penn could -- until we remembered that Spike Jonze managed to eke out a similarly heartwrenching performance in a spot he directed for Ikea.
Remember this one?