Calimero - Well that's an injustice

The famous cartoon hero Calimero, a black chicken with an egg shell on his head, marked the childhood of many with his ups and downs. Many remember him lamenting over himself and his bad destiny and saying at the end of each episode, 'Thar is injustice!' (or: 'Well, that's real injustice.'). Calimero is good and doesn't want to harm anyone, but happiness is simply not on his side.

He first appeared on the children's television show 'Carosello' in Italy in 1963, and the characters were created by creatives from the animation studio Organizzazione Pagot, first as part of a series of animated commercials for soap and cleaning products Ava, which were sold throughout Italy.

Italian detergent factory Miralanza performed a sad and annoyed black chicken in front of the public in an advertising campaign for Ava soap, which has not even been polished yet, because the tip of the egg remained on his head, and he is already facing all the misfortunes of this world.

The creative team made a series of promotional cartoons, and they all had the same ending: a black chicken, bathed and washed with Ava soap, would turn into a beautiful and clean, and most importantly and happily - a white chicken.

Calimero outlived Miralanza's advertising campaign, became a character for himself, and moved from commercials to life, to cartoons and comics. This is, I guess, a unique case in the history of imaginary friends and fictional heroes: someone who was destined, like a dragonfly, to live only one day or one advertising season, became a hero of the era, about whom stories were told that no longer had a connection. with soaps and detergents.

But just as life is not a television commercial, so that every story has a happy ending, so Calimero was not so lucky that the screenwriters sapped his life black with some magic. On the contrary, his story will be a story of irreparable torment and trouble, of the existence of those who are destined for life to be and remain - victims. The black chicken among the yellow chickens and could be nothing but a victim.

Calimero is not very smart, so the troubles that the screenwriter brings him into are not overly ingenious or complicated. Others would easily get out of them, but Calimero would not. It is his job to lament over himself and his bad destiny and to say at the end of each episode: "Thar is injustice" (or: "Well, that's a real injustice"). And that sentence eventually remained what we remember Calimero for.

Was he happier as a model of soap and detergents, in a world where everything costs, everything is produced and everything can be bought, including pure white feathers even after you are born black, or is he happier like this, in a world ruled by an injustice in which he, Calimero, also exists only to make injustices happen to him. If anything were fixed with this world, Calimero would disappear. Calimero would die.

Although he turns 59 this year, the famous Calimero looks younger than ever today. The famous baby, the only black chicken in the family of yellow chickens, since its presentation in Italy, now back in 1962, has come a long and interesting way that took him through Japan, where he gained full worldwide recognition, to France and the Gaumont animation studio. Calimero refreshed the image and devised new adventures of this hero, but also kept the qualities that made Calimero loved by many generations - cheerful spirit, wit, friendliness and most importantly - love of justice.