Editorial by Emmet McGonagle
Stitch’s PR problem?
He may be cute and fluffy, but Stitch has the power to destroy the entire universe at his tiny blue fingertips.
First propelled to earth in 2002’s Lilo and Stitch, this little guy has been described as “an illegal, genetic experiment whose primary function is to destroy everything he touches.” Does that mean he’s killed a bunch of aliens? Regardless of attacking a number of alien officers, stealing a spaceship, using his new best-friend Lilo as protection from Jumba and Pleakley (and subsequently literally eating Pleakley’s head at one point) and killing a beloved fish called Pudge (which never left the film’s storyboards, luckily for Pudge); it seems the world still believes Stitch has more than enough room for redemption.
With Stitch making his first foray into the world of CGI (honestly, he looks way better than the atrocities they committed against Sonic the Hedgehog), let’s deep-dive into Experiment 626’s public relation problems and find a viable strategy for everyone’s favourite blue alien.
Attributes we can work with:
Family values! he was created as a weapon of mass destruction – similar to the atomic bomb of Jojo Siwa’s music career – it’s well known that Stitch’s soft spot is his family. After befriending Lilo, he went on to defend the rest of the Pelekai family (including Lilo’s sister Nani and her boyfriend David), protecting the group from harm’s way which he inadvertently put them in the firing line of in the first place.
Charisma, Stitch also has a mean Elvis Presley impersonation up his sleeve – a trait which could come in handy for any aspiring entertainer trying to break America. Watch out, Simon Cowell.
Solution:
Atrocities aside, there are a lot of routes we can take in order to turn Stitch from killer to rock ‘n’ roll thriller. First off, let’s put some of those Elvis moves to good use and show off some dancing skills along the way! Who knows, maybe Stitch could become a TV personality thanks to one of those soul-sucking competition shows which shall not be named.
The real goal here is to show the world that even though Stitch is different from humans, he has no intentions of actually destroying the planet. While soul-sucking competition shows could be a viable option for a talented impersonator such as Experiment 626, there are a few other routes which could to his advantage. Remember those poorly-photoshopped Vanity Fair covers? Well, Stitch has more than four limbs anyway, so he’d be perfect for a magazine mix-up in the not-too-distant future.
While he’s hanging out in the Condé Nast offices, why not strap him into their popular lie detector test and prove once and for all that he has no intentions of murdering us all, leaving a pile of blood and ash in his wake.
‘Ohana’ means family, and maybe that’s the key to solving all of Stitch’s PR problems. Let’s throw in a reality TV show along the way, showing viewers the virtues of family life in the picturesque island of Kauaʻi.
