5 Stages of Inebriation Illustrated by Disney Characters

By Gerry Flynn

Growing up I never really understood Disney films, I don’t mean I was a simpering moron (I was but that’s irrelevant) – I mean I just didn’t get the appeal. Every issue in life seemed to be solved by musical numbers and without fail, good triumphs over evil in an ever reductive, didactic moral message that was streamed into the eyes of the young and impressionable through the medium of bright colours and warbling voices. Fast forward to now where you're probably wasting your time reading this, and I’m still just as jaded by the bastards! But many of my peers are still infatuated by these cartoon ghosts of their childhood. Perhaps they’re transported back to a simpler, happier time just by watching these films; a time where warm milk was the solution to life’s problems and not a double whiskey at sunrise. So, without further a due, here is drunkenness as represented by your childhood moral messengers...

1) Friends for life syndrome - Goofy

It’s that stage of the night whereby you realise that this casual acquaintance in your arms, slurring the words to Bohemian Rhapsody, may actually be the sole organism on this lonely blue planet who truly understands you. It is also this stage that you will confide in them your plans to kill your spouse for their considerable inheritance, and spend the duration of the next day’s hangover cop-proofing your house.

2) The Action Hero - Micky Mouse

And here’s the 5ft nothing guy who’s decided to get territorial on the dance floor after one too many WKDs. So convinced is he of his own moral righteousness and so oblivious to his plight for recognition, are other drinkers in their drunken stupor. He is quite understandably furious, like a seething foetus dipped in alcohol. One more Apple Sourz shot and this guy will trip over his own umbilical cord swinging for the DJ because they’re not playing his jam.

3) It’s my birthday and I’ll die if I want to - Pluto

You’ve all gathered to attend someone’s annual ageing ceremony only to find them half naked, doused in their own detritus and unconscious next to the oven, where they decided to line their stomachs with a highly questionable baked bean pasta combo that looks like someone already ate it, threw it back up and set it on fire.

4) Empathetic oneness with the world - Snow White

Evicted from the club after indecently exposing yourself to the bouncers and vomiting over yourself, you are divorced from reality by the goodnight shot you swore would help. So you gleefully stumble through what appears to be wilderness, but will later reveal itself to be the car park at Aldi. Along your voyage you regale your friends with tales extolling the values of painting bins at Glastonbury and making them promise to do it with you next year whilst they try to drag your bleeding, vomit-sodden carcass home for the night.

5) All’s well that ends in chicken - The Seven Dwarfs

We’ve all been there as the last embers of the night die away and the shot-slamming enthusiasm at the beginning of the night gives way to the realisation that your rent money has just afforded you a night shambling around with other vapid meat-sacks to the sound of a Jesse J remix in a dingy squat-hole where the bartenders all have ponytails. Greasy recycled animal bits are your only consolation shared with friends and it takes the soberest one among you to spy that the shutters are going down on the last chicken shop for miles and you're all about to get hangry.

#Edits