Jiminy Cricket: The Conscience Behind Pinocchio's Mischief

Joshua Noel: 00:01:15

Have you ever murdered a cricket only to find his ghost become your conscious? Probably not. But if you did, please seek help. This is Systematic Geekology. We are the priest to the geeks.

I'm Joshua Noel here with the one and only Andy Walsh. Today we're talking about Jiminy Cricket and Pinocchio as part of our faces behind us here on Systematic Geekology.

se who don't know, that's our: 2026

Early on in the year, we put up a vote to see what people wanted us to which characters they were most excited about. And Jiminy Cricket was one that got a lot of votes. So Andy Walsh and I are excited to talk about it.

Andy, before we get into anything else, though, what have you been geeking out on lately?

Andy Walsh: 00:02:01

Well, you know, the wind was taking on my geek sails a little bit last night, but I am still excited about the New York Knicks in the NBA Finals. They had a historic run of 13 wins in a row, an outstanding point differential over those wins.

And so, you know, we had a minus setback last night, but the future is still looking good.

Joshua Noel: 00:02:24

Nice. Nice.

I'm going to be annoying and also kind of date this recording for when it comes out because, like, the state of play was relatively recent or like PlayStation's big event.

Talking about all the games and stuff coming out and like all the other Kingdom Hearts fans who absolutely knew they weren't gonna say Kingdom Hearts, were still devastated that they didn't say Kingdom Hearts. But that new Hellboy coming. Hellboy, that new God of war coming out in the new Wolverine coming soon look just so good.

So I've been geeking out, just watching like YouTube videos, some of the gameplay and stuff that they showed and getting excited for those. It looks like there'll be a fun time. Probably not as much fun as for me as a Kingdom Hearts 4 would have been, but I'm still gonna have fun. Yeah.

Andy Walsh: 00:03:08

Yeah, that, that Wolverine game, I was excited about all the X Men references and then I watched the actual gameplay and saw how gory it was and I went, maybe I'll stay with Lego Batman. Thank you.

Joshua Noel: 00:03:19

It is kind of funny though, because they're basically like, x Men don't exist in this world. And I'm like, fine. I guess I really was here for fighting as Wolverine. I some games I played for story and some I'm like, I want to be Wolverine.

Andy Walsh: 00:03:33

Yep, I saw a whatever in the blue squat, blue sky. Equivalent of a used to be a tweet is yesterday that was. Video games are basically playing with dolls.

And the more the game just lets you play with dolls, the, the better it is.

It's like, I don't know that that's always true, but you know, definitely what you were just describing fits into that category of I just want to be Wolverine.

Joshua Noel: 00:03:53

Yeah. Yeah, well, like Kingdom Hearts. Sorry, we're going on tangent.

Kingdom Hearts, like I will sit there and they have like, they'll release where you can just watch all the videos and don't actually have to play. And I'm like, that's fine for me. Sometimes I'm like that. But like Wolverine, I. I just want to smash things.

Like when you take the toys and just crush them together, that that's what I want. So yeah, I'm excited for that. Anyway, guys, we do want to shout out some of our financial supporters. You guys are amazing.

Today I'm gonna mention Frank Toglauer.

I'm not sure I'm saying your name right, but if you guys want your own shout out like Frank, you too can become an official member of Systematic Ecology on our website. The link is in the show's description and just put whatever you want there. I will attempt to pronounce it when I shout you out.

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ies that we've done so far in: 2026

On the website, but all the ones that have been on the main feed are in a single playlist using that link.

So, all that said, it's time for us to jump into our main discussion, which we're talking Pinocchio, which is just, you know, like, we do a Disney series on here. There's like, the Disney stuff, and we go through, like, movie at a time.

Like, I just don't expect some of these, like Pinocchio to show up outside of that, like, niche. Like, we're specifically talking about Disney animation, you know.

Andy Walsh: 00:06:02

Yeah, I did not see this one.

Joshua Noel: 00:06:04

Coming either, but here we are. So we're talking about Jiminy Cricket and his role across several iterations of Pinocchio. Most telling.

I thought it was really interesting how they used him in the Del Goro.

Andy Walsh: 00:06:20

Guillermo del Toro.

Joshua Noel: 00:06:21

Yeah, his Pinocchio. I thought it was interesting how they used the Cricket there. I couldn't think of his name for the life of me. It's one of TJ's favorites.

He thinks it's the superior Pinocchio movie. But how they used him in it there was interesting, and I think it has to do with what Disney did.

Because in the book that little cricket dies pretty quick. Like, almost. Actually, I think it is literally immediately he's just dead. And Disney decided that wasn't great for a kid film, so they changed it.

Made him to this lovable, you know, cricket on your shoulder. Speaking advice. Mild mannered, very kind character who really outlives the movie of Pinocchio.

And I think that's why these other iterations like Del Toro's movie don't just have the cricket killed off immediately. I think Disney made the character more than he was, you know.

Andy Walsh: 00:07:12

Yeah. I mean, you say he outlived Pinocchio. I mean, he is one of the three faces of Disney.

And I don't know about the seat, but, you know, as Mickey Mouse enters the public domain and, you know, is perhaps a little bit less usable as an identifiable character, Jiminy Cricket may come to the fore a bit more as the company mascot along with Tinkerbell. I don't know. I don't run Disney, but I just.

Joshua Noel: 00:07:38

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, he's in. Well, so obviously he's in Pinocchio.

And I think everyone listening probably knows he is the little cricket who is Pinocchio's conscious and gives him advice throughout the Disney animate film.

Andy Walsh: 00:07:50

Cricket.

Joshua Noel: 00:07:51

But he. Yeah. What did I say?

Andy Walsh: 00:07:54

No, you said Cricket, which is correct. He is called Jiminy Cricket, but he is a cricket because he has four limbs and no wings and is bipedal.

Joshua Noel: 00:08:07

Yeah. He looked kind of like an ant, but that. Besides with, like, less legs. I don't know, something about his face is weird to me. Okay.

But he shows up in fun and fancy free, so it's one of the, like, package film era films. We have him in Mickey's Christmas Carol, who Framed Robert A Rabbit. He's in the Once Upon a Time show.

For some reason, he's in a lot of educational shorts that Disney did like in the 50s and 60s.

And of course, most notably for me, he is in all of the Kingdom Hearts games because he is the one who has the journal that logs everything that's happened.

Andy Walsh: 00:08:39

Yeah. And I think, rightly or wrongly, I kind of associate him with the wonderful world of Disney, like, presentations. The, you know.

Oh, yeah, the, like, Sunday night, you know, feature. Sometimes it'd be a feature film, sometimes it was more like a documentary behind the scenes kind of thing.

Or maybe I'm merging different kinds of shows. But anyway, I. I remember him being a presenter character on. On Disney programs of my childhood.

Joshua Noel: 00:09:04

Yeah. Yeah. I think he was in House of Mouse a lot too, I feel like. But it definitely outlives this one film.

So if you don't know who Jiminy Cricket is, I'm kind of impressed, actually, because he's pretty much everywhere. Yeah. So in the original book, we mentioned it earlier, what actually happens? Pinocchio the cricket tries to give him some advice.

Pinocchio being the nice little boy, he took the book, throws it against at the little cricket and murders it so that it will shut up. And then later on throughout the book, the cricket kind of comes back as like a ghost and he's just kind of Pinocchio's conscious.

Pretty different, I think, from the version most people are familiar with, because most people aren't familiar with the book anymore, I don't think. Yeah, yeah.

Andy Walsh: 00:09:47

I certainly never read the book. When you told me about that or when I read about it in your outline, I was. Oh, this is all news to me. Interesting.

Joshua Noel: 00:09:56

That's pretty funny. So for you then and for, you know, I guess that most people. Could you maybe just lay out who is.

What is Jiminy's Cricket story in the Disney animated film?

Andy Walsh: 00:10:08

Yeah. So just like he is a cricket with air quotes. He's kind of a conscience with air quotes. He's the narrator of the story.

He reminds me of Gonzo and Rizzo the rat in Muppet Christmas Carol. It's sort of a waifish character sort of drifting through town. And it's like, oh, what light through yonder window breaks? Let me go check that out.

Maybe I can get something to eat and get somewhere to stay warm and, you know, peeps on Geppetto putting the finishing touches on his marionette, Pinocchio, and, you know, introducing him to his pet cat and his pet fish. And Jiminy Cricket just kind of, you know, enjoys the show and then just sort of crashes there.

And Geppetto, you know, as he's drifting off to sleep, makes some kind of comment about wishing that, you know, Pinocchio was a real boy. And so the Blue Fairy shows up to bring to animate Pinocchio. And, you know, Jiminy Cricket kind of gets tangled up in this.

Because he's there, he kind of gets tangled up in this. Like, what, you know, what's, you know, who's going to look out for Pinocchio? Like, you know, Blue Fairy. I'm not sure.

You're being a very responsible parent slash wish granter. You've animated and given sentience to this being without any sort of development or education or anything.

I think we need some training wheels on this bike here.

And volunteers, or is conscripted to be his conscience, proceeds to then oversleep on his first day on the job, allowing Pinocchio to be taken in by a couple of ne' er do wells who talk him out of going to school and instead going to star in a puppet exploitation show. I don't really know what. I don't know how to describe that. Right. But it's a puppet show, I guess, that is also somehow kind of a scam.

But it's not clear what the scam is, except that it's also exploiting Pinocchio as the like. Well, here's a. Here's a puppet that we don't have to puppet. And people will be intrigued by that. And so then Jiminy Cricket tries to rescue him from.

Pinocchio discovers that this is not a. A one off. He's now imprisoned by the Stromboli, the puppet show auteur.

And so Jiminy Cricket tries to rescue him from that, but can't pick the lock because it's too old. And so Pinocchio winds up in Pleasure island in this whole other scam of turning boys into donkeys for cheap labor.

And they finally get out of that and. And then Jiminy Cricket and Pinocchio go home and find that Geppetto has gone looking for his missing boy and has wound up in the belly of a whale.

And so the third act is now we're in the belly of the whale. How do we get out of that? Oh, that's right. Whales can sneeze and.

Joshua Noel: 00:13:18

Yeah, yeah.

Andy Walsh: 00:13:19

And, you know, so I, you know, I had not watched this movie since probably I was a child. I don't think our kids were interested in it. I don't remember watching with our kids.

Maybe my wife did when I wasn't around because she had more time with them when they were that age. But. Yeah, so the donkey thing freaked me out as a little kid. So it was never one that I was really all that interested in revisiting.

I kind of put it on in the background yesterday just to refresh my memory a little bit of what exactly happens. I remember the whale, I remember the donkeys. I remember I've got no strings to hold me down. But wasn't exactly sure of all the plot mechanics.

And yeah, Jiminy Cricket kind of. Kind of. All right. Kind of helps out. Kind of falls asleep at the wheel some.

Joshua Noel: 00:14:03

Yeah, yeah. Also fun in the book. I'm pretty sure it's a big shark instead of a whale.

Andy Walsh: 00:14:07

Okay.

Joshua Noel: 00:14:08

Which is definitely cooler. But yeah, so we have.

We've actually reviewed several Pinocchios on this show, weirdly enough, but during the Disney eras, TJ and I talk about why a lot of people consider the animated one basically the perfect animated film. So this is like the standard for animators.

But I think that's more from like an art perspective than a story perspective because they just do a lot of really interesting things for the time. Because you gotta remember, this is a really, really old film, guys. It is not by any means from our. My generation. I don't think it's actually.

I don't think it's from Andy's generation really either.

Andy Walsh: 00:14:45

Thank you. No, I, I would not even remember.

Joshua Noel: 00:14:48

How old it is, but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't.

Andy Walsh: 00:14:51

I would say that it's for my grandparents generation. I don't think even think.

Joshua Noel: 00:14:54

Yeah, that would have been my guess.

Andy Walsh: 00:14:56

So.

Joshua Noel: 00:14:56

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think, you know, I think it's a good movie overall. I, I think Jiminy Cricket's role. And that's what's weird to me.

It's like somehow culturally, he seems to have a bigger impact than he actually has in this story.

Andy Walsh: 00:15:12

Yeah, yeah, there's definitely a. Like, well, what if Indiana Jones was never in the movie? Would it be any different? There's a little bit of that flavor to Jiminy Cricket too.

Joshua Noel: 00:15:21

Yeah, yeah. And it's. It is weird because, like, again, the book compared to the movie. The book, Jiminy Cricket's dead.

He comes back as a ghost a couple times to be like, hey, what are you doing? But he's like, not really there for most of it. And Pinocchio in the movie is kind of naive and he goes along with stuff in the book.

Pinocchio is just kind of an asshole kid. Like, you're like, this kid might be the worst child. Like, he's just not good. So it is kind of funny seeing those differences as well.

And I just not sure how much of an impact it was. Jiminy Crickets and more that they just wrote Pinocchio as more naive in this, you know.

Andy Walsh: 00:15:57

Yeah, that's fair. Also, let's just point out, you know, Jiminy Cricket at the end of the movie for doing very little gets a very shiny medal.

Unlike Chewbacca, who did a whole lot more for a lot less reward.

Joshua Noel: 00:16:10

Poor Chewy. Poor Chewy. So do you have any, like, favorite lines or moments from Jiminy Cricket that like stand out to you or is it just. I don't know.

Andy Walsh: 00:16:21

Yeah, I mean, you know, I think my favorite bit was. That was the lock picking bit. I'm just like, oh, I can get you out of this cage. Oh, no, never mind. It's the wrong model.

I don't know how to pick this lock. I'm not that kind of cricket. Like, I don't understand. I just don't understand here what's going on.

Yeah, but yeah, like I said, I wasn't totally engaged with it this time. And so perhaps that allows a bit more cynical distance. And you're absolutely right that it's a gorgeous looking film and very well animated.

No notes on that front, but yeah, just a bit puzzling in terms of story structure. I would still put AI artificial intelligence as my favorite Pinocchio story or the best Pinocchio story with all respect to tj.

Joshua Noel: 00:17:09

Oh, poor tj. But. But the. Yeah, I mean, it's weird. I can't think of anything in this. Like, I like how he narrates it in a funny fancy free.

Like I found that was actually really compelling way to tell the story because he's a likable character, obviously. I like him in Kingdom Hearts. He's very useful that he keeps my journal and I can go and see which dalmatians I've found or not found yet.

But like, I can't think of anything specific that he said or did that I'm like, oh, yeah, that was my favorite Jiminy Cricket. So I don't know, I'm kind of at a loss. I do. Like, when he shows up, he is a likable character.

I think, for me, I feel like I'm gonna sound too much like the. Like a. Like Gen Z almost, but I'm like, it's almost more about the vibe. Like, Jiminy Cricket shows up.

He's a calming, friendly, wise presence, but I don't think of anything that I'm like, oh, that was a good line. Or I like how he did that or anything.

It just kind of like, if he shows up in something, I'm like, oh, I know what he's supposed to be, and I can connect there, you know?

Andy Walsh: 00:19:12

Yeah, I think you're right that he works very well as the narrator of the story, and so it makes sense to insert him into the story so that he can be present for the events and not just sort of looming or lurking through the whole story. And. Yeah, yeah, I suppose he does provide a certain level of, like, he seemed, you know, for much as.

As much as we're kind of going, what in the world is happening in this story? To a certain extent, that is also Jiminy Cricket's reaction as.

As unsuccessful as he is largely in averting the problems of the story or, you know, averting the troubles that befall everyone, he kind of has a sense of, this is. This is not a good idea. What are we doing? This is bonkers. Don't send this kid out into the world this unprepared for everything around him.

And so he does seem to be, like, the one responsible adult in the world. Even if he's not the most.

Maybe competent, he's at least the most intelligent or the most sort of worldly wise character among the good guys, for lack of a better word, among the heroes and protagonists of the story.

Joshua Noel: 00:20:23

Yeah, I do kind of wonder. I don't. Like, I don't know if they thought this deep about it, but part of me is wondering if it's literally because of his size.

Like, if he was a large human, would Pinocchio have listened to him better? Like, is it because he's just so easy to ignore because he's literally a cricket, you know?

Andy Walsh: 00:20:41

Yeah, I mean, that's a good question. It's hard because Pinocchio just has no reference on the world at all.

Joshua Noel: 00:20:47

Right.

Andy Walsh: 00:20:47

It's hard to know if he would. If he would recognize anybody else.

But, yeah, I suppose his naivete does lead him to just sort of kind of blindly trust Honest John because, you know, because he's an adult, because he seems to know what he's talking about.

Joshua Noel: 00:21:01

I don't know.

Andy Walsh: 00:21:01

Jiminy Cricket also seems to know what he's talking about, But I think maybe the issue there is more just like doing stuff is more interesting than not doing stuff. So I'm going to give this a try. It seems like fun.

Joshua Noel: 00:21:16

So true. So true. Well, you know, we've kind of danced around this for a minute, but in all of our.

The faces behind this episodes, we want to ask and look at, like, how would the story be different without the character's influence?

And I don't know if what's funny is, I. I personally, I think he had a more of an impact in the book than he did in the animated film, and he died immediately in the book.

But the moment he comes back as a ghost and he says something here and there, like, I think the scarcity of him and then just appearing momentarily and then it being so obviously supernatural, I think had more of an impact of, oh, hey, I should listen to this ghost that was brought back from the dead to tell me that I'm being stupid. Seems to have more of an impact than the tiny little cricket who keeps following one around that's going, don't do that. You know?

Andy Walsh: 00:22:09

Yeah, he seems to. I mean, he is aware of the problems. He does have a bit of a Cassandra role that he can see that the problem's coming and no one listens to him.

But his role is more of trying to help Pinocchio out of the scrapes that he gets into, because he doesn't listen to his conscience, which is not really the function of a conscience, rather than being the one that kind of guides him away from trouble in the first place.

That's why what I think is interesting about AI is, is that while there is no cricket and there's no equivalent character, in a lot of ways, maybe Jude Law's character kind of fulfills the same function of somebody along tagging along for the ride and helping him get out of scrapes. But the David character has an actual set of parents, and in particular, his mom raises him. And so he has some education, he has some training.

He learns compassion and empathy and a lot of other good virtues from his mother, and as a result, kind of has a conscience of a sort. Right.

If you think of the conscience, at least partly as the voice of all the people that came before you, all the adults and significant people in your lives as you were a child growing up and kind of remembering the things that they taught you or the specific examples that they set for you, and that. That's sort of more of what a conscience really represents.

David in AI Actually has that in the influence of his mother that Pinocchio just doesn't like. I mean, we are literally witnessing the first, like, 48 hours of Pinocchio's life. He has no frame of reference, no sense of right and wrong.

He's just kind of like, I don't know. I'm here. I'm doing stuff. This is fun. Oh, wait, no, it's not fun. Help. I don't want to be on this ride anymore.

Joshua Noel: 00:23:56

He. Yeah, yeah. What's. It's too. Man. I hate to do this, but, like, I don't have a lot of reference for Jiminy Cricket.

So I apologize, Will, that I have to keep bringing up Kingdom Hearts. But, like, I do think it's funny how in the very first Kingdom Hearts game, you have Jiminy Cricket.

He's just like, with Donald and Goofy, you run into him. That's your little gang sora, Donald, Goofy. Then you have tiny little Pinocchio, and all he does is, like, take the journal.

But, like, you see Pinocchio in a wrong world, and he's like, oh, Pinocchio, what are you doing here? And he's like, oh, I lost Geppetto. He's in a big whale somewhere. And he's like, so are them. I'll help.

And then later, Pinocchio's heart gets stolen from, and he's just like, oh, I like Pinocchio. Go help him. I'm like, what? What is he actually doing here? Like, the journal part, I get, like.

I get the function in the game, but, like, as far as, like, story wise, we were probably gonna go help Pinocchio getting his heart stolen either way, right? Like, I felt like he was just kind of there to say the obvious thing. I don't know.

Which feels like kind of his role in the movie, too, is he just kind of says the obvious thing, right? So I'm not sure that any of these stories would be drastically different without him.

The only exception is fun and fancy free because he's the one telling the story. So without him, we wouldn't have heard the story. That's the only thing I could think of. So, Andy, would you rather be. So this is another one.

We're asking all of them. Would you rather be, like, the mentor or the mentee?

So in this case, would you rather be Jiminy Cricket acting as the conscious for someone else, or would you rather be a puppet who just got introduced to the world with a cricket for your Conscience.

Andy Walsh: 00:25:37

You know, as somebody who has voluntarily taken up a career in public health, I think the answer is, I am Jiminy Cricket. I would not do well. As fun as it might seem at times, I would not do well as the carefree, fancy free.

Let's just go along for the ride until it isn't fun anymore. I can see the appeal of that. And there are people like that who have a lot more fun than I do in certain circumstances.

But I'm just being honest about what I know about myself. That is not me. And I don't think I am capable of being that. Even if it might be more fun some of the time.

Joshua Noel: 00:26:17

I just truly. I think both options are bad options in this scenario.

You're either a tiny cricket trying to give advice to someone you know isn't gonna listen to you, or you are literally just thrown into the world with no frame of reference of anything and expected to just listen to some tiny little cricket telling you what to do.

Andy Walsh: 00:26:38

Yeah, can. Can I be the goldfish that gets a slice of cake? Is that an option?

Joshua Noel: 00:26:43

That does sound better. You know, just. Just to be different. I guess I'll be. I'll. I'll say I could be the puppet.

I do like being introduced to new things, and I think it would be fun to see the world through new eyes, but also terrifying. And also, I think I'd probably die pretty quickly. Like, that's the biggest problem is, like, either way, I'm like, it's not gonna end well.

Andy Walsh: 00:27:08

Yeah. But, you know, you get it. You get a magic. Get out of here.

Joshua Noel: 00:27:11

Pick a poison.

Andy Walsh: 00:27:11

Get a jail free card when the blue fairy comes along and fixes your donkey ears.

Joshua Noel: 00:27:16

That's true. That's true. Oh, man. All right, so going a little bit deeper, asking a couple more questions here.

Just kind of like thinking through, I don't know, maybe some philosophy and stuff around this.

I think we're asked to believe that someone like Pinocchio needs to be fully dependent on someone like Jiminy Cricket who's just listening to all of his advice and stuff like that. But that kind of feels like a. I don't know, like too much of a dependent relationship.

Like, borderline toxic, what they want us to think Pinocchio is supposed to do. And yet it does seem smart. If you have someone giving you solid advice, you should listen to them. But I don't know if it should be that dependent.

You know what I mean? So that. That's one of the things that's like, I don't. What they're Asking us to believe about the character.

I'm not even sure if I want to believe about that.

Andy Walsh: 00:28:08

Right. There's the notion that I've been introduced to relatively recently, of doing the emotional labor in a relationship and things like that.

It's not exactly the dynamic here, but there is a little bit of that. You need somebody else to do the thinking and being responsible for you. And when you are a child and three days old, absolutely, that is valid.

But, yeah, I think there is a temptation to just always rely on that. Right.

That as long as somebody else can be the adult, for me, I'm just gonna light my finger on fire and go to the marionette show and smoke cigars and shoot pool. Who wouldn't want to do that? Instead of having to think about the consequences of your decisions. And, yeah, I get the appeal.

And yeah, sometimes good and fun things can come of that. But I don't think as an adult, again, children get a pass because they are supposed to have parental figures and guidance and so forth.

But as an adult, sometimes you do have to be the adult in a relationship, in a dynamic where you're the one thinking for yourself about what the consequences of your choices are going to be and not always offloading that to somebody else.

Joshua Noel: 00:30:55

Yeah, I think. I think in healthy relationships, like friendships, whatever.

Like relationships, there's probably a time where each person is probably supposed to be the Jiminy Cricket.

Andy Walsh: 00:31:07

Exactly.

Joshua Noel: 00:31:08

Like. So we've been watching that. Me and my wife have been watching Broadchurch.

I've saw part of it, the American version, like, a long time ago, but I never actually finished it. So me and wife are going through that, watching that.

And David Tennant's character at season two, all of a sudden, it's taking this other character that he'd been working alongside and the other detective, Detective Miller. I actually need your set of eyes, someone to look at this. I'm too close to it. I need someone else to see it with fresh eyes.

And she's kind of able to come in and go, hey, you've missed this. You haven't seen this. You weren't thinking about it this way. And I'm like, yeah, that. That makes sense.

That's like her being a Jiminy Cricket that he asked for someone else's advice and perspective because he got too close to a situation. I know. I have, like, tj, when we make sure.

For my other podcast, the whole church podcast, I run a lot of stuff by him because I get really excited and I'm like, oh, this is really cool. It's the metaphysics of this version of a Theology of God. And TJ's like, hey, this is a church unity podcast.

What does that have to do with church unity? So I need him to be like, hey, wait a minute, is that relevant? Because I just get excited about something. Let's just talk about that.

I think there are times where we do it for each other in a healthy way.

Andy Walsh: 00:32:19

Yeah. And the whole ecosystem of science as it's currently constructed is based on that principle that everything goes through peer review.

Your grant applications, your publications, after you've done the research, all of it. The assumption is always, nobody can do this on their own. You always have to get somebody else to check it for you. And then you change roles. Exactly.

Then the next time you're the reviewer and they're the person with the idea that that needs to be double checked. So, yeah, you know, I think there's, there's definitely. It's not that, you know, you can, you can always be independent.

It's that there needs to be that mutual give and take as opposed to always giving and always taking.

Joshua Noel: 00:32:56

Yeah. Respect. Not depending on other people being able to think for yourself, but still knowing your shortcomings. Yeah.

One other thing that, that it made me think of, and it's going to be really silly, but Pinocchio first sees Jiminy, and mind you, no context, some little cricket starts telling him what to do and he just throws the book and murders them. In the, in the book version, obviously. Hey, you shouldn't just kill figs for aggravating you. That's bad.

But at the same time, it does bring up a point of like, maybe don't be the guy giving unsolicited advice to someone you don't know. That's probably also not great. Like in this case, he's a child puppet. Whatever. Understandable.

But I am also thinking of, like, if you, you know, we need to be Jiminy Crickets for one another every now and then. But there's also a point of like, realizing when someone wants that of you and when they don't.

You know, a lot of times people go through something traumatic, maybe they need advice. They might not be ready to hear it yet. So unsolicited advice isn't always great either.

Andy Walsh: 00:33:58

Yeah, some. Sometimes people want, you know, need validation of their emotions or empathy or sympathy or something like that. Yes. Yeah.

Joshua Noel: 00:34:07

And not for you to just sound like a little buzzing bug going, you're doing that wrong. They might throw a book at you. So, yeah, maybe don't do that. Oh, man. I truly am running out of things to talk about with Jiminy Cricket.

I do love the character. He's an icon for a reason. I think he's a good design. He's likable. I'm just not sure he has a huge impact on the story or Pinocchio for that matter.

But, hey, he's good. He gives good advice. He's a likable character who is a good narrator in other IPs.

Andy Walsh: 00:34:39

And, you know, in fairness, as somebody who has. Who has been a new parent. Right. You don't want people judging your abilities as a parent based on the first three days. Right. There is a pretty.

Pretty strong learning curve to the whole thing. And, you know, you might not be your best at those first three days. A little bit sleep deprived, a little bit sort of disoriented.

There's no instructions. Nobody tells you how this is going to work, Geppetto, you know, and so, yeah, maybe a little bit of grace for Jiminy Cricket and Geppetto and that.

You know, you don't usually start this job with a functional toddler five year old. Like, you know, he has the physicality of somebody who can get in a lot more trouble than a newborn infant does. Yeah.

Joshua Noel: 00:35:33

Which is actually terrifying when you think about it from the parent perspective. Which, you know, also, maybe Jiminy Cricket could have done better working with Geppetto. I mean, like, hey, this is what Jiminy Cricket.

This is what Pinocchio is doing right now. I am a tiny bug. Could you please help?

Andy Walsh: 00:35:50

Right. Maybe don't send him to school right away. Maybe try to be his dad for a couple hours. Hours before just offloading him to. To the school system.

Joshua Noel: 00:35:59

That. That part is. Yeah. Maybe the school is the real bad guy. The school system of Italy, at whatever time this was.

Andy Walsh: 00:36:08

Well, we don't know. He never got there. Maybe he would have received tremendous education if he had just gone.

Joshua Noel: 00:36:16

Yeah. So stay in school, kids. That's the. I don't know, man. There just. There isn't a ton for me here. I did have fun. I like thinking about the character.

I like that the character exists, that we're lifting him up. He is definitely one of the faces behind Pinocchio. Even if he's not an incredibly competent face behind Pinocchio, so is what it is.

Do you have anything else before we wrap up or you think we're. We're good to go?

Andy Walsh: 00:36:47

No, I think I have said more than I ever expected to on Jiminy Cricket.

Joshua Noel: 00:36:52

Yeah, yeah, me too. Me too. That said, we will say slightly More about Jiminy Cricket. After this episode, we'll do a bonus question.

Andy and I are going to answer this for our members.

If you want to be an official member, you can go over there and hear what Andy and I think about what other Disney character might have been served well to have Jiminy Cricket as their conscience.

It's gonna be a multi layered question because we also have to figure out which Disney character would actually listen to Jiminy for him to be impactful. So if you want to hear our thoughts on that, there will be a bonus question you can check out.

But for now, Andy, if you had to give a recommendation for our listeners, what would it be?

Andy Walsh: 00:37:35

Yeah, I think I'm just gonna be obvious and say Steven Spielberg's artificial intelligence. Good movie, good Pinocchio story, Good John Williams score. You know, era standout. Early performance from Haley Joel Osmit. Check it out.

Joshua Noel: 00:37:51

All right.

Andy Walsh: 00:37:52

It's not going to answer any of your questions about modern day AI, but it is a good Pinocchio story.

Joshua Noel: 00:37:57

Yeah, man.

So I'm going to do a really lame thing here because I think I've already recommended this, but there's a book, few different creators behind it, an illustrated version of Pinocchio, almost like a graphic novel version that I think is really cool. The creators behind it, you have Mike Magnolia and Lemony Snicket working together. The author.

The books, of course, still by Carlo Collodi, but Mike Magnolia illustrating Lemony Snicket, kind of figuring out exactly how it should fit in a comic book style. It's so good, I actually loved it. That might be my favorite version of Pinocchio. So if you get your hands on it, I recommend that one.

If it's too expensive for you, you can ask your public library to get it and they will usually. So maybe check that out. Be sure to rate and review our show wherever you get your podcast, please.

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The algorithms think our show is important so that other people will find it and maybe we can be more impactful than Jiminy Cricket, but that's up to you. We do ask that you rate and review our show wherever you do get your podcasts. I just said that. Also want to shout out our financial supporters.

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So if you want to support us and rock a cool T shirt that looks good in purple, the annual theme T shirts gonna be good all the way through this year. If you want to get your own T shirt says Faces Behind Spec Ecology on the front, check it out on our website.

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Of course we do one important thing and remember we are all a chosen people. A geekdom of priests.

Andy Walsh: 00:40:27

Sa.