I've seen several stories of people being influenced by Willy Wonka or animated cartoons in their inflation interest. But have any of you been really annoyed by it as a kid?
I both liked and disliked inflation depending of who received it.
The first character I remember liking to see inflated was Donald Duck, when I still was in kindergarden. There were several times, but I think the one I liked best was the one in the Three Caballeros.
The first character I was horrified to see inflated, still in kindergarden, was Pluto. I considered him very respectable. He was loyal, lighthearted, and usually he was the one that saved the day. He didn't deserve this. The infamous scene is the one in which he bites the valve of that inflatable pool toy shaped somewhat like a horse, that was harassing him. Pluto wasn't doing any harm to anyone. Donald Duck manipulated this toy, and was laughing at Pluto's reactions. To make things more humilliating, this "horse" had a mocking smile. From what I remember in the shape Pluto took when he inflated, this may have inspired the shape Roger Rabbit gets with the "Suck o Lux" vacuum.
From then on, I covered my eyes whenever that scene came(my mother recorded it in vhs from tv airings). Also covered my eyes during other pluto cartoon, that I don't have on any tape of my own, in which he has a lot of puppies and a hose gets stuck in his mouth. His cheeks puffed and then I covered my eyes thinking he was going to inflate. Fairly recently I got to know he actually doesn't inflate here, only his cheeks.
Not that I hated Donald so I liked to see him get inflated. He was one of my favourites, but it happening to him didn't offend me, for some reason that I don't know how to explain. I loved his inflations.
The next "respectable" character is Super Mario. I respected him during several years and liked to imitate and act like if I were him, although I've always been thin. I even weared a cup during several years. I don't remember seeing Mario inflated during the time I considered him honorable. The closest was in a cartoon I have in vhs from kindergarden too, from "Super Mario Super Show" in which he makes himself giant to fight Koopzilla, and there he looks a little fatter. That somewhat tickled me a bit but didn't reach to offend me.
Seems like I had a tendency to like heroic funny characters that wanted to help others(I was a big Ninja Turtles fan too!). The problem with funny characters is that they are an easier target for this kind of jokes that made me feel violated.
Back to Mario, I didn't see him inflated, but at the age of 7(1994), I had several annoying visualizations of him and Luigi being dressed in womens clothes, and being inflated. Being dressed like a girl was probably the second worst humillation for me.
For the time I finally saw Mario inflated with the P-balloon in Super Mario World, I was 8, and my interest in the character had declined considerably, very likely because Animaniacs absorbed a lot of my interest. I think Wakko took the "honor place". I remember thinking, when I saw mario with the P-balloon, "Phew! thanks heaven I didn't see this last year(when I was still a big Mario respectful)".
I eventually became a big Mario fan again, and even though I like Mario inflating now(possibly a "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" reaction), sometimes my internal 7 year old kid is mad at me for choosing the username "Pballooned".
Well... The story continues, but I'm tired now and possibly will continue in another thread.
Anyhow, which inflations pissed you off, as a kid, and maybe now?
The one thing that got on my nerves sometimes was when certain cartoons would have episodes with a character getting inflated, but often the "wrong" character would get inflated.
What I mean by that is that cartoons that had female characters almost never got inflated, ever.
When I think back to that, it was always male characters that got inflated.