Of course, I also couldn't help but wonder: am I reading too much into this?
Was there ever a better example of “ politics without romance,” to borrow a phrase from Nobel Prize-winning economist James Buchanan, the pioneer of public choice theory? He’s mostly interested in having nice weather so it doesn’t ruin his celebration. Even children will see that Humdinger isn’t acting out of some “common good” to improve Adventure City. In his hubris, Humdinger tries to do one thing-make the weather better-and ends up doing something very different: causing an environmental disaster.Īlso, I noticed there’s a lesson in public choice theory. Still, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the overall plot seemed like a shining, Hayekian example of central planning gone wrong. Liberty, the newcomer, gets her own wheels. The pups put out a few fires (literally and figuratively) and rescue Chase. Chase-a German Shepherd pup who serves as a police dog-loses confidence in himself and ends up in the pound after he’s nabbed by a couple of Humdinger’s goons. There are twists and turns along the way, of course. With the assistance of a homeless puppy-named Liberty-the Paw Patrol is able to clean up Humdinger’s mess. The machine isn't turned off after it's set in motion- another lesson- setting the stage for a cataclysmic weather event later in the movie.įortunately for Humdinger and the people of Adventure City, there is a private team of rescue puppies led by a little boy who is able to help.
The scientist reluctantly agrees to use the machine to suck out the rain clouds "just for tonight" when Humdinger threatens to shut down the project if she doesn’t comply with his order. “I want all of those pesky clouds sucked up by the end of the day,” Humdinger blares.
Humdinger clearly has no idea how the machine works, but he sees he can use it to solve his weather problem-despite the scientist’s warning that it's a device for studying weather, not manipulating weather. “It’s a free-floating gyroscopically balanced remote controlled weather containment and analysis apparatus … We call it the cloud catcher.” Is that true?” Humdinger asks the scientist who runs the machine at a university. “I hear you have a weather machine that sucks up clouds. (It just so happens, the clouds also threaten the fireworks celebration Humdinger is throwing to celebrate … himself.) (In reality, Humdinger is really just a cat person.) Worse, Humdinger-tired of the rainy weather in Adventure City-decides to improve the city by getting rid of the pesky clouds that make things so dreary. Unlike Adventure Bay, a small community where people trade and help each other through trade and voluntary action, Adventure City is run in a very top-down fashion, with Humdinger ordering people around to suit his own purposes.Įarly in the film, we learn he’s capturing “stray” dogs and holding them in a secret shelter. As Mayor of Adventure City-a notable contrast to Adventure Bay-Humdinger quickly turns the metropolis into chaos by using his authority to fuel his own ego and nefarious plans.
People who’ve seen the Paw Patrol TV show likely know about Mayor Humdinger-a selfish, grasping politician always seeking to use his position as mayor of Foggy Bottom to his own advantage. To my surprise, however, Paw Patrol is a pretty good flick, and I couldn’t help but notice the story has a not inconspicuous message that tells an important and timeless economic lesson. I wasn’t exactly excited to see the movie, to be honest.
It was our first “just-the-two-of-us” movie so I grabbed us a couple blue slushies and a small mountain of buttered popcorn to watch this movie about a boy named Ryder who leads a crew of heroic “search and rescue” puppies in a land named Adventure Bay. He’s a big fan of the TV show, and as the youngest of my three kiddos, little Beck tends to get less of Dad’s time and attention than his older siblings. I recently took my 4-year-old to see Paw Patrol: The Movie.