ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes gender variance depicted in children’s animated cartoons. The case studies analyzed are episodes from the fantasy series Adventure Time and the superhero series SheZow. Adventure Time depicts a range of gender-variant characters, and this chapter analyzes the episode ‘Princess Cookie’ that depicts a male character who desires to be crowned a princess, reading this desire as intersecting with other ‘deviant’ qualities. SheZow is about a male cross-dressing vigilante, and the analysis examines the transformation of masculinity in this series. Both series are also analyzed for strategies of gender inversion in other episodes. There is tension in these series between subverting and reinforcing gender normativity and the polarization of gender.
