May 20th, a new film released on Disney Plus that continued the story of a 90s classic…but
with a twist. In this telling, Chip and Dale were simply actors that had parted ways after
their show was cancelled, reconnecting only after a slew of kidnappings plagued some former stars,
including their friend Monteray Jack. In this revival of this well-known friendship,
who is the most good? And who is the most evil?
As usual, we'll be starting with the most pure and
noble character and working our way down. These characters are The Good.
The gold medal of most good we’re granting to Chip. While Chip and Dale had similar morals
for most of their childhood and the beginning of their career, that didn’t stay the case once Dale
worked to make a name for himself. After stepping back from Rescue Rangers, Chip attempted to pick
up the pieces of his life by dedicating himself to offering a net of safety to others, even if
it was only through selling insurance. When his old friend Monteray Jack called him, Chip didn’t
hesitate to offer help. When Dale also showed up, Chip lied to keep things civil before he left.
When Monty was declared missing, Chip was overcome with guilt and so agreed to help find information
to help track down the Valley Gang. Yes, Chip had been reluctant to grow friendly with Dale again,
but considering what happened between them, Chip could have been far worse than just pretending not
to remember much of the show they did together. Even during the scene where the two were beginning
to part, Chip didn’t start screaming or accusing Dale of anything. He only asked to talk things
through and when that request wasn’t met, Chip left to allow Dale his own life. Given
how they parted ways, Chip couldn’t be blamed for how suspicious he was of those around him.
The silver medal of most good goes to the other main star, Dale. Dale had the best of
intentions but wasn’t always great at expressing himself. It wasn’t exactly evil of him to try and
find projects of his own. Dale had been a great sport about his position on the Rescue Rangers,
allowing himself to be painted as the dumber and more accident prone of the duo. Dale would have
fared much better had he just expressed his frustration and desire to feel appreciated.
However, Dale could be blamed for how he handled the situation. Despite Chip’s pleading to talk
things through, Dale brushed off the concern to see if the call was his agent. Later, when the
two thought Monty was gone forever, Dale was still posting on social media for his supposed fanbase,
annoying Chip by coming off as egotistical. Thankfully, Dale finally came around. When he
was finally regaining the popularity he sought and the promise of a reboot, Dale refused in order to
place Chip’s safety first. Dale was even able to save Chip from a deathblow from Sweet Pete.
Winning the bronze medal of most good is Officer Ellie. A huge fan of Chip and Dale,
she broke protocal thinking her heroes could help with finding Monteray Jack before he
could be bootlegged. Though Ellie had a lot of self-doubt from a previous case,
she was able to set that aside in order to try and save Monty and the other bootlegged
toons. When she was captured by Sweet Pete and Captain Putty, she used the phonecall
Putty made her do to give Dale a message in order to warn him. After the dust settled,
Ellie decided to use her skills to step away from the force and start her own private
detective agency. Her goal had always been to help others, and she wasn’t going to be deterred long.
Following in a tied ranking we have Lumière and Tigra. They had become friends with Dale over the
years of their convention appearances. They were a nice balance of encouraging and realistic, not
wanting to discourage Dale’s desire for success but wanting to keep him a little closer to earth.
In the final moments of the film, they made an appearance as Chip and Dale tried to
flee from Bob the Warrior, subduing the villain and calling the police.
In another tied placement is the now established couple of Gadget
and Zipper. After Chip was taken by Sweet Pete, Gadget and Zipper leapt to help Dale
save him. Not only did they help to get Dale into the facility, but they were revealed
to have helped Dale over the years on his numerous projects, with Gadget telling him
they couldn’t do any more independent films due to needing the money for their growing family.
Taking the first ranking in this section we have to mention Chip’s mother. When Chip thought Dale
was near death, he revealed the story of what happened to him on the day they met.
Chip’s mother wasn’t on screen for more than a few seconds and wasn’t even granted a name,
but she clearly cared for her son and wished for him to find a friend.
Next is the final member of the Rescue Rangers team,
Monteray Jack. Monty was going through a rough patch when he called Chip and Dale for help. His
love of cheese had landed him in some trouble, making him paranoid. Though he was struggling,
Monty was still a friendly and loving guy. He didn’t expect others to pity him and had
tried to make an effort to stop himself from his poor habits before calling his friends.
With that said, we've arrived at the neutral territory. These characters fall in The Grey Area.
In a minor role, next we have Baloo. Like some of the others on this list,
Baloo wasn’t shown for long. In his appearances, Baloo was always shown to be welcoming,
making time for his fans and showing respect and fondness for his fellow cartoon celebrities
as he watched Chip and Dale running about. Even when Jimmy the Polar Bear was being
a little creepy and invasive, Baloo kept his composure and allowed the fellow bear to fanboy.
A serpent that appeared easily impressed, we have DJ Herzogenaurach. Another fan of the duo,
he bombarded Chip and Dale in the lockerroom to express his fondness of their show
and show off his remix of their themesong. He immediately began pestering them about doing a
small rap performance, recording the improvised song to boost his own presence on social media.
Like many in this film, Herzogenaurach was out to make a name for himself,
even if it meant using others’ fame to create a platform.
Following is Ugly Sonic. Seeing this odd creation in this movie was bittersweet,
and not just because his human teeth are off-putting. In his first appearance in the movie,
Ugly Sonic was shown to be self-concious about the reputation he was stuck with and was working
to revive his image in some way. While trying to gain his footing in some other endeavor,
he did his best to go with the flow and be a part of the jokes people made about him. He tried to
have a positive mindset in the face of everyone doubting him. When Dale begged Ugly Sonic for help
later in the film, trying to use the hedgehog’s claim of FBI connections to take out Sweet Pete,
Ugly Sonic had turned down doing anything to assist them, and left them to be chased down
by Sweet Pete and his henchment. In the end, Ugly Sonic was revealed to have been telling the truth
about his show with the FBI as he showed up to raid Sweet Pete’s facility at the docks.
Finally, we've reached the dark side. These characters are The Bad and The Evil.
Next up we have the cheese salesman Bjornson. One of the people working under Sweet Pete,
Bjornson’s job was to lure toons seeking out stinky cheese and trying to trap them into
a position of being indebted to the Valley Gang. When Chip and Dale slipped their true intentions,
Bjornson was quick to turn them over to Sweet Pete, using their fame and Pete’s love
of making bootlegs to avoid being in trouble to allowing suspicious people into the shop.
Taking the bronze medal of most evil we have a shared ranking between Bob the Warrior and Jimmy
the Polar Bear. These two weren’t the most capable henchmen, but they did far better at their job
than many other sidekicks in animated features. For the most part, Bob wasn’t too brutal when
interacting with Chip and Dale at first, even seen making jokes with them as he led them to
Sweet Pete’s office. Of the two, Bob was the more capable and on the ball of them. He was
able to figure out that something was amiss when he found the left behind bags of the supposed rats
and the fake nose found on the floor. When they chased Chip and Dale through the convention,
Bob disregarded everyone else’s safety in order to hunt the two down.
Jimmy on the other hand was more relied on for brute force than intelligence,
and so was shown to be easily distracted. Unlike Bob, Jimmy was more interested in talking to
Baloo than he was following through with finding Chip and Dale until the two were cornered again.
The only real leniency we can grant these two is that they were stuck in a very peculiar position
in life. Bob and Jimmy were both residents of the Uncanny Valley, and so joined the Valley
Gang because they weren’t able to find another way to gain success. If they had to be stuck
with the repuation of being somewhat unsettling to watch on screen, then they figured there
was no point in being a part of anything other than more odd and sometimes off-putting movies.
That doesn’t excuse the fact that they tormented and mutilated countless cartoons, enslaving them
to make bootleg after bootleg, but it does give some understanding behind their actions.
Winning the silver medal of most evil is the cliche traitor, Captain Putty. Even before he
was exposed as being one of the people behind the kidnappings, it was easy to see Putty as someone
not worth trusting. He was sarcastic and easily wrote off his fellow officers and all of their
concerns. Though he tried to form a backstory to lie about his motivation to get involved with the
Valley Gang, Putty soon began laughing at the very idea of doing anything for anyone other
than himself. He revealed that he was doing it all simply for the money, and that he wasn’t concerned
with helping people or hurting people so long as he gained some instant gratification through a
quick paycheck. When Ellie tried to appeal to his sense of sympathy, Putty was shown to be scrolling
through his phone with a carefree smile, enforcing that he wasn’t better than Sweet Pete or the other
henchmen. It had also been exposed that Putty had been the one to initially make Ellie doubt
her abilities as an officer by turning in the fake tip that got others on their team injured
beyond repair. It made his ongoing taunts towards her through the film come off as even more cruel,
knowing he was just trying to break her down to get rid of the threat to Sweet Pete’s operation.
Finally, taking the gold medal of most evil we have Sweet Pete, formerly known as Peter Pan. Yes,
this had been an unexpected villain, but it worked amazingly well. Even in the original
Disney feature of Peter Pan, he was shown to be short-sighted and selfish with a poor
sense of empathy. That being said, it wasn’t too far-fetched to see an aged and jaded Pete
take out his anger on innocent toons. It isn’t unusual for the movie industry to use a celebrity
and then toss them aside, especially when those stars are child actors. So hearing how Pete was
discarded once he was going through puberty did invoke some sympathy. Already having experience
in the entertainment industry, of course Pete would turn to making his own low-budget movies
in order to gain some success. A lot of credit can be given to Pete for how he managed to not
only come up with his bootleg operation but how he was able to buy and repurpose old merchandise to
make a well-known line of port-a-potties. Sweet Pete’s whole operation of mutiliating and using
old toons was horrifying. It showed just how far he was willing to go in order to make his own
life more comfortable. He saw the other toons as little more than properties for him to use
and so he dehumanized all those that he roped into his operation. Chances are that Sweet Pete likely
would have used his former friends from Peter Pan if it meant he could profit from them. He
didn’t show to have any fondness upon seeing one of the Lost Boys at the convention. We will say,
however, that Pete’s comment about death coming for us all was a relatable moment.
Before we go, we wanted to hand out some extra medals to the characters that fit them the best.
Taking the Darwin Medal we have Dale. When we say that Dale isn’t the brightest,
we say it with all the fondness we can manage. Dale had been able to figure out Ellie’s code
and reconnect with Chip, but he had to jump through a lot of mental hoops in order to do so.
Following with the Wrath Medal is Sweet Pete. After being tossed aside from the film industry,
Pete’s response was to use other toons to make a name for himself
and profit from the fame of others for his own comfortability.
The Greed Medal goes to Captain Putty. Driven simply by gaining some money,
Putty didn’t show any inner turmoil at sacrificing his own men in order to get that paycheck.
The Sloth Medal we’re granting to Ugly Sonic. Though he was shown to have FBI connections,
Ugly Sonic was clearly more interested in spending time at his booth at the
convention than rallying his new co-workers to help Chip and Dale.
Next the Pride Medal goes home with Dale. Due to his inability to communicate what
he wanted from Chip, Dale had become obsessed with creating a name for himself
without much thought to what would happen to Rescue Rangers.
Finally, we’re giving the Gluttony Medal to Monteray Jack. His love of cheese was
well-known among fans of the 90s cartoon, but to see that craving
land him indebted to a gang was unsettling. But let us know in the comment section if
you agree with our ranking. And tell us what we should cover next. Remember to hit that
notification bell and binge our Good to Evil playlist. Where we break down the morality of
the characters in your favorite cartoons, shows and movies. But most importantly, stay wicked.