Tarsiers in Popular Culture: Primates Featured in Quiznos Ads

In the Phillipines, there is a small primate that is considered to be, on the tree of life, somewhere between prosimian - lemurs and lorises - and actual monkeys - such as mandrills and spider monkeys. Most people in the United States, and in Western culture in general, will have never heard of tarsiers, yet their image would be familiar to many upon seeing them.

The most recent portrayal of tarsiers in popular media, was a Quizno's ad, featuring what were called "spong monkeys" (also called sponge monkeys) singing about how they like Quizno's sub sandwiches. An image of a tarsier was taken and had a mouth and eyes pasted over it to make it look stranger. Opinions on what the creatures in the ads were ranged from "rats" to "monkeys". Neither are technically correct, yet the latter is closer to the truth.

The original source of the spong monkeys is rathergood.com, run by Joel Veitch. There, instead of singing about Quizno's subs, they sing "We like the moon". It is a silly song with nonsense lyrics, such as "We like the moon, but not as much as a spoon". This song was the basis for the Quizno's ad.

While this ad may have introduced many people to tarsiers for the first time, it is often argued that a much earlier set of characters was based off of tarsiers.

"Master Yoda", from the Star Wars movies, was based off of tarsiers. His appearance resembles them somewhat, such as the shape of his head, and the ears sticking off to the side. That is not his only resemblance to them however, as both Yoda and tarsiers share skills in fighting. Tarsiers can take birds in mid-flight from the air for prey by jumping at them and grabbing them.

When one watches the movie "The Gremlins" (1984), and then looks at pictures of tarsiers, it is hard to miss the connection. Gizmo, the main gremlin character of the movie, shares many tarsier characteristics. Both have large eyes, are small and fuzzy , have large furless ears that stick out to the side, and have similar facial shapes. Some people think that tarsiers look "creepy", but others find them cute. I suppose the same could be said for the Gremlins as well.

Tarsiers can also be said to resemble the alien character in "E,.T." (1982). The main features they share in common with the alien in "E.T." are their long fingers, head shape, and brown coloring. They may have inspired that character as well.

Another pop culture derivative of tarsiers were Furbys. Furbys are small robotic toys that can be programmed by children to learn spoken phrases. They look almost identical to tarsiers, minus the tail.

So what are these tarsiers anyway? They're primates from Southeast Asia, and like their fictional gremlin counterparts, they are carnivorous. They like to eat insects primarily, but will take other small prey, such as birds and lizards. They are nocturnal, which means they are active mostly at night, and they spend their time in the trees. Their large eyes do not have a tapetum in them (the reflective film inside the eyes that make some nocturnal animals' eyes seem to glow), which is one reason their eyes are so large. In the dark southeast Asian jungle, the pupils of their eyes can dilate to almost the diameter of their eyes, allowing the tarsiers to see extremely well at night.

Many people, upon seeing tarsiers, believe they would like to have one for a pet. There are many reasons why primates in general do not make good pets. Ethical issues are raised by the closeness of primates to humans on the tree of life, (including the potential to pass diseases back and forth from humans to the animals and from the animals to humans). Primates of all types are also not truly domesticated, as dogs, cats, ferrets, and livestock have been for thousands of years. All primates remain as unpredictable wild animals, even if kept captive. Another concern is that tarsiers simply do not thrive in captivity. Even with the dangers of living in the wild, they are known to have a generally longer and healthier life span as wild animals than as captive ones. As nocturnal creatures, tarsiers are active at night, and thus would probably keep their owners up at all hours even if they could thrive in captivity!

It is interesting to think of how these exotic primates will be portrayed next. Maybe Pixar will make a movie featuring them? Now you can recognize tarsier-based characters when you see them, and enjoy knowing something about those characters than many others might not pick up on!

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarsier
http://www.primates.com/primate/tarsiidae.html
http://www.rathergood.com/moon_song/