Literature / Piilomaan pikku aasi

Piilomaan pikku aasi ("Little donkey of Hidden Land") is a Finnish children's book by Lea Pennanen.

Piilomaa was once ruled by a kind donkey king and queen, but the evil mule Mukkelis Muuli Kadehtija ("Tumble Mule the Envious") poured sleeping potion on all the land's rivers, making everyone lazy, and overthrew and imprisoned the king. The queen however managed to escape, and years later her son, the titular little donkey, along with his adoptive dog sibling Korppu and the coal-black cat who they pick up on the road, goes off to save his father and overthrow the tyrannical mule.

The book was adapted into a television show in the 70s, with Irma Tanskanen narrating the story accompanied by illustrations from the book.

Provides examples of:

• Absent-Minded Professor: Lasse Lämppä, the scientist who helps the heroes, is rather scatterbrained. When they first meet him, he tells them "out" but the black cat tells them he means "come in". And when they start telling him about their plans to save the donkey king, he quickly stops listening to them to return to his work.
• Ambiguous Gender: It's unclear what gender Korppu, the coal-black cat, Sokeri the gossip mouse, and Vaakku the crow are.
• Big Little Brother: The donkey queen mentions that she escaped when Korppu was a puppy and gave birth to the little donkey afterwards. The little donkey is a lot bigger than his adoptive older dog sibling.
• Body Pocket: One line mentions the little donkey putting a key in his pocket, even though the illustrations depict him naked except for his hat.
• Detect Evil: The heroes are given a magic lantern that normally glows green, but turns red when enemies are nearby.
• Evil Cannot Stand Cuteness: The evil foxes hate the smell of roses, which is what the rose witch uses to hinder them.
• Fantastic Racism: The opening narration states that Piilomaa used to be only inhabited by donkeys, cats, and dogs, and Mukkelis Muuli and his fox lackeys had to wear donkey masks to not be recognized as villains even though they just arrived.
• Forced Sleep: Mukkelis Muuli overthrew the donkey king by poisoning the water supply with sleeping potion, and later he forces his subjects to drink juice and eat ice cream that makes people lazy.
• Good Animals, Evil Animals: The main heroes are donkeys, dogs, and cats, and the villain is a Stubborn Mule with fox lackeys.
• Grail in the Garbage: At one point, the heroes are captured by a witch, whose castle was turned upside down and she's unable to reverse it because she lost her magic wand. The little donkey finds it laying on the floor with ordinary flower-holding sticks.
• Heel–Face Turn:
  • One of Mukkelis' allies, Sokeri the gossip mouse, betrays Mukkelis and joins the heroes when he refuses to give it sugar for giving him the right information.
  • The witch Kuva Kuva, who was planning to give the heroes to Mukkelis for a chocolate prize, changes sides when she finds out that the castle the he was going to give her was mined from her own chocolate mine.
• I Am Not Weasel: Mukkelis Muuli puts up signs during his reign calling him a "great donkey".
• Ill-Timed Sneeze: When the little donkey, Korppu, and the black cat are hiding from the foxes in the hotel under a ping pong table, Korppu suddenly sneezes, revealing where they are.
• Informed Attribute: Mukkelis Muuli is said to be a wizard, but we never see him actually cast any magic.
• Interspecies Adoption: Korppu the dog is adopted by the donkey queen.
• Invisibility Cloak: The rose witch gives the heroes one after they turn her castle back to normal. Though sometimes the narration calls it a scarf.
• Jumped at the Call: When the donkey king's hat shows up in the mother donkey's hut, the little donkey immediately shouts that he's going to save him, and he and Korppu take off the next day despite their mother's warnings.
• No Smoking: A fox is mentioned at one point to "smoke" a pipe made of licorice.
• Really Royalty Reveal: It turns out that the mother donkey is actually the escaped queen, making the little donkey the prince. The power briefly gets in his head.
• The Runaway: The plot is kicked off when the little donkey and Korppu run away from the mother donkey when she tells them that they can't go save the king.
• Signature Headgear: The little donkey wears the straw hat that his father threw to the wind in hopes that someone would find him for the whole story.
• Sinister Sweet Tooth:
  • Mukkelis Muuli loves ice cream and forces his subjects to eat it, and is seen licking a lollipop in one scene.
  • The evil witch Kuva Kuva is motivated to capture the heroes by Mukkelis promising her a castle made of chocolate, and also keeps a whole storage of ice cream. She however decides to turn good upon finding out that there's a whole chocolate mine under her mountain.
• Token Heroic Orc: The evil fox witch Kuva Kuva eventually changes sides, and she's the only heroic fox in the story and the only one not banished in the end.
• Villain Song: At one point Mukkelis throws a party and sings a short song:
  Oh, I am the mule of mules
  Oh, I am Mukkelis Muuli
  Everyone listen to me
  Everyone obey me
• We Can Rule Together: When the little donkey makes it to the secret island where his father is imprisoned, Mukkelis tries to convince him to join him and tells him he'll get all his riches.
• World of Funny Animals: The world is inhabited by talking animals that sometimes wear clothes and walk uptight but sometimes not.