Redridinghood provides a new perspective and a new medium for the classic Brother’s Grimm fairy tale. In Donna Leishaman’s tale, red riding hood is updated, and interactive. While the core story remains the same, Leishaman’s interactive style draws viewers in and brings new life to the story. Marshal McLuhan says, “Our official culture is striving to force the new media to do the work of the old. These are difficult times because we are witnessing the clash of cataclysmic proportions between two great technologies. We approach the new with the psychological conditioning and sensory responses to the old.” For here we have this classic tale, translated and updated into a new language and media, using code, and hypertext, Leishman transforms this story into the new medium. The only draw back to her electronic text, is that she doesn’t compile different variations to the Red Riding Hood story. There are many endings to the story, but in Leishman’s story there is no definitive ending. Perhaps that was on purpose, no definitive ending allows her to add her own digital narrative to this common story. Still I think she would have been better served if added multiple buttons to her electronic text. Each one could have showed a different ending. There were many different endings to this classic fairy tale, if she showed little red riding hood choosing a different path, or just show different narrations by the wolf, that would have brought the viewer/reader in even more.
ColleenBurke85