No Knees

On a limited budget it's somewhat hard to animate someone running without it looking jerky. As recently as The Perils of Penelope Pitstop, animators tended to draw legs moving with very little bending of the knee, sometimes at even a full run. In real life, this would be more than a little painful, as shown in this animated insert from Sesame Street.

The preferred trick around this is avoid showing the legs altogether. You can position the "camera" above the runner's waist while still showing them swaying about a little, or aim the shot straight at the feet, which also doubles as looped footage.

Some artists go (stop?) an extra step if a character has a skirt. The legs might be drawn nearly straight all the way down even while stationary, as if she doesn't have knees, thighs, or defined hips.

Oddly enough, knees seem to be a little too flexible in the Twisted Knee Collapse.

See also Wheel-O-Feet.

Examples of No Knees include:

Video Games

• Lampshaded in Lego Island, which, being as all the characters are Lego minifigs, displays this by default..

Papa Brickolini: I can feel it in my knees... Mama Brickolini: Papa, you're just imagining those things! Papa: Imagining knees? ...Maybe you're right?

• • Also lampshaded at one point in the Lego webcomic Fabuland Housewives.
• The main heroine of Narbacular Drop, the game whose team was hired by Valve to work in the Spiritual Successor and Even Better Sequel called Portal, was called Princess No-Knees--but it's not immediately obvious whether she lacks them, as it's a nickname referring to her inability to jump.

Web Animation

• In the 2009 Homestar Runner Halloween toon, "Doomy Tales of the Macabre", Strong Sad removes Homestar's knees--to no very great effect.
  • Well, it slows him up a bit, but as a Doomy Tale of Macramé, it isn't very scary.
    • Turning Homestar into macramé, however...

Comic Books

• Aside from having (rather notoriously) problem with feet and pouches, Rob Liefeld tends/tended to do this, with both men and women. Although the women tended more to have one knee that seemed to branch out into the rest of each leg.

Web Comics

• Pintsize from Questionable Content originally had no knees or elbows, but during the course of the comic he happily received upgraded limbs.