Why Do So Many Cartoon Characters Only Have Four Fingers?

Did you ever notice how many cartoon characters have four fingers?  “The Simpsons”, “Family Guy”, “SpongeBob SquarePants”… they all do it.  And they’ve been doing it for 100 years.

But why?

Way back in the early days of animation, characters like Mickey Mouse and Felix the Cat had four fingers because animators used circles when sketching their hands.  Five fingers looked odd on a circular hand.

Walt Disney once said it looked like a BUNCH OF BANANAS.

Another reason:  It’s less work.  Hand-drawn animation is very labor-intensive.  Removing a finger saved a little time and money.

A third potential reason is that a lot of early cartoon characters were ANIMALS, like dogs, cats, and rabbits.  Now, they have five digits, but the fifth one is hidden farther up the leg.

So when animators gave them more human-like hands, maybe they figured they’d just go with four fingers, because there were four digits on the paw.

SOURCE: Mental Floss