Dr. Seuss' the Lorax Once-ler Villain Revealed

Entertainment Weekly has our first look at The Once-ler, the villain in Dr. Seuss‘s original children’s book The Lorax, as he will appear in Illumination Entertainment’s upcoming CGI adaptation. Check out these new photos, along with further information about this once-mysterious cretin, below.

In the original book The Lorax, the Once-ler was seen as just a pair of green arms, and the character has remained a mystery to Dr. Seuss fans until this very minute. In the upcoming big screen outing, The Once-ler is revealed to be a young, fresh face man voiced by Ed Helms, who is scalded by The Lorax, voiced by Danny DeVito, for cutting down his forest. The story found in the film is described as a fable about making bad choices, and then making amends.

The decision to turn The Once-Ler into a young man may not sit well with longtime Dr. Seuss fans, but the character design actually came from clues left behind by the legendary author. Producer Christopher Meledandri explains.

“(He) gave us the clues on the page. If there was a clear sign this character was something other than human, we would have abided by that. But okay, he’s wearing gloves. You’re not going to put gloves on a monster. The minute you make the Once-ler a monster, you allow the audience to interpret that the problem is caused by somebody who is different from me, and it ceases to be a story that is about all of us. Then it’s a story about, ‘Oh I see, the person who led us into the predicament is not a person. It’s somebody very, very different.’ And so it takes you off the hook. What I think Ted is saying is: there is a Once-ler in all of us.”

To read more about The Once-ler and his adaptation into the world of film, clickHere

The Lorax comes to theaters March 2nd, 2012 and stars Danny DeVito, Ed Helms, Rob Riggle, Betty White, Zac Efron, Taylor Swift. The film is directed by Ken Daurio, Cinco Paul, Chris Renaud.