- “With his waggish humour and prodigious strength, Brom Bones was quite the hero, all the country round.”
- ―Narrator[src]
Brom Bones is the secondary antagonist of Disney's 1949 short The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (the second half of The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad). He is the leader of the Sleepy Hollow Boys, a gang of young men in Sleepy Hollow.
Background[]
Personality[]
Washington Irving was very descriptive of Brom Bones' personality. Disney's version lifted that description nearly word for word. He is "quite the hero of all the country bumpkin..." and he's "always good for a fight or a frolic. Still, there is no malice in his mischief...". However, Brom was not above becoming insanely jealous of Ichabod after Katrina started paying attention to him, to the point of adapting a bullying persona towards Ichabod, although he proves to still be well-intentioned at times.
Physical appearance[]
Brom is slender and muscular and he has black hair. He wears a green vest over a light green shirt and black pants.
Role in the film[]
Brom Bones is the town hero of Sleepy Hollow. He likes kidding around and drinking beer with his buddies, the Sleepy Hollow Boys, and riding on his favorite horse, Daredevil. Brom likes to play jokes, particularly on the new schoolmaster, Ichabod Crane, but Ichabod is very good at ignoring these taunts. Brom Bones has always had his eyes on Katrina Van Tassel, the beautiful daughter of Baltus Van Tassel, the county's most prosperous farmer. His physique and bullying behavior always scares away rivals for Katrina's hand, but fails when he finally finds a match in Ichabod, with his wit, agility, and gentle behavior. Katrina plays the two off each other, resulting in Brom's becoming more jealous of Ichabod as he wins Katrina's favor. As they both try to escort her home from a day of shopping, Brom not only gets stuck with all the packages, he loses them as he tries to catch up with both Ichabod and Katrina, trips over the gate, gets locked out of the house, mistakes the sounds of Ichabod kissing a flower Katrina gives him for the two of them kissing, passes up the chance of finally knocking Ichabod out to look nice in front of Katrina, falls down a well as he sprints after him, and is knocked senseless by a carelessly tossed horseshoe as he climbs back up.
At the Van Tassel's annual Halloween party, Brom silently fumes as he watches Ichabod and Katrina happily dance together. He notices Tilda, a short plump woman sitting across from him who tries to flirt with him, but Brom finds her repulsive. Brom then gets the idea to switch Katrina with Tilda while on the dance floor. This backfires comically, as Tilda absolutely refuses to let him go. Brom succeeds in switching partners at least once, but Ichabod promptly cuts in, leaving Brom once again with his unwanted lady friend. He tries to follow Ichabod but Tilda keeps pulling him back until he manages to throw her in a closet and trap her inside. Brom spies Ichabod dancing on the cellar door, inspiring him to open it and get him to fall in. Unfortunately, Tilda emerges from the front door with a big "Yoo hoo!" and makes a beeline straight for Brom. Brom backs into the cellar and the door shuts on him. He gets out through the doors leading outside and is forced to watch Ichabod finish his impressive dancing, making him the hit of the party. Defeated again, the disappointed Brom is forced to admit that Ichabod has won again and his dancing is exquisite.
Then, as Brom is eating a sandwich, he spots Ichabod knocking over a salt shaker and nervously tossing the salt over his left shoulder. The devious bully has discovered the schoolmaster's weakness: his strong superstition. Brom, taking advantage of this, promptly steps forward and begins to tell the story of Sleepy Hollow's most infamous specter, the Headless Horseman. As he gets into the spirit, his song becomes darker and darker, with him acting out the part to Katrina's amusement and Ichabod's growing terror. Brom concludes by telling how he met the Horseman himself last Halloween but escaped him by crossing the old bridge at the edge of the woods ("Once you cross that bridge, my friends, the ghost is through, his power ends!").
That night, as he rides along on Old Gunpowder, Ichabod has a terrifying encounter with the Headless Horseman much like Brom's tale. As he manages to cross the bridge on Gunpowder, Ichabod turns back to see the Horseman rise in his stirrups and throw his head being a blazing jack o'lantern straight at him. Ichabod tries to dodge the gruesome object but is too late when the horrible missile hits his head hard, and sends him tumbling into the dust from Gunpowder, who has somehow run off. The next morning, Ichabod mysteriously disappears, and the only things that are found by the bridge are his hat and a shattered pumpkin.
After Ichabod's disappearance, Brom ultimately marries Katrina and both appear to be quite happy with this. Rumors soon start circulating that Ichabod's still alive and got married to wealthy widow in some distant county -- but most Sleepy Hollow-residents don't believe this, thinking that the schoolmaster was spirited away by the Headless Horseman.
Gallery[]
Screenshots[]
Miscellaneous[]
Trivia[]
- "Brom Bones" in Washington Irving's original story is a nickname; the character's real name is "Abraham van Brunt."
- While it is not explicitly stated, there is an implication is that the Headless Horseman that Ichabod met was in fact Brom Bones in disguise, and Brom (as the Horseman) successfully frightened Ichabod into leaving the Sleepy Hollow area and never coming back (or less likely, killed Ichabod). The Headless Horseman's horse looked exactly like Brom's horse in the movie. However, Ichabod peering down into the Headless Horseman's cloak to find nothing there would suggest otherwise, plus Brom is bulkier.
- Brom is in many ways similar to Gaston, as they are the handsome and manly town heroes who chase after the most beautiful girl in town and grow insanely jealous of any competitors. However, unlike Gaston, Brom has no true malicious intent and is kinder than him, along with Brom actually getting the girl and surviving his tale by defeating his love rival, albeit indirectly.
- Brom Bones' character model also inspired that of Sir Kay, one of the two anti-heroes from The Sword in the Stone, and for Gaston in Beauty and the Beast.
- Some fans believe Brom Bones is the hero in the story. This is related to the fan theory that Ichabod mainly wanted Katrina's money.
- Though it is unclear if the horseman was real or not, there is evidence that Brom Bones made up the story of the Headless Horseman and pretended to be him. The pumpkin and sword seen at the party were the same ones used by the ghost. Also, the ghost's body is very similar to Brom Bones' and though the horseman does not cross the bridge he does throw his "head" at Crane. A dirty grin also appears on Brom's face after he discovers Ichabod throwing salt over his shoulder. However, as noted above, the apparent lack of anything underneath the Horseman's cloak hints that the "Headless Horseman" that Ichabod Crane encountered was real and not Brom disguised.
- It could be possible that, in the dim light, Ichabod simply couldn't see Brom hidden within the heavy collar of the cloak, particularly if Brom had taken the precaution of veiling his head with some sort of dark, transparent material. This may, in fact, be foreshadowed in the party scene, in which Brom, on a chair and with a cloth thrown over his head and shoulders, imitates the Horseman's galloping.
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