- “How dare you speak to us this way!”
- ―Aunt Spiker to James
Aunt Spiker is James' aunt, Sponge's older sister, and one of the two main antagonists of the 1996 live-action film, James and the Giant Peach. It is unknown whether Spiker and Sponge are the sisters of James' father or mother, or possibly his great-aunts since they appear to be elderly in the book’s illustrations.
Background
After the death of James' parents, the two had no choice but to take in James and "raise" him. They never care for him, nor do they seem to make him feel loved. Instead, they treat him like a slave, give him fish heads, and make him sad and feel like he never had love in his life. They always had a tendency to beat him when he disagrees with them or backtalk, and almost always send him to his room without dinner. Also, instead of calling him by his real name, they call him very rude nicknames like "rotten little grub" and "nasty little beast".
Personality
Aunt Spiker is a cruel, malicious, and thoroughly repulsive lady, who is more dominant than her sister Sponge, and presumably the older of the two. She derives a sadistic pleasure in manipulating and tormenting young James, who she and Sponge see as nothing more than a very huge slave. This is especially more prominent by the near end, as when James stands up to them, they develop a murderous intent on him.
Spiker is described as tall and thin (almost emaciated) with steel glasses (which she doesn't have in the film). Both she and Sponge are vain, each singing praises of their imagined beauty. In actuality, they are very repulsive, as they both have wrinkled skin and even wear wigs to mask the the short grey hair they both have, which makes them even more hideous. They, however, ends up attacking each other's repulsiveness. To make up for their repulsiveness, Spiker is also smarter and less gluttonous than Sponge, who originally wanted to eat the peach, but Spiker had the better idea of using it to get rich. Like her sister, Spiker hates bugs, and will do anything to squash any if she sees them.
Appearances
James and the Giant Peach
In the movie, after James' parents are eaten by a rhinoceros, he is sent to live with his mean aunts, Spiker and Sponge, who adopt him. In the beginning of the film, when James awakens from being asleep in his room, Aunt Spiker and Aunt Sponge come into his room, and Spiker comments that he already wasted four minutes of daylight, and along with Sponge, orders him to get up and get to work. They are both very abusive and treat him like a slave, forcing him to do hard labor, beating him for no good reason, and feeding him nothing but fish heads. They call him offensive names instead of his actual name. They also have a terrible hatred of insects and bugs and kill them in a variety of awful ways, and are thus hated by them as well.
Later on in the movie, Aunt Spiker is seen sitting next to Aunt Sponge in a chair and listens to her sister tell her that if she takes off both her socks, she'll see her dainty toes, to which Spiker tells Sponge not to forget how much her tummy shows. Later, Spiker notices James reading his travel map to New York City and takes it from him, asking him how he even dreams of leaving. Spiker and Sponge threaten their nephew by reminding him that the rhino will get him if he tries to leave, and Sponge tears up James' travel map. Both aunts then demand James to get back to work.
Sometime later, Spiker and Sponge discover a peach on a withered old tree (caused by the influence of the "crocodiles tongues" that James accidentally spilled when he received them earlier from a mysterious soldier) and watch it grow to immense proportions in a matter of seconds. Spiker and Sponge use the giant peach as an attraction, making lots of money as James watches from the house, not allowed to leave or play with the other children.
That night, Spiker and Sponge send James outside to pick up the garbage dropped by their customers. While doing so, he grabs a chunk of the peach as a "crocodile tongue" enters it for him to eat. James ventures into the giant fruit and transforms into a stop-motion animated character, where he finds and befriends a group of anthropomorphic invertebrate insects (who are all much larger than his small petite frame), who also dream of an ideal home. As they hear the aunts search for James, Centipede manages to cut the twig holding the giant peach to the tree, and the peach rolls away to the Atlantic Ocean with James and his insect friends inside it. One night, while navigating on the peach, James has a nightmare of him as a caterpillar being chased and attacked by Spiker, Sponge, and the rhino, eventually getting trapped in a blind alley before he awakens.
Later, when James arrives in New York City with the giant peach (having transformed back into his normal form by then), he is followed by his two persistent aunts, apparently somehow managing to drive their now-crushed car under the ocean and reach New York covered in seaweed and crabs. They then try to convince the authorities that James is a liar and that he be released to them. However, James, now no longer afraid of his cruel aunts, stands up to them and reveals the truth about their horrible treatment of him. Unable to believe that James dares to stand up to them, they furiously attack him with firemen's axes until the sudden reappearance of the insects come to James' rescue. James and the bugs then tie Spiker and Sponge up with Miss Spider's thread, and the beat cop has them taken away on a crane, after which they are presumably arrested.
After the credits, there's a scene showing an arcade-like game which consists of controlling a rhinoceros to attack replica models of the aunts.
Book
In the book, when the peach gets loose, it rolls over Aunt Spiker and Aunt Sponge, instantly squashing them both..
In the 1996 film, they survive and pursue James to New York City in their beat-up car (in the Ice World, James and Miss Spider see a shipwreck with figureheads, having a terrible resemblance of the two aunts). Upon arriving in New York, both are soaked as if they had been driving their car across the seabed. They attempt to capture James but they end up getting tied up with Miss Spider's silk and taken away by New York City police.
Trivia
- When James and Miss Spider were searching for both Mr. Centipede and a compass, one of the sunken ships had both Aunt Spiker and Aunt Sponge on the mast for unknown reasons.
- Aunt Spiker has similarities to Lady Tremaine, as both of them force the protagonists of their respective films to work as slaves.
- Coincidentally, Spiker and Sponge also resemble Belle's sisters, in particular, the fat and lean one, respectively.
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