from Mars: In-Depth: Love: Vinnie and Charley

First Appearance Together: "Rock N' Ride!"
Additional Signifigant Appearances Together: "Back to Mars Part One", "Back to Mars Part Three", "The Masked Motorcyclist", "Hit the Road, Jack", "Once Upon a Time on Mars Part Three", "Last Stand at the Last Chance"

        Of all the relationships in "Biker Mice from Mars," perhaps none has captured the imagination of the fans more than the one between white-furred wild mouse Vinnie VanWham and sharp-witted human mechanic Charley Davidson. It's no wonder. Both of these characters are extremely engaging, and their romance is perhaps the most dynamic and most enjoyable in the entire series. It's definitely not static, like some of the others (*cough* Throttle and Carbine *cough*). It dips, twists, and turns, starting as an antagonistic friendship and stumbling towards romance, leaving the fans wondering--what comes next?
        Their relationship is, if nothing else, the longest-running on the show, going from the first episode to the last few moments of the series finale and beyond. As the main characters are being introduced, the seeds of this romance are planted.
        Vinnie and Charley meet under the classic "damsel in distress" motif we've all come to know and love. Shortly after the Biker Mice arrived in Chicago, Vinnie enters the Last Chance Garage in search of parts for Throttle's bike, only to find its lovely proprietor, Charley, being threatened by one of Lawrence Limburger's flunkies, Greasepit. As we all know, there's nothing Vinnie loves quite so much as impressing a cute girl—unless it's being a hero and saving the day. So he does just that, first taunting Greasepit, then getting ready to knock his lights out. According to the rules of cartoon heroics, Vinnie should have Charley hanging on his arm and drooling all over him in ten minutes. Not a bad start for his first day on Earth, eh?
        The only problem is that Charley is not going to be impressed by Vinnie's showing off. She just ain't that kinda girl. Charley is a thoroughly modern woman--self-sufficient, level-headed, independent, and intelligent (not to mention brave: her garage is in the bad section of Chicago. Setting up shop in a place like that takes guts!)—and not about to go ga-ga over some puffed-up guy with an ego bigger than he is!
        In fact, the defining moment of the relationship occurs within the first five minutes. Vinnie uses one of his flares to cut down an overhead cable, which he uses to swing across the room, preparing to slam Greasepit in the gut. So far, "Operation: Impress the Girl" is going great. Then Vinnie lets go of the rope, and, with his moment of glory just within his reach, slips on a puddle of grease and falls flat on his ass. He goes from being the rescuer to being in desperate need of rescuing. You can almost hear Charley thinking, "Excuse me? What the Hell was that? Some hero you are!"
        So before Vinnie sees his first sunrise on Earth, he's already lost his chance to completely blow Charley away with his awesome heroics. Again, it wouldn't have worked in the first place--that kinda thing just doesn't fly with her. Well, are YOU enjoying the view?

But still, he keeps at it, trying to impress her, both through feats of daring do and with his supreme overconfidence--after all, what girl isn't dazzled by a guy who thinks the sun rises and sets on him? He constantly refers to her as "sweetheart," a nickname that seems both irritating and endearing, and playfully invites her to enjoy the visual feast that is him (sample: as the mice find themselves suspended over a lava pit in "Once Upon a Time on Mars Part One," Charley positions Vinnie with his back to her so that Limburger will be unable to see the work she's doing on Modo's arm. Vinnie grins, shakes his rear, and asks, "Enjoying the view, sweetheart?").
Charley picking on Vinnie.

Charley, in the mean time, seems to take a special pleasure in deflating Vinnie's ego and taunting him whenever the chance arises—in effect, turning all his showing off and egotism against him. For example, in "Rock N' Ride," just after Vinnie catches the mechanic and prevents her untimely death, he grins and asks, "Have I got style, or what?" In reply, Charley waves a hand in front of her face and grumbles, "What you've got is bad breath! You been eatin' onions again?!" Another time, in "Big Trouble," Vinnie catches Charley as she falls from the top of Limburger Tower (I'm starting to sense a theme here) and asks, "So, drop by here often?" She replies, "What a lousy pick-up line (a bad pun, yes, but it fits)." It may seem like Charley is being an A-1 ingrate, but actually, that's just her personality. Like I said, Charley dislikes guys who are full of themselves. This seems to stem from getting dumped by her former movie star boyfriend Rod VanHam on a prom night long, long ago and far, far away (see "Danger is Our Business"). Rod's ego makes Vinnie look like he has an inferiority complex, but still, Charley's relationship with him seems to have left a bad taste for that kind of guy in her mouth.
        So at any rate, Charley doesn't fawn over guys--unless they happen to be very chivalric. Consider the case of her brief infatuation with Sir Lancelot of the Round Table (see Biker Knights of the Round Table Part One"). During a brief battle based on misunderstanding, Lancelot pulled Charley off Vinnie's bike and called her a wench. Charley kicked him in the head. Not a promising start, eh? But afterwards, Lancelot's manners and deference to women so impress our favorite mechanic that Charley is very quickly smitten with the knight. One almost draws the impression that she likes him because he's almost the anti-Vinnie: cultured, well-mannered, gentle, mature. Vinnie, on the other hand, once replied to the statement, "See? Chivalry is not dead--even if some people keep kicking it in the teeth" with "Only when it deserves it."
        Another of Charley's favorite sticking points with Vinnie is his immaturity and male chauvinism. It's not hard to see why she'd play around with him on either point. Vinnie seems at times to be little more than an overgrown teenager, and discourages Charley from joining the mice on several missions because she's a woman. The mechanic does get sweet revenge for this sort of talk on several occasions, most notably in "The Masked Motorcyclist" and "Hit the Road, Jack." On the other hand, he knows how to send such criticism right back at her: when Charley demands to know why Vinnie dumped her into the bushes when the time to fight arose in "A Mouse and His Motorcycle," Vinnie winked and answered, "This is stupid macho-guy stuff, remember?"
        That's what a person has to realize about all Vinnie and Charley's back and forth: they're just playing with each other. Both of them know the other's triggers, and will tease and pick whenever they can. They enjoy it. It's fun. This kind of thing actually strengthens a relationship, according to experts, or at least, something I read in a magazine while I was waiting to get my hair cut.
         Charley riding with Vinnie.

In fact, despite the bantering, the relationship is growing right from the start. It begins, of course, as simple friendship, with subtle signs that it might become something more. Charley is clearly more comfortable with Vinnie than with any of the mice, and is almost constantly with him. Whenever she rides with the mice, and doesn't take her own bike, Charley is on the back of Vinnie's--even though both Throttle and Modo have abundant room for a second rider on theirs. The fact of the matter is, the two of them work well together. Their different strengths compliment each other. His impulsiveness, her thoughtfulness; his energy, her ingenuity. In "Last Stand at the Last Chance," for example, Throttle wisely has Vinnie stay with the mechanic at the besieged Garage. His reasoning is two-fold. One, Vinnie will be able to help protect the mechanic and possibly postpone Greasepit and his goons from tearing down the Garage. And two, Charley will be able to restrain Vinnie from actually beating up on said goons, which would get him hauled off to jail. Well, in theory, anyway. About five minutes after Throttle and Modo leave, Vinnie's tearing through the streets and taking on the goons anyway. But in all fairness, could anybody really ever hope to restrain Vinnie? I don't think so. More importantly, while Vinnie is out smashing machinery and fighting Greasepit, Charley has time enough to come up with a makeshift smokescreen that holds the bad guys off for a time. Without the two of them working together, the Garage almost certainly would have been destroyed.
Vinnie saving the day once again.

And who is the one who constantly comes to Charley's rescue? Vincent! Out of the estimated 13,987,234,398,713,243,879 times Charley is taken hostage or kidnapped or whatnot, Throttle or Modo easily could have stepped in, but 99.99992 percent of the time, it's Vinnie who takes care of the job. He enjoys being the hero and saving the day, but it's also because of his own developing feelings for the lady. Charley worries about Vinnie every time he rushes off half-cocked into danger (which, I'd say, means she's worrying almost constantly). On one occasion when she thinks she may have caused his death ("Last Stand at the Last Chance") she becomes particularly upset.
Vinnie mooning over Charley.

And of course, Vinnie has been looking to be with Charley from the very start. He does have a crush on her--look at the way he grins shyly after Charley blows him a kiss in "Road Ravens." In fact, Vinnie shows off so much for Charley because he thinks that at some point she's actually going to be impressed by it. He's a show-off by nature, but Charley's presence heightens the desire. And what seems like picking or just stupid comments are often his attempts to ingratiate himself to her. For example, in "Stalkers," when Charley tells the Biker Mice that the Stalkers didn't take her as a hostage because they said she "had no trophy value," Vinnie replies, "You do to me, babe." Charley tells him that it isn't the time for that-—Rimfire has just been captured, after all-—but still, Vinnie's just being honest. Vinnie has a real thing for Charley, and he's just telling her in his own unique way.
        But even though they won't just flat-out say "I like you," both Vinnie and Charley do show the depths of their feelings from time to time. Perhaps the best example comes from "Back to Mars Part One." As the mice prepare to return to their home planet, Vinnie is last to enter the Transporter booth that Charley is desperately trying to get working. Vinnie tries awkwardly to tell Charley goodbye, stumbling over his words and wringing his hands in obvious anxiety. It's clear in his eyes that there's something Vinnie wants desperately to get across, but he just can't come out and say it. When Charley chides him and tells him to hurry up, Vinnie is crestfallen. Only when she admits that she'll miss him, too, does Vinnie smile, blow her a kiss, and happily rejoin his bros. While he obviously doesn't feel strongly enough about the mechanic to stay on Earth or consider it (or maybe he's too unsure of her feelings toward him), Vinnie's tongue-tied attempt to bid her adieu is proof of what he's feeling. And of course, Charley does admit that she'll miss him, even if her reply is a little terse (you probably would be, too, if you were trying to keep a piece of alien machinery you have no idea how to work from turning three of your friends into tiny bits).
        Another clear sign is Vinnie's obvious jealousy whenever another guy makes a move on or even gives an indication of being interested in Charley romantically. Even when there's no real threat of the challenger intruding on their relationship, he can get downright nasty. It's almost comic to watch his reaction. When Sir Lancelot commented on Charley having lost her clothing (he misinterpreted her skintight "Masked Motorcyclist" jumpsuit as underclothes), causing the mechanic to giggle and blush shyly, Vinnie growls, "Hey, Lance--keep your mind on your horse." He's had similar reactions to advances on "his girl" from Stoker (in "Caveat Mentor"), Charley's former boyfriend "Asphalt" Jack McCyber (in both "Virtual UnReality" and "Hit the Road, Jack"), the aforementioned Sir Lancelot ("Biker Knights of the Round Table" parts One and Two), and Greasepit--yes, Greasepit--in "Big Trouble." Yeah, it's stupid macho crap, but hey, that's Vinnie. He's a very "stupid macho crap" kinda guy.
        More! In "Last Stand at the Last Chance," after Vinnie's scheme to destroy some of the marauding goons' vehicles succeeds, the mouse gleefully swings Charley in a loop (after they simultaneously shout, "Yeah! Set 'em up and knock 'em down!"), the two of them laughing happily together as if they were long time lovers and death wasn't knocking on the door. They embrace, Charley sighs, "What a guy," and Vinnie just laughs and smiles. The two of them quickly realize they're being a bit more intimate than "just friends" ought to be, and pull apart quickly. Charley explains it away nervously as women needing to "verify the legalities (or possibly, "verify their realities." I really can't tell, and I've listened to her say it eight times straight)." The sudden return of Greasepit and his goons seems almost a welcome intrusion on this awkward moment. And who can forget Charley's tender kiss on Vinnie's cheek at the end of "Once Upon a Time on Mars Part Three?"
        Still, one has to wonder why a relationship that seems to be working out so well is taking so long to develop. Neither Vinnie nor Charley seems to be the shy sort, yet it takes them three seasons to get really close? Alot of factors come into play (maybe the fact that it's an action-adventure comedy intended for children has something to do with it…?). First, consider the fact that neither of them are looking for a really serious relationship at the beginning of the series. Like I said, Charley's an independent, modern-type girl who probably feels that she doesn't need a man in her life at this point. And Vinnie is still carrying a torch for Harley when the Biker Mice crash land on Earth. She's the one he's been searching for since the mice were forced off Mars, and he really wants to find her. That relationship, particularly the ending, was hard on him (read more about Vinnie's relationship with Harley at the Biker Mice in Love: Vinnie, Harley, and Stoker page). So initially, neither Charley nor Vinnie was interested in any sort of future together. Second, add in the fact that they're literally from different worlds. Assuming that the writers (not to be confused with The Writer ;) didn't have it in the cards that the Biker Mice were slaughtered in some future season, at some point, the chance to return to Mars would have popped up for a second time. Last time, Vinnie's decision to return home wasn't too difficult--he wanted to go back, he and his bros had to return Limburger to Mars for trial, and he and Charley were just friends. The choice was easy last time. But what about next time?

The choice was easy last time. But what about next time?

But assuming they would continue to grow closer, should the chance to return to Mars ever arise again, Vinnie's decision might be damn near impossible to make. With no known Transporters on Mars, and only two or three functional spaceships, a trip there is pretty much one way. If Vinnie and Charley became too romantically entangled, one of them could end up having to choose between the planet of their birth and the person they love. Tough choice to make. And finally, don't underestimate just how much of an impact their being of difference species might have. As stated by the venerable Tom Taranowicz (bow down, infidel!) in his comments at the Unofficial Biker Mice from Mars Fan Club:

"Y’see, the Martian Mice are much more advanced in some ways than humans are. They harbor no prejudices, and since they have been monitoring Earth TV and Radio waves for years, have grown to accept and appreciate our stan- dards of beauty (check out numerous references to this in numerous episodes). So, sure, Vinnie would find Charley "do-able." Charley, on the other hand, being burdened with Earth’s standards and mores (no 60’s flower child she) would find the bestiality aspect a bit hard to overcome. Although I’ve noticed her hands pretty low around the Vin-man’s waist from time to time while riding with him."

Draw what conclusions you will from that. I just love the fact that he said "do-able."
Still, I'd say that this relationship stands a good chance of being successful. They were friends before they were (or will be) anything else, and to me, those have always seemed like the kind of romances that stand the best chance. There's no small amount of passion between them. They deliberately provoke each other, but in jest. Besides, they're a fun couple! This most unlikely of romances might never be resolved in the eyes of the fans, but don't forget the last image of the series--that gentle kiss, and Vinnie riding into the sunset...with Charley's hanging on behind.

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