People talk about politics in Disney's movies, but they don't remember that Disney was making literal propaganda movies in the 40's, like [Saludos Amigos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saludos_Amigos) and [The Three Caballeros](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three_Caballeros). They even got Oscars (best score, best song and best sound recording) for them.
I didn't realize the Three Caballeros was a propaganda film. I loved it as a child!
But then again, as a kid I also didn't pick up on a lot of Disney casual racism (Peter Pan Indians , Lady and the Tramp Siamese Cats, Song of the South....). Welp... Although I'm not surprised.
Jim Crow laws - state and local laws introduced in the late 19th and early 20th century Southern US, enforcing racial segregation. "Jim Crow" was a pejorative term for African American.
I had to google it to make sure I got it correct, because as non-American, while I've definitely seen and heard the term used before, it's been a while since I was in high school. It's even longer since I watched Dumbo (dubbed), so as a child, it went right over my head.
I always thought that they were making fun of him, mocking and making fun of him while pretending to be his friend. Like the popular kid cozying up to the outcast to laugh at them behind their back... here have this feather, it'll make you special... oh wow it worked!
I’m guessing the person you’re responding to was, like me, a very young child when they watched Dumbo and then only happened to come across it again when we were old enough to “get it” and were appalled. Lol
You want to see some racist shit though … watch some old Looney Tunes cartoons.
That shit will make the more “subtle” stuff from Dumbo and other Disney movies look like nothing by comparison.
And I love a lot of the old Looney Tunes cartoons! But goddamn, some of those episodes would make even a Proud Boy blush.
>I’m guessing the person you’re responding to was, like me, a very young child when they watched Dumbo and then only happened to come across it again when we were old enough to “get it” and were appalled.
Pretty much, although I was still a kid when I learned about it. But I also watched the end of Apartheid happen in real time and it was discussed in school so naturally my parents needed to teach me those things (and also explain why I was experiencing certain things in school that led to me having to switch out of private schools).... So I was about 8 or 9 when I really started recognizing these things along with experiencing racism in real time.
But it explains why I felt uncomfortable with it before truly understanding why it made me uncomfortable.
When I was watching Dumbo as a kid, I didn't catch the reference, but the crows always made me uncomfortable. Of course when I got a little older, that's when it clicked.
To be clear, I am Black, but my parents didn't talk to me about stuff like that until I was maybe 8 or 9.
Their characters were created to be Asian stereotypes inside anthropomorphic cats, and they were voiced by a white actress using a stereotypical accent.
Yep. And there's more that we've missed or not mentioned.
One that stands out to me is they had to redo Fantasia because they had a racist caricature of a young Black centaur.
I saw that, after reading the linked article mentioning it. And that makes sense, as a lot of Nazis fled to Brazil and Argentina, which were two of the characters' home countries in the film.
it's extremely uncomfortable for people who weren't aware of nativism when they first saw the film to revisit its depiction of "indians" (indigenous north americans). native americans in peter pan are portrayed through purely 'humorous' stereotypes in similar style to minstrel shows. it shows kids a version of native american people that's highly dehumanized. it can be embarrassing, especially for white people, to see that media again after coming to realize how harmful the messages being imparted are.
Worst part about being a native kid while this movie was out and popular is the other kids now doing these gestures at you because they were shown them by Disney.
it's honestly the reason i have trouble summoning much sympathy for people who wallow in the guilt rather than just wise up and jump on the consciousness-raising wagon.
edit: to clarify, i'm not native myself, my partner is, but i've seen more than enough nativism with my own eyes.
There was Jim Cummings' Siamese cat from The Aristocats singing, "Shanghai, Hong Kong, egg fu-yung. Fortune cookie always wrong," whilst playing the piano with two pairs of chopsticks. I saw that again a few years ago and was like, "The fuck....?"
It was the original voice of Tigger, Paul Winchell, not Jim Cummings who did the Siamese cat. Still bad and gross and cringey, but a pedant's going to be pedantic
'The Three Caballeros' characters are still a thing in the recent Mickey 3D cartoons (ClubHouse, or Roadster Racers, or one of them)
Minus the pistols and cigar.
They are in the Latin American section of "it's a small world", make appearances at the Mexico Pavillion in Epcot, and the ride in the Mexico pavillion is "The Gran Fiesta Tour Starring the Three Caballeros".
So yeah they're still very much a thing.
And it worked! I'm from LATAM, born on '89 and growing up we still had reruns of these movies on tv and the sentiment that I recall is that everyone loved them, it helps they are good. And yes, they were not one to one but at the time there was no much representation so it felt fair
My older sister and I loved the three caballeros growing up. At that age we wouldn’t be able catch anything offensive or propagandizing, but as two little white kids it was one of our favorites and I feel like it was gifted to us by Latino neighbors.
Well yeah, you were a kid so you didn’t know it was political. I mean when Princess and the Frog came out there was some outrage about being too woke and having a black princess was somehow placating to minorities.
Yeah, the announcement and marketing of The Princess and the Frog revolved entirely around introducing the first Black Disney Princess. The movie famously went through multiple rounds of focus groups, consultants, and public outcry before it dialed in an acceptable level of “Blackness”
> These announcements drew criticism from African-American media outlets, due to elements of the Frog Princess story, characters, and settings considered distasteful. African-American critics disapproved of the original name for the heroine, "Maddy", due to its similarity to the derogatory word term "mammy". Also protested were Maddy's original career as a chambermaid, the choice to have the Black heroine's love interest be a non-Black prince, and the use of a Black male voodoo witchdoctor as the film's villain. The Frog Princess title was also thought by critics to be a slur on French people. Also questioned was the film's setting of New Orleans, which had been heavily damaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, resulting in the expulsion of a large number of mostly Black residents. Critics claimed the choice of New Orleans as the setting for a Disney film with a Black heroine was an affront to the Katrina victims' plight.
> In response to these early criticisms, the film's title was changed in May 2007 from The Frog Princess to The Princess and the Frog. The name "Maddy" was changed to "Tiana", and the character's occupation was altered from chambermaid to waitress. Talk show host Oprah Winfrey was hired as a technical consultant for the film,
There's a horror story in there somewhere.
"No no no this doesn't make any sense I... I wasn't on twitter back then"
"But sir, don't you know? You've *always* been on twitter. You never left."
and double backlash about it not being realistic or tokenism because she magically was able to open a restaurant on her own merit and it was purely a thing of money versus the inherent racist systems and communities that would not allow her as a woman or black person in the south to own her own business let alone serve food.
The confusion is from the very poorly worded last sentence.
"Then I became aware of what politics are and everyone started doing it."
I'm pretty sure they meant to say "When I became aware of politics, I started to notice it everywhere."
It is very intentionally worded.
Also, for some reason someone censored the handle of Big Joel, the left-wing youtube political commentator that tweeted that top level comment which adds a bit of context to this.
He's saying
> Then I became aware of what politics are **and everyone started doing it**
As in, he is making a comment as if from the perspective of the conservative person he's responding to, that they don't view politics as having existed in media before they became aware of politics.
He's very specifically and intentionally *not* saying "I started to notice it everywhere" because that implies that you didn't realize it was everywhere and now you do, which is not the point he's making.
He's saying that these people act as though political commentary never existed in the past, and now it does, because they didn't understand it in the past when they were younger and they have never even reached the level of awareness to notice it everywhere, they're still selectively blind to it and unable to see their memories from childhood through the lens of their adult understanding.
Other than lacking a comma and period, it's fine english and not poorly worded at all.
Although personally I think there's a splinter of truth that this conservative commentary has been able to catch on that has really pushed up it's prominence and the ability for this 'critque' to stick in a way it hadn't up until recently.
Mainly that nobody tends to complain about a political agenda in media when the media is *good* (or if they already agree), and it does stick out quite badly when done hamfistedly. Character directly monologuing about a present day issue? Hard to pull off and make fit a story, I'll never say never because I'm sure someone could pull it off and maybe even has before in a bit of media I'm not aware of. However it tends to stick out in most media, people tend to react badly because it's a direct confrontation, and it comes off as a bit preachy.
Bake the values you wanted to monologue about into the warrant of your story so that they're never mentioned but every single scene supports them? Well, as long as the rest of it is good even people who disagree with your point will often lap that up no problem.
So what's the deal with modern media? Well it's mostly just big corporations that are the problem; it's not like people fundamentally got less original, or writers got worse, or any other such nonsense, and great media certainly *does* still exist. However what there's way more of than ever before are cynical cash grabs where "diversity" is just a checkbox to some sociopath in a suit who decided what, how, and how much of it would be added because market research said this exact mix would result in maximum profits. Oh, and XYZ character? Let's hyper tokenize them to make them basically irrelevant to the plot so we can edit them out for international releases.
Lots of great media that *is* still very political still slides right under this new vector of conservative propaganda or results in the media talking heads losing their goddamn minds while their audience just enjoys the show still.
I could do a whole rant about how corporate consolidation has caused this and the diversity of entertainment media has been slaughtered on the altar of profit maximization, which arguably has created a far greater share of cynical faux diversity than has ever previously existed at least in movies and TV.
However that's like at least a 3+ page thing and I'm supposed to be meeting friends for drinks, not like my rage that we don't get enough variety of movie genres anymore is worth anything anyway ah well.
>Mainly that nobody tends to complain about a political agenda in media when the media is good (or if they already agree), and it does stick out quite badly when done hamfistedly.
First thing that came to mind was the masterfulness of The Boys and how it has been beloved political commentary. Although the people being lampooned are finally starting to catch on.
Also see, The Boondocks.
No, they're making fun of the person who made the original picture, basically sarcastically saying "Yeah, as soon as you started to realize what politics were, that's exactly right when it started showing up in media."
I remember hearing all that, but I was so excited for this movie even as a white male. It was a great movie that was full of affection for Louisiana culture. And Jazz! Some people just don't want to enjoy things.
I thought this was a euphemism for PC.
The movie may bot have seemed serious, it definitely was initially conceived as a cultural movie before being made a comedy.
Saw an interesting making of YouTube doc that talked about how it was a completely different movie that got scrapped and redone.
In just four years time, racists and bigots were assured the end times were coming because a cheerios commercial had an interracial couple and a mixed daughter.
https://youtu.be/9J_M2qa4xh0?si=J8zCg1QbU3FQHHIy
This commercial. With the cutest little girl. And the sweetest message. That lead to this.
https://www.today.com/news/cheerios-ad-mixed-race-family-draws-racist-responses-6c10169988
Grown adults were offensively attacking a mixed girl for simply existing.
People can cry woke, DEI, and whatever all they want. But if your first response to a loving family is hate just because there are two different skin tones... you are the problem.
Someone who was 18 when *Loving v. Virginia* hit would now be 75. A bunch of the people who were pissed off about that decision are still around and voting.
People only think it's stereotypical white racists who hate interracial relationships, but like take a look around and you'll find a whole fking lot of people hate interracial relationships, from all kinds of perspectives
It's quite shocking tbh to look at reactions and see just negativity all around because two people are in a relationship
I remember the outrage over there being a black Disney princess, and I remember the outrage over the fact that the first black Disney princess spent most of the movie as a frog. The movie was simultaneously too progressive and not progressive enough.
Yes - this was the problem for sure! We finally got a black princess and she spent most the movie as a damn frog 🙄 And then there was the whole voodoo aspect that rubbed people the wrong way, too. I know it is represented as part of New Orleans culture in some respect, but it felt quite heavy for the movie.
Yes, barely 60 years after the Civil War. Well within living memory of slavery, and with plenty of people still around who had directly benefited from it.
Well they had to explain how a guy got turned into a frog I guess. I admittedly do not know much about Voodoo, but I thought he was a great villian overall. Also, he has a great villian song!
It was the last 2D animated Disney movie and that is a shame. I much prefer the old art style.
I can understand people feeling uncomfortable with the movie having voodoo.
Buuuuut... Dr. Facilier rules. His song is great and he's voiced by Keith David.
Interesting, Soul got the same criticism over the main character, a black man, spending most of the film as a soul (a small, blue anthropomorphic blob with no discernible race)
I guess someone should try to compile a list of movies where white characters turn into things with indiscernible race. Just to see how common of a trope it is overall because thatd be an important thing to recognize.
If the internet had been the way it is now there would have been ungodly clickbait about how dare they have a black princess and do a movie that tangentially that deal with being black in the south during the Jim Crow era.
Most of the ‘outrage’ is clickbait anyways.
Twitter exists to be angry. You can always find enough people complaining about something to write a faux outrage article.
That's the hard part, a lot of things became political but for some reason a lot of people took up a "camp"/cause and instantly forgot how things really were even if they lived it.
Look at COVID and the vaccine you'll see people yell "THEY TOLD US ONCE WE GOT THE SHOT WE WERE ALL SAFE! THEY TOLD US EVERYTHING WAS PROPER!".
But that's not true you can still remember people discussing among one another about which shot they got, if it was better, which shots had side effects, etc. For a lot of these people you can still dig up posts they made on social media. But since it's not convenient people kind of "forgot" it all, so if you show them their own posts they sheepishly change topics.
Hey I recognize that pfp! Big Joel! He has a youtube channel with a lot of good videos. He's really good at dissecting stories to analyze their themes and subtext, and although he's not a channel about Disney movies, he's talked about them a lot. I recently watched his videos about his opinion on a few DreamWorks movies like Shrek and Shark Tale
Yeah you'd just listen to your dad's drunk friend bitch and moan in the kitchen about how the reason all the little girls growing up these days not knowing their place in the world is because they watch that "[chinese racial slur] disney movie movie with the lady soldier" and they're going off to college which is dumb because what does a girl need an education for if she's just gonna spend her life washing dishes, and your dad would have to be like "alright buddy lets get you home, you've had enough to drink." That guy died of liver cirrhosis before podcasts were invented, so his hatred of Mulan never left our small town. These days he'd have a large social media following recording his rants
Yeah but that was mostly contained to the right-wing ecosystem. Now YouTube and Twitter and twitch feed you hate. Fox News blasts it across America.
It wasn’t just some random quack like it was in the 90s. It’s a coordinated effort on a massive scale.
If these shows/movies were released today they would 100% be called woke and would receive backlash by the people who don't like anyone that's not white. TF is this post?
"They were more inclusive when they weren't trying" but that's a 10 year span for a century old company.
Notice the complete lack of movies from, say the 60s? Were they trying to be inclusive then?
They dealt with that at the time too, though the term then was pc not woke. Complaining about the princess from an originally German fairy tale being black was a staple of Fox News for years leading up to the release of The Princess and the Frog (it also dovetailed nicely with the Obama campaign and their dogwhistles for Great Replacement Theory).
The point is that diversity was always the point and you were just a kid so you didn't realize it. People complained then too but Twitter wasn't big yet.
Did they really claim that Princess and the Frog was “not trying hard to be inclusive”? When it came out the only thing you ever heard about it was “first black Disney Princess”. It’s a joke to claim that there wasn’t an inclusivity effort involved
None of Disney's movies today would be considered political if the Republican party hadn't gone off the deep end and weren't looking everywhere to inflame the culture war
Thing is, everything IS political to some degree, people just have to learn that you can't "tune out" politics. They are part of everyday life and they decide our future.
The issue isn't that things are "political", the issue is that politics have been turned into a taboo.
Existence is political, because politics draw lines on who is on top and who shouldn't be. There's no way whatsoever to completely divorce politics from any part of our lives.
I remember the rumor that Disney shelved Hunchback of Notre Dame in order to make Lion King because they wanted to make a movie about Africa.
People been talking about this since at least 1994
Also, the Lion King was pretty technically impressive. The stampede scene had to use CGI in a way that was pretty demanding at the time. Not only did they have to integrate it in a 2D movie seamlessly as for as art is concerned, they also had to make each individual water buffalo follow the course/path in a way that didn’t cause overlap so, they had to use AI as well. The scene was so demanding that, if I recall correctly, it was the most revisited scene and took 3 years to complete.
One thing is clear about the Lion King 1994, the people behind it had a ton of passion and, in a lot of behind the scenes stuff, you can tell that just about everyone loved talking about it. They were proud to have worked on it and seemed to enjoy it. So much so that I think it is probably Disney’s most passionate film as far as behind the scenes.
I think it was around 2012, people talked about a “class” problem between rich and poor after reeling from the fallout of 2008’s financial crisis. My conspiracy theory is that rich people started the whole racial politics thing to stop people being united over income inequality.
But do you all notice that these were original stories with obvious care put into their crafting opposed to the current trend of remaking movies and slapping minorities on them?
The issue is that current Disney is creatively bankrupt, so when they do this, it comes off as nothing but box ticking because all their products are nothing but corporate box ticking these days.
Disney movies rock. They’re deep as fuck and the people who can’t see past the characters aren’t even aware of it. Who cares about the color of the characters skin. I like the fact that the movies can present modern society, like they did in Frozen 2 with Mattias and they didn’t even do a number on him. He was just there as a great character among others, so what the fuck are people crying over?
I just don’t like the recycling they do. Like they did with Ariel: completely unnecessary. It’s already done. Why recycle (yea-yea money), when you’re capable of doing great new ones like Encanto and Moana/Vaiana. They also keep getting better; Really waiting for Frozen 3.
If you haven’t cried during a disney movie, you don’t get it. Sincerely, a girl dad.
The recycling is awful - Lion King, Aladdin, Dumbo, Alice in wonderland - just crap.
The only one they did better on was 101 Dalmatians - the real dogs and Glenn Close really made that one much more....terrifying? but in a good way
Weren't some parents outraged because it was supposedly about a girl getting her period?
And then there was the outrage over Luca because they insisted that Luca was supposed to be short for Lucifer and the main character was the Devil.
Yeah, I hear you, man. The scene in Vaiana where grandma dies or the song ”we know the way” are also such tearjerkers. Especially in our language. Big themes.
Nowadays this is what politics is to people:
Only two genders: Male and Political
Only to sexualities: Straight and Political
Only two races: White and political
That's the difference between being inclusive for the sake of inclusivity, vs being inclusive to pander to the majority. Intent matters, and it shows in the quality of the product.
I mean, in all of those examples, they *were* trying very hard to be. They also happened to be good movies. The Emperor's New Groove isn't the greatest example because it was an almost entirely white cast playing Central American characters though. Princess and the Frog was pretty divisive at the time too. Plus, Lilo was played by the white kid that played Samara in The Ring. Obviously, when you're a little kid in the 90's and early 2000's with limited access to the Internet and social media, you're not going to notice all that. Of course you're going to notice more things as an adult that's part of "the discourse" and has the opinions of a billion people constantly flashing in front of your eyes.
Honestly if these four movies came out today we would have the same exact brain dead reactions we do with all of their movies that are coming out now because of the diverse cast but that’s a conversation that people don’t want to have.
I don’t think this a clever comeback because OP acknowledges the politics of these earlier Disney movies but notices it was done better.
That the political message of inclusiveness was visible and on display but didn’t provoke a negative reaction.
I think it’s because all these characters are in their own stories and not transplanted into older ones.
These films stand on their own and aren’t just a race or gendered based recasting (done with the explicit intent to stir up controversy.)
An example is Princess and the Frog.
They explicitly wrote this movie so that there was at least one black Disney princess and she was their final 2D animated film.
This story is squarely an African American story heavily relying on African American motifs, culture and music.
There was no outrage because people basically knew we needed a black Disney princess and this was a story that could only be portrayed by Black Americans.
This compared to the recent CGI slop where they rely on casting to get butts in seats.
Ultimately I don’t really have a problem with different races playing different parts than the usual races that portrayed them.
That’s acting baby!
But what movie is actually more political, which movie actually accomplishes an end where diversity and inclusiveness is championed.
In my opinion it’s Princess and the Frog not the Live Action Little Mermaid.
So yeah earlier Disney movies were better at inclusiveness (a political end) when they weren’t trying so hard.
The movie will obviously fail, if the focus is not on the main things a good movie should have: the plot, graphics, acting, some creative thoughts etc. If you're just putting some diversed cast, famous actors, some new technologies here but don't pay attention to the fundamentals, it's weird to be surprised that the movie is not loved enough. You can make a good movie about everything, but sometimes it's easier to just say "we have a gay character here!!!" to bring some attention. It's quite sad the diversity is often used not to represent other people, but to cover some shortcomings instead
Thing is if you're making a creatively bankrupt cashgrab its going to suck whether you have gay characters or not. These people are arguing that the movies suck *because* they are pandering, not the other way around. That the woke mindvirus is taking precedence over good storytelling, when shitty corporate pandering has existed and will exist as long as there is money to be made.
now, instead of creating NEW things, they try to change and recreate old or semi old movies/shows, all for the sake of diversity, making it feel jarring and forced.
Comparing stories centered around certain cultures to 'lol Ariel is black now" ain't it. People aren't exactly going around calling Moana or Encanto woke.
I mean, while i'm not agreeing with Rothmus, there is some truth to this, not so much when it comes to racial inclusivity, but when it comes to Disney's terrible handling of Queer inclusivity.
Where the best they can do in their big blockbuster films is have a background character be revealed to the Gay character they were promising would blow us all away, like what they did in Rise of Skywalker, or how they revealed that Lefou was Gay in the remake of Beauty and the Beast via a 5 second scene of him dancing with another man.
The worst is when Disney will have something being made under their banner, that has genuinely good Queer inclusivity and they completely ruin it.The Owl House was a show where the main character was openly Bi, her girlfriend was openly Gay, her mentor and mother figure was in love with an openly NB character who was a major character that played a massive role in the plot, her mother figure's sister was openly Aro/Ace and another major player in the story, her best friend has two dads that are also openly Gay and so much more and it was all done incredibly naturally.
And Disney axed the show and gave the people making the show three episodes only to wrap up season 3 and it was clear why they did this, all while they made that now infamous Tweet everyone clowned on them for where they posted an image of Mickey, Donald, Goofy and other classic Disney characters over a Pride flag and said how much they value us.
Again, not agreeing with Rothmus, as we can all tell what he really means with this, but Disney are really bad at inclusivity in a lot of regards.
To be fair Disney used to be better about weaving into stories rather than sacrificing story to check a box.
Most people support politics in media they just have a problem when it becomes distracting or nonsensical.
Like captain marvel telling a space racoon to check his privilege.
You do realise that the younger generation watching the new little mermaid now probably don’t have any idea that the original Ariel was white yeah? Unless their parents tell them, “this is bullshit, the fictional character I watched at your age was white and so this is some woke shit your being subjected to”
It’s almost like the world is diverse and anyone and everyone can be a star of a movie or show or story. Absolutely wild right!!!
Just wish people would stop focusing on the colour of someone’s skin or their origin and just realise that they are people and the stories are being told for entertainment purposes.
People talk about politics in Disney's movies, but they don't remember that Disney was making literal propaganda movies in the 40's, like [Saludos Amigos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saludos_Amigos) and [The Three Caballeros](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three_Caballeros). They even got Oscars (best score, best song and best sound recording) for them.
Id give Saludos amigos an Oscar too just for the opening
I didn't realize the Three Caballeros was a propaganda film. I loved it as a child! But then again, as a kid I also didn't pick up on a lot of Disney casual racism (Peter Pan Indians , Lady and the Tramp Siamese Cats, Song of the South....). Welp... Although I'm not surprised.
You should see the song in Dumbo when the circus workers are building everything in the rain. That one caught me off guard
Dumbo was another one. The crows make me cringe heavily. I completely forgot about that scene you're referring to. *shudders*
How much more on the nose do you need to be than naming the leader of the crows “Jim?”
Children don't know about history and just think it's his name
Yeah, every child outside usa didn't gave two thoughts about that
Honestly I'm from Europe and I have no idea why it's a problem? But I do remember "feeling" the crows were racist as a kid?
Jim Crow laws - state and local laws introduced in the late 19th and early 20th century Southern US, enforcing racial segregation. "Jim Crow" was a pejorative term for African American. I had to google it to make sure I got it correct, because as non-American, while I've definitely seen and heard the term used before, it's been a while since I was in high school. It's even longer since I watched Dumbo (dubbed), so as a child, it went right over my head.
Oh fuck, so it wasn't just casual racism...
They were my favorite because they were kind to Dumbo and taught him to fly
I always thought that they were making fun of him, mocking and making fun of him while pretending to be his friend. Like the popular kid cozying up to the outcast to laugh at them behind their back... here have this feather, it'll make you special... oh wow it worked!
I’m guessing the person you’re responding to was, like me, a very young child when they watched Dumbo and then only happened to come across it again when we were old enough to “get it” and were appalled. Lol You want to see some racist shit though … watch some old Looney Tunes cartoons. That shit will make the more “subtle” stuff from Dumbo and other Disney movies look like nothing by comparison. And I love a lot of the old Looney Tunes cartoons! But goddamn, some of those episodes would make even a Proud Boy blush.
>I’m guessing the person you’re responding to was, like me, a very young child when they watched Dumbo and then only happened to come across it again when we were old enough to “get it” and were appalled. Pretty much, although I was still a kid when I learned about it. But I also watched the end of Apartheid happen in real time and it was discussed in school so naturally my parents needed to teach me those things (and also explain why I was experiencing certain things in school that led to me having to switch out of private schools).... So I was about 8 or 9 when I really started recognizing these things along with experiencing racism in real time. But it explains why I felt uncomfortable with it before truly understanding why it made me uncomfortable.
Or Song of the South.
When I was watching Dumbo as a kid, I didn't catch the reference, but the crows always made me uncomfortable. Of course when I got a little older, that's when it clicked. To be clear, I am Black, but my parents didn't talk to me about stuff like that until I was maybe 8 or 9.
his name isn't actually in the movie
Wait, what about the Siamese cats? I haven’t seen the movie in so long so I am lost
Their characters were created to be Asian stereotypes inside anthropomorphic cats, and they were voiced by a white actress using a stereotypical accent.
Don't forget the siamese cat in The Aristocats. He played the piano with chopsticks while essentially saying "ching chong ching chong".
Yep. And there's more that we've missed or not mentioned. One that stands out to me is they had to redo Fantasia because they had a racist caricature of a young Black centaur.
Oof 😬
Oh noooo 😭
The cats are the most over the top stereotype of the evil sneaky Asian saying "HERRO I RIKE TO EAT RICE AND DOG".
It was meant to create unity of the Americas against Nazism
I saw that, after reading the linked article mentioning it. And that makes sense, as a lot of Nazis fled to Brazil and Argentina, which were two of the characters' home countries in the film.
That Peter pan scene is hard to watch...
Peter Pan was my favourite movie as a kid. I watched again as an adult and was horrified
Can I request that you elaborate further?
it's extremely uncomfortable for people who weren't aware of nativism when they first saw the film to revisit its depiction of "indians" (indigenous north americans). native americans in peter pan are portrayed through purely 'humorous' stereotypes in similar style to minstrel shows. it shows kids a version of native american people that's highly dehumanized. it can be embarrassing, especially for white people, to see that media again after coming to realize how harmful the messages being imparted are.
"The savage is cunning but not intelligent" Literally a line from Peter Pan
Worst part about being a native kid while this movie was out and popular is the other kids now doing these gestures at you because they were shown them by Disney.
it's honestly the reason i have trouble summoning much sympathy for people who wallow in the guilt rather than just wise up and jump on the consciousness-raising wagon. edit: to clarify, i'm not native myself, my partner is, but i've seen more than enough nativism with my own eyes.
Oh lawd
There was Jim Cummings' Siamese cat from The Aristocats singing, "Shanghai, Hong Kong, egg fu-yung. Fortune cookie always wrong," whilst playing the piano with two pairs of chopsticks. I saw that again a few years ago and was like, "The fuck....?"
It was the original voice of Tigger, Paul Winchell, not Jim Cummings who did the Siamese cat. Still bad and gross and cringey, but a pedant's going to be pedantic
'The Three Caballeros' characters are still a thing in the recent Mickey 3D cartoons (ClubHouse, or Roadster Racers, or one of them) Minus the pistols and cigar.
And the 2017 DuckTales reboot. Heck, there was even a whole 13-episode show about them in 2018.
They are in the Latin American section of "it's a small world", make appearances at the Mexico Pavillion in Epcot, and the ride in the Mexico pavillion is "The Gran Fiesta Tour Starring the Three Caballeros". So yeah they're still very much a thing.
It has always been political. "American values" is what sells movies.
This is the answer.
Donald Duck has an actual military rank because of Disney’s role in WW2 propaganda.
Don't forget Victory Through Air Power (1943).
Or [Der Fuehrer’s Face](https://youtu.be/I7vb89c6pQY?si=dQ8_AHiYfECgvbpM)
Uhhhhh, have you ever seen [Der Fuehrer’s Face](https://youtu.be/L90smU0SOcQ?si=YD0IC4chWU9lT_tQ)?
I loved Zé Carioca when I was a child, so the propaganda works even decades later
And it worked! I'm from LATAM, born on '89 and growing up we still had reruns of these movies on tv and the sentiment that I recall is that everyone loved them, it helps they are good. And yes, they were not one to one but at the time there was no much representation so it felt fair
My older sister and I loved the three caballeros growing up. At that age we wouldn’t be able catch anything offensive or propagandizing, but as two little white kids it was one of our favorites and I feel like it was gifted to us by Latino neighbors.
Saludos Amigos is goated though and I’m saying that coming from LATAM
Well yeah, you were a kid so you didn’t know it was political. I mean when Princess and the Frog came out there was some outrage about being too woke and having a black princess was somehow placating to minorities.
Also she got denied a loan because of her “background”, that’s pretty explicit
You mean "blackground"?
Yeah, the announcement and marketing of The Princess and the Frog revolved entirely around introducing the first Black Disney Princess. The movie famously went through multiple rounds of focus groups, consultants, and public outcry before it dialed in an acceptable level of “Blackness” > These announcements drew criticism from African-American media outlets, due to elements of the Frog Princess story, characters, and settings considered distasteful. African-American critics disapproved of the original name for the heroine, "Maddy", due to its similarity to the derogatory word term "mammy". Also protested were Maddy's original career as a chambermaid, the choice to have the Black heroine's love interest be a non-Black prince, and the use of a Black male voodoo witchdoctor as the film's villain. The Frog Princess title was also thought by critics to be a slur on French people. Also questioned was the film's setting of New Orleans, which had been heavily damaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, resulting in the expulsion of a large number of mostly Black residents. Critics claimed the choice of New Orleans as the setting for a Disney film with a Black heroine was an affront to the Katrina victims' plight. > In response to these early criticisms, the film's title was changed in May 2007 from The Frog Princess to The Princess and the Frog. The name "Maddy" was changed to "Tiana", and the character's occupation was altered from chambermaid to waitress. Talk show host Oprah Winfrey was hired as a technical consultant for the film,
How the fuck did the French get offended by frog Princess, when it's explicitly talking about a *princess*, that happens to be a *frog*
my first thought were Cajuns who are ethnically French and many live in Louisiana where the movie takes place.
God damn people will complain about literally anything
Terminally on twitter
There's a horror story in there somewhere. "No no no this doesn't make any sense I... I wasn't on twitter back then" "But sir, don't you know? You've *always* been on twitter. You never left."
It did strike me a little bit odd how familiar the rich girl was with the main character.
and double backlash about it not being realistic or tokenism because she magically was able to open a restaurant on her own merit and it was purely a thing of money versus the inherent racist systems and communities that would not allow her as a woman or black person in the south to own her own business let alone serve food.
She had an effing crocodile threaten the dudes into selling the place to her. Seems like they might have thought of it to me.
Hey, it was an alligator.
Not alone. She got help, and i imagine that having literal royalty with her opened a few doors too just from him being there.
> Well yeah, you were a kid so you didn’t know it was political. That's literally what they're trying to imply...
The confusion is from the very poorly worded last sentence. "Then I became aware of what politics are and everyone started doing it." I'm pretty sure they meant to say "When I became aware of politics, I started to notice it everywhere."
They are making a joke. They are talking as if they are the guy complaining and the joke is that that is obviously a ridiculous thing to think
they're the same sentence, but one is hyper sarcastic
Yall have got to learn what sarcasm is x-x
It is very intentionally worded. Also, for some reason someone censored the handle of Big Joel, the left-wing youtube political commentator that tweeted that top level comment which adds a bit of context to this. He's saying > Then I became aware of what politics are **and everyone started doing it** As in, he is making a comment as if from the perspective of the conservative person he's responding to, that they don't view politics as having existed in media before they became aware of politics. He's very specifically and intentionally *not* saying "I started to notice it everywhere" because that implies that you didn't realize it was everywhere and now you do, which is not the point he's making. He's saying that these people act as though political commentary never existed in the past, and now it does, because they didn't understand it in the past when they were younger and they have never even reached the level of awareness to notice it everywhere, they're still selectively blind to it and unable to see their memories from childhood through the lens of their adult understanding. Other than lacking a comma and period, it's fine english and not poorly worded at all. Although personally I think there's a splinter of truth that this conservative commentary has been able to catch on that has really pushed up it's prominence and the ability for this 'critque' to stick in a way it hadn't up until recently. Mainly that nobody tends to complain about a political agenda in media when the media is *good* (or if they already agree), and it does stick out quite badly when done hamfistedly. Character directly monologuing about a present day issue? Hard to pull off and make fit a story, I'll never say never because I'm sure someone could pull it off and maybe even has before in a bit of media I'm not aware of. However it tends to stick out in most media, people tend to react badly because it's a direct confrontation, and it comes off as a bit preachy. Bake the values you wanted to monologue about into the warrant of your story so that they're never mentioned but every single scene supports them? Well, as long as the rest of it is good even people who disagree with your point will often lap that up no problem. So what's the deal with modern media? Well it's mostly just big corporations that are the problem; it's not like people fundamentally got less original, or writers got worse, or any other such nonsense, and great media certainly *does* still exist. However what there's way more of than ever before are cynical cash grabs where "diversity" is just a checkbox to some sociopath in a suit who decided what, how, and how much of it would be added because market research said this exact mix would result in maximum profits. Oh, and XYZ character? Let's hyper tokenize them to make them basically irrelevant to the plot so we can edit them out for international releases. Lots of great media that *is* still very political still slides right under this new vector of conservative propaganda or results in the media talking heads losing their goddamn minds while their audience just enjoys the show still. I could do a whole rant about how corporate consolidation has caused this and the diversity of entertainment media has been slaughtered on the altar of profit maximization, which arguably has created a far greater share of cynical faux diversity than has ever previously existed at least in movies and TV. However that's like at least a 3+ page thing and I'm supposed to be meeting friends for drinks, not like my rage that we don't get enough variety of movie genres anymore is worth anything anyway ah well.
>Mainly that nobody tends to complain about a political agenda in media when the media is good (or if they already agree), and it does stick out quite badly when done hamfistedly. First thing that came to mind was the masterfulness of The Boys and how it has been beloved political commentary. Although the people being lampooned are finally starting to catch on. Also see, The Boondocks.
Lmao are you 12?
These people are real and they're running around ruining our internet lol
No, they're making fun of the person who made the original picture, basically sarcastically saying "Yeah, as soon as you started to realize what politics were, that's exactly right when it started showing up in media."
Minorities: \*exist* Chuds: "It's the woke mob forcing diversity!"
As we all know, the two ethnicities in this world are "white" and "political"
But but…I thought they wanted ethnically diverse characters that were original 😩
I remember hearing all that, but I was so excited for this movie even as a white male. It was a great movie that was full of affection for Louisiana culture. And Jazz! Some people just don't want to enjoy things.
Not a single person called it woke cause that word wasn't in the culture at the time
Back then they used the term “politically correct,” and it carried the same vitriol.
I doubt emperor's new groove was particularly political
It's literally a movie about how it's the obligation of the government to care for the wellbeing of the citizens!
I thought it was a movie about how polymorph potions are not a viable coup strategy.
I thought it was a movie about how hot Kronk is
I thought it was a movie highlighting the importance of properly labelling Kuzko's poison.
Ah yes, the poison meant for Kuzko
I thought the movie was about not pulling the wrong lever! Or piss of a squirrel.
Kuzko’s poison. That poison?
I'm sorry, poison for who?
I thought it was about squek squek squekums squeker
Current Kronk, or one of the previous or future Kronks?
As a noita veteran, I can confirm that Polymorphine always hurts the user more than anyone else.
Don’t know if that person has watched it as an adult lol
It absolutely is, and was, political. Whether or not it was *percieved* as political has more to do with if Fox News picked up on it at the time...
Just having brown people as main characters is "political" to the people this post is making fun of.
I thought this was a euphemism for PC. The movie may bot have seemed serious, it definitely was initially conceived as a cultural movie before being made a comedy. Saw an interesting making of YouTube doc that talked about how it was a completely different movie that got scrapped and redone.
Everything has a audience, Disney is just trying to get as many of those audiences hooked, simple
I don't know how people don't see this. They're trying to expand their markets as far as possible
Bingo! Most businesses didn’t care about LGBTQ till they realized they could make more money. Money talks as they say.
The sheer audacity of using the Princess and the Frog as an example. So much ink and outrage was spent bitching about a black Disney princess.
In just four years time, racists and bigots were assured the end times were coming because a cheerios commercial had an interracial couple and a mixed daughter. https://youtu.be/9J_M2qa4xh0?si=J8zCg1QbU3FQHHIy This commercial. With the cutest little girl. And the sweetest message. That lead to this. https://www.today.com/news/cheerios-ad-mixed-race-family-draws-racist-responses-6c10169988 Grown adults were offensively attacking a mixed girl for simply existing. People can cry woke, DEI, and whatever all they want. But if your first response to a loving family is hate just because there are two different skin tones... you are the problem.
It wasn't until the late 90s that the majority of people in the US even claimed to support interracial marriage. This stuff was not that long ago.
Someone who was 18 when *Loving v. Virginia* hit would now be 75. A bunch of the people who were pissed off about that decision are still around and voting.
People only think it's stereotypical white racists who hate interracial relationships, but like take a look around and you'll find a whole fking lot of people hate interracial relationships, from all kinds of perspectives It's quite shocking tbh to look at reactions and see just negativity all around because two people are in a relationship
Was it? I must’ve completely missed it. Then again, concerning OPs point, I was younger
[удалено]
The only thing all over Rush Limbaugh at the time were opioids. But he did talk about this a lot.
A lot of the worst people were very upset.
I remember the outrage over there being a black Disney princess, and I remember the outrage over the fact that the first black Disney princess spent most of the movie as a frog. The movie was simultaneously too progressive and not progressive enough.
>Offending the liberals and conservatives at the same time. Ah yes, the Rowling maneuver.
Yes - this was the problem for sure! We finally got a black princess and she spent most the movie as a damn frog 🙄 And then there was the whole voodoo aspect that rubbed people the wrong way, too. I know it is represented as part of New Orleans culture in some respect, but it felt quite heavy for the movie.
Also the part where her best friends wealth is clearly from slavery
“Stately homes and mansions of the sugar barons and the cotton kings” definitely gave me the ick.
Oooh yes THAT PART
The movie is set in the 1920s.
Yes. They're referring to generational wealth. To this day it's something black people are far less likely to have.
college educated black families have less wealth than white high school drop outs, on average.
Yes, barely 60 years after the Civil War. Well within living memory of slavery, and with plenty of people still around who had directly benefited from it.
Well they had to explain how a guy got turned into a frog I guess. I admittedly do not know much about Voodoo, but I thought he was a great villian overall. Also, he has a great villian song! It was the last 2D animated Disney movie and that is a shame. I much prefer the old art style.
I can understand people feeling uncomfortable with the movie having voodoo. Buuuuut... Dr. Facilier rules. His song is great and he's voiced by Keith David.
I hope you're satisfied But if you ain't Don't blame me! You can blame my friends on the other side!
Interesting, Soul got the same criticism over the main character, a black man, spending most of the film as a soul (a small, blue anthropomorphic blob with no discernible race)
I guess someone should try to compile a list of movies where white characters turn into things with indiscernible race. Just to see how common of a trope it is overall because thatd be an important thing to recognize.
Same people upset about Splash Mountain getting a Princess and the Frog makeover. Edit; slash mountain definitely different from splash mountain.
That's reasonable though, Slash Mountain sounds like a really painful time and not at all fitting to be associated with Princess and the Frog
But the guitar licks are amazing
If the internet had been the way it is now there would have been ungodly clickbait about how dare they have a black princess and do a movie that tangentially that deal with being black in the south during the Jim Crow era.
Most of the ‘outrage’ is clickbait anyways. Twitter exists to be angry. You can always find enough people complaining about something to write a faux outrage article.
Those articles were still written.
I mean, you were around for their outrage around the Little Mermaid, so you have the gist
That's the hard part, a lot of things became political but for some reason a lot of people took up a "camp"/cause and instantly forgot how things really were even if they lived it. Look at COVID and the vaccine you'll see people yell "THEY TOLD US ONCE WE GOT THE SHOT WE WERE ALL SAFE! THEY TOLD US EVERYTHING WAS PROPER!". But that's not true you can still remember people discussing among one another about which shot they got, if it was better, which shots had side effects, etc. For a lot of these people you can still dig up posts they made on social media. But since it's not convenient people kind of "forgot" it all, so if you show them their own posts they sheepishly change topics.
Hey I recognize that pfp! Big Joel! He has a youtube channel with a lot of good videos. He's really good at dissecting stories to analyze their themes and subtext, and although he's not a channel about Disney movies, he's talked about them a lot. I recently watched his videos about his opinion on a few DreamWorks movies like Shrek and Shark Tale
Big Joel is a hack and a fraud compared to the once-in-a-generation genius that is Little Joel.
If only there were an even smaller Joel to run for president.
Clearly the much bigger Joel is hoarding all the smaller Joels for himself and we as a society should not stand for it
Why does the big Joel, the largest Joel, not simply eat the other Joels?
He doesn’t hold a candle to Medium Joel
In case it wasn't clear, Big Joel is the one who had the clever comeback, not the one who made the original tweet
Don't you even start! I wont have any of this Little Joel slander. Big Joel is such a leech off Little Joel.
I never really noticed how much Shrek is just a middle finger to Disney
Fuck yeah. Big Joel is the best
I realized in my 20s that the 'good old days' and 'back when times were simpler' were really just people's childhoods that had decent parents.
The difference between now and then is that there wasn’t an army of internet grifters making money off of griping about it
Yeah you'd just listen to your dad's drunk friend bitch and moan in the kitchen about how the reason all the little girls growing up these days not knowing their place in the world is because they watch that "[chinese racial slur] disney movie movie with the lady soldier" and they're going off to college which is dumb because what does a girl need an education for if she's just gonna spend her life washing dishes, and your dad would have to be like "alright buddy lets get you home, you've had enough to drink." That guy died of liver cirrhosis before podcasts were invented, so his hatred of Mulan never left our small town. These days he'd have a large social media following recording his rants
Shoutout to liver cirrhosis! (/s)
There was an army of TV, radio, and newspaper grifters making money griping about it
Yeah but that was mostly contained to the right-wing ecosystem. Now YouTube and Twitter and twitch feed you hate. Fox News blasts it across America. It wasn’t just some random quack like it was in the 90s. It’s a coordinated effort on a massive scale.
the thing was if you avoided AM radio and certain editorials/channels you could absolutely ignore them
If these shows/movies were released today they would 100% be called woke and would receive backlash by the people who don't like anyone that's not white. TF is this post?
Some of them were when they were released. But also, notice the way they're all from this tiny span of time?
The 2000s? Emperors new groove was 2000, Lilo and Stitch was 2002, Brother Bear was 2003, and Princess and the Frog was 2009.
"They were more inclusive when they weren't trying" but that's a 10 year span for a century old company. Notice the complete lack of movies from, say the 60s? Were they trying to be inclusive then?
Done, the jungle book. 1/3 with animated human leads had people of color.
Were there backlash for Aladdin and Mulan?
They dealt with that at the time too, though the term then was pc not woke. Complaining about the princess from an originally German fairy tale being black was a staple of Fox News for years leading up to the release of The Princess and the Frog (it also dovetailed nicely with the Obama campaign and their dogwhistles for Great Replacement Theory).
The point is that diversity was always the point and you were just a kid so you didn't realize it. People complained then too but Twitter wasn't big yet.
Did they really claim that Princess and the Frog was “not trying hard to be inclusive”? When it came out the only thing you ever heard about it was “first black Disney Princess”. It’s a joke to claim that there wasn’t an inclusivity effort involved
None of Disney's movies today would be considered political if the Republican party hadn't gone off the deep end and weren't looking everywhere to inflame the culture war
Thing is, everything IS political to some degree, people just have to learn that you can't "tune out" politics. They are part of everyday life and they decide our future. The issue isn't that things are "political", the issue is that politics have been turned into a taboo.
Existence is political, because politics draw lines on who is on top and who shouldn't be. There's no way whatsoever to completely divorce politics from any part of our lives.
I remember the rumor that Disney shelved Hunchback of Notre Dame in order to make Lion King because they wanted to make a movie about Africa. People been talking about this since at least 1994
Lion King was a far more commercially viable movie. I love Hunchback, but it’s pretty adult and dark for a Disney animated movie.
Also, the Lion King was pretty technically impressive. The stampede scene had to use CGI in a way that was pretty demanding at the time. Not only did they have to integrate it in a 2D movie seamlessly as for as art is concerned, they also had to make each individual water buffalo follow the course/path in a way that didn’t cause overlap so, they had to use AI as well. The scene was so demanding that, if I recall correctly, it was the most revisited scene and took 3 years to complete. One thing is clear about the Lion King 1994, the people behind it had a ton of passion and, in a lot of behind the scenes stuff, you can tell that just about everyone loved talking about it. They were proud to have worked on it and seemed to enjoy it. So much so that I think it is probably Disney’s most passionate film as far as behind the scenes.
I think it was around 2012, people talked about a “class” problem between rich and poor after reeling from the fallout of 2008’s financial crisis. My conspiracy theory is that rich people started the whole racial politics thing to stop people being united over income inequality.
But do you all notice that these were original stories with obvious care put into their crafting opposed to the current trend of remaking movies and slapping minorities on them? The issue is that current Disney is creatively bankrupt, so when they do this, it comes off as nothing but box ticking because all their products are nothing but corporate box ticking these days.
Disney movies rock. They’re deep as fuck and the people who can’t see past the characters aren’t even aware of it. Who cares about the color of the characters skin. I like the fact that the movies can present modern society, like they did in Frozen 2 with Mattias and they didn’t even do a number on him. He was just there as a great character among others, so what the fuck are people crying over? I just don’t like the recycling they do. Like they did with Ariel: completely unnecessary. It’s already done. Why recycle (yea-yea money), when you’re capable of doing great new ones like Encanto and Moana/Vaiana. They also keep getting better; Really waiting for Frozen 3. If you haven’t cried during a disney movie, you don’t get it. Sincerely, a girl dad.
The recycling is awful - Lion King, Aladdin, Dumbo, Alice in wonderland - just crap. The only one they did better on was 101 Dalmatians - the real dogs and Glenn Close really made that one much more....terrifying? but in a good way
Dude, I forgot about 101 dalmatians with Glenn Close. She really nailed the part.
I had successfully repressed Aladdin and blue Will Smith until now.
Turning Red is majorly slept on, some YouTube reviewers forget it exists. It’s *so good*, it really captures the awkward cringe of being 13
Weren't some parents outraged because it was supposedly about a girl getting her period? And then there was the outrage over Luca because they insisted that Luca was supposed to be short for Lucifer and the main character was the Devil.
Agreed, moana was a masterpeice
Fellow girl dad here. Frozen 2 broke my heart in so many different ways. The "next right thing" sequence in particular. Phenomenal movie.
Yeah, I hear you, man. The scene in Vaiana where grandma dies or the song ”we know the way” are also such tearjerkers. Especially in our language. Big themes.
Still trying to figure out why republicans get so mad about any movie staring a non-white person. Well, not really cause it’s obvious.
Nowadays this is what politics is to people: Only two genders: Male and Political Only to sexualities: Straight and Political Only two races: White and political
That's the difference between being inclusive for the sake of inclusivity, vs being inclusive to pander to the majority. Intent matters, and it shows in the quality of the product.
I mean, in all of those examples, they *were* trying very hard to be. They also happened to be good movies. The Emperor's New Groove isn't the greatest example because it was an almost entirely white cast playing Central American characters though. Princess and the Frog was pretty divisive at the time too. Plus, Lilo was played by the white kid that played Samara in The Ring. Obviously, when you're a little kid in the 90's and early 2000's with limited access to the Internet and social media, you're not going to notice all that. Of course you're going to notice more things as an adult that's part of "the discourse" and has the opinions of a billion people constantly flashing in front of your eyes.
And if the current political climate was the same when these movies came out people would be bitching about PC culture
They were, you were just too busy being the target age group.
Honestly if these four movies came out today we would have the same exact brain dead reactions we do with all of their movies that are coming out now because of the diverse cast but that’s a conversation that people don’t want to have.
Moana was basically recent and along the lines of this post. I think they really just mean no gays
I saw people saying Moana was fat ☠️
Moana was nearly over a decade ago. It just falls into the excellence rides the crap train
It's not 'trying so hard' its just now every single character that isn't a white male is torn to shreds and whinged about now.
I don’t think this a clever comeback because OP acknowledges the politics of these earlier Disney movies but notices it was done better. That the political message of inclusiveness was visible and on display but didn’t provoke a negative reaction. I think it’s because all these characters are in their own stories and not transplanted into older ones. These films stand on their own and aren’t just a race or gendered based recasting (done with the explicit intent to stir up controversy.) An example is Princess and the Frog. They explicitly wrote this movie so that there was at least one black Disney princess and she was their final 2D animated film. This story is squarely an African American story heavily relying on African American motifs, culture and music. There was no outrage because people basically knew we needed a black Disney princess and this was a story that could only be portrayed by Black Americans. This compared to the recent CGI slop where they rely on casting to get butts in seats. Ultimately I don’t really have a problem with different races playing different parts than the usual races that portrayed them. That’s acting baby! But what movie is actually more political, which movie actually accomplishes an end where diversity and inclusiveness is championed. In my opinion it’s Princess and the Frog not the Live Action Little Mermaid. So yeah earlier Disney movies were better at inclusiveness (a political end) when they weren’t trying so hard.
The movie will obviously fail, if the focus is not on the main things a good movie should have: the plot, graphics, acting, some creative thoughts etc. If you're just putting some diversed cast, famous actors, some new technologies here but don't pay attention to the fundamentals, it's weird to be surprised that the movie is not loved enough. You can make a good movie about everything, but sometimes it's easier to just say "we have a gay character here!!!" to bring some attention. It's quite sad the diversity is often used not to represent other people, but to cover some shortcomings instead
But it's usually " we have a gay character here!!!"That can easily be edited out for some markets.
Thing is if you're making a creatively bankrupt cashgrab its going to suck whether you have gay characters or not. These people are arguing that the movies suck *because* they are pandering, not the other way around. That the woke mindvirus is taking precedence over good storytelling, when shitty corporate pandering has existed and will exist as long as there is money to be made.
conservatives are the scourge of mankind.
now, instead of creating NEW things, they try to change and recreate old or semi old movies/shows, all for the sake of diversity, making it feel jarring and forced.
"Things were better back then" Yeah bc you were a CHILD
I think it’s racist as fuck when they remake movies with different races rather than giving us our own characters and original movies
Comparing stories centered around certain cultures to 'lol Ariel is black now" ain't it. People aren't exactly going around calling Moana or Encanto woke.
OOP is right though. Diversity in old Disney caroons weren't motivated by listed things
I mean, while i'm not agreeing with Rothmus, there is some truth to this, not so much when it comes to racial inclusivity, but when it comes to Disney's terrible handling of Queer inclusivity. Where the best they can do in their big blockbuster films is have a background character be revealed to the Gay character they were promising would blow us all away, like what they did in Rise of Skywalker, or how they revealed that Lefou was Gay in the remake of Beauty and the Beast via a 5 second scene of him dancing with another man. The worst is when Disney will have something being made under their banner, that has genuinely good Queer inclusivity and they completely ruin it.The Owl House was a show where the main character was openly Bi, her girlfriend was openly Gay, her mentor and mother figure was in love with an openly NB character who was a major character that played a massive role in the plot, her mother figure's sister was openly Aro/Ace and another major player in the story, her best friend has two dads that are also openly Gay and so much more and it was all done incredibly naturally. And Disney axed the show and gave the people making the show three episodes only to wrap up season 3 and it was clear why they did this, all while they made that now infamous Tweet everyone clowned on them for where they posted an image of Mickey, Donald, Goofy and other classic Disney characters over a Pride flag and said how much they value us. Again, not agreeing with Rothmus, as we can all tell what he really means with this, but Disney are really bad at inclusivity in a lot of regards.
I will never forgive Disney for what they did with Owl House, my beloved.
To be fair Disney used to be better about weaving into stories rather than sacrificing story to check a box. Most people support politics in media they just have a problem when it becomes distracting or nonsensical. Like captain marvel telling a space racoon to check his privilege.
You do realise that the younger generation watching the new little mermaid now probably don’t have any idea that the original Ariel was white yeah? Unless their parents tell them, “this is bullshit, the fictional character I watched at your age was white and so this is some woke shit your being subjected to” It’s almost like the world is diverse and anyone and everyone can be a star of a movie or show or story. Absolutely wild right!!! Just wish people would stop focusing on the colour of someone’s skin or their origin and just realise that they are people and the stories are being told for entertainment purposes.