Fridge / Turning Red

Fridge Brilliance

• During the late 90s and early 2000s old cartoons such as Red Hot Riding Hood were still being broadcasted on Teletoon as reruns late at night, so there's a good chance Mei might've seen them, hence her going "AWOOGA!" at the sight of Devon while in panda form.
  • Also the fact that Mei cannot control her panda spirit when Devon's nearby as it starts misbehaving, this is because the teen was the impetus for Mei's premature transformation.
• Early in the movie, when Mei comes home from school she greets the two statues outside the temple front door as "Bart" and "Lisa". The statues are red pandas sculpted to resemble Maneki Neko statues. "Bart" has his right paw raised, while "Lisa" has her left paw raised. In some traditions, a maneki-neko with its left paw raised indicates "welcome, come inside", while one with its right paw raised invites people to spend money within. The statues' names fit their symbolism: "Bart" is inviting people to spend money, matching Bart Simpson's greedy, materialistic attitude, while "Lisa" is being more friendly and welcoming to visitors, which goes well with Lisa Simpson's more friendly, outgoing personality.
• Mei's friends take it well when they see her red panda form, apart from the initial screaming. Remember, however, that Priya is into reading supernatural fiction, and immediately asks if Mei has become a werewolf. With Harry Potter, Twilight^note which was Expied as "Nightfall", and YA lit in general going viral during the early 2000s, the girls would at least know.
  • The Anachronism Stew of Nightfall being the book about paranormal romance also makes sense if you were reading YA in that time. Vampire and werewolf romances existed long before Twilight did, so another book managed to start the bandwagon ahead of time in this universe.
• Ming explains to Mei that the reason she didn't tell Mei sooner about the family's red panda transformation was because it happened to her daughter earlier than expected. She had been watching for signs, but the thing is, her brand of watchfulness long planted in Mei a secretiveness where even something as small as getting a "B+" in class is a horrible secret. Ironically, Ming's watchfulness lead to her not seeing the signs.
  • Alternatively, she couldn't see the signs because she still thought of Mei as her little "Mei-Mei" despite she was 13 years old.
• Ming has good reason to be afraid of her kaiju-sized panda, but Jin sees that Mei's panda is relatively manageable and good-natured. Jin is good-natured, even henpecked, while Ming is an overbearing helicopter mother inadvertently passing down trauma from her own relationship with her mother to her daughter.
• While it's thanks to The Power of Friendship that Mei is able to control her transformations, it may be also because the red panda spirit that bonded with Mei understood that her friends are harmless, after they assure her that they still love her for who she is, so it trusts them and it's comfortable enough to not change back even when Mei's emotions are high. After all, it's still a wild animal, and as such, it only reacts whenever it's threatened to defend itself.
• Color-wise, Miriam's position as Mei's best of the Best Friends makes sense. Like Mei's mother, she's decked out in green, and it's around them that she is able to appear composed—however, unlike the somewhat fake composure Mei has with her mother, the relaxation is complete and real with Miriam. Take note that Miriam is also on the side where Mei's green hairclip is during the latter's Happy Place thoughts—and she is always the first one to speak up and comfort her, just like she is always the first one to want Mei to escape the tight grip her family has on her.
  • It also fits with the story's unsaid theme about how friends can be just as important (and sometimes more-so) than actual family. Miriam and Ming sharing the same theme color (green) reflects that as much as Mei loves her family, she also needs the outside influence of her friends to act like her family away from her family.
  • More color brilliance: It's actually quite fitting that Miriam's eyes are as green as her clothes because it shows another contrast between her and Ming. Ming, whose eyes are brown like Mei's, only sees Mei as her perfect daughter who follows all her rules and requirements and will follow in her footsteps perfectly, reducing her daughter to a seed that can't fully blossom. Miriam however sees Mei as someone who needs to be encouraged to express herself, find her true self and grow into something more, like a healthy plant.
• The casual viewer will notice something "off" with the family home and temple in Toronto, Canada. The architecture is a mishmash of modern brick and mortar with traditional pagoda-style buildings. Turns out there's a good reason for that. Mei's father Jin later tells his daughter her grandmother did not approve of him marrying Ming. Enraged, she transformed into her gargantuan kaiju red panda form, and she destroyed half the temple before Grandmother Lee relented.
• Why is Ming's red panda kaiju-sized and so full of rage? Well, we learn that Ming attacked her mother due to the pressures of being perfect, and most likely bottled up her anger after the attack until it was unleashed at the concert.
  • Additionally, the panda forms being analogous to repressed feelings and emotions also explains why Mei's panda is so small in comparison to the others, even with the age/size difference between her and her family. She is Proud to Be a Geek, and was only repressing her interests and likes around her mom. Otherwise, she's happy to vent and express herself however she wants, especially around her friends. It's no wonder that thinking of them and the good times she has with them is what allows her to control her panda, because she's not repressing it, but instead expressing it in a controlled manner through her genuine love for her friends. The rest of the women have the value of age and experience when controlling their more turbulent emotions, which is why theirs are bigger and stronger than hers but much more controlled and less chaotic, unlike Ming, who was always dealing with her unresolved trauma over scarring her mother during her outburst and thus bottled it up, making it utterly uncontrollable when unleashed. It's all but outright stated that Ming's inability to vent like Mei in her youth is why her panda was so violent on the few occasions when it emerged, which only led to her suppressing it more throughout the years.
• If the panda was so important to their village in China, why did they leave for Toronto? Since we know that Mei's mother was born and raised in Canada, we can assume her grandmother is the one who chose to leave. If she is about 70 years old in 2002, she was around 30 during the Cultural Revolution, when pre-communist elements of Chinese culture (such as ancestor worship) were banned in China and people, especially youngsters, were encouraged to rat out and persecute anyone who still practiced them, including their own family. With ancestors being a huge part of her family culture, and possibly reeling from the effects of the preceding Great Leap Forward, she probably saw no choice.
• Ming's panda spirit being contained in a Tamagotchi is actually the best form for it to take. It's still sealed away like her necklace, but is now interactive (and constantly hungry), so Ming has to keep it up with it daily and learn to co-exist with its needs too, like learning to cope with her past trauma. Basically, it gives Ming a way to embrace and control her panda spirit without worrying about turning into a destructive Kaiju.
• Mei and co. are shown to be open-minded when it comes to Priya dancing with another girl. They also joyfully accept Tyler being a 4*Town fan. This might not make sense to the average US citizen considering that homophobia was still rampant in the early 2000s, but this movie takes place in Canada, one of the most LGBT-friendly countries. In fact, gay marriage was legalized in Ontario (the province the characters live in) in 2003 (a year after this movie takes place).
• Grandma Lee and the aunties' talismans are all various piece of jewelry made from jade, a green gemstone associated with peace and balance, a perfect talisman for a curse unleashed by rampaging emotions. However, jade is also quite fragile, explaining how they were able to break them so easily in order to transform back.
  • Ming's red jewel and Mei's prospective red ring talisman are the only ones that aren't green, showing how grandma and the aunties have managed to move pass their redness, but Ming still has hang-ups from the trauma of having hurt her mom, and Mei would have been miserable if she had separated from her panda.
• Ming likes Abby and Priya, but thinks Miriam is a little odd and later accuses her of corrupting Mei. Abby is of Korean descent and Priya is of Indian descent, two likewise Asian cultures that are also known for respecting their elders and being occupied with their youth's education; Miriam is the only white member of the group, so her upbringing was more lax, and Ming fears she might lead Mei astray.
  • Related to the above, Abby's and Priya's parents downright refused to let them go to the concert, while Miriam, though by the condition of a near Impossible Task for a 13-year-old girl, was still given a chance to go, showing why Ming would prefer Mei being friends with girls who were raised "properly" and had their parents keeping a close eye on them, just like she does with her daughter.
• Ming says that the ritual can only be done once or else it would be permanent, but she and her relatives were able to go through a second sealing ceremony, so how's that possible? Their talismans were broken and their panda spirits enter again in their bodies, so it was like a sort of resetting, allowing them to seal their pandas again. Mei didn't make it through her ritual to get a talisman to break, so her one and only chance was indeed lost.
• Tyler's presence on the basketball court and his sports headband and gym attire simply seem to align with his Jerk Jock characterization. However, by the end of the film, it's clear that he's been emulating the appearance of Aaron Z., down to the hair and ear-piercings. Both he and Aaron Z. are Blasian, which is one reason why he's such an adoring fan.
• Tyler is shown to be incredibly uncomfortable around the girls, from them egging him on to dance with them and when they group hug him at the concert. It's mostly coming from the fact that he appeared to never have had this type of friendship with anyone else, so any type of interactions like this would of course be scary for him, as it would anyone his age in this situation. It's only after he is accepted as a friend does he join them in their handshake at the end.
• How do red pandas and Toronto work well together? Toronto is dubbed as the raccoon capital of the world and raccoons greatly resemble red pandas, to the point that they are nicknamed trash pandas!^note It is not just a resemblance: red pandas are musteloids, and raccoons and weasels are its closest living relatives, not the giant panda.
  • Red pandas are also red and white, which are the same colors on the Canadian flag.
• So how did three teenage girls (and a teenage boy including Tyler) manage to convince 4*Town to sing a song when the pandas were trying to finish the ritual? According to the official 4*Town website, oldest member Jesse actually has two kids, so hearing about the strife between a parent and their child could've convinced at least one member to try and help Mei get her mom back to normal.
  • Not to mention the potential great PR they would receive for being the heroic singers that help saved the day.
  • In addition, the whole "Help change the giant furball that just wrecked the stadium to something security can deal with before she wakes up" aspect would not hurt.
• Why did Miriam seem to be the most hurt by Mei's Betrayal by Inaction? Priya (who is Indian) and Abby (who is Korean) are from Asian families that are implied to be strict like Mei's and have a similar cultural philosophy of always putting your family first and never disappointing your parents. While they were also sad and hurt when Mei didn't speak up for them, to some extent they may have understood why, in that moment, she chose to side with her mother instead of them. Miriam is white and not from an Asian family, so she does not have that understanding of such a cultural background. In that moment, all she saw was Mei choosing her family over her friends.
  • It's also probable that even though it's been several days since The Reveal that Ming doesn't like Miriam, Miriam is still stung by that revelation and her pleading wasn't JUST wanting Mei to tell the truth about her role in their money-making plans but also because she didn't want Mei to validate Ming's view. And then when Mei doesn't defend her, Miriam could have believed that she had lost Mei's friendship permanently, hence why she's so down at the concert.
• When Mei knocks out Ming's giant-panda form, why doesn't the same impact knock Mei herself out (or worse)? Because by this time Mei has fully accepted the panda spirit, just as Sun Yee did. As a result, the red panda form works for Mei the way it was originally intended to work: as a fighting form with vastly enhanced speed, strength, and agility. It makes perfect sense that the red panda form would also confer increased resistance to injury.
• Mei is warned many times throughout the movie that the more she allows herself to transform into her panda form, the harder it will be for her to separate herself from it. While the family are likely repeating warnings derived from fears passed down to them from their own ancestors (as when Mei asks if the ritual has ever failed, her Grandmother simply tells her "it cannot happen" which suggests it most likely never has), Mei finds it difficult to separate from her own spirit purely because she spent so much time in panda-form and has learned to accept it as a part of herself.
  • It is likely that those in the past who had bonded with their panda spirit and mastered their transformations to the extent Mei had did not go through with the ritual (either giving an appropriately deferential refusal or outright fleeing). In places and times where the less distinct hair colors are going to be a major issue, the use of hair dye or wigs would be a less traumatizing alternative.
• Priya's sideways head bop isn't just a character quirk; it's a common Indian head gesture used to nonverbally affirm whatever others are talking about.
• How was Mei able to keep herself from transforming into a red panda at the concert? Well, we know at this point she is able to control her transformations to the point it's voluntary.
• It is easy to note the degree of Mei's deceitfulness toward Ming in the second act, but if one pays attention her relationship with her mother has always been fundamentally dishonest. Almost any point from the start where there is a conflict between what Mei is feeling/thinking and what Ming would expect or find pleasing sees Mei shading her words toward the latter — even the original 4*Town presentation focused on their artistic merit over "My ride-or-die buddies and I want to bond." This is of course aggravated by the considerable difficulty Ming has getting her mind around the concept of her daughter having thoughts or feelings not fitting into her mental image of "perfect little Mei-Mei".
• Mei's friend group is somewhat of a parallel to the formation of the 4*Town Band, especially near the end. Both the band and the friends were originally a 4-person group until a fifth person joined in later — Tyler in Mei's group and a unspecified fifth member in 4*Town, respectively.
• Why does Sun Yee seemed to show a little depressing emotion upon seeing Mei during the ritual? Because all she hoped is for her descendants to see her gift as a blessing instead of a "inconvenience". She later became more proud when Mei decided to keep her Panda. Mei also had nothing to regret for after seeing her ancestor's reaction to her decision.
• At one point, Mei's mom nearly knocks over a vase. Breaking a vase is a common gag or even plot device, mainly because it's a certain special rare kind of vase. What's Mei's mom's name? Ming!
  • Both of the Mandarin dubs back this up by transcribing Ming's given name as 明 ("bright; clear"), the same character used in the name of the historical Chinese dynasty (or time period) when these 'priceless vases' were produced.
• Jin reveals to Mei that her mother refuses to talk about her panda form. He only saw it once, when Wu Lee refused to give her blessing when they were going to marry. When you consider a teenage Ming was utterly ashamed of herself for scarring her mother in the past when frustrated by Wu's perfectionism, something she never forgave herself for. Knowing how dangerous her power was — she still transformed as a young adult into her kaiju form, and in her rage nearly destroyed half the temple until her mother relented. By all accounts, most people would be freaked out by the revelation alone of marrying into a family of magical pandas, and no one could blame him from fleeing what is this universe's equivalent of Godzilla. But Jin didn't leave her side, loving Ming, for go-getter attitude and gigantic panda and all. Without their love for each other, Mei couldn't have been born, and there'd be no story to tell.
• Priya appears to have started puberty somewhat earlier than her friends. It makes sense that she's the one who always has extra deodorant and pads on-hand.
• In panda form, Mei walks on her hind legs most of the time, while real life red pandas are quadrupeds. However, red pandas have been noted to stand on their hind legs when they feel stressed or threatened^note A defense mechanism to make them appear larger and stronger than they really are. The transformation is triggered by strong emotions, something which would make a real life red panda stand on its hind legs!
• In addition to the Red/Green Contrast, Mei's name alliterates with the two most important women in her life; her mother Ming, and her best friend Miriam.
• It's stated that the sealing ritual requires singing from the heart, but the exact song is irrelevant — the Cantonese chant the elders use is just for the sake of tradition. During Mei's ritual, the circle doesn't fully activate until the red moon hits totality, until then the edges just glowed. During Ming's improvised ritual, the same singing as the red moon is waning barely gets the much larger circle to flicker, and it isn't until 4*Town steps up that it works. While circle size and red moon status could very well be factors, a bigger one is probably that the elders aren't putting too much emotion into their chant — this is par for the course, just routine. For a smaller ritual under ideal conditions, the minimal emotion from helping out their family was enough for it to work. But a bigger one under worse conditions needed more emotional power behind the singing to compensate, so that mundane chanting was no longer enough even with the additional backing of wanting to save Ming before it was too late. Crosses into Heartwarming in that 4*Town clearly loves what they do and isn't just singing for the fame and fortune if their singing was able to supercharge the ritual pretty much on their own.
• Mei's beloved plushie, Wilfred, appears to be based on the pug breed of dog. Pugs were first bred and established in China hundreds of years ago, likely further referencing the Lee family's Chinese heritage, which plays an important part in the movie.
• At the concert, as Grandma Lee and the aunties start singing, on the SkyDome wall behind them is a banner with the name of the concert: "4*TOWN BREAKING FREE TOUR '02". Going to the concert is the key event in Mei breaking free from her mother's control.
• In the epilogue, Grandma Wu loses a hand of poker despite having four of a kind, and attributes it to her new panda charm, a 4*Town necklace. Her losing hand is four fours, and the number 4 means "death" or "failure" in Chinese tradition. The winning hand is also four of a kind: four eights. In Chinese tradition, the number 8 represents wealth or success.
• "Nobody Like U" is a love song, but it also perfectly describes the relationship between Mei-Mei and her friends. No wonder this is the song they chose for the sealing ritual. Nothing else could be so perfect a description of what they feel in their hearts. Read for yourself:
  You're never not on my mind, oh my, oh my
  I'm never not by your side, your side, your side.
  I'm never gonna let you cry, oh cry, don't cry.
  I'll never not be your ride or die, alright.

Fridge Horror

• Other than the Cultural Revolution theory above, another possible reason that the family started sealing away their pandas is likely anti-Asian sentiment that was rife at the time the family was likely adapting to North America.
• After Ming discovers Mei's off-color drawings of her and Devon, she angrily confronts Devon about it and wrongfully accuses him of doing those things to her daughter as other people watch. In reality, while false accusations are a very rare occurrence, people can get their lives ruined over them, so Ming could have very well ended up jeopardizing an innocent seventeen-year-old's reputation and future. Good thing Ming was known for her dramatic behavior beforehand, considering Devon's still on the job during Mei's panic in the town after her public transformation.
• Ming assaulted an innocent security guard who nicely told her that she couldn't spy on her daughter during school hours. If not for Mei's involuntary transformation, she might have been arrested and banned from school premises. What's to say that she didn't have to go to a judge after destroying an entire concert stadium because she lost her temper, to put it lightly?
• Ming could have badly hurt Mei at the concert because she was squeezing her too tight while berating her. She doesn't snap out of it until the family teams up to complete the ritual. What might her reaction have been when she came to and saw the bruises on Mei, as well as her realization that she nearly killed her own daughter after losing her temper? Heck, how did her sisters and mother feel about realizing they had accidentally goaded her into breaking the talisman?
• Ming's panda spirit was re-contained in a Tamagotchi toy, and it's now active and constantly requires attention from Ming. What will happen if Ming forgets to "feed" the spirit for too long, or if the battery dies (that is, if it still can at that point)?
  • Symbolically speaking, it would mean she's not attending to her traumas and emotions anymore and is back to bottling everything up. So... not good.
  • That said, a Tamagotchi is perhaps the best form her panda's home could take. Digital creatures require constant care and feeding, perfect for someone who likes to be organized and focused. (To say nothing of looking little and cute instead of towering and fearsome... a definite help as Ming moves forward from her past.)
  • Can also offer a bit of Fridge Brilliance. Since Mei is becoming more independent by the end of the movie, the panda toy is there to help give Ming something to look after. I'm sure the toy's supernatural properties would also prevent the battery from dying out.
• On the subject of the USA, what's stopping the US Government, or any other less-than-scrupulous organization, from attempting to "persuade" Ming, or even worse, Mei, to volunteer for "examinations" in an attempt to mass produce Super Soldiers?
  • This of course presumes Ming's mother Wu was the only one of Sun Yee's lineage left when she got out of (given her age most likely the People's Republic of) China. If she had sisters/cousins that either headed elsewhere or remained home and had less luck avoiding official attention... D.C., Beijing, London, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, etc. may all be confronted with how their Secret Weapon may not be so secret or unique.
• At the end, the family is shown raising $10,000 out of $100 million for the Skydome's property damages. Even without counting inflation, the Lees are gonna be in debt to the city for a LONG time.
  • Related to that, its a good thing that Mei is academically gifted because with their massive financial debts, Mei is going to have to rely on scholarships if she wants to go to college.
  • There's an argument that Ming got off light by owing the city of Toronto $100 million in property damage instead of doing jail time, but consider that maybe she could've gotten off much lighter: how many city council members would be up for confronting a woman who can transform into a kaiju-sized panda? It's just as likely that Ming insisted that she pay back the full property damage (Chinese culture is big on honoring your debts) and the city nervously accepted.
  • Alternatively, the city of Toronto doesn't even know who Ming is and she's imposed that fundraising goal on herself because she's just that honor-bound.
• According to the tapestries, Sun Yee had the ability to be both cuddly and kaiju. Ming is stuck in kaiju, but while Mei defaults to cuddly, she likely has the potential to go kaiju as well. It's unlikely to happen, considering how well-adjusted and integrated Mei and her Panda are, but maybe all it takes is for her normal Panda form to not quite be enough to face a threat and she gets really angry and desperate...
• Inferred Holocaust aside, Ming traumatized thousands of 4*Town fans, adults and children alike, who had probably saved up for months to afford the tickets. They were at a concert, to see a band that didn't tour often, and were nearly crushed by falling rubble. That's not even going into any offscreen stage crew backstage trying to dial emergency services and reduce potential injuries. How many of them will be able to go to a concert again, or any outdoor public event?
  • Considering how absolutely terrified they were when stuck dangling by their harnesses, this could very well have been the last tour 4*Town ever does, or at least the last time they tour in Toronto.
• Speaking of 4*Town, they are all very lucky that their harnesses didn't break and they were able to escape, lest they sustain serious injuries and possibly even be killed, leaving the band torn apart, their families with a tremendous loss, and in Jesse's case, two children fatherless and possibly a spouse widowed.
• One of Mei's aunts says that her daughter was due on the fourth day of the month, but she held her in until the fifth. In real life, doing this can cause serious brain damage to the baby, due to the loss of oxygen supplied to the brain. One notable case of this is U.S. President John F. Kennedy's sister Rosemary Kennedy.
  • Birth due dates are not always accurate, so it's possible that Lily just avoided any stressors that could trigger labour until after the 4th.
  • It's also possible that Mei's cousin was born a few minutes after midnight on the 5th and Mei's aunt was exaggerating her involvement in that.
  • This Troper was supposed to be born in August, but didn't arrive until September 1st.
• What would have happened if Mei's friends hadn't come to visit, and shown her how to control her transformations? She was a sobbing, self-harming wreck after just one day of being shut in her room fighting the panda, with (apparently) no advice or support from her parents. What would she have been like after two or three weeks like that? Imagine the power of the red panda — which is released by any strong emotion, and then does what its host's mind wants it to — bonded to a person whose mind is all emotion because they have no rational mind left!
  • Heck, Mei's miserable state before her friends showed up is a solid interpretation of Ming's childhood and how she dealt with turning red. Given her cold Tiger Mom of a mother along with her implied Friendless Background, Ming was virtually alone and had no positive support to turn to as she dealt with her inner panda.
• If Ming is already furious enough that her daughter admitted that it was her idea to panda out in school to earn ticket money, as well as disliking Mei's friends more, how would she respond if Mei confessed that it was them who help calm her down and not her parents (not Ming)?
  • That definitely would have pissed off Panda Ming further, but that was the plan at that point. Afterward, considering she acknowledged at the end how much her parenting probably hurt Mei, she'd be saddened but not likely to actually retaliate. Heck, she might even be thankful that Mei had the additional support she needed to control her transformations, especially with the implication that Ming didn't have that luxury.
• The process of separating yourself from your panda is clearly very painful for Mei, and there's an argument to be made that her emotional bond with her panda spirit made it worse. That said, there's some implication that there's some pain involved by default; as Mei's unconcious body thrashes around in the waking world, Ming doesn't seem surprised and tells her to keep going. In addition, when everyone sans Mei goes to separate from their panda spirits after the climax, they all seem to visibly brace themselves as they walk through the portal, as if expecting it to be worse than it ends up being. (Why it seems to be easier the second time around is another question.)
• Two of Mei's friends also mention that they weren't allowed to go to the concert, the planned (and presumably used) cover story being a sleepover at the third friend's house. How did their parents react when they learned that not only did they go to the concert anyway, but that act of defiance put them in danger thanks to Ming?
  • To be fair, whatever punishment they might have been getting could've been somewhat lessened due to the fact that they did still help Mei and her family, simultaneously playing a role in patching the generational troubles they had in the process. Probably still got grounded, but hey, Worth It.

Fridge Sadness

• As much as Mei telling Miriam that her mother doesn't like her and Miriam's resulting surprise is Played for Laughs, the fact that Mei calmly states that without any hesitation indicates that she's heard her mother's disapproval of the best of her Best Friends so often that she's accepted it as a fact of life and clearly doesn't notice Miriam's confusion and hurt at the revelation, nor did she consider that even if Miriam was aware of her mother's dislike, it would be a hurtful thing to be reminded of.
• Ming's Red Panda Spirit hanging back and looking at Mei sorrowfully for some seconds (as opposed to its enraged appearance when it broke out of the necklace, and the rest of the family's spirits flying away without a care) takes on an additional layer of sadness when you consider that the red panda spirit was meant to protect the family; by driving Ming to threaten her daughter, the spirit did the exact opposite of its job. Its apologetic expression in the scene is likely from realising this fact, as well.
• Tyler seems to have gotten over it quick, but who's to say that Mei's other classmates aren't still scared of her after the party incident?
  • The ending (where we see several people, both adults and children, visiting the temple and getting pictures with panda Mei) suggests they also managed to get over it.

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