Rebellious Princess - Television Tropes & Idioms

Any doubts about why I'm The Motherfucking Princess?

Jasmine: I've never done a thing on my own. I've never had any real friends...
Rajah: *makes a surprised and offended growl*
Jasmine: Except you, Rajah! ...I've never even been outside the palace walls.
Sultan: But, Jasmine, you're a princess.
Jasmine: ...Then maybe I don't want to be a princess any more!
—Disney's Aladdin

To the Rebellious Princess, being part of the royal family is overrated: You have no control over the path of your life, your responsibilities are numerous and burdensome (or not burdensome enough), you're generally under everyone's thumb, or you're destined to live unhappily in an Arranged Marriage. The only options are to throw off your frilly dress and to run off with the first hero who passes through (in old fashioned stories), or set off for Action Girl adventures on her own on the sly (in the modern ones).

The Rebellious Princess is usually a teenager, typically brash (since it goes hand in hand with being rebellious), and often blonde. Quite often, she's the hero's love interest. Sometimes the Rebellious Princess is the Staff Chick, but not always: in videogames she can also be the Straight Arrow, the Black Magician Girl or the Lady Of War.

Somewhat more common in the earlier days of the RPG genre than they are now; their population has dwindled with the reduced number of games involving monarchies.

Compare Modest Royalty. Contrast Princess Classic.

Examples

Anime

Lucia Nanami of Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch is the heroine, but doesn't understand nor appreciate her position — so she just tries to do what she wants.
Princess Euphemia li Britannia in Code Geass renounces her throne succession rights and goes against her father the Emperor's policy (though not far enough to start a full-scale rebellion). She is also the love interest of one of the main characters, Suzaku Kururugi; this is "bad and rebellious" since in the eyes of the huge majority of the Brittanian ruling class Suzaku is a "damn dirty foreigner."
- In R2, the rebellious princess mantle that Euphemia dropped when she died is taken up by her older sister Cornelia, who goes rogue to clear Euphie's name after the Euphinator incident. She later drops said mantle, but attempts to pick it up again at some point when Schneizel shows his true colors, and almost gets a bridge dropped on her courtesy from him. She dodges it, but barely. After the final Time Skip of the series, she is also the last Britannian Royal who still fights against Emperor Lelouch, after Schneizel is geassed into submission, Nunnally, imprisoned, and the rest, killed off in one way or another.
- In at least two Alternate Continuity manga series, she somewhat subverts this by successfully becoming Governor of Area 11, and is seen to work hard at her station, with nothing mentioned about renouncing her succession rights.
- And of course, Lelouch vi Britannia, the man behind the titular rebellion.
Gundam seems to have a fair number of these:
- Cagalli Yula Athha in Gundam SEED is de facto the princess of the neutral state of Orb but runs off to wage guerrilla warfare against ZAFT in Africa. She is much less volatile in the sequel, Gundam SEED Destiny.
- In G Gundam, we have the tomboyish and willful Maria Louise from Neo France doing lots of un-princess-like things to get the attention of her "Knight in League" and local Gundam Fighter, George do Sand. After she actually grows up and learns her lesson, Maria doesn't lose her spirit and does what she can to aid George and the Shuffle Alliance.
- Pictured above: Relena Peacecraft/Darlian in Gundam Wing. Even after being made Queen of the World Sphere Alliance, she refuses to go along with Romefeller's plans, makes her own policy indeed, and when she can't fully instaurate it she prefers to leave matters to Treize rather than being a puppet and bowing to the noblemen. Her full and public rejection of the Princess mantle during Endless Waltz which is televised worldwide is her most famous Crowning Moment Of Awesome.
- If we count the Daikun clan from Mobile Suit Gundam as royalty, then Zeon Daikun's daughter and Char Aznable's / Casval Daikun sister Sayla Mass/Artesia Daikun fits the trope quite well.
- Deconstructed with Princess Marina Ismail from Gundam 00. No matter what she tries to do, she's just a figurehead and never really accomplishes much despite her struggles. Until the second season finale, where she starts rebuilding Azhadistan after the war is over.
Princess Fala/Allura in Go Lion (and presumably Lion Voltron). She doesn't actually run away, but has to go against her advisors (who even tied her up at the start to keep her from piloting the blue lion). Later, she gets her wish to join the team as their Chick.
- She takes it a step further in a late episode, ultimately refusing a demand from fellow planetary sovereigns that she take full command of Go Lion/Voltron. She is at last confident enough to lead a planet and an alliance of planets, but still be just a team member when it comes to the Super Robot, albeit designated as Black Lion's alternate pilot. Of course, her possible romantic feelings for Akira/Keith may play a role in that as well.
Farnese from Berserk is a deconstruction (although she's technically not a princess). She becomes rebellious and pyromaniacal because her parents never paid any attention to her (when her father instructed her to burn an old toy of hers, her half-brother Serpico remarks that it was the first time her father spoke to her in a year). This earns her the social isolation it would realistically earn her, and she eventually burns the mansion her family lived in down out of frustration. She then gets shipped off to a convent and becomes the leader of the Church Militant because that's all the various nobles and churchmen believe her to be good for.
Princess Ana Medaiyu of Overman King Gainer becomes a willing hostage to have some fun, and play along with going on Exodus with the Yapan. Later she tries to returns, but decides to stay once her father publically disowns her to protect her from London IMA in case the Duke's line is discontinued, for allowing such a large Exodus to take place.
Being the top-ranked priestess and direct conduit to the Purato god, JuJu of Mahoujin Guru Guru is as close to a princess as you can get without actual royalty. She opts to run away and seek out the heroes after a Running Gag involving a Clingy Mac Guffin makes things too ridiculous to tolerate at home.
Flora Skybloom from Basquash!, after feeling the pure hotbloodedness of Dan and the rest of his team from their Bigfoot basketball matches, escapes from her castle, hides her identity and makes her way into his inner circle.

Film

Outside of the interactive electronic oeuvre, practically every female protagonist in the Disney Animated Canon since The Little Mermaid has been of this type (Ariel, Jasmine, Pocahontas, etc. etc. etc.), possibly as a response to feminists complaining about how "Disney Princesses" had been treated previously (almost exclusively) as Distressed Damsels. Belle from Beauty and the Beast is a notable departure from both character types (she's rebellious, but she's a rebellious intellectual of no bloodline worth mentioning), as are Lilo and her older sister Nani from Lilo and Stitch.
- Kingdom Hearts adds emphasis to Belle (who elbowed Xaldin, took the rose from him and laughed as she ran) & Ariel (the Chemist of Kingdom Hearts). Everyone else got the short end of the stick though.
According to the adverts, Princess Kyla of the flop movie Delgo.
Princess Ann in Roman Holiday, who runs away for a day in the city of Rome due to the pressure put upon her.
Princess Vespa from Spaceballs
Subversion: Princess Leia may be a rebel, but so is her father Bail.
- But she (and her brother) are still rebelling against their biological father.

Literature

Princess Eilonwy from The Prydain Chronicles, whose outspokenness and rebelliousness at times border on childish brattishness.
- And since Disney created The Film Of The Book with The Black Cauldron, Eilonwy is also part of the previously listed Disney line-up. Given the above plus the fact that she predates Ariel, the Rebellious Disney Princess trope is Older Than They Think.
Ista from Lois Mc Master Bujold's Paladin of Souls would fit this almost perfectly were it not for the detail of being a forty year old widow and mother of the young queen. She started out guilting her ~~keepers~~ attendants into permitting her an incognito ~~vacation~~ pilgrimage, and by the end....
dy Hueltar: (having caught up with Ista after the breaking of a sorcerous siege) "Now that you are calmer, Lady Ista, surely it is time we began to think of going safely to Valenda...."
Ista: "I'm not going back to Valenda. I'm going to follow the army into Jokona to hunt demons for the Bastard. Safety has little to do with the god's chores."
- Her other series, the Vorkosigan Saga, has Emperor Gregor, who's almost a male version of this in The Vor Game, partly because he's suicidal and afraid of going insane and being a horrible ruler. He gets over it.
Ce'Nedra from David and Leigh Eddings' Belgariad series certainly has the attitude and the love interest bit down, but she actually loves being a princess- one of her major problems with marrying Garion was the fact that, as Overlord of the West, he outranked her.
Princess Andromeda (Andie) in the second book of Mercedes Lackey's Five Hundred Kingdoms novels. Subverted slightly in that Andie is led to rebellion by her intelligence and virtue, as the Queen and her Chief Advisor have nothing but bad intentions.
- This is a world where tropes have a force stronger than law itself. The Queen and her advisor couldn't have been good, and the book says so.
Princess Cimorene from the Enchanted Forest Chronicles - early in the first book, she intentionally gets herself "kidnapped" by a dragon in order to escape her current life and an arranged marriage.
Princess Meg from The Runaway Princess, a typical "hates doing princessy things like embroidery" princess, starts off the book by questioning the stereotypical princess story her mother reads to her before bed, and later defies her father and attempts to interfere with the contest he set up to marry her off and help stimulate the kingdom's economy. She ends up winning the contest herself, accidentally.
Princess Amy from The Ordinary Princess bolts from her home after her parents and their councillors come up with a plot to hire a dragon and imprison her in a tower in order to force some prince into marrying her. Amy's deception of being an ordinary person is helped by the fact that, as a baby, a fairy actually blessed her to be ordinary — she doesn't look or act like a stereotypical princess at all!
Annice of Sing the Four Quarters by Tanya Huff. Her even being a bard - not to mention pregnant, despite this being an act of treason due to a proclamation her brother, the king, wrote - is the direct cause of her having been legally stripped of royal status mostly because her brother had a snit fit when she refused the Arranged Marriage he'd set up in favour of attending the Bardic College, in spite of his Idiot Ball slash Fridge Logic moment of even trying to set up the Arranged Marriage in the first place - the prince he was setting her up to marry came from a queendom that was rabidly phobic of bards...to the point of having had a mob kill one of the ones Shkoder (Annice's country) had sent as diplomats. The Fridge Logic inherent in his attempt is pointed out near the end of the book, when the Bardic leader pretty much hits the king over the head with the fact that the bard-hating queendom wouldn't even have considered Annice as an eligible candidate once word of her ability to Sing the kigh got out. She and her brother don't talk much, even after he fixes his mistake and apologizes. And if you think being legally outcast disqualifies her? There's the fact that even though Annice isn't legally part of the royal family any more, the whole kingdom still refers to her as the Princess-Bard and the people who know about her royal heritage (she tries to hide it, being rather miffed with her brother over the whole thing) still treat her as royalty.
Anne Dare of Greg Keyes' The Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone tetralogy — though she is thwarted in her rebelliousness first by family members who are actually smart enough to predict her defiance and catch her at it, then by some (well-deserved) guilt-tripping from her friend and maidservant, and finally by, well, reality, in the form of a legion of disasters, tragedies and prophecied battles.
Aravis of The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Horse and his Boy — princess of the Calormene province of Calavar who prefers hunting and riding and scimitar-fighting to what princesses like her best friend Lasaraleen are expected to do. Even leaves her home rather than being forced to marry the Smug Snake of the Tisroc's Prime Minister. Ends up marrying Shasta aka Prince Cor and becoming the Queen of Archenland.
Arya Stark from George R.R. Martin's A Song Of Ice And Fire is a deconstuction of this, as she eventually becomes a Dark Action Girl.
Nerilka of Pern isn't a princess, but she's the closest Pernese equivalent. She refuses to sit at home and waste her skills during a devastating plague, quietly leaving to work incognito with the healers instead.
Both of the "Twice Royal" Balitang girls in the ''Daughter of the Lioness'' books. Sarai takes the traditional rebellious teenager route, while Dove becomes an actual rebel.
- Pierce uses this for a character in The Song of the Lioness quartet. Thayet is the princess of a war-torn country who runs from potential assassination or a dreaded Arranged Marriage after meeting up with Alanna, and ends up marrying Alanna's ex-boyfriend/best friend, King Jonathan.
Susan Sto Helit of the Discworld books is a reigning duchess rather than a princess but otherwise fits the bill in that she displays no interest whatsoever in using her title or position and ends up taking a job as a lowly schoolmistress. Though it must be said she has very few of the tradtional personality traits associated with this trope.
Although Éowyn of The Lord of the Rings does not carry the title of 'princess', her uncle is the king and her brother Éomer is his heir (after their cousin Théodred died in the war); she also marries Faramir, Prince of Ithilien, a province of Gondor. Her uncle had given her the responsibility of leading the people to the safe Dunharrow in the mountains. When she was later despairing about things, she secretly rode into battle with the rest of the army disguised as a man, where she killed the Witch-king (with Merry's help).
Princess Miriamele from the Memory, Sorrow and Thorn series disguises herself as a boy and flees her father's castle to avoid an Arranged Marriage, and also because she hates what he's doing with the kingdom. True to the trope, she ends up being the Love Interest for Simon and kicks no little ass herself. What makes her interesting is that her ultimate motivation is to return home to redeem her father, which fails to stop the Evil Plan but does set her up to kill her father when it's the only way to defeat the Storm King afterwards.
Arya, from the Inheritance Cycle. Sort of.
Aeriel in The Dreamland Chronicles is a minor aversion. She is an Amazon Princess so her adventuring doesn't really make her a rebel. What makes her a rebel to her people is that she falls in love with a man and is willing to do things for him that her tribe considers dishonorable.

Tabletop Games

In Forgotten Realms setting princess of Cormyr Alusair decided that everything may go far and fast but she will devote to adventures (in different senses) all time she can spare. Frequently to the point of prolonged inaccessibility via all but emergency communication means. Some people were displeased, but few dared to confront her and she was only second daughter, not crown princess anyway. That is, until she was forced to become Steel Regent. Earned nickname "The Steel Princess" not just because Authority Equals Asskicking (though access to high-end equipment and elite troops doesn't hurt) but via constant training and enough experience to write "The Steel Princess' Field Guide to Tactics of the Purple Dragon". And when talking with sister about how few less-than-elite commanders read this book...
Tanalasta: Perhaps because your style was stiff. I'll be happy to help you liven it up in a revision.
Alusair: There isn't going to be a revision — there's going to be an order.

Theatre

Guinevere in the musical Camelot.

Video Games

Pretty much every character named Nina in the Breath Of Fire series.
- Not in the fourth, where Nina is nowhere as rebellious, and in the fifth, where she wasn't a princess at all.
Extremely common in Final Fantasy games:
- In Final Fantasy IV, the player encounters Edward/Gilbert, a rebellious prince who masquerades as a "Spoony Bard".
- Lenna and her elder sister Faris in Final Fantasy V - the latter, having disguised herself as a man and become the captain of a gang of pirates, distinctly more so than the former. To her defense, she had been adopted by the pirates' captain after a tragic Hiryuu accident.
- Final Fantasy VI gives us Sabin/Mash, another rebellious prince who gives up co-monarchy over the kingdom of Figaro to live as a monk.
  - Except that his main motivation was that cutting his country in two while The Empire was getting more powerful with each passing day was a bad idea: when it came time to defend his kingdom against the empire, he did not reject the call.
- Rinoa of Final Fantasy VIII is not quite a princess, but fits the trope nicely — she's the leader of a terrorist group seeking to overthrow the Galbadian government, of which her father is the Minister of Defense. And her party nickname IS "princess".
- Garnet from Final Fantasy IX is a borderline member — she has a much calmer, shyer personality than most, but she's still a Rebellious Princess.
- Ashe in Final Fantasy XII is still working for her country, but in a nonstandard way. Larsa also takes a break form being heir to The Empire to adventure.
  - Like Sabin, they are not that rebellious, and the way they act comes from their sense of duty as royal heirs both take the crown of their country at the end: being badass and proactive is not necessarily a synonym of being rebellious
Marle from Chrono Trigger also exemplifies this trope, even going so far as to use a pseudonym (her real name is Nadia).
Princess Seraphine from Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords. The player character is supposed to escort her to the court of the man to whom she's betrothed, but she begs for help in escaping. If the player elects not to force her into her arranged marriage, she joins the party and aids with future battles.
Princess Alena from the second chapter of Dragon Quest IV. In fact, within the realm of video games, she's the ur-example.
- Lady from the Japanese-only game Lady Stalker is a rich girl instead of a princess, but is otherwise not only a perfect example, but is so much like Alena that she's one of the pieces of evidence used to back up the rumor that the game was originally intended as a Dragon Quest Gaiden Game focused on Alena.
Nalia from Baldur's Gate 2 follows this trope to the letter, except that she's nobility rather than royalty. She also spouts somewhat condescending quasi-liberal about helping the "less fortunate", but in a world where even the most egalitarian governments tend to be oligarchic and the economy is a sort of capitalism, she's fighting a losing battle. She's also shown as being somewhat of a self-righteous poser. Nalia's character is somewhat vindicated about halfway through the D'Arnise hold quest, where the player character meets her aunt- a woman who is outraged that some of her servants left their posts at the castle after trolls attacked and conquered it. When the player considers that this attitude is in line with what many other noble NP Cs believe, suddenly Nalia's hopeful idealism doesn't sound so bad.
Jelanda in Valkyrie Profile, and Alicia and Celes in Valkyrie Profile 2
Eclair in La Pucelle Tactics.
- Does that really count? She heads off adventuring after receiving her mother's blessing, which was only given when the queen realized Eclair had suffered a complete breakdown due to the enormous pressure and responsibility placed on her. It had progressed to the point that she created an alternate personality to deal with it.
Parodied in Kingdom Of Loathing, in which one of the randomly encountered enemies in the "Penultimate Fantasy Airship" zone is the Spunky Princess.
Princess Peach in her own game, Super Princess Peach and Super Mario RPG. In pretty much any other game, she's a Distressed Damsel, though.
Jade Empire has Silk Fox, who enjoys escaping the pressures of palace life by donning a disguise that looks like a cross between a ninja suit and a harem girl outfit. Mainly, she just wants to take down the Evil Chancellor to her father. Interestingly enough, her character model is the only one that changes throughout the entire game: She removes her veil in the Imperial Palace and after the Point Of No Return.
Super Robot Wars has not one, but three:
- Princess Shine from the Original Generation series, who starts piloting a Humongous Mecha to liberate her kingdom and eventually ups and joins the heroes outright...
- Princess Armana Tiqvah from the Alpha series (actually, Alpha 3), who bucks the trend by being a princess of The Empire instead.
- One of the protagonist of the mostly forgotten Super Robot Wars 64, Manami Hamill, actually fits this despite not being a Princess, but an Ojou. She's a daughter of a high ranking family that actually supports the resistance force in attempt to liberate the Earth.
Princess Tiltyu of Freege in Fire Emblem 4. Pretty much she's the only noblewoman in the first generation who ran away from home because she disagreed with their methods (Princess Ayra of Isaac did run off from home, but she still adheres her Kingdom's ethics and it was per her brother thr King's request, since she had to keep Prince Shanan safe).
- In Fire Emblem 6, there's Princess Guinevere of Bern who's on the run for opemly questioning her older brother, King Zephiel She's finally crowned as Queen when Zephiel dies at the hands of Roy, but still has lots of nobles hissing at her.
- Fire Emblem is somewhat unusual when it comes to this trope in that rebellious princes outnumber their female counterparts. Probably the most famous of these is Hector of Ostia from the seventh game; he's technically a minor noble, but otherwise hits every note of this trope.
Angela of Seiken Densetsu 3. While her motive might not quite fit the trope, her personality and actions are certainly a match.
- In that game's predecessor, Secret of Mana, Princess Purim runs off with the hero in search of her love interest, Dyluck.
  - Though she's not actually a princess, but she is the daughter of a noble and she did run away from the castle, So Yeah.
Kumatora from Mother 3 - how many princesses do you know that can take on an army tank and live? Though, to be fair, she's not really the princess of anything.
Lise of the still-Japan-only Atelier Lise. It's a little different in that she actually loves her parents and they love her... however, her father is a financial idiot and has managed to get the entire kingdom into a multimillion-gold debt to a foreign bank, and if the kingdom can't pay it off, the bank will foreclose on the rights to rule the kingdom - by any means necessary. Thus Lise disguises herself and leaves home to make a fortune in a neighboring kingdom, setting the game's action and plot into motion. She fits the other parts of the trope to a T, being a bit brash and overbearing and she did technically dodge an arranged marriage by doing this - an arrangement to the Prince of the kingdom she's now in. Ooops.
Is it still rebellious if Daddy was the same way? Flare of Suikoden IV is strong willed and, if not brash, at least unflinchingly true to her core principles. Then again, King Lino en Kuldes spends most of his days in sandals and a sleeveless t-shirt. C'mon. You know you want this royal family.
- Flare runs away from home in Tactics to help Kyril and his crew defeat Iskas and his crowd. Semi-subverted because she sees it as duty to her country and her father ends up catching up with them. Also semi-subverted because she had her hypochondriac doctor guard with her throughout unless you let him die, then he's dead forever.
- Princess Lymsleia from Suikoden V qualifies, although her being rebellious is aimed towards the Godwins' scheming and is trying to be as much of a hindrance to them as possible until the prince can stop them.
Baten Kaitos has Xehla, who is a rebellious queen. Milly in Baten Kaitos Origins is of the rebellious rich sheltered girl type.
- The first Suikoden also has Odessa Silverberg being a Rebellious Princess, you probably won't notice unless you read the novels. She starts out as The White Princess, but fell in love with a rebel leader, and starts seeing the error of The Empire. When her lover is about to get executed, she broke through the execution in attempt to rescue her lover, with a sword and wearing a wedding dress. Her lover still died, but at least she got him out of being executed by the enemy and he still gets to transfer his ideals to her, leading her to become the leader of The Liberation Army.
- How is Xelha a rebellious queen when the reason why she left her country was to find a way to prevent the evil god Malpercio from returning and save the world? That's pretty responsible action to take for her kingdom. Not to mention that her mother, the previous queen, told her that she would need to take the action if the need arises.
- Subverted with Milly in Baten Kaitos Origins as the real reason that she joins Sagi and Guillo is to spy on them and report any important findings back to her father, Baelheit.
Elise from My World My Way is a spoiled brat of a princess who goes out to become an adventurer after an adventurer rejects her.
Kara from Illusion Of Gaia, though she does continue to act like a spoiled princess for some time.

Western Animation

Animaniacs sent up the above example in their Pocahontas parody with the song "Just the Same Old Heroine." ("First I tuned an aerial / Then I rang a bell...")
Partially subverted in Gummi Bears. Princess Calla, a Cute Bruiser in training who loves to go adventuring, has her father discover her secret participation in a contest for the winner to become an official protector for herself. However, far from disapproving, he is deeply impressed with her physical prowess and says publicly that it's clear she needs no personal protector after all.
Toph from Avatar The Last Airbender. Not exactly a princess (her family is rich, but not titled unless you count an actual last name) and not quite a teenager (she's twelve), but other than that she fits the trope dead-on.
One could argue Starfire from Teen Titans being that leaving her home planet to do the hero thing on Earth, plus fighting against her sister when it was time to go back, is pretty rebellious.
Sam in Danny Phantom. She's not a princess, but she is rebellious and individual and filthy rich, so you get the point.
In the Strawberry Shortcake episode A Princess Named Rap, a retelling of Rapunzel, the titular princess wants to be a good ruler, but has a hard time keeping her individualistic tendencies at bay. At one point, she even sings a preteen anthem with the line "Why can't the things I love be part of royalty?"

Real Life

Queen Christina of Sweden.
Princess Margaret of England, Countess of Snowdon.
Saint Elisabeth of Hungary, either as a princess (she preferred to spend her time in direct charity rather than just making donations, which the other nobles didn't approve of and even her husband Ludwig was skeptical of, fearing her protegés would abuse her kindness) or as a widow (she left the Warburg court willingly after her husband's death so she wouldn't have to bow to her brother-in-law's regency, wanted to be a nun rather than re-marrying, went through Training From Hell to enter the Dominic Tertiaries and even threatened to disfigure herself so her relatives wouldn't trap her in an Arranged Marriage)
Another famous and very rebellious Elisabeth was Elisabeth of Bavaria, Empress Consort of Austria and Queen Consort of Hungary, Croatia and Bohemia, better known as Sisi. Her position as the Rebellious Empress and the eccentric Bunny Ears Lawyer in the Austrian Imperial Court would bring her much misfortune, and her myth was the inspiration for the German musical Elisabeth.