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"Gift or no gift, I am just as special as the rest of my family."
Mirabel Madrigal

Encanto (Enchantment) is the 60th entry in the Disney Animated Canon. It is directed and written by Zootopia directors Byron Howard and Jared Bush, as well as Charise Castro Smith, and featuring songs by Lin-Manuel Miranda.

Somewhere in the mountains of Colombia, the Madrigal family lives in a magical house in an isolated community called an Encanto. Each member born into the family possesses a unique power… except for 15-year-old Mirabel (Stephanie Beatriz), who has no powers. But when it becomes apparent there's something endangering the very magic surrounding her home, she learns that she may be her extraordinary family's only hope.

The film was released on November 24, 2021, preceded by the short film, Far From the Tree. Following a 30-day theatrical window, it arrived on Disney+ on December 24. Not directly related to the Disney film Enchanted despite the similarity in the title and both films are released by said studio.

Previews: First Look, Teaser, Trailer.


We don't trope about Bruno, no, no, no...:

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    Tropes A to C 
  • Absurdly Long Stairway: Mirabel gets utterly exhausted climbing the multiple flights of stairs inside Bruno's room. Bruno himself later cites that those stairs certainly made his decision to leave his tower easier.
  • Accidental Hero: While it was Dolores who blabbed to everyone about Mirabel's presence in Bruno's vision, by ruining the proposal, Mirabel saved Isabela from marrying a man she doesn't love without trying to, let alone knowing Isa didn't want to marry Mariano in the first place.
  • Act of True Love:
    • Even though Mirabel is well aware that becoming involved in Antonio's gifting ceremony would result in her being blamed if Antonio did not receive a gift, she simply cannot ignore his outstretched hand and pleading "I need you". Putting aside her own feelings and being willing to endure the shocked gasps and misgivings of the crowd, she reluctantly takes Antonio's hand and reassuringly guides him to his door. Even when this causes her to relive the painful memory of her own failed gift ceremony, she still cares more about Antonio's well-being than her own.
    • When Bruno has his vision about Mirabel and sees that there was no one answer, no clear fate, he knows that they will assume the worst (since everyone always saw the worst in him) and that Mirabel will be responsible for the cracking of the Casita. Rather than reveal his vision, he chooses self-exile to spare 5-year-old Mirabel from being ostracized any further. Toward the end, he even rushes to Mirabel's side to take full responsibility for her actions, to spare her the blame at the risk of ever reconciling with his mother.
  • Advertising by Association: "From the studio that brought you Moana and Zootopia."
  • Anaphora: The teaser poster's Tagline, emphaszing the magical-ness: "Magical house. Magical family."
  • All for Nothing: During the climax of the film, Camilo, Isabela, and Mirabel all race to save the dying candle. Camilo and Isabela make it pretty far before losing their gifts at the last possible second. Mirabel reaches the candle as the house collapses about her and her family clamors for her to forget the candle. Casita uses its last breath to form a shield and save Mirabel’s life. Then the candle goes out. Given the fractured state of the family at that moment, it's unclear if anything was actually going to save the candle.
  • All-Loving Hero: Although special mention goes to Mirabel, the entire family Madrigal could count as they have dedicated their lives to using their various powers to help the town and its people.
  • Ambiguous Time Period: It's difficult to determine exactly when the story takes place.
    • The Art of Encanto says it's supposed to be 1900.
    • The writers say "first half of the 20th century".
    • The only clue to the technology is the tripod style camera and Mirabel's early sewing machine, but the isolation of the Encanto and the impassable mountains would likely keep out any technological progress.
    • The flashback of Alma and Pedro shows a violent conflict striking their village and driving them out of their homes, and a soldier on horseback is shown wielding a machete, which is likely the Thousand Days' War that occurred between 1899 and 1902.
    • Alma mentions during Antonio's ceremony that 50 years had passed since Encanto was created, possibly putting the plot in the early 1950s. This would line up with Bruno saying that he enjoys telenovelas, which were popular at that time, but as he can look into the future, his awareness of things like game shows and telenovelas doesn't really help anchor the time period.
  • Amplified Animal Aptitude: Appears to be the case with Bruno's rats as they are shown using tools to groom themselves (ie Bruno's toothbrush) and one of the rats is able to work the camera to take the new family group photo. In addition, they are able to follow the situation that's going on between Mirabel and Bruno and take the initiative to go and get Antonio's help.
  • Amusing Injuries:
    • Agustín suffers horrific reactions to bee stings that are played for laughs thanks to Julieta's ability to heal them with her cooking.
    • When Camilo is serving tea to an anxious Pepa she accidentally zaps him with a loose lightning bolt, which leads to him shapeshifting rapidly and, in the process, knocks against a hard piece of furniture, which in turn causes the teapot spill hot tea all over him before landing on his foot. He suffers no lasting damage and is next seen searching for Mirabel.
    • A running gag with Mariano involves his nose getting repeatedly smashed like a papaya.
  • Anachronism Stew: Subtly, but Bruno’s makeshift rat theater is modeled after a Wheel of Fortune-type game show and he mentions telenovelas by name. Since there is no prior mention of electricity, this can be explained by Bruno’s prophetic abilities.
  • Animal Motifs: The Madrigal family is constantly surrounded by butterflies. The house, Encanto, has butterfly designs throughout its structure. Mirabel is shown to be surrounded by yellow butterflies in promotional material. The magic candle features a glowing butterfly design. The location by the river where the Encanto was given to the family appears to be a breeding ground for yellow butterflies. Not to mention Mirabel's dress has embroidered butterflies and her grandmother has a butterfly pendant on her waist. The title of the song that plays during Alma and Pedro's love montage Dos Orugitas is Spanish for Two Caterpillars.
  • Apocalypse Maiden: Bruno's shifting "cracked casita" vision seems to imply this of Mirabel, and he left the family to prevent 5-year-old Mirabel from being branded as such. It's played with because the story reveals that the strength of the miracle is actually based on the harmony within the family which had been cracking under the weight of Alma's expectations for some time. Mirabel's argument with Alma was the final straw, but Mirabel herself was never the keeper of the power to destroy the miracle.
  • Arc Words:
    • Open your eyes. Abre los ojos.
    • "I'm fine" comes up a lot, said by Mirabel, Dolores, Luisa, and Isabela at some point. They're all lying.
  • Armor-Piercing Question:
    • During the end of "Family Madrigal", one child and then the rest of the children ask Mirabel directly what her gift is, which she promptly dodges through song.
    • Pops up in the song "What Else Can I Do?" when Isabela sings, "I'm so sick of pretty, I want something true. Don't you?" This causes Mirabel to realize that she and her sister have more in common than she's been assuming.
    • In the climax, after Alma accuses her of causing the loss of the family's magic because she didn't get a gift, Mirabel, heartbroken by her words, asks this question that hits her very hard:
      Mirabel: I will never be good enough for you, will I?
  • Armor-Piercing Response: Mirabel then delivers a response that not only horrifies and shocks Alma completely, but even fully pierces Casita.
    Mirabel: The miracle is dying, BECAUSE OF YOU!
  • Arranged Marriage: Downplayed. While Word Of God says that Alma preferred Félix pairing with Pepa more than Agustín with Julieta, it appears that Alma never interfered with either union. However, with the success of Antonio's gifting ceremony, it does seem that Alma is taking a stronger interest in the next generation of magical blessings. The engagement of Isabela and Mariano is not presented as a traditional completely arranged marriage, but Alma strongly favoring Mariano definitely put pressure on Isabela to agree to the proposal to make the family proud regardless of her own feelings. Had the dysfunctional family situation just continued, it would not be difficult to see Alma taking the next step and actively finding a husband for Dolores and Luisa.
  • Artifact of Hope: The Candle was enchanted by the miracle that created Casita and bestowed the Madrigal's magical gifts, with the candle itself burning for 50 years without going out serving as a measure of the strength of the family that powers the miracle. In the end, decades of Alma's toxic perfectionism took its toll on the family's harmony so the strong emotional fight between Alma and Mirabel was the final straw. The miracle was broken, the Casita "died", their powers were gone, and the candle went out.
  • Artistic License: Although Colombia has been on the metric system since 1853, "Seven foot frame, rats along his back" sounds more dramatic to an American audience than "2.14 meter frame, rats along his back".
  • Artistic License – Botany: During "What Else Can I Do?", Isabela creates a river of sundew and points out that they are carnivorous as a few of the plants "snap" their petals at Mirabel. While the plant does need to capture and eat primarily insects in order to survive, it does so passively, with its petals acting like fly paper. Once an insect is stuck, the petals produce enzymes that digest it.
  • Artistic License – Physics: When you observe Mirabel's rope swing across the chasm to Bruno's bedroom, the length of the rope that she uses is over 10 times her height. It seems very unlikely that she'd have the strength or technique needed to be able to toss that much rope with a heavy wooden post essentially straight up to reach the crags of rock the post anchors with.
  • Atlas Pose: Luisa ends up carrying enormous weights at several points throughout "Surface Pressure", though she uses her head for leverage instead of her shoulders. At one point she even lifts a massive globe like Atlas is frequently depicted holding.
  • Audience Surrogate: The trio of children who follow Mirabel around react to events more or less as the audience would: they don't know who all the Madrigals are and what their gifts are, so Mirabel has to explain things to them, they want to know what Mirabel's gift is when she conspicuously leaves herself out of the "La Familia Madrigal" song, they express amazement that Antonio's new gift room is "bigger on the inside", they're upset when the family can't find Mirabel after Casita finally falls, and they're overjoyed when Mirabel comes back after she and Alma have reconciled.
  • Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Familial example. Bruno is related to a lot of the tension that his family is under — having indirectly ruined Pepa's wedding and being unable to please Alma — but when he returns, his mother and sisters' first reactions when they see him for the first time in a decade is to run up and hug him.
  • Back Handed Apology: When Mirabel confronts Isabela, she demands an apology from Mirabel for "ruining" her life, and Mirabel apologizes... albeit with a good deal of snark.
    Mirabel: I... am... sorry, that your life is so great.
  • Bathos: When Casita begins to fall apart while Mirabel races to save the candle, the scene cuts to Bruno saving his rat friends and putting on his bucket as a helmet to crash through the wall to get outside.
  • Bear Hug: The family does this throughout the film.
    • Mirabel gives one to Antonio as they're both under her bed before they go to his gift ceremony.
    • Mirabel gives one to Luisa after the song "Surface Pressure", concerned that her sister is carrying too much. Luisa returns the hug, cracking Mira's spine in the process.
    • Bruno's vision on how to save the miracle shows Mirabel having to hug Isabela, to Mira's dismay. Isa actually gives Mira a genuine hug during the song "What Else Can I Do?" for helping her express herself more.
    • Upon reuniting with her son for the first time in a decade, all Alma can do is hug him happily (which does surprise him).
    • Julieta and Mirabel share a hug when the latter returns to the Encanto after disappearing when the Casita collapsed.
    • Julieta and Pepa both do this with Bruno upon reuniting with him after a decade.
    • In the song "All of You", Luisa sheepishly admits that she cries sometimes, and her sisters both give her a consoling hug.
  • Bearer of Bad News: Bruno is blamed for the various visions he has that prophesize terrible things. In the end, we learn that a lot of what he is saying is either metaphorical, preventative, or simply a warning. Because many of these prophecies come true; he is seen as a villain (even by the rest of the Madrigals) until Mirabel learns how much he loves the family and how sad it clearly makes him to be ostracized just for delivering a message.
  • Beauty, Brains, and Brawn: Subverted. "The Family Madrigal" outright calls Isabela and Luisa the "Beauty" and "Brawn" respectively, while Julieta later tells Mirabel that she has a "wonderful brain". However, Julieta also says she has a big heart and ultimately Mirabel turns out to be The Heart of the family.
  • Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Mirabel endures a lot of slapstick and upheaval throughout the film, but her clothes and hairstyle remain intact and, at worst, get a bit of sand in them. This is especially noteworthy because after her adventure with Isabela during "What Else Can I Do", not one grain of pollen stains her. According to word of God this was intentional, since any stains would have been distracting during the confrontation between Mirabel and Alma.
  • Big Fancy House: The Madrigals live in a large multi-story home with magical rooms that are much bigger on the inside. And it's also sentient.
  • Bigger on the Inside:
    • Along with their gifts, each Madrigal also gets a room in Casita that's much larger inside, with environments themed after what gift they get. This is lampshaded by a village child upon seeing the miniature jungle in Antonio's room.
    • Bruno's room involves a huge canyon full of stairs. From the outside, Bruno's tower is just two stories higher than the main Casita roof, but inside it contains a chasm over 1000 feet deep note .
    • It's downplayed, but the walls where Bruno hides, particularly the one containing his secret room are bigger on the inside too.
  • Bilingual Bonus:
    • During the theatrical release, when Alma recounts how she met Pedro and the events that drove them from their hometown, "Dos Oruguitas" is performed entirely in Spanish without translation. The song tells the story of two caterpillars on a journey to become butterflies, fitting the association between the Madrigals and butterflies that is consistently used throughout. Downplayed in that the Disney+ release provides subtitles that helpfully translate the entire song.
    • At one point, Agustín says "miércoles", which means "Wednesday", but in context, Spanish speakers will know that it's used as a substitute for "mierda", which means "shit".
  • A Birthday, Not a Break:
    • Per Madrigal family custom, Mirabel's fifth birthday should have been a special day of celebration but became a day of sorrow and confusion when she did not receive a gift.
    • Exaggerated with the triplets, the very day of their birth (October 17) marked the beginning of the thousand days war, they lost their father and their home the same day and their birthday became the anniversary of their father’s death.
  • Boastful Rap: "Surface Pressure" seems to start out as one for the super-strong Luisa, but quickly becomes a Subversion when she reveals that not only is she cracking heavily under the pressure of all her day-to-day tasks, but she is losing her strength too due to the family's miracle fading.
  • Book Ends:
    • Alma saying "Abre los ojos" (open your eyes) to Mirabel. In the first scene of the film, this is to present Mirabel with the Candle at the latter's gift ceremony; in the last scene, it is to present Mirabel with herself, as reflected in her doorknob that is about to be placed in the new front door of the rebuilt Casita.
    • In the opening song "Family Madrigal", there is an overhead shot showing Alma in a line of villagers passing bricks from one to another for a construction effort in the town. In the finale song "All of You", this shot is repeated with Alma and the exact same villagers, except this time the construction effort is rebuilding the Madrigal family Casita.
  • Bottle Episode: Unlike the majority of previous Disney entries, including most films in the Revival Era note , Encanto does not involve the protagonists physically embarking on an epic journey, and the story is focused primarily within the Madrigal household or the surrounding village. This is justified, as the miracle which created the Encanto also surrounded it with virtually impassable mountains to sequester the town from the outside word.
  • Brought Down to Normal: The miracle is powered by the strength of the family. As they've experienced years of tension and disharmony under Alma's high expectations, cracks have formed in their Casita, leading up to the emotional confrontation between Alma and Mirabel causing the Casita to fall apart, the candle to go out, and the family to lose all of their powers.
  • Bullet Time: Played With. During the song "Waiting On A Miracle", the passage of time is shifted so that Mirabel moves and sings in normal time while everything else is slowed down to a crawl, such that Mirabel completes the entire song in the time that it takes to snap the "family" photo celebrating Antonio receiving his gift.
  • Butterfly of Death and Rebirth: The yellow butterfly is heavily associated with Pedro, the grandfather of the family. His death and Alma's grief was the catalyst for the miracle, symbolized by a yellow butterfly on the magical candle. When Alma and Mirabel reconcile, the restoration of the family bond heralds a whole cloud of yellow butterflies.
  • Butterfly of Transformation: The lyrics of "Dos Oruguitas", which tells the story of two caterpillars falling in love with each other but needing to split apart to forge their own futures as butterflies.
  • Call-Back:
    • Mirabel walks Antonio to his door during his ceremony. At the end, their roles are switched as Antonio walks Mirabel to install the new doorknob and finish rebuilding Casita.
    • During "We Don't Talk About Bruno", one of the townspeople mentions how Bruno predicted the death of her pet fish. Bruno brings it up later when getting ready to use his gift to find out how Mirabel can save the family's magic.
      Bruno: If I see something you don't like, you will be all "Bruno makes bad things happen. Oh, he's creepy and his vision killed my goldfish."
    • The melody in Alma's verse in "The Family Madrigal" is echoed in "Dos Oruguitas" as it's revealed how, exactly, they received the family miracle described in the verse.
    • The bridge sung by Mirabel in "What Else Can I Do?" uses the same melody as Isabela's verse in "We Don't Talk About Bruno", as a way of showing how Mirabel understands Isabela beneath the surface and can meet her at her level.
    • The first stanza of "All of You" calls back to the first stanza of "The Family Madrigal". In "The Family Madrigal", Mirabel describes her family as "a perfect constellation / so many stars and everybody gets to shine". This gets turned around in "All of You", where following these lines, Mirabel states that "But the stars don't shine, they burn / And the constellations shift / I think it's time you learn / You're more than just your gift".
  • The Call Put Me on Hold: Every blood-relative of the Madrigal household has amazing powers that is used to help the community... except for Mirabel. Her gift ceremony ended with her door vanishing and no gift to be found and she had to live with that hanging over her for ten years.
  • Calling the Old Man Out: When Alma accuses Mirabel of threatening the family and their magic because she wasn't given a gift, Mirabel, in hurt and disappointment, shoots back that it's Alma's unrelenting expectations and the pressure she puts on the family - not deeming anyone good enough for her - that's causing the magic to fail.
    Mirabel: I will never… be good enough for you. Will I? No matter how hard I try. [Looks at her sisters, giving her a realization] No matter how hard any of us tries. Luisa will never be strong enough. Isabela won't be perfect enough — Bruno left our family because you only saw the worst in him—
    Alma: Bruno didn't care about this family!
    Mirabel: He loves this family - I love this family! We all love this family! You're the one that doesn't care! You're the one breaking our home!
    Alma: DON'T YOU EVER—!
    Mirabel: The miracle is dying, because of you!
  • Calming Tea: At one point, Camilo hands Pepa the Mood-Swinger a cup of tea when she's nervous about the house breaking down. She accidentally zaps him with some lightning from a cloud above her and this causes him to rapidly shapeshift.
  • Character Development:
    • Mirabel starts off feeling like she isn't able to contribute anything to her family or make her abuela proud due to her own lack of a gift. As a result, she assumes she's the only one in her family struggling. Through the events of the movie, she learns to see past her other family members' perfect facades to learn that everyone is struggling under the great expectations put on them, and that their gifts, while seeming great, can be great burdens as well. By the end of the movie, Mirabel learns that she does have a place in her family despite her lack of a gift by being The Heart of it, helping her family express their problems and repair their strained relationships.
    • In chronological order of Alma's life — she started as a spirited and hopeful young woman Happily Married with children. After her home is invaded and beloved husband is murdered, Alma becomes a Broken Bird who hardens herself to becomes the strong leader her family and town needed, but it also made her a fearful, demanding Control Freak. After being called out by Mirabel for her toxic mindset, nearly seeing her family killed, and losing the Casita, Alma was humbled. She admits to her being the source of many of the family issues and is actively working to mend the damage she caused.
    • Due to the pressure of being the “golden child” of the family and Alma's favorite, Isabela starts off hiding her true feelings to keep her family happy and was willing to fit into her grandmother's vision of perfection even if it meant sacrificing her own happiness. As a consequence, she was aloof and grumpy towards most of her relatives throughout the film, unintentionally making her sisters and cousins feel inadequate living in her shadow, which would negatively affect her relationships with some of them. However, after she showed her true emotions after growing a cactus and was released from the pressure of having to be perfect, she became a happier woman who is excitedly willing to experiment with her powers. Once everyone came together to rebuild the house, Isabela's relationship with her sisters, as well as the rest of her family members, grew more loving and affectionate as they worked together.
  • Cassandra Did It:
    • Bruno Madrigal is a superstitious man with the Gift of Future Vision. To his displeasure, a majority of his visions foretold bad things, leading to the entire town blaming him for all the misfortune that would come to be. When he read his latest vision of how Mirabel would play a part in the destruction of the Madrigal magic, or its stability, Bruno was aware of how horribly the family and town would react to this. Believing that everyone would hate him and ostracize his niece, he decided to self-exile into the walls of Casita without sharing his last vision.
    • Mirabel herself plays a similar role; when she first claims that she has seen cracks forming in the casita, she's dismissed, but once they start appearing unmistakably where others can see them, Abuela shifts to blaming her for somehow causing them.
      Abuela: What did you do?!
  • Cassandra Truth:
    • Subverted. Once she sees the cracks appearing in the casita, Mirabel runs to the family to warn them — but the cracks have disappeared by the time that Alma and the others have come to look. It at first seems that no one believes Mirabel, but later that night, Mirabel overhears Alma confessing that she does believe her, but refused to tell anyone that the home was falling apart.
    • During "We Don't Talk About Bruno", Dolores repeats no less than three times that she can "hear him now". Initially, the viewer is led to believe that she's talking about Mariano, when she's actually talking about Bruno.
  • Change the Uncomfortable Subject: As Mirabel sings about her family and her gifts, the children start pestering her about what her gift is, leading to her hastily redirecting to reiterations of her family's gifts.
  • Cheated Angle: Luisa's bun is always visible even if it should be hidden from view behind her head.
  • Chekhov's Gun: At the beginning of the film, just as Mirabel goes to put her hand on her doorknob to leave her room, she takes a moment to brush off a piece of her knitting yarn that got stuck to her clothes. Abuela's able to find her at the end of the film because another piece got stuck to a branch in the direction she'd gone.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Each branch of the Madrigal family has its own distinct color scheme. Pepa, Félix and their three children Dolores, Antonio and Camilo wear yellows and reds, while Julieta, Agustín, and their daughters Mirabel, Isabela and Luisa wear blues and purples — a visual means of keeping track of how everyone is related. Bruno, meanwhile, dresses in green.
  • Cool House: Casa Madrigal is magical, sapient, and can create rooms bigger than itself that can house full jungles or a room made out of flowers.
  • Company Cross References:
  • Costume Porn: The Madrigals with the exception of Bruno all wear bright, vibrant clothing, and the embroidered butterflies and florals of Mirabel's skirt are particularly exquisite.
  • Cringe Comedy: Everything that occurs during the proposal dinner. From Camilo’s face getting stuck with Fish Eyes to Pepa summoning a storm over the table. The cherry on top is the entire town bursting in yelling congratulations just as the would-be groom has just gotten punched in the face by the would-be bride.
  • Curb-Stomp Battle: After Pedro is mercilessly cut down by the faceless horsemen, the magical candle erupts with a force that sends the horses and the men flying while calling forth a mountain range to protect Alma, her children and the other refugees.
  • Curse Cut Short: Mirabel says "What's her (Isabela's) problem with me, anyway? She's the one with roses coming out of her-" before Bruno cuts her off.

    Tropes D to G 
  • Darkest Hour: At the film's climax, The Magic Goes Away, Casita crumbles to the ground, the Madrigals all lose their powers, and Mirabel is nowhere to be found. All is seemingly lost.
  • Dark Is Not Evil: Bruno has creepy omen powers, is associated with rats and generally looks like a typical Disney sorceror...and yet he is extremely loving to his family, sticking around to watch over them and more than willing to protect Mirabel in several occasions.
  • Dark Reprise:
    • "Waiting on a Miracle" starts off as one for "The Family Madrigal".
      Don't be upset or mad at all
      Don't feel regret or sad at all
      Hey, I'm still a part of the family Madrigal
      And I'm fine, I am totally fine
      I will stand on the side as you shine
      I'm not fine, I'm not fine
    • In "The Family Madrigal", Alma sings a verse about taking care of the community as a means of "earning the miracle that somehow found the family." Her part is sung to the same tune as "Dos Oruguitas", later played during a flashback sequence detailing how the miracle came to be: Alma's beloved husband Pedro sacrificed his life to buy his wife and newborn children time to escape from bandits, which triggered the encanto that created the casita and the mountains surrounding the village.
  • Death Wail: During the flashback shown as "Dos Oruguitas" plays, a young Alma sees her husband killed right in front of her. Even though the scene is silent except for the song, we see her collapse to the ground with a cry of anguish on her lips making it very clear the suffering and despair she feels in that moment.
  • Defrosting Ice Queen:
    • Isabela and Mirabel have an "icy" relationship with Isabela coming off as an Aloof Big Sister towards everything Mirabel does. As Mirabel explores what it takes to save the miracle, she comes to understand that Isabela has been living under the burden of having to always be the family's "perfect golden child". This leads to a big breakthrough for Isabela and a warming of their relationship in "What Else Can I Do?" concluding with a hug.
    • Alma had been keeping the trauma of her past to herself which led to her being a reserved matriarch. However, after Mirabel didn't receive a gift, Alma became more withdrawn and more focused in making sure the family showed it was worthy of the miracle which left the family members feeling that they were nothing more than their gifts and Mirabel feeling she had no value. Sadly, it takes Mirabel Calling the Old Woman Out and the destruction of the Casita to get Alma to see things differently. However, by the river where she lost Pedro, Alma shares her painful back-story with Mirabel, finally allowing herself to fully process her grief and take the steps to become more open and caring.
  • Deliberate Values Dissonance:
    • North American viewers may be confused by the sight of a young child drinking coffee, where in Colombia it is actually considered normal for children to drink coffee in the morning usually with milk. However, the creators admit that Juancho (the coffee kid) is coffee-obsessed even by Columbian standards.
    • The amount of power Alma as the eldest Madrigal has over her family and their lives may seem odd to people who live in countries where multigenerational households aren't common, as well to those who's family is spread out by great distances. Especially so for North American viewers, where the youth of many communities are willing to distance themselves from older relatives who display toxic traits or live in communities that emphasize the concept of a found family rather than giving sole importance to blood related families.
    • The idea of feeling obligated to marry for the sake of your family rather than because you love your potential significant other is far less common in North America and (some of) Western Europe than it is in other parts of the world. As a result, Isabela and Dolores' respective situations regarding Mariano can seem particularly absurd and even like the plot of a soap opera for these people.
    • The fact that Dolores shows very little initiative in actually pursuing Mariano (she waits until Mirabel takes a moment to introduce the two) can be confusing to North American viewers, as it's become more socially acceptable for women to be the pursuer in the last few decades.
    • The whole concept of a "proposal dinner," such as the one that drives the movie's second act, can seem pretty odd to cultures where marriage proposals are a mostly private affair between the bride-and-groom-to-be, and where the exact moment of "popping the question" is usually expected to be a surprise. An entire dinner involving the entire family, who all know beforehand that a marriage proposal will be performed (and presumably accepted) flies in the face of all those cultural norms, which are common in Western European and Anglophone cultures.
  • Discretion Shot: Both times that the story flashbacks to the night that Abuelo Pedro was killed, it's never shown on screen. The closest the audience sees is a bandit pointing a machete at him. Both times, the scene then cuts to Alma's reaction of anguish.
  • Disney Acid Sequence:
    • "Surface Pressure", Luisa's musical number about her stress from constantly trying to meet everyone's expectations, is filled with huge, colorful visuals, like fighting off Cerberus and literally balancing the world on her shoulders like Atlas. The visuals are symbolic of her insecurities, rather than things that are actually happening to the characters.
    • Segments of "We Don't Talk About Bruno", where each family member's verse brings Mirabel into their moment/flashback, namely Pepa and Félix's wedding day.
    • Subverted with Isabela's number "What Else Can I Do?". It seems at first like the bombastic number full of technicolor flora that she's summoning is another symbolic moment just happening in their heads. Then we're shown that Isabela is actually making all of this happen in real life and she and Mirabel have burst through the ceiling on the giant tree and magical plants are now covering the house and sprouting all around town.
  • Disney Creatures of the Farce: Reconstructed. The animals' arrival is cause for huge celebration since Antonio has received a gift, but they do run into some issues the next morning at breakfast by baffling Alma by warming up her seat. They also contribute to the debacle during the proposal dinner.
  • Disney Death: When Mirabel and Alma's argument results in the miracle dying, the family loses their powers, the candle goes out permanently and the Casita uses the last of its magic protecting Mirabel from the debris and "dies" becoming nothing more than piles of wood and rubble. The family, with the help of the villagers, spend months rebuilding their home and the final act is to add a doorknob to the front door. The family whole-heartedly agrees it should be Mirabel and as she walks to the door, she receives their praise and acceptance in song. With the family unified once again, when Mirabel sets the doorknob in place, the miracle reignites, restoring everyone's gifts and bringing the Casita back to life.
  • Dope Slap: The Casita whacks Camilo twice with its shutters after his father scolds him for turning into his sister Dolores so he can get seconds at breakfast. Despite the "punishment" Camilo still gets away with a second plate.
  • Double-Meaning Title: Encanto means "enchantment" in Spanish, but "en canto" also means "in song". Encanto can also mean "I love" or "I adore."
  • Dramatically Missing the Point:
    • Alma sees the magical "gifts" as something that her family must prove to be deserving of and never take for granted. Except a gift isn't a reward, it's an unconditional gesture of love. By believing it will preserve the magic to have her children and grandchildren live to benefit others, leading to rampant emotional instability, Alma unwittingly took the true gift, her family's safety and happiness, for granted, which Mirabel calls her out on.
    • Everyone shunned Bruno because they thought he brought misfortune, when in actuality he just predicted misfortunes that were going to happen anyway. To make matters worse for poor Bruno, it’s likely that some of his “prophecies” were simple observations that were treated as unavoidable fact - for instance, anyone could have told that woman her goldfish needed to be in a more suitable tank than a small bowl, or a candyman that over-indulging in his sweets would cause him to gain weight.
  • Earn Your Happy Ending: After going through 10 years of being overshadowed by her family members and being put down by Alma for not having a gift, Mirabel's efforts to save the miracle gain her the recognition of being The Heart of the family.
  • Easter Egg:
    • The Hidden Mickey is a cactus that Isabela makes. It has two small bumps that resemble Mickey's ears.
    • In "Waiting on a Miracle", a hidden Mickey can be seen in the fireworks.
    • When Antonio sits down with the animals, there is a picture of Mickey on the wall.
  • Either/Or Prophecy: What makes Bruno's vision of the "cracked Casita" so unique is that it alternately shows Mirabel with the Casita whole or cracked behind her. Bruno himself admits that when he had the vision there was no one answer, no clear fate as if he is seeing a nexus point that is awaiting the family to decide. In the end, we see that it does come down to the wire. Isabela and Mirabel hug at the end of "What Else Can I Do" and Mirabel now fully understands what is needed to save the miracle. However, at the same moment Alma reaches her Rage Breaking Point at all the chaos Mirabel has caused during her investigations and blows up at her which leads to the charged emotional fight that ultimately causes the miracle to fail.
  • Eldritch Location: The Madrigal Casita is a sentient mansion constructed whole-cloth by their magic candle. Their doors and the rooms that lead to them can spontaneously manifest fully-stocked with everything they need, the rooms are Bigger on the Inside and the house itself is inherently connected to the family, its crumbling infrastructure a direct result of the family's growing instability.
  • Empathic Environment: When Mirabel and Alma reconcile at the river, the overcast sky gives way to golden sunshine, symbolizing that they've overcome the Darkest Hour.
  • Epileptic Flashing Lights: A few scenes that involve lightning and storm clouds have flashing light effects with varied intensity. Although not as prominent as in other films with similar effects, Disney still sent out warnings to cinemas regarding the flashing light effects.
  • Epiphora: In the song "We Don't Talk About Bruno":
    It was my wedding day
    It was our wedding day
    We were getting ready, and there wasn't a cloud in the sky
    No clouds allowed in the sky
    (...)
    Um, Bruno...
    Yeah, about that Bruno...
    I really need to know about Bruno...
    Gimmie the truth and the whole truth, Bruno
  • Establishing Character Moment: A great one for Bruno during "The Family Madrigal" - while all the other family members get a detailed descriptor of their powers, all Bruno gets is a hushed chorus line of "we don't talk about Bruno!" and a quick explanation from Mirabel that he saw the future and disappeared.
  • "Everybody Helps Out" Denouement: The movie ends with all the townsfolk coming to help out the Madrigals in a moment of gratitude. Together, they and the entire family Madrigal repair Abuela's house without any powers.
  • Exactly Exty Years Ago:
    Abuela: Fifty years ago, in our darkest moment, this candle blessed us with a miracle.
  • Exact Words:
    • In her youth, Bruno told Dolores that the man of her dreams "would be just out of reach, betrothed to another." The guy she has a thing for, Mariano, is planning to propose to her cousin Isabela at the start of the film. Of course, the prediction didn't say anything about him actually marrying the girl he was betrothed to or that the girl had any interest in him to begin with, the film ending with Isabela breaking off the would-be engagement and together with Mirabel playing matchmakers to Mariano and Dolores.
    • The Madrigal family insist that they won't talk about Bruno. They'll sing about him, sure...there's no rule against that.
  • Extremely Short Timespan: Except the prologue and the epilogue, with Time Skip separating them from the rest of the story, the whole story take place in two days and a night.
  • Eye Motifs: References to "eyes" and "appearance" occur frequently.
    • The phrase, "Open your eyes/abre los ojos", is repeated multiple times, especially at the beginning and end.
    • Mirabel is the only blood Madrigal to wear glasses. Her glasses symbolize her unique perspective. She's constantly having to fidget with and adjust them in order to see properly. Her green-framed glasses also mirror the glowing eyes of Bruno when seeing a vision of the future, further tying the two of them together.
    • Mirabel is called Mira for short. "Mira" is Spanish for "look".
  • Faint in Shock: Pedro pretends to do this upon learning that he and Alma are expecting triplets.
  • False Cause: Alma assumes Mirabel is the cause of the magic breaking down because all of the times she sees the damage coincide with Mirabel's involvement, but in reality, Mirabel's issues are actually a symptom of the real problem—the impossible standards Alma imposed on the family, which didn't actually fit them as they grew, leaving many of them in pain. Mirabel is just the most obvious in her inability to fit Alma's ideals and thus is an easy target for scapegoating. Why does the house react so strongly to Mirabel in particular, then? She says it pretty straight-forwardly herself right before the first cracks appear—she "can't keep down the unspoken invisible pain." Alma treats the inability to cope and conform as the problem and a threat to the Miracle, when the real problem is the fact that the surviving Madrigal family, Alma's real Miracle, is in pain.
  • Family Portrait of Characterization: Tellingly, the gift-less Mirabel is left out of the family picture that celebrates Antonio's new gift. And when the Madrigals resolve to be a better family in the end, she and her outcast uncle Bruno are part of the photo. Their second family photo is taken just as Casita shoves the family together, resulting in awkward facial expressions and a blurry shot of Antonio riding his pet jaguar; this shows how the family is now more willing to accept and embrace their imperfections.
  • Fisher King: The Madrigal Family has shades of this as far as the encanto is concerned. Pepa's emotions affect the weather, Isabel can conjure plants that cover the town, Antonio's gift has some level of control over the local wildlife and when the casita collapses from the family's internal tensions, it happens after a crack that splits the town and one of the surrounding mountains.
  • Five-Second Foreshadowing:
    • While ranting about her ruined marriage proposal, Isabela proclaims that Abuela and the family were happy about it. She never mentions that she herself was happy with the proposal, since she was only going through it for the sake of the family.
    • During "Surface Pressure", Luisa declares herself "as tough as the crust of the earth is." The crust is the thinnest layer of the planet, covering up the roiling ocean of magma underneath. A few lines later, she confirms that she is masking her insecurities with a thin veneer of confidence.
    • As Casita is collapsing and Mirabel is trying to get the candle under the mistaken belief that saving it will save the Miracle, every time the camera cuts back to the candle, it's a bit shorter. Sure enough, once Casita fully collapses, the candle completely burns out.
  • Five Stages of Grief: Zig-zagged with Alma. She does not go through the five stages of grief in a healthy way because the step of Bargaining was partially answered by the miracle. While it provided safety for Alma and her children, it also prevented her from mourning the loss of her husband as the mountains themselves surrounded her to form the Encanto which prevented her from even giving Pedro a proper burial. The movie shows us Alma in the Casita, sitting in her bedroom looking sad, traumatized, and grief-stricken. But then her face turns resolute and she decides to put aside her feelings for the sake of those now depending on her. She puts on her mourning shawl and leaves the room to become the leader of the family and wears that shawl for the next 50 years while living in a state of repressed denial. She knows that Pedro is dead but buries her feelings and calls him "lost". It's not until she reveals the full story of Pedro's murder to Mirabel during "Dos Oruguitas" that Alma finally allows herself to grieve and takes off her mourning shawl (before "All of You") which allows her to take the first steps toward truly healing and rebuilding her relationship with her family.
  • Foreign Cuss Word: Played With. When Agustín realizes Dolores just overheard him and Mirabel, he says “Miércoles”. The word literally means "Wednesday" but the writers were aware that it is a common Last-Second Word Swap in Spanish for “mierda” (shit) with speakers going "Mier... coles". Here, however, it is said directly without pausing to serve as Bilingual Bonus and a tip of the hat to its cultural usage, knowing that native Spanish speakers will get it right away and non-native ones can figure it out.
  • Foreign Language Theme: The main credits theme, "Colombia, Mi Encanto" by Carlos Vives, is entirely in Spanish, one of two such songs alongside "Dos Oruguitas" by Sebastián Yatra that plays in the film proper.
  • Foreshadowing:
    • At the beginning of the film, Mirabel insists that even though she has no gift, she isn't sad because she is just as special as the rest of her family. One of the village children then snarks that maybe Mirabel's gift is being in denial. This foreshadows Mirabel's "I Want" Song "Waiting on a Miracle" where, after watching Antonio receive his gift and reliving her own failed ceremony, she finally admits to herself that she's tired of living in the shadow of her magical family and is ready for her own miracle.
    • Before Antonio's gift ceremony, Mirabel says he is "an animal guy" and gives him a stuffed jaguar. His gift turns out to be communicating with animals, and he gets himself a real pet jaguar.
    • When Mirabel asks Dolores if she's heard anything about the cracks in the house, she mentions the rats in the walls were worried. It turns out Bruno has been living in the walls with the rats, and secretly fixing the cracks. Even later, when Bruno officially returns home, Dolores mentions that she knew all along that he had never left since she could still hear him whispering to the rats.
    • The prophecy Bruno made on the night Mirabel failed to get her powers is able to be seen two ways, one with cracks in the Casita and the other with the Casita whole. Unlike how prophecies are often used in storytelling, Bruno's cracked casita vision actually implies a nexus point where there's no one answer, no clear fate and it defines a point that is awaiting the players to decide.
    • During “We Don’t Talk About Bruno”:
      • Pepa starts the song by singing about how Bruno ruined her wedding by predicting bad weather and causing her to create a hurricane in anxiety. Not only does this mean Pepa inadvertently acknowledges that Bruno was not the cause of her misfortune (her paranoia was), but Félix mentions he thought it was a joyous day all the same. Pepa only finds peace at the end when she comes to embrace her "bad weather" as something beautiful, the way her loving husband already does.
      • The first half of Dolores' verse seems to indicate that she fears Bruno as much as everyone else, but the second half implies that she feels sympathy towards him and knows that he’s not as bad as he appears to be.
      • Dolores says one of Bruno’s visions was that the man of her dreams would be just out of reach betrothed to another. She later ends up with Mariano, who was arranged to propose to her cousin Isabela at first. She also talks about being able to hear Bruno in the present tense because he's still living in Casita, inside the walls with the rats.
      • Isabela sings about how Bruno foresaw that "the life of my dreams" would "someday" be hers indicating that she's not currently living it and that her "power would grow like the grapes that thrive on the vine" like the massive power surge she gets when she starts being herself and growing different plants than just flowers.
      • Bruno was ostracized by the rest of the town for predicting that bad things would happen, such as that one woman's pet goldfish was going to die, and then it did. Bruno obviously only predicts that bad things are going to happen, he doesn't cause them to happen, and he even brings up that specific goldfish example as people blaming him for things he had no control over, and as soon as he starts properly interacting with Mirabel we see that he's perfectly harmless.
      • During the ending verse with everyone singing over each other, Isabela, who received the most positive-sounding prophecy in the song, breaks from reprising her verse and instead starts repeating 'And I'm fine' over and over, a phrase that in the movie is used exclusively by people who are most certainly not fine.
      • To add onto that, watching Isabela's facial expression during the part where everyone is dancing around Mirabel gives away that she's clearly unhappy.
      • At the end of the song, all the singers come together to say "He's here!" They're referring to Mariano, but this also hints at Bruno still being in the house.
    • Julieta describes Mirabel as having a "big heart". It turns out Mirabel will grow to be The Heart of her family.
    • There are signs throughout that Isabela is really not that interested in Mariano as a husband. She has no reaction when when Mirabel brings up Mariano during "The Family Madrigal" song. When she learns he wants five kids, she's shocked as she doesn't want that many kids with a man she doesn't love.
    • At the beginning of "The Family Madrigal", when the titular family goes to fulfill their duties in town, the family goes into two lines with Mirabel in the center. When she restores the magic and a new door is formed with a family portrait, Mirabel is at the center of the family, cementing that she's The Heart of the Madrigals.
    • When Dolores announces Mariano's intentions to propose ("Tonight... he wants five babies") for a moment she coolly regards Isabela's shocked reaction before returning to her food, looking a bit withdrawn, because she has feelings for Mariano.
    • Also, Alma says “Such a fine young man with our perfect Isabela”. During this, Alma removes the one “imperfect” white flower that pops out among the other pink ones on Isabela’s head. Alma does this when she says “perfect” reflecting how she is trying to keep earning the miracle. This also shows Isabela's façade of perfection breaking for a moment.
    • During "The Family Madrigal" song, Mirabel draws your attention to the painting of the family tree and that it has a split in the wood. Her hand practically points to it. This is the crack in the wall through which Bruno watches the family eat together in the dining room, so he can eat alongside them.
    • Three coatimundi steal Agustín's watch from out of his pocket at breakfast the morning after Antonio's gift ceremony. That night, the coatimundi steal the pieces of Bruno's prophecy out of Agustín's pocket at Isabella's engagement dinner.
  • Freeze-Frame Bonus: During the rebuilding of Casita during "All of You," Julieta and Agustín are arranging blocks that have butterfly-shaped cutouts in the middle. Before he tells Julieta, “She takes after you,” the butterfly pattern in the block Agustín sets is upside down compared to the rest of the row.
  • From Bad to Worse: The marriage proposal dinner is a stacked example. The final straw is when Mariano's family shows up to offer congratulations, and they see that everything has gone to shit.
  • Funny Background Event:
    • As Agustín sets the candy from the "Not-Special Special" on the kitchen counter, each item trundles off with Casita's tiles to be put away.
    • During the song "We Don't Talk About Bruno," Bruno himself (or at least his shadow) can be seen on the upper floor of the casita, dancing along, specifically during Dolores' segment.
  • Funny Photo Phrase: Twice during the film, the family has a group picture taken. Once after Antonio receives his gift and, at the end, after Casita has been rebuilt. Both times, the family calls out "¡La familia Madrigal!" as the shutter snaps.
  • "Gaining Confidence" Song: "What Else Can I Do?" is one for Isabela. She starts out in shock that she managed to make a cactus and is eager to explore the true limits of her gift, but is held back part way through by realizing how she's always been perceived in Mirabel's eyes. Mirabel encourages her in the second half of the song to keep going and pushing the limits, which ends up with a much freer Isabela dancing and belting carelessly.
  • Generational Trauma: Alma Madrigal is inadvertently abusive to her familia, making them feel like their worth is tied entirely to how they can use their gifts in service to the community. Mirabel gets it the worst, being seen as a burden by Alma for not having a gift at all. The reasoning behind her harsh treatment is that the miracle was born from the sacrifice of her husband's life, so Alma believes that she must protect it by being selfless with its many benefits.
  • The Genie Knows Jack Nicholson: Bruno passes the time by pretending to watch sporting events, game shows, and telenovelas, and he displays artistic renderings of each which are quite modern. The film's time period is ambiguous, but seems to be somewhere between 1900 and 1950; certainly no one in the valley owns a television that we see. If this is explained by Bruno using his prophetic abilities, doing so just to learn what kind of entertainment will be invented in the future seems out-of-character for him.
  • The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry: Compared to the other sibling relationships in the movie, including Mirabel's and Luisa's, Mirabel and Isabela's relationship is heavily strained. Mirabel resents Isabela for being the "golden child" and "perfect" while she's seen as the flawed one without a gift, and when the key to fixing the house appears to be making up with Isabela, she's angry and can barely get through an apology before going right back to insults. Isabela, on the other hand, seems to use Mirabel as a proxy for all of her frustration at being perfect, believing Mirabel to be free from obligation without a gift, and blames her for "always ruining everything". Both of them reconcile once Mirabel helps Isabela realize how happy she is when she's true to herself.
  • Greek Chorus: The three kids serve as this.
  • Green Thumb: Mirabel's oldest sister, Isabela, has the power to make flowers grow as part of her ability of "perfection". The sign of her abilities changing is when she sprouts a cactus instead of a decorative flower, which leads into "What Else Can I Do?" about her newfound ability to make things imperfect and askew when she shows her true self.
  • Group Picture Ending: The last scene of the movie is the Madrigals taking another family photo for their newly rebuilt Casita, this time including Mirabel and Bruno. The new magical image on the front door includes not only Mirabel this time, but also Félix and Agustín, who both deserve such an honor but neither expected it.

    Tropes H to M 
  • Happy Rain: In the climax, Pepa dances under a raincloud after Casita is repaired while Félix cheers her on.
  • Hard Truth Aesop:
    • Life isn't fair. You may well be denied opportunities and talents that other people get — ones you may feel (or indeed, be) entitled to, and no amount of hard work or moral virtue will get those opportunities back. What you can do is make the most of your own opportunities and talents.
    • Family is important, but that doesn't mean it's always supportive. They mean well, but your relationships with them can turn toxic under certain conditions and that doesn't mean you should just lie down and take it for the common good. Things ultimately only improve for the Madrigals when Mirabel finally snaps and calls out Alma for how badly her perfectionism has been affecting the family and that no one will be good enough for her.
  • Heel Realization: Alma undergoes this after the Casita falls (along with Mirabel calling her out on it), realizing how her toxic perfectionism had affected her family. Her admission of her mistakes leads to her and Mirabel reconciling.
    "I was given a miracle, a second chance. And I was so afraid to lose it that I lost sight of who our miracle was for. And I am so sorry. You never hurt our family, Mirabel. We are broken because of me."
  • Heroic Sacrifice: Pedro is revealed, towards the end of the movie, to have saved Alma and the triplets by sacrificing himself to certain doom. At the river, he kisses Alma, then turns and rushes back to the sword-wielding men on the horses. He is killed offscreen, and his sacrifice grants Alma the Miracle.
  • Hidden Elf Village: The first thing the miracle created after enchanting the candle was create a massive wall of impassable mountains used to protect the villagers from the outside world. In spite of this, the village seems to be entirely self-sufficient, no doubt thanks to the Madrigal's miracle and their gifts.
  • Hope Spot: For a moment, it seems as if Mirabel and Isabela reconciling and Isabela embracing her true self is the point where things start to turn around. Isabela is truly happy for the first time in years, Mirabel has finally connected with her big sister, the house's cracks are starting to repair themselves and the candle is glowing brighter. Mirabel knows what's wrong and she knows how to fix it...and then Abuela comes home, and the two get into such a horrific argument that it snuffs out the miracle and brings the house down.
  • Human Jungle Gym: During Antonio's Gift ceremony, a group of about four small children are seeing hanging off of Luisa while she carries around a tray of flowers.
  • Humanshifting: Camilo's gift is the ability to mimic the form of any other person, regardless of age, size or gender.
  • Hypocritical Humor: "We Don't Talk About Bruno" is a full-blown Disney-style musical numbernote  with the Disney Acid Sequence to accompany it about how Bruno is an Unperson and why he's an Unperson.
  • "I Am Becoming" Song:
    • "What Else Can I Do?" is one for Isabela as it's about her embracing her newfound ability to make "imperfect" plant life and finally shedding the facade of her being The Ace.
    • "All of You" is one for the Madrigal family as a whole, due to it being about them moving past their unhealthy perfectionist attitude and becoming a closer, more mentally healthy family.
  • Identical Grandson: Isabela looks a lot like a young Alma.
  • Idiot Ball: Agustín makes the incredibly poor decision to bring the pieces of Bruno's vision tablet with him to the dinner table instead just leaving it hidden in the nursery. Naturally, this leads to it being revealed to the entire household.
  • I Have No Son!: At the start of the film, when Mirabel is introducing the Family Madrigal, we are told that "we don't talk about Bruno" and that he disappeared. As the story unfolds, we learn that Alma asked Bruno to use his powers to see what it meant when Mirabel didn't get a gift. Bruno sees the magic in danger and that Mirabel is somehow involved without a clear fate, he knows she'll be blamed regardless and disappears to spare her. However, this leaves Alma with the feeling that Bruno left because he didn't care about the family. While we never actually see Alma disown Bruno, it's not hard to imagine that she gave her blessing to the taboo about talking about Bruno.
  • I Just Want to Be Special: "Waiting on a Miracle" is Mirabel's "I Want" Song to find her magical place within the family. When the family magical candle is waning and the Encanto's foundation crumbling, Mirabel decides that solving why their magic is failing will finally make her special. By the end, Mirabel has finally come to terms with the fact that neither she nor anyone else in the family needs a "gift" to be special.
  • I'll Never Tell You What I'm Telling You!: "We Don't Talk About Bruno" consists entirely of people talking about the character they don't talk about.
  • Immediate Self-Contradiction:
    • "Waiting on a Miracle" opens with Mirabel telling herself not to be upset or mad, claiming she's "totally fine" then three beats later, the emotional floodgates open and she admits truthfully "I'm not fine" and proceeds to sing a cathartic release dealing with her decade of living in the shadow of her miraculous family.
    • "Surface Pressure" features Luisa singing about how tough she is before quickly switching with a "but!" to discuss her building anxieties and vulnerabilities.
    • "We Don't Talk About Bruno" is a comedic example. Despite the repeated chorus proclaiming, "We don't talk about Bruno, no, no, no!" — and again, "We don't talk about Bruno... (Beat) ...BUT!" We then hear verse after verse of family members and villagers eagerly sharing their stories about Bruno. note 
  • An Immigrant's Tale: The story can be interpreted as a fantastical second-generation immigrants' tale. A young Abuela and her family were driven from their home and managed to build a life for them despite losing her husband in the journey. Seeing this new home as a precious, fragile treasure, Abuela encouraged her children and grandchildren to take every opportunity to be their best selves and make their community the best.
  • Ink-Suit Actor: Isabela looks eerily like her actress, Diane Guerrero.
  • Innocently Insensitive: One villager brings Mirabel a "not-special" gift basket while continuously talking about how she has no gift. He clearly means no harm, but the first song shows the audience that Mirabel really doesn't like to talk about it.
  • Inside a Wall: The walls are where Mirabel not only finds Bruno, but it's also where he's been living since he'd disappeared.
  • Involuntary Shapeshifting: Camilo starts transforming randomly when the family's gifts start going haywire.
  • Ironic Echo: A quick version when Alma and Mirabel are arguing near the end.
    Alma: Bruno left because of you. Lusia's losing her powers, Isabella's out of control because of you!
    (60 seconds later)
    Mirabel: The Miracle is dying because of you!
    (a few minutes after, as Alma and Mirabel reconcile)
    Mirabel: We were saved because of you. We were given a miracle because of you. We are a family because of you.
  • Irony:
    • The gifts bestowed upon the members of the Madrigal family are extensions or reflections of their basic personality. Ironically, due to Alma's intense devotion to sharing the family's gifts with the community, the family members become restricted in their identity to just their gifts. This is one of the sources of tension that ends up breaking the family apart, as family members want to grow beyond their "gift label" but can't because of Alma's unending goal to prove themselves worthy of a miracle: Isabela wants to explore botany, but can't get her hands dirty; Luisa, while she enjoys helping with her strength, never feels she can just relax for a while.
    • The point of the miracle and the core of its power was to keep the Madrigal family safe and sound. As such, it's the growing tension, frustration, and disharmony in the family that is weakening the miracle and causing the cracks that Bruno has been fixing. Unfortunately, Mirabel's impetuous actions to save the miracle, while motivated by the best of intentions, also serve to introduce considerable chaos into the household that increases family tension and Alma's worry and fear. Ironically, just as Mirabel realizes that what's needed to save the miracle is to allow the family to simply be who they are, Alma is pushed to her breaking point, leading to a highly emotional fight with Mirabel that, in turn, pushes the disharmony to the breaking point and causes the miracle to fail.
    • Most of the Madrigals' gifts have an ironic quality for their bearers due to the family's dysfunction. Brawny Luisa shouldering all of the weight in the family makes her feel incredibly fragile and weak; Pepa's weather control is tied to her emotions, and because her stress produces weather that she's come to believe is negative, her stress and "bad weather" self-perpetuate; pretty, perfect flower girl Isabela longs to be messy and dangerous and show thorns; Dolores has super hearing, but is timid and respectful and would evidently rather not be so privy to other people's secrets; Camilo's shapeshifting lets him be anybody, but potentially leaves him unsure of who he is (an angle planned but not explored in the final film); and Bruno tries to help and give glimpses of the future, but when he gives bad tidings, they're taken bitterly and not as actionable advice. Mirabel also counts; despite having no magical gift, and nobody expecting much of her, she is able to heal the family.
    • "We Don't Talk About Bruno" captures the irony of gossip and taboos, where certain subjects are declared off-limits just before being discussed in indulgent, obsessive detail. The entire song is the Madrigals finally talking about Bruno, effectively unsealing the taboo while declaring the whole time that he's an off-limits topic.
  • It's All My Fault: After meeting a heartbroken Mirabel at a nearby river (the same place where Pedro died), Alma admits that she got so caught up thinking that everyone's gifts is the miracle, that she didn't realize that the real miracle is that they are a family.
  • It's Okay to Cry: Luisa learns this during the song, "All of You":
    Isabela: You're so strong.
    Luisa: (sadly) Yeah, but sometimes I cry.
    Isabela and Mirabel: (both happily hugging Luisa) So do I.
  • "I Want" Song: "Waiting on a Miracle" for Mirabel; the song is about her sadness about everyone in the family being powerful but herself, and wanting to be seen and accepted as an equal, even though she doesn't have a gift.
  • I Work Alone: Mirabel takes it upon herself and only herself to save the miracle. This is probably because nobody takes her seriously when she warns everybody that the Casita is in danger, and the only person who does, Alma, is so strict with her that Mirabel would rather act behind Alma's back than openly talk with her. While she technically succeeds in figuring out why the miracle is fading, her lack of communication leads to a lot of collateral damage and misunderstandings that ultimately destroy the miracle entirely.
  • Jaw Drop: Pedro does this for fun, upon learning that he'll be a father to triplets, just before he pretends to faint.
  • Jerkass Has a Point:
    • While it was bad timing and Félix has to elbow him, Camilo isn't wrong that the Madrigals won't be okay without a house to live in.
    • For all her haughtiness, Isabela is right that Mirabel tries too hard. Even though she's clearly struggling to carry the huge "Not Special Special" basket, Mirabel refuses to ask for help and ends up getting in the way of many people in the Casita courtyard, including Isabela.
  • The Kids Are American: The film is an American animated film about a Colombian family. Abuela Alma, her daughters, and son-in-law Félix have more noticeable accents than the grandchildren, who overall speak with more neutral American accents. This is largely due to the casting, where the older generations are mostly voiced by Colombians and the youngest generation mostly by Colombian Americans and Latino-Americans. The exception is Uncle Bruno, who has John Leguizamo's New York accent.
  • Lampshade Hanging: The Madrigal family is quite large and is introduced through the opening number "The Family Madrigal"; the kids to whom Mirabel is singing to keep getting confused over who's who and has what powers, so the lyrics have Mirabel go over them a few times for the kids' benefit and the audience’s.
  • Laser-Guided Karma: Alma pushed the family too hard in using their gifts tirelessly for the town's benefit, but the work they've done for the town is repaid when everyone loses their powers and Casita collapses. The entire town shows up the next morning to rebuild the Madrigal's home, as thanks for everything the family has done for them.
  • Last-Second Photo Failure: At the end, the entire Madrigal family is gathering for a picture. Everything is perfect until Casita decides to join in by raising bits of the floor, sending members of the family colliding into each other or falling over at the exact moment the image is taken.
  • Latino Is Brown: Utterly averted. Both the Madrigal family and the surrounding townsfolk have a wide spectrum of skin tones, with individuals that the domestic American audience would consider "white" or "black".
  • Left the Background Music On: Throughout "We Don't Talk About Bruno," although she isn't the one singing for the majority of the song, there are multiple points where Mirabel and at one point, even Bruno himself can be seen dancing along.
  • Lighter and Softer: An In-Universe example based on how Alma tells the death of Pedro and the birth of the miracle. When telling the aforementioned story to 5-year-old Mirabel at the beginning of the movie, Alma tells it in a way that makes it sound more fairy-tale like, only saying that Pedro was "lost" when facing the horsemen, and mostly focusing on the positives that came afterwards (the miracle, the creation of Casita, watching her family grow). During the second telling in "Dos Oruguitas", the story of how Pedro died has shown actually to be a very traumatic painful experience in Alma's life; she was unable to properly cope with the grief, so she had to pick herself up, and this lead her to become the stern perfectionist matriarch in the present. The biggest differences are young Alma's reactions; in the first telling she just bent down and cried softly next to the candle, but in the second telling she collapses to the ground while crying hysterically.
  • Limited Wardrobe: Even for special occasions, no one seems to change clothes except for Antonio's white suit for the Gift Ceremony.
  • Lineage Comes from the Father: An unintentional inversion. Alma is a single mother, and her only son Bruno doesn't have any kids. The male grandchildren are too young to have kids themselves. So, the Madrigal line has only been carried on by women.
  • Logo Joke:
    • In the trailer, the Madrigal family's house replaces the Disney castle, with a burst of butterflies forming the magic arc.
    • The Walt Disney Animation Studios logo has a big 60 around the footage of Steamboat Willie, marking the film's status as the sixtieth film in the Disney Animated Canon.
  • The Lost Lenore: Pedro for Alma. His sacrifice ignited the encanto that brought their house to life and gave their family magical gifts, and her grief over him drives her own perfectionism, leading to many of the family's problems.
  • Lyrical Dissonance: While "Surface Pressure" is an upbeat Reggaeton number, the lyrics are about Luisa expressing her fears that she will be unable to successfully deal with all the obligations she must do.
  • Magic Realism: The characters in-universe accept fantastical elements, such as the moving Casita and the Madrigals' gifts, as if they were commonplace. While numerous characters agree that the gifts are incredible, they don't wonder where or how they came to be and simply accept them as part of their daily existence. The fact that the film is set in Colombia fits with how Latin America is famed for its literary works in said genre, with the work of Gabriel García Márquez serving as prominent inspiration.
  • Magic Feather: While the candle is everlasting and legitimately magical, Alma and the Madrigals are incorrect in assuming it is the source of the miracle. The real source is the family's bonds with each other, and the candle's flame just detects how strong or weak those bonds are.
  • The Magic Goes Away: The main driver of conflict in the plot is that the magic that gives the Madrigals their gifts and keeps Casita alive is fading. During the Madrigals' Darkest Hour, the magic finally vanishes, leaving them powerless for the first time in three generations. After the family mends their family bond, the magic returns.
  • Magitek: The glass plates on which Bruno records his visions of the future act like laser transmission holograms. This is most clearly visible with the cracks in the Casita that appear and disappear depending on the angle the plate is seen from.
  • Massive Multiplayer Ensemble Number: "We Don't Talk About Bruno" covers the Madrigal family's (and by extension, the town's) experiences with Bruno, the Black Sheep of the family, and the Harbinger of Impending Doom. Each verse has a different melody, which then combine for the all-skate at the end.
  • Meaningful Background Event: During Dolores' segment of "We Don't Talk About Bruno", eagle-eyed viewers can spot a shadowed figure in green creeping around the upper floor of Casita, which is later revealed to be Bruno himself. Doubles as Funny Background Event, where you can see that Bruno has stopped walking and has decided to instead dance to the music.
  • Meaningful Name:
    • A madrigal is a type of musical poem originating from the Renaissance, a name befitting of a family at the center of a musical film. It also sounds similar to the word "magical", befitting a family full of magic users.
    • The name Mirabel means "wonderful, extraordinary". Alma calls five-year-old Mirabel a wonder, and Mirabel spends the plot trying to prove she's extraordinary.
  • Mickey Mousing: In the climax of "Waiting On a Miracle," five fireworks go off in rhythm with the song.
  • Midword Rhyme:
    • "Surface Pressure" includes the line "Who am I if I can't carry it all? If I fal-ter?"
    • In "All of You," the townspeople sing "We have no gifts, but we are many, and we'll do any-thing for you."
  • A Minor Kidroduction: The film begins with Mirabel as a 5-year-old on the day of her gift ceremony.
  • Misplaced Wildlife: A minor example that only a keen bird enthusiast will notice, but of the three toucan species shown in the film (yellow-throated, Channel-billed, and keel-billed), only the Channel-billed toucan is found in Colombia.
  • Mood Whiplash: Mirabel and Isabela have just reconciled after the latter manages to truly express herself, fixing some of the cracks on Casita. And then Alma storms in immediately, and everything goes straight to hell.
  • The Mourning After: Abuelo Pedro has been dead for 50 years, but Abuela Alma still regularly wears a black mourning shawl.
  • Muggle Born of Mages: The protagonist Mirabel, who despite having one superpowered parent and one non-superpowered one, is the only child in the Madrigal family to not receive a magical gift. Her exception is amplified when the next child after her, Antonio, does receive a magical gift, making her feel even more of a black sheep.
  • Musical Exposition: The opening song "The Family Madrigal" introduces the family members and their magical talents.
  • Must Have Caffeine:
    • One of the village children keeps downing coffee and is completely wired because of it.
    • In one scene, Pepa is seen walking with a storm cloud and holding a cup of coffee. The moment she takes a sip, the storm cloud vanishes.
  • My God, What Have I Done?: At the climax of the movie, Alma can only watch helplessly as half of her grandchildren risk their lifes to save the magic candle. Isabela and Camilo put themselves in danger since Alma has told them all their lives that the candle is the most important thing in the Encanto and Mirabel placed the importance of the miracle above her own life after Alma blames her for being the cause of the problems in the family. This is blatant evidence that Alma's mindset has seriously affected her family, and Alma is left reeling with the epiphany.

    Tropes N to R 
  • Never My Fault: During "We Don't Talk About Bruno" there were people blaming Bruno for things that were obviously their own doing.
    • One villager blamed Bruno for him gaining weight.
    • One villager blamed Bruno for her fish dying (she probably wasn't responsible for the fish dying, but she did choose a type of pet widely known for having a short lifespan).
    • Pepa blamed Bruno for the rain on her wedding day. She's the one with the power to control the weather.
  • Never Say "Die": In the beginning, when describing to little Mirabel how the family got the miracle in the first place, Alma states that Pedro was "lost" rather than "killed". This is justified as she's telling this to a little girl. In the climax, when Alma finds her 15-year-old granddaughter at the same river, she says it's where the family was given the miracle, and all Mirabel can say is "Where Abuelo Pedro..." She doesn't say whether her grandfather was lost or killed or anything like that, nor did Alma try to finish her sentence.
  • Never Trust a Trailer:
    • The trailer includes a clip of Mirabel announcing that she'll "save the magic", followed by an action montage. This suggests that the film will be an adventure story, but it actually takes place almost entirely within the house. Many of the clips featured (such as the Cerebrus) are just metaphorical images from Luisa's anxiety-ridden song "Surface Pressure", and the exotic-looking locations are magical rooms that benefit from Bigger on the Inside.
    • The trailer also implies that the toucan will be a Non-Human Sidekick but he really just has the one scene shown in the trailer.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: After Isabela and Mirabel reconcile and hug, Mirabel realizes why the miracle is getting weaker and that is can be fixed by allowing the family to simply be who they are. Unfortunately, during each step of her investigation, Mirabel's impetuous actions caused a lot of chaos in the household that greatly raised Alma's worry and fear. This leads to a heated argument where Alma accuses Mirabel of causing all the recent problems for not having a gift and Mirabel angrily counters by saying that Alma not deeming ''anyone'' good enough for her is what's breaking their home and this argument is what finally causes the miracle to fail.
  • Noblesse Oblige: The ethic Abuela maintains in the Madrigal household, so that the family is "worthy" of the magic that they inexplicably got. She admits she doesn't know what she or anyone could have done to deserve such a blessing, but she's determined that they work hard to serve the community to make up for that.
  • Non-Standard Character Design: The horses, particularly the one Bruno rides to find Alma and Mirabel towards the end, lack the Cartoony Eyes most of the other animals in the movie have. As a result, the horse looks way more photorealistic.
  • Not Quite the Right Thing: Bruno has secretly been patching the cracks in Casita's walls for a long time to keep his family from worrying about it. It's a noble intention, but those cracks were Casita warning of problems within the family. Hiding them just kept the family oblivious of their own inner turmoil until it boiled over and made the entire house collapse.
  • Nothing Is the Same Anymore: Casita is completely destroyed by the death of the miracle, but it is rebuilt by the Madrigals and the villagers. When Mirabel finishes it by adding the doorknob to the front door, the miracle is reborn anew, however the candle does not restore itself, instead there now is a glowing portrait of the whole family on the front door. Also, after the candle goes out, a giant fissure opens through the mountains that remains even when Casita comes alive again, meaning the isolated village is now open for anyone to enter or exit.
  • "Not So Different" Remark: Throughout the movie, Mirabel comes to realize that her sisters' problem are no different from her own, which is something she defends them about when getting into a heated argument with Alma.
  • Now, Let Me Carry You: The Madrigal family has always used their gifts to help the local townspeople, seeing it as their duty in repayment for their miracle. Julieta is the town doctor, and Luisa is seen running herself ragged trying to do all of the town's chores that require heavy lifting. In the climax, when the house has crumbled and the Madrigals are rendered powerless, the townspeople rally to help them rebuild the house in repayment to all the Madrigals have done for them.
  • Oblivious to Their Own Description: Played for Drama. During the climax of the film, Alma fires a number of hurtful accusations against Mirabel, which turn out to apply much more aptly to Alma herself. Mirabel realizes this and fires back.
  • Obviously Not Fine: Even as Casita is visibly cracking, Pepa has caused a rainstorm inside the house, the family pours out the door in a chaotic mess, and Mariano dashes through the crowd with a broken nose, Alma stands at the door and fervently insists to the concerned townspeople that "The magic is strong! Everything is fine!"
  • Official Couple: Pepa and Félix are already married at the start of the movie, as are Julieta and Agustín. Dolores and Mariano also get together at the end.
  • Oh, Crap!:
    • Agustín has this reaction when he discovers Mirabel found Bruno's vision.
    • Mirabel and her father have this reaction when Dolores overhears them talking about Bruno's vision (due to her gift of having super hearing). They realize this is not going to end well because they both know that Dolores Cannot Keep a Secret.
    • Mirabel makes a big "Uh-oh" face when her grandmother accidentally sees her in Bruno's vision during dinner time.
    • Isabela's usual unflappable expression drops the second Dolores reports that Mariano wants five babies with her. She's so shocked that she sprouts flowers in her hair. Abuela immediately removes the one that doesn't match.
    • Pepa the moment she realizes the candle is about to die. In response Camilo rushes to save it.
    • Antonio gets a look of utter fear and confusion when his animal friends flee the crumbling house. He is so paralyzed that Félix has to save him for being crushed by a falling doorway.
    • Alma looks shocked and distressed when Mirabel’s door vanishes because she worries that the magic could be dying out.
  • Once Done, Never Forgotten: Every woman wants their wedding day to go perfect and it's understandable that Pepa would be upset with how her ceremony turned out after Bruno became involved. However, Pepa and Felix had been married for over 10 years before Bruno left the family. Yet in all that time, neither Pepa nor Bruno ever seemed to reconcile over that event. The fact that the first thing Pepa brings up in "We Don't Talk about Bruno" is that he ruined her wedding, which is now 20+ years ago, shows that she can really harbor a grudge.
  • Once More, with Clarity:
    • The movie opens with Abuela telling little Mirabel a short version of how the Encanto came to be, which she describes like a lovely folktale. In the Darkest Hour, Abuela retells the story in its full, heartbreaking detail. It wasn't a pretty legend, but a real tragedy that continues to haunt Abuela.
    • The prologue ends at the young Mirabel's ceremony where she reaches for her doorknob before the screen blots out to white. When the same flashback is seen during Antonio's ceremony, we get to see what happened after Mirabel touched the knob — her door mysteriously disappears, leaving her the only Madrigal with no magical gift.
  • One-Word Title: "Encanto", meaning both "enchantment" and "in song" — fitting for a musical film about a magical family.
  • Opaque Lenses: Mirabel has these in Bruno's vision, standing ominously in front of a cracked Casita.
  • Painful Persona: Isabela Madrigal has a reputation as the "perfect golden child" of her family, possessing beauty, gracefulness, and a talent for creating beautiful flowers. Because of this, however, she gets the most pressure from her perfectionistic Control Freak of a grandmother to not do anything that would ruin her image, including feeling pressured into marrying someone she doesn't love, and not being allowed to grow any plants that aren't pretty flowers. By the end of the film, she feels a lot happier when she finally gets to live free from Alma's expectations.
    Mirabel: Some of us have bigger problems, you selfish, entitled princess!
    Isabela: (Gasp!) Selfish?! I've been stuck being "perfect" my whole entire life!
  • Painting the Medium:
    • "Waiting on a Miracle" is written in 3/4 time in contrast with the other songs being set in 4/4 to highlight Mirabel's feeling of being out of step with her family. This is accentuated by the animation showing how the rest of the world slows down around her as if Mirabel exists in her own sense of time for the song.
    • Musical triplets play during "Dos Oruguitas" when Alma looks down at her three babies and feels some reassurance.
  • Papa Wolf: After Bruno's vision is revealed to the rest of the family, Alma chews out Augustín for helping Mirabel try to keep it a secret, to which he responds that he did it because he wanted to protect his youngest child.
    Alma: You should have told me the second you saw that vision! Think of the family!
    Agustín: I was thinking of my daughter!
  • Parental Favoritism: According to the book A Tale of Three Sisters, Isabela thinks Mirabel is Agustín's favorite daughter.
  • Parents as People: Despite Alma's harsh words towards Mirabel when the latter is just trying to help, Alma isn't an outright villainous parent, but rather is simply too stuck in her attachment to her Encanto to see how her high expectations affects the others. Her "toxic perfectionism" is abusive but she does it because she believes she is "protecting" the Encanto. In the end, she realizes Mirabel is right about how she is responsible for the dysfunction in the family and the loss of the Encanto and La Casita. At the river as Alma apologizes; Mirabel learns of the trauma Alma suffered and how she feared losing the Encanto like she lost her home and her husband all those years ago. Alma never fully worked through her grief, and has sadly taken that forward in life, until she comes to realize that the true blessing in her life is the family she has and almost lost.
  • Parting-Words Regret: In the climax, Abuela and Mirabel have a heated argument where Abuela tries to scapegoat her for everything going wrong, and Mirabel shoots back that Abuela's focus on perfectionism and deeming no one good enough (even with their gifts) has been ruining the miracle. Their argument causes La Casita to collapse, revealing that Alma indeed was the rift. Mirabel then disappears shortly after her parents find her in the ruins of La Casita, looking dazed and covered in rubble. They all fear that she ran away. Cue the family searching for her for hours, with Alma having a guilt-stricken look when she finally locates Mirabel by the river.
  • Patter Song: "The Family Madrigal" turns into this towards the end, after the town kids start asking Mirabel about her gift and Mirabel starts quickly rattling off a summary of everyone else's gifts in an attempt to distract them.
  • Personality Powers: All the gifts complement their owner's interests and values, e.g., Luisa, who sees herself as a protector, is super strong, Pepa the Drama Queen has the weather announcing her moods, and Antonio the Animal Lover can understand his animal friends. Ironically, over time, a core tension arises because the family members become known only by their gifts and their actual personality is lost to the community.
  • Poor Communication Kills:
    • Everything bad that befalls the Madrigals, including Bruno leaving, Casita crumbling, and Mirabel feeling like a misfit, can be traced back to poor communication among the family. Everyone is trying so hard to follow Alma's directive that the family needs to show they are worthy of the miracle that they aren't able to stop and share how that endless effort is causing the individual members to falter, feel exhausted, or feel pigeon-holed into roles they aren't sure they want to play anymore.
    • Bruno "ruining" Pepa's wedding was due to this. He wasn't making a prophecy about the weather when he said "it looks like rain", but merely joking about how she was sweating in an effort to help her calm down that ended up horribly backfiring due to not realizing just how anxious she was. He later apologizes for the misunderstanding.
  • Precision F-Strike: After Dolores overhears Agustín and Mirabel talking about Bruno's prophecy and runs off, Agustín drops a very quiet "miércoles"note .
  • Production Foreshadowing: One of the last images in the credits is an airship, which acts as a tease for the next film by Walt Disney Animation Studios, Strange World.
  • Prophecies Are Always Right: Played with. It's debatable how many of Bruno's prophecies were based upon actual visions of the future verses Bruno's simply observing most likely outcomes (ie the goldfish, the fat gut) or making an unfortunate joke that had unpleasant consequences. However, every definite prophesy comes precisely true. Bruno does not predict the future, he sees it. On the other hand...
  • Prophecy Twist: The story shows that Bruno's visions are complicated by the fact that the events he sees don't always occur in chronological order and he only sees up to a certain future point in time before he loses focus and the vision ends. This leaves plenty of room for ambiguity and/or misinterpretation.
    • Dolores was told the man of her dreams would be "betrothed" to another. The vision didn't look forward enough to say the man would actually marry his betrothed.
    • Isabela was told that she'd have the life of her dreams and her powers would grow like grapes on a vine which happens, but Isabela had to be willing to give up being the perfect golden child for it to occur.
    • Mirabel is involved with either breaking the Casita or saving it. It's a vision that Bruno realizes has no clear answer, no clear fate. As we learn that the miracle's strength is tied to the unity of the whole family, there were too many people involved for Bruno to make definite prediction on the outcome because it wasn't tied solely to Mirabel.
      • However, Mirabel was directly present for both the breaking and healing of the family, so the prophesy was fulfilled completely even though it was not understood.
  • Psychosomatic Superpower Outage: The cause of Casita's cracks. The Madrigals' magic is strong as long as the family is united and emotionally healthy, but Alma's insistence on being worthy of their miracle is an endless goal that caused some of them to hide their feelings of exhaustion, inadequacy, or even resentment. As these bottled-up issues fester, the family ends up withdrawing from each other, in turn making Casita as fragile as their bond.
  • "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Upon reaching her Rage Breaking Point, Mirabel, who was not gonna put with this treatment anymore, gives Alma a vehement, angry speech about how no one will ever be good enough for her (and for only seeing the worst in Bruno) and that she is responsible for the miracle dying. Mirabel is correct, but her argument with Alma becomes the straw that breaks the camel's back: the Casita falls apart around them, the Candle's flame goes out, and the miracle ends.
  • Red/Green Contrast: Played for Drama. Alma wears a deep violet-red, and the only Madrigals to wear green are Bruno and Mirabel, with whom Alma has the greatest conflict. The plot of the film is resolved when she reconciles with both of them. Made even more touching since Alma and Pedro met on December 7th, the start of the Christmas season.
  • Reprise Medley:
    • The song "We Don't Talk About Bruno" ends with the various other singers in the song reprising each of their segments with one another.
    • "All of You" consists of reprises of "The Family Madrigal," "What Else Can I Do?," "We Don't Talk About Bruno" and "Surface Pressure."
  • Rewatch Bonus:
    • "We Don't Talk About Bruno":
      • During Dolores' segment, Bruno himself can be seen in the background, skulking around the second floor.
      • Isabela recounts that Bruno prophesied that she would have the life of her dreams and that her power would flourish. Upon first viewing, the audience is meant to assume that this life of her dreams is the one she has now as the perfect golden child, and that her power is currently flourishing making pretty flowers. On rewatches, it's revealed that the life of her dreams is having the perfect pressure removed and making various types of bizarre fauna.
      • During the madrigal segment, both Dolores and Isabela are shown to have panicked/anguished expressions on their faces, while their lines change to "I'm fine", hinting that they are very much not fine with the current turn of events.
    • When Dolores announces Mariano's intention is to propose ("Today... he wants five babies") for a moment she gives Isabela (who reacts in shock) a side-eye, foreshadowing the fact that she has feelings for Mariano.
    • When Dolores whispers her news to Camilo during the proposal dinner, his shapeshifting reflects his shocked thought process. First he shifts to Mirabel because she uncovered the vision, and then Bruno who had the vision, then to a googly-eyed Camilo as he tries to figure out what it all means.
  • Riddle for the Ages: There is no conclusive answer as to why specifically Mirabel did not receive a gift nor what her gift would have been had her door not vanished. Writer and director Jared Bush has stated that the reasons behind Mirabel not getting a gift are intentionally left ambiguous.
  • Right for the Wrong Reasons: Everyone turned against Bruno because they thought he was jinxing them with his predictions. However, during "We don't talk about Bruno", we see that what he said to people were basic observations that didn't require magic to see, like Pepa's nerves at her wedding, the priest's receding hairline, the shopkeeper obsessed with sweets getting a gut and the lady's goldfish dying because a bowl is the single worst way to keep a fish.
  • A Rotten Time to Revert: Camilo transforms into a taller form when trying to help Mirabel as Casita is breaking down around them. The faltering magic forces him back into his smaller real shape and Camilo falls, unable to reach her in time.

    Tropes S to Y 
  • Sapient House: Casita, the house they live in is sentient and usually reacts accordingly to what's going on around it, helping out the Madrigal family with dishes, serving morning coffee, saving their lives when it was collapsing, during the climax.
  • Say My Name: The children repeatedly shout, "MIRABEL!!" as they pursue Mirabel who tries to hide the fact she doesn't have a magical gift.
  • Scenery Porn: All the environments shown in the movie are vibrant and highly detailed. This includes the intricate Spanish tiles and colorful traditional architecture of the Madrigal family home and the nearby village, the verdant mountains and forests surrounding the village, the jungle ecosystem contained within Antonio’s room, and the sea of pink and purple flowers in Isabela’s room.
  • Screams Like a Little Girl: When Luisa sings "Was Hercules ever like 'Yo, I don't wanna fight Cerberus'?" the song shows Hercules dropping his sword and shield and running away squealing from the giant three-headed hellhound in question. His scream is made even funnier by the contrast to Luisa's Contralto Of Danger as she picks up his abandoned sword and shield.
  • Screw This, I'm Out of Here!:
    • Played for Laughs when Pico, the toucan, already spooked at being in Bruno’s tower now sees the half-open door leading into Bruno's darkened bedroom complete with ominous creaking and decides he's had enough.
      Mirabel: Quitter!!!
    • Mirabel attempts to flee the children during "The Family Madrigal", when they start asking about what her gift is. She doesn't have one, and she doesn't like to have it be pointed out, compared to the rest of the Madrigal family.
  • Secret Squatter: Bruno became self-exiled after his prophecies turned sour. As it turns out however, he couldn't bring himself to leave his family, and so turned into this and lived inside the walls and frame of the house by himself for the past decade.
  • Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: Played with. It seems that his prediction of Mirabel causing the Casita's collapse led to her argument with Alma which caused it to happen, and Bruno seems to be trying to take the blame in this way at the end; however, it's made clear that the underlying causes were deeper and that that event just forced everything out into the open.
    • Bruno told Pepa on her wedding day that "it looks like Rain", causing her to think it will rain, so her powers end up making a hurricane. Subverted in the end, since it wasn't even a prophecy in the first place, he was just making a joke.
  • Senseless Sacrifice: Pedro's attempt to plead with the faceless horsemen for the lives of his family and the other refugees, while clearly noble and courageous, only results in his death. Alma collapsing in grief on the riverside leaves her and triplets exposed as the horsemen press on. It's Subverted because the candle ignites in a miracle that sends the horseman flying and raises the mountains to form a protective valley for her and the other fleeing villagers.
  • Sentimental Homemade Toy: Mirabel sews a stuffed jaguar for Antonio, her youngest cousin, as a gift to help him feel less nervous about his gift ceremony because she knows he loves animals. He greatly cherishes the gift. When their house begins to collapse, Antonio lets his uncle Bruno borrow it to calm his nerves.
  • Sequel Hook: A subtle one. When the casita collapses, one of the mountains protecting the encanto from the outside world splits in two which allows Alma to finally revisit the river at which her beloved Pedro died. Word of God confirmed that even though Mirabel and Alma reconcile and the family magic is restored, the mountain gap remains. If there is a sequel, odds are that way out of the valley will have something to do with it.
  • Shipper on Deck: After Mariano and Isabela decide not to get married, Mirabel plays matchmaker between Mariano and Dolores. When it's clear that Mariano and Dolores are hitting it off, Mirabel and Isabela high-five each other.
  • Shout-Out:
    • Mirabel is associated with yellow butterflies. The creative team has said they were heavily inspired by Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez famously used yellow butterflies in his works as a literary device, often representing love and hope. In addition, one of Bruno's telenovela plots is about a woman who unknowingly becomes romantically involved with her nephew, mirroring a similar plot point in his book One Hundred Years of Solitude.
    • Early on when the dinner table sets itself, the dishes roll out single-file in an arc, similar to the "Be Our Guest" number in Beauty and the Beast.
    • At one point in "Surface Pressure", Luisa asks if Hercules ever said "Yo, I don't wanna fight Cerberus" as we see both of them in an arena, which may references where Disney did feature both of them—albeit in very different renditions.
      • Also in "Surface Pressure", the metaphors in the song take Luisa and Mirabel on an expy of the Titanic as it's about to hit the iceberg; behind them, there's three donkeys mournfully playing violins on the deck.
      • The song has a very subtle reference to Spirited Away; particularly, the famous scene of Haku and Chihiro falling from the sky hand in hand.
    • When Bruno explains to Pepa that saying "it looks like rain" was not a prophecy, but an attempt at levity to keep her from stressing out on her wedding day, he tells her not to bottle up her feelings with the line "let it in, let it out, let it rain, let it snow, let it go!" If you listen closely you can hear the piano line from the beginning of "Let It Go" note .
  • Shown Their Work:
    • Massive amounts of research went into this. They were only able to make one trip to Colombia (where they found the perfect location) due to COVID, so they created and relied on the Colombia Cultural Trust. They had people give presentations illustrating the realities of traditional Colombian culture in minute detail. Their goal was to create an experience of complete immersion.
    • Parrots and toucans are correctly drawn with zygodactyl feet, with two toes in front and two in back.
    • Agustín's style of dress and taller build imply that he is a cachaconote  from Bogotá, the capital city of Colombia. His tendency to have bad reactions to bee stings reflects that city-dwellers in Colombia tend to have stronger reactions to insect bites and stings because of the relatively milder climate.
    • Dolores's Verbal Tic, a short, sharp, "Hm!" is apparently commonly used by young Colombian women when learning or sharing secret or scandalous information. Being that Dolores has Super-Hearing and therefore knows everybody's business, it makes sense that she would be the one to have this tic.
  • Significant Wardrobe Shift: Throughout the movie, we see that Alma always wears her black mourning shawl to honor her late husband Pedro. However, as the story unfolds, we learn that it's also a sign that she has not processed her grief in a healthy way. It's not until the climax when she reveals the full story of Pedro's murder to Mirabel during "Dos Oruguitas" that Alma admits that she was wrong and allows herself a chance to grieve. This is demonstrated by the fact that she finally takes off her mourning shawl (just before the song "All of You") and leaves it off for the remainder of the film showing the rebuilding of the Casita and indicating that she has taken the first steps toward truly healing.
  • Silence Is Golden: The only sound heard during the buildup to Antonio's ceremony is that of other children's laughter.
  • Small, Secluded World: The entire village of Encanto is enclosed within a circle of mountains, conjured up by the same miracle that blesses the Madrigal family, to better protect against the marauding soldiers that hounded them. Attention is called to this when Bruno justifies not actually leaving because the mountains are so very tall (and given what his room is like, he'd be disinclined to do all that climbing).
  • Somewhere, an Equestrian Is Crying: It should go without saying that three people (two adults and a teenager) riding a horse all at once is a terrible idea, let alone at a full gallop and then making the horse jump right at the end, too.
  • Song of Prayer: "Waiting on a Miracle" ends with Mirabel asking what is implied to be God to bless her with a miracle so she would no longer feel left out of her magical family.
    "Bless me now as you blessed us all those years ago
    When you gave us a miracle"
  • Songs in the Key of Panic: Towards the end of "The Family Madrigal", just after Mirabel finishes talking about her relatives and their respective magical gifts, a girl asks her, "But what's your gift?" This causes the song to play faster and more urgent as she tells several excuses to avoid revealing she's not magical unlike her family.
  • Spit Take: Used to great effect after Camilo whispers Mirabel's secret into Félix's ear. The spray reaches all the way across the table onto Mariano’s caldo and heralds that the proposal dinner is about to go From Bad to Worse.
  • Star-Crossed Lovers: Pedro and Alma, their love was tragically cut short by senseless violence.
  • Stealth Pun:
    • Luisa is shown carrying multiple donkeys on her shoulders. In other words, she's hauling ass.
    • Pepa is furious when Félix interrupts her in We Don't Talk About Bruno. In other words, he's stealing her "Thunder!"
    • Rats tell Antonio that Bruno is hiding in the walls. In other words, the latter is ratted out.
    • Casita and the magic eventually go away because the Madrigals have built their strained relationship on perfection, and they only return once the Madrigals (especially Alma) rebuild their relationship on love. The conflict is resolved because one foundation was destroyed for a new one.
  • Stronger Than They Look:
    • Pepa seems to be way more physically strong than someone would expect of a woman her build and age, as she lifts two adult male family members off of their feet at different points in the movie.
    • Similarly, her son Camilo seems pretty skinny, but is seen effortlessly catching his cousin Mirabel as she falls during "We Don't Talk About Bruno" (then again, it is a musical number).
    • Although Agustín is the biggest Butt-Monkey in the family, he is able to lifts the triplets for a group hug in joy that the siblings are reunited.
  • Sudden Soundtrack Stop:
    • During "The Family Madrigal", the music cuts out several times to emphasize what Mirabel is saying, such as during her joke about the kid drinking too much coffee. At the very end of the song, the music goes completely silent once Abuela cuts in.
    • While Bruno and Mirabel are having a vision, they see Mirabel needing to embrace someone in order to save the magic. The music swells... and then cuts out anti-climatically when it's revealed to be Isabela, who Mirabel does not get along with.
  • Surprise Multiple Birth: A flashback shows Alma revealing her pregnancy by holding up a paper doll, and then flicking it to reveal a string of three dolls. Pedro plays up the trope by pretending to faint dramatically.
  • Surprise Slide Staircase: Casita does this to keep the town kids downstairs before the gift ceremony starts.
  • Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: After Mirabel helps Luisa and Isabela work through their problems via empathy and Disney musical numbers, you would think that was their cue to stand with their younger sister and present a united front to Alma. In reality, one (admittedly impressive) demonstration of care and understanding is not enough to undo years of being conditioned to seek Alma's approval, and they stand cowed and silent while their grandmother rips into Mirabel. This is behavior that can be expected from someone who's been the victim of abuse and/or dysfunction: being willing to stand by and let someone else, who was trying to help, take the brunt of the aggressor's anger, because otherwise it gets turned on you.
  • Survival Mantra:
    • "I'm fine", "everything's fine" and its variations. From Mirabel about her lack of gift and place in the family, to Luisa about her stress and fear of losing her strength, to Isabela about to be married to a man she doesn't love.
    • Pepa repeatedly chants "Clear skies, clear skies" to herself as a means of calming herself down and dispelling any bad weather she may have summoned.
  • Symbolic Distance: Word of God revealed that Bruno's room was not always so large. The dozens upon dozens of stairs manifested as he became more and more distant from his family.
  • Symbolism:
    • As part of the plot, Casita begins to show cracks, not only indicating the magic going away, but also how the Madrigal family's foundation is breaking down, due to the pressure that comes with their perfectionism. Mirabel tries to be okay with the ways her family's unintentionally hurt her because she loves them, but she finally admits to herself after being left out of the family picture at Antonio's birthday party that she's in pain. When she finally admits this instead of accepting being pushed out, the strained structure that literally never made a place for her begins to break, and continues to do so in parallel with her conflict. It becomes clear later that things had been cracking before, but this is when the cracks pass the point of being able to be hidden.
    • After Mirabel and Alma explode in a vicious argument, a huge crack in the floor appears right between them, and the Casita begins to crumble. Their conflict tears the house apart, metaphorically and literally.
    • Luisa losing her strength in wake of the magic going away is an indicator of her personal feelings about the pressure she deals with, reflecting how she's buckling under the pressure. At one point, she completely loses her powers while having a meltdown, as though signifying she's been pushed to her limits emotionally.
    • Isabela wears a lilac dress, reflecting her "golden child" status in the eyes of her Abuela. After "What Else Can I Do?", her dress is dyed black from the pollen, simultaneously representing not only her long-overdue "rebellious" phase, but also how her "perfect" facade has been marred. By the end, she dyes her dress an artistic bunch of colors, signifying her completing her transformation from the "perfect" lady to being herself.
    • Throughout the flashbacks showing her life with Pedro, Alma is depicted as wearing her hair in braids, representing her youthful outlook on life. Years after Pedro sacrifices his life, Alma has replaced her braids with a tightly-worn bun, reflecting her loss of innocence and her strict resolve to be the perfect matriarch.
    • The sequence of Alma continually walking past the family members who buckled the most under the pressure (Bruno, Isabela, Luisa) drives home that she's so wrapped up in her grief for Pedro that she didn't notice all this time how her perfectionism was tearing her family apart under her nose.
    • Alma noticeably wears a black cloak after her husband's death, as though continually mourning for his absence in the family. After acknowledging the error of her ways and embracing Mirabel, Abuela has shed her cloak, not only ready to move past her grief but also let go of her perfectionism. It also doesn't hurt that this is all to "Dos Oruguitas", a song about two little caterpillars becoming butterflies, reflecting that Abuela has shed her "chrysalis" as a mourning widow, and is ready to be the unconditionally loving grandmother her family needed all this time.
  • Symploce: The song "We Don't Talk About Bruno" splits it over multiple speakers, only changing the pronoun:
    Pepa: It was my wedding day
    Félix: It was our wedding day
  • Tempting Fate:
    • Mirabel to the town children after revealing she has no gift:
      Mirabel: Because the truth is, Gift or no Gift, I am just as special as the rest of my family.
    • Upon seeing the tablet of Bruno's final vision, Agustín urges Mirabel to act normal while assuring her that no one has to know. Cue the nursery door creaking all the way open, revealing that Dolores, with her Super-Hearing has overheard their entire conversation.
    • At the proposal dinner, Señora Guzmán jokingly hopes that tonight will not be a horrible disaster. Well...
  • There Are No Therapists: After the tragic murder of her husband Pedro, Alma would certainly have benefited from talking to a therapist or even the local priest about her grief but she never did so. The lack of a therapist is justified, however, by the fact that the Encanto is surrounded by mountains and thus inaccessible while her failure to talk to the priest is explained by her having to be the community leader and putting on a Tough Leader Façade as a result.
  • Thought-Aversion Failure: Pepa's weather control powers spiraled out of control and caused a hurricane on her wedding day because she couldn't stop thinking about Bruno's remark of "It looks like rain." She says the comment flooded her brain.
  • Took the Wife's Name: Agustín and Félix adopted their wives' name when they married into the Family Madrigal. While the Madrigals aren't a Family Business in the corporate sense, they do serve as the foundation of their community and wish to carry on that legacy under a unified name.
  • Town Girls: Julieta and Agustín's three daughters form a set of Town Girls — Luisa is butch, Isabela is femme, and Mirabel is in between.
  • Trailers Always Spoil:
    • Bruno Madrigal is shown in the second trailer, despite previous promotional material (even the family tree!) and merchandise going out of their way to hide his existence.
    • Some theaters ran a quick "happy holidays" message before showings that featured Lin-Manuel Miranda, Stephanie Beatriz, and John Leguizamo with the names of their characters, essentially spoiling that Bruno is an important part of the film.
  • Trauma Conga Line: With the revelation by Jared Bush that the triplets were born the same day their father died and the miracle occurred, it means that in the span of a day, Alma was in labor and gave birth to triplets, then her town was attacked by nameless horsemen, forcing her and her husband to flee into the mountains to escape on foot with postpartum Alma carrying the newborns. She then watches her husband killed in front of her and as the horsemen now bear down upon her, she fears for lives of her children until the miracle saves her, but it also separates her from her husband's body so she was never able to give it a proper burial. She then finds herself thrust into the role of being the guide and caretaker of the refugees from her village as she's the only one granted a home. Then, seeking rest in newly formed Casita, she finds that her room is the exact duplicate of the room she shared with Pedro, who was brutally murdered hours ago. Also, while the Encanto now provides safety from the marauding horsemen, it also completely cuts them off from the outside world forcing the refugees to quickly create a self-sustaining village for themselves since magical gifts aren't coming to help for a least five years. Then after finally getting a town established and magical gifts working to serve the community, Mirabel mysteriously doesn't get a gift and Alma is left anxious and troubled that the miracle which saved her all those years ago is fading and she now has to wait ten years to learn if the miracle has stopped giving gifts altogether.
  • Tuck and Cover: Even as Casita collapses, it uses the last of the magic animating it to drag furniture around Mirabel and pile it above her head, shielding her from the falling rubble and saving her life.
  • Ungrateful Townsfolk: Some of the pressure Luisa feels comes from feeling like everyone in town expects a lot from her without really giving anything back. Heartwarmingly inverted in the ending, where, as the Madrigals look at their collapsed house, the people of the community show up to help them rebuild completely unprompted, wanting to pay the help they've gotten over the years back to the family.
  • Unreliable Narrator: When Alma tells Mirabel how they received the miracle after Pedro was "lost", she is shown to be watching sadly but stoically as her husband dies, befitting the wise, dignified matriarch she presents herself as. When she finally recounts the truth, Mirabel and the audience can see she broke down completely, collapsing to the ground screaming and not even noticing the miracle at first- finally admitting the grief and trauma she'd denied all her life.
  • Unspoken Plan Guarantee: When Agustín sees that Mirabel has assembled Bruno's last prophecy, which shows her in front of a crumbling Casita, he quickly helps her hide it. Agustín whispers to her that no one needs to know, and they'll discuss it with Julieta after dinner when they have a private moment. Then they turn their heads with Dolores giving them an Oh, Crap! look, revealing she heard him. Cue the evening being a disaster.
  • Use Your Head: Bruno escapes the crumbling house by smashing through the wall headfirst. Luckily he’s wearing his metal bucket, and the wall is in a weakened state.
  • "The Villain Sucks" Song: In "We Don't Talk About Bruno", several family members take turns bad-mouthing Mirabel's estranged uncle for jinxing people with his predictions. Though later it turns out that Bruno doesn't have an evil bone in his body. And some of the claims about him are dramatic hyperbole, such as his 7ft height.
  • The Unfavorite:
    • Mirabel's the only child of the Madrigals expected to receive a gift who did not, and although she's said that she's just as special as anyone else in the family, it's hard to live in a superpowered family for a decade and keep feeling that's true. Unfortunately, not receiving a gift triggered Alma's fear that the family had not lived up to being worthy of the miracle. Even though she tries to carry on as the firm but loving matriarch, she harbors a sense of Why Couldn't You Be Different? toward Mirabel. It's not until Antonio receives his gift a decade later, that Alma is reassured that the miracle still finds the family worthy, but, by that point, a decade of Alma's anxious goal of "being worthy" has had a serious impact on the family's harmony which has led to a weakening of the candle and constant cracks in the Casita.
    • There's subtle implications that Alma prefers Félix over Agustín as a son-in-law. It's implied that's due to Agustín's constant injuries that have to be healed by Julieta. It was confirmed by Word of God that Alma was immediately charmed by Félix whereas she initially doubted Agustín was the right match for Julieta.
  • Voices Are Mental: Although he can do perfect impressions, Camilo's default when he shapeshifts appears to be his normal voice.
  • Voluntary Shapeshifting: Camilo's gift allows him to shapeshift into anyone.
  • The Watson: The trio of children who follow Mirabel around are young enough not to already know who all the Madrigals are and what their gifts are, so Mirabel has to sing them the "La Familia Madrigal" song to explain all the Madrigal family members and their gifts to them, and thus to us the audience.
  • Weeding Out Imperfections: One scene has a subtle, downplayed example. When Isabela is startled by the revelation that her soon-to-be-fiancé Mariano wants five babies, she accidentally makes many pink flowers, along with a single white one, sprout on her head. Abuela plucks the only white flower, symbolizing her obsession with maintaining the perfect image of the family as well as the pressure that is being placed on Isabela's shoulders to get married and continue the family's lineage.
  • Wedding Smashers: Pepa in her own wedding. She created a hurricane out of stress, and also thanks to Bruno's comment which was supposed to be a joke to calm her nerves, but due to how others interpreted his gift, it did the exact opposite.
    Pepa: Bruno says "it looks like rain"
    In doing so, he floods my brain
    Married in a hurricane
  • Wham Line:
    • At the start of "Waiting on a Miracle", Mirabel reveals that she's very much not fine with being the only member of the Madrigal family without any magic.
      Mirabel: Hey, I'm still part of the family Madrigal
      and I'm fine, I'm totally fine
      I will stand on the side as you shine
      I'm not fine, I'm not fine
    • At the end of "Surface Pressure", Luisa reveals that the cracks don't just mean that their house is falling apart but that something is happening to the family members and their powers as well.
      Luisa: Last night, when you saw the cracks, I felt weak.
    • When Mirabel goes to talk to Isabela, who is still bitter about her ruined marriage proposal, they have a brief argument where the former accuses the latter of being selfish and entitled, and mentions that Isabela can still marry Mariano. The older sister retorts with this, causing Mirabel to admit that it's a very serious confession:
      Isabela: I never wanted to marry him! I was just doing it for the family!
    • During the heated argument, Mirabel goes as far as to tell Abuela that she's the reason the miracle is dying for not deeming anyone good enough for her, always seeing the worst in Bruno, and always seeing Mirabel as a disappointment because she wasn't given a gift.
      Mirabel: The miracle is dying, because of you!
  • What the Hell, Hero?: Downplayed. Alma scolds Agustín for not coming to her the second he found out about the vision saying he needed to "think of the family". Agustín goes Papa Wolf and retorts that he was thinking first and foremost about his daughter and her well-being. Even Julieta stands up to Alma pointing out that she's always been too hard on Mirabel. Unfortunately, the confrontation is cut short when they are interrupted by the concerned villagers and never gets to the root of the problem.
    Alma: You should have told me the second you saw the vision. Think of the family!
    Agustín: I was thinking of my daughter!
    Julieta: Mama, you've always been too hard on Mirabel.
  • White-and-Grey Morality: All the named characters are fundamentally decent people, and their conflicts with each other arise from personal and family issues and poor communication. The only characters who can be pegged as evil are the faceless soldiers who killed Pedro Madrigal in flashback.
  • White Magic: While the source behind it is left undefined, the Madrigals' magic is described as a miracle and is referred to as a gift or blessing, which Alma decides to use in service of the community.
  • A Wizard Did It: A Justified Trope, since the film is based on classic Colombian magical realism, where characters tend to accept fantastical elements without questioning their logic and origins. How the Encanto came to be is never explained. It's only implied that Pedro's death and Alma's grief had something to do with it. The film, however, also deconstructs this, since the lack of clarity on the rules of the magic leads people to take interpretation and application into their own hands, which sets up the conflict between Alma and Mirabel.
  • World-Healing Wave: The magic which created the family house also created mountains to surround the new valley, keeping the family and the other refugees safe from the danger they had fled to escape. It turns out it was much more dramatic than Alma had originally described, as it was triggered by Pedro's sacrifice and Alma's grief, literally blasting back Pedro's killers before creating the mountains. In the finale, the rebuilt house enacts another Wave to heal the damage caused by its destruction.
  • Worst Wedding Ever: Zig-zagged. Bruno made a poorly-phrased joke and stressed Pepa about her own wedding, resulting in a hurricane ruining it. While Pepa still resents him for it, Fèlix still remembers it as being a "joyous day anyway".
  • Yank the Dog's Chain:
    • Mirabel's "gifting ceremony". While the reasons for why she didn't receive a gift has no official answer, it does seem cruel for the "powers that be" to actually create a magical door on Mirabel's 5th birthday, implying that a gift will be given, just to have it melt away when Mirabel touches the doorknob.
    • During "What Else Can I Do?", after Mirabel and Isabel bury the hatchet and share a sincere hug, the Casita's cracks repair itself, matching up with Bruno's vision. Just as it seems the Casita has been saved, Alma shows up and chastises Mirabel for tainting Isabela's image and further accusing her for ruining her family's lives, after which the house starts to crumble apart again and break down completely.
  • Yellow/Purple Contrast: A stunning example occurs when Mirabel and Abuela reconcile, and a swarm of yellow butterflies envelops them above the river dyed purple with the light of the breaking dawn.
  • You Are Better Than You Think You Are:
    • When Alma acknowledges how her fear drove her to putting unrealistic expectations on her family leading to their stress and fractured state, Mirabel is finally able to see Alma as an entire person and reminds her that despite her faults, she's still accomplished so much for the Encanto and the family.
      Mirabel: We were saved because of you. We were given a miracle because of you. We are a family because of you.
    • As part of the healing process, Mirabel sings this to her family during "All of You":
      But the stars don't shine, they burn,
      And the constellations shift.
      I think it's time you learn
      You are more than just your gift.
  • You Are Not Alone: The whole town rallies to help the Madrigals rebuild the Casita during "All of You":
    Lay down your load,
    We're only down the road.
    We have no gifts but we are many,
    And we'll do anything for you.
  • You Don't Look Like You: A merchandise example. This Lego figure of Luisa looks nothing like her, being a generically cute girl in a purple dress.
  • You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: The tone in which Mirabel shouts, "Isabela?!" when Bruno's vision shows her hugging Isabela to strengthen the magic again.
  • You Have to Believe Me!: After Mirabel finishes her "Waiting On A Miracle" song, the house responds to her strong emotions of feeling alienated from the family and Mirabel sees a tile shake itself loose and hit the ground as severe cracks start appearing all around the house. She quickly interrupts the party to sound the warning, but, by the time they leave Antonio's room, the evidence is gone. As Mirabel tries to describe what she saw, you can see her practically begging Abuela with her eyes and body language to believe her.


"Abre los ojos; What do you see?"

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The Candle

The Candle from Encanto is the source of the miracle that created Casita and the source of the Madrigal's magical gifts, the candle itself burning for 50 years without ever going out.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (10 votes)

Example of:

Main / ArtifactOfHope

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