YMMV / Thumbelina (1994)

• Accidental Innuendo: The way the toad brothers explain their show business in “On the Road”:
  We get on,
  We get off,
  We get paid.
• All Animation Is Disney: When test audiences first saw this movie with the Warner Bros. logo, the reviews were mediocre at best. When aired with the Disney logo, reviews on average were much higher. The rights to this film were sold to 20th Century Fox when Bluth was hired to work at their ill-fated 2D animation studio. Then Fox itself was bought in 2019 by Disney, who occasionally makes Thumbelina available to stream on Disney+. Talk about irony!
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Ms. Fieldmouse isn't concerned about Thumbelina at all, she's just pimping Thumbelina out to stay on Mr. Mole's good side without having him consider her as a possible match for him. She clearly wants to get married to him herself, though whereas it's simply because of the money or because she did genuinely love him is not particularly clear. Maybe both.
    • The theory of her being in love with the Mole actually makes the song Marry the Mole make perfect sense. Listening to it again, it's a very cynical view of love and why it's better to marry to ensure you're taken care of.
  • Mrs. Toad was messing with Grundel when she promised him Thumbelina's hand, which may be the only real explanation for why she left Thumbelina behind immediately after declaring they were to be married to go fetch the priest.
• Audience-Alienating Era: Likely did much to cement the belief that Don Bluth had fallen into one. Its Golden Raspberry win didn't help matters.
• Awesome Music:
  • "Let Me Be Your Wings" is a pretty decent ballad and considered by many to be the best song in the movie.
  • "Soon". Never mind the lyrics, just listen to the melody and Jodi Benson's glorious voice on the long notes.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Thumbelina is taken by some to be a charming and likable protagonist, but her frequent pessimism and naivete are particular points of contention. Some viewers think these traits are logical given her situation and that they help her stand out a bit, given how derivative other parts of the movie are, while others still find it annoying that she spends every other scene either being taken advantage of by other characters or sinking into hopelessness and despair at the slightest of setbacks.
  • Prince Cornelius is derided for being a slightly-bland Prince Charming stereotype, but some viewers appreciate that he does have things to do as the movie progresses, searching for Thumbelina after she's kidnapped and eventually fighting off her unwanted suitors, giving her a chance to escape. This is especially so compared to his literary counterpart, who didn't even appear until the end of the story and was just there to give Thumbelina her happy ending.
• Critical Backlash: "Marry the Mole" is generally considered the worst part of the movie (even "winning" a Golden Raspberry award), but in recent years it's gotten defenders who argue that, while not good, it's definitely better than what the hatedom would have you believe.
• Crosses the Line Twice: Mrs. Toad getting Thumbelina to sing by stomping on her foot.
• Cult Classic: While far from a perfect film, Thumbelina has developed bit of a cult following over the years by those who view it as one of Bluth's better films from his Audience-Alienating Era.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Although the film was a box office bomb in its native country of the United States, it was more successful in Japan.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: It's not uncommon for people to point out how much Mrs. Toad looks a lot like an animal version of Nicki Minaj◊.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Sure, Beetle is a shallow, self-absorbed jerk, but the only reason he's working for Grundel at all is because the toad was throttling him and then stole his wings, effectively blackmailing him. It's easy to watch him get dragged around by his ankle the entire way and feel a little bad for him.
  • Grundel himself too. He just wants something to love, after all. Especially, since it's implied that that even his own family doesn't think highly of him, like how the mother doesn't even bother try to keep Thumbelina captive in order to marry her son, which seemed more like a joke on her part.
• Just Here for Godzilla: Fans of Animaniacs went to see the theatrical release of this movie only for the "I'm Mad" short that played before the film.
• Les Yay: Thumbelina staring down Mrs. Toad's long legs as the latter starts dancing. Not helped by Thumbelina saying "Oh dear..." in a tone that makes it sound like she's thinking "I should not be aroused by this, but I am."
• Never Live It Down:
  • "Marry the Mole" is this for the film, having won a Razzie for Worst Original Song. This makes Thumbelina the first animated film ever to win such an "award".
  • A lot of fuss is made over Jacquimo's failure to fly Thumbelina home instead of leaving her to search for the Vale of the Fairies, even though there's only one point in the film where it would've been really practical for him to do so.
• Nightmare Fuel: Cornelius getting knocked off Buzzby and falling into the water as the frost sets in, his finger just breaking the surface and the Forget-Me-Nots getting caught on the digit before blowing past.
• Not Badass Enough for Fans: Thumbelina gets some criticism for being pushed around by various characters and only telling them to get lost at the movie's climax, but the girl gets put through the absolute wringer throughout the movie, she does still try to keep moving forward even after being kidnapped, publicly humiliated and thrown into a world she knows next to nothing about. It's only when she thinks Cornelius is dead she has a full-blown Heroic BSoD and since she's just a small girl in a world full of people ready to take advantage of her, it's no surprise she gets plenty discouraged throughout the movie. Plus since she was raised on a farm with a mother who adores her, it's understandable she isn't a fiery person who knows how to fight her own battles right away—she has to learn that the hard way.
• Older Than They Think:
  • It's commonly thought that making Thumbelina a beautiful singer was done in an attempt to cash in on Disney's The Little Mermaid. While her being a redhead voiced by Jodi Benson does certainly lend some credence to this, few may know that Thumbelina was already said to possess a lovely singing voice in Andersen's original tale.
  • A few details seem to draw inspiration from the 1984 Faerie Tale Theatre adaptation of the tale:
    • The main theme song of that adaptation includes the words "While we are apart/I'll follow my heart/And come to you in your dreams." The main theme song of this version is titled "Follow Your Heart."
    • In both, Thumbelina's first words are "Hello, Mother."
    • In that version, Mr. Fieldmouse serves cornbread to Thumbelina when she first takes shelter in his burrow. In this version Miss Fieldmouse bakes corn cakes for Mr. Mole.
    • While urging Thumbelina to marry the Mole, the TV adaptation has the Fieldmouse call him "The richest rodent in these parts," while here she calls him "The richest rodent for miles around."
    • In both, Thumbelina's mother reunites with her daughter and is present at her wedding in the end.
• Questionable Casting:
  • Charo as Mrs. Toad, who was even designed to closely resemble the actress. To her credit, Mrs. Toad is considered one of the more interesting characters in the film.
  • John Hurt as the Mole may also count for some.
  • Tony Jay plays the bull on Thumbelina's farm, and after the first song is never heard from again.
• Retroactive Recognition: The Irish choir Anúna provided backup vocals for some of the film's songs. 23 years later, they would gain more recognition thanks to their work on Xenoblade Chronicles 2.
• The Scrappy:
  • Jacquimo has become something of one, and endless comments have been made about how it completely goes over his head that he simply could've flown Thumbelina back home instead of looking for the Vale of the Fairies.
  • Ms. Fieldmouse has gotten this status for providing the So Bad, It's Good song that gave the movie its Razzie award, as well as being the first animated movie in general to win one, and also for trying to manipulate Thumbelina into an unhappy marriage for reasons that don't really make sense.
• So Bad, It's Good: "Marry the Mole"; it's so ridiculous and so inane that it comes right back around to being unintentionally hilarious.
• So Okay, It's Average: At the very least, it's considered one of the more "watchable" of Don Bluth's movies from the 90s.
• Squick:
  • Some may find that Mrs. Toad resembles her voice actress just a little too closely. Especially around the chest.
  • To a lesser extent, Berkeley Beetle getting his wings yanked off. How was he to use them again after getting them back?
• They Copied It, So It Sucks!: A common criticism about the film is its often-blatant attempts to cash in on the more popular titles that were being made by Disney at the time, borrowing the redheaded protagonist with a beautiful singing voice (voiced by Jodi Benson, no less) from The Little Mermaid, the female lead being serenaded via Flight of Romance from Aladdin, and the stained-glass window bookends from Beauty and the Beast.
• Took the Bad Film Seriously: Jodi Benson is on her A-game, making Thumbelina feel like a real person and one to be rooted for. She also puts her beautiful singing voice to good use.
• Values Dissonance: The Latino frogs are portrayed as basically a mesh of Spanish, Mexican and Italian (!) stereotypes whose main role in the story is abducting and marrying a girl against her will. While Mrs. Toad is voiced by a Spanish singer, her three sons are all voiced by white actors imitating Spanish accents.
• Values Resonance: The film has frequently been mocked for the repetitiveness of the various characters Thumbelina encounters trying to coerce her into marriage or trying to exploit her beauty. In a post-MeToo era this can seem like a shockingly frank depiction of the sheer amount of sexual harassment many women experience in their lifetimes and, for a kids' film, a scathing portrayal of real-life sexual aggressors who refuse to take no for an answer.
• The Woobie:
  • Thumbelina, so much. She's born to a loving mother, but life is somewhat difficult due to the fact she's so small, and she's the only person she knows of who is of that size. Then she gets kidnapped just after meeting Cornelius, stalked by Mrs. Toad's amorous son, humiliated by the Beetle and nearly freezes to death. Then Mrs. Field Mouse blithely tells her the love of her life is dead and tries to force her into marrying a Jerkass Mole. Damn, girl.
  • Thumbelina's mother, too. After finally being blessed with a daughter after pining for one for so long, she awakes one day to find that someone broke in during the night and made off with her. She spends the rest of the movie worried senseless over what could have happened to Thumbelina, with only Cornelius's promise to provide some measure of assurance that she'll see her again.

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